Ed Gorman's Blog, page 166

Michael Dirda- Edgar Rice Burroughs

MONDAY, MAR 12, 2012 7:00 PM CDT (from Salom)
The unlikely creator of John Carter

Long before the Disney movie, a failed light bulb salesman began writing stories of Mars warriors and ape men
BY MICHAEL DIRDA, BARNES & NOBLE REVIEW

TOPICS:BOOKS

This article appears courtesy of The Barnes & Noble Review.

In 1911, Edgar Rice Burroughs, having failed at everything else, decided to write a novel. He was then in his mid-30s, married with two children, barely supporting his family as the agent for a pencil-sharpener business. In earlier years he'd served in the Seventh Cavalry, worked as a rancher and gold miner, started an advertising agency, sold light bulbs and candy and uplifting books door-to-door, and not really made a go of anything.

For occasional entertainment Burroughs read the early pulp magazines, especially All-Story. Named after the cheap newsprint upon which they were printed, the pulps supplied adventure and romantic fiction to the masses for half a century. By the 1920s and '30s newsstands around the country would display the lurid and spicy covers of Weird Tales, the Shadow, Amazing Stories, True Confessions, Dime Detective, Astounding, and Black Mask. Pulp writers would include such important literary figures as H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Robert A. Heinlein and scores of others.

But in 1911 most of the writers weren't of this caliber, and Burroughs was convinced he could write better adventure stories and maybe even make a living at it.

In fact he rather underestimated himself.

One hundred years ago, in the February 1912 issue of All-Story, there appeared the first installment of "Under the Moons of Mars" (retitled "A Princess of Mars" for its 1917 book publication). It starts, as all good adventure stories should, with a strange manuscript, this one a memoir penned by Captain John Carter and bequeathed to his nephew Edgar Rice Burroughs. The reader is hooked from the very first sentence: "I am a very old man now; how old I do not know." Over the next several months purchasers of All-Story would learn of the fantastic adventures of this former Confederate soldier. Mysteriously transported to Mars, called Barsoom by its inhabitants, John Carter there battled monstrous beasts and warlike peoples, soon falling in love with the copper-skinned Deja Thoris, Princess of Helium.

The serial, needless to say, was a hit, though no one yet knew that ERB would soon become a phenomenon. His editor at All-Story quickly asked him to write a historical novel, which the obliging author produced in a few weeks, only to have the chivalric romance rejected. Eventually, it would be revised and rejected again. Putting "The Outlaw of Torn" aside, Burroughs took up his own new idea, its action set largely in Africa (where he had never been). Drawing on the classical legends of the heroic Romulus and Remus, who were suckled by a wolf, and adding a touch of Mowgli from Kipling's "The Jungle Books," Burroughs created one of the most famous fictional characters of modern times. In the November, 1912 issue of All-Story — only a few months after the conclusion of John Carter's adventures on Mars — there appeared, published in its entirety, "Tarzan of the Apes."

Readers went crazy.


For the rest go here: http://www.salon.com/2012/03/13/the_u...

NEW & EXCITING GRIFT MAGAZINE

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A new crime fiction journal that mixes interesting, hard-hitting non-fiction with some of the best short fiction in the genre.
The lineup is:

Scott Phillips on the Factory novels of Derek Raymond
Ray Banks on film adaptations of Charles Willeford's books
Lawrence Block on his various experiments with storytelling styles
Chris Rhatigan's long interview with author Julie Morrigan
John Kenyon's interview with author Chris Offutt
John Kenyon's review of the three novels of John Rector

It also features brand new crime fiction stories from Jack Bates, Ken Bruen, Alec Cizak, Matthew C. Funk, Chris F. Holm, Craig McDonald, Court Merrigan, Thomas Pluck, Keith Rawson and Todd Robinson.

INTERVIEW WITH GRIFT PUBLISHER JOHN KENYON

An interview with Grift Publisher John Kenyon:

1. You've spent most of your adult life as a reporter. Did any of your experiences lead you to hardboiled crime fiction?

Unlike some who have emerged from this job with a notebook full of ideas, I suppose I was driven to write about crime at least in part because of a lack of it in my day job. Of course, I have covered almost everything but cops and courts in my career, so it's no surprise that I didn't write much about crime. Really, I'm sure my motivation to turn to fiction was much like that of most people who earn a living writing news: Forced all day to stay within the confines of truth and facts (regardless of what those clever wags always so quick to criticize the media may suggest), it's nice to go home and spin out a tale made up of whole cloth. Sure, I'll pull bits and pieces from things I've reported on -- the novel I'm working to polish draws on the most newsworthy event to hit our area in 50 years -- but only in bits and pieces. I've yet to be so influenced by something on the beat that I've had the desire to fictionalize it.

2. How did the idea Grift develop?

There seems to have been an explosion of outlets for crime fiction over the past five years or so. Thanks to the ease of starting a sophisticated web site or utilizing print-on-demand technology, several people have launched publications of one kind or another. I've long had it in my head that I wanted to do something like this myself. The boxes in my basement full of issues of a music 'zine I published in the 90s (back issues available cheap!) kept me from taking that leap. The above-mentioned developments render that worry moot; Grift is print-on-demand, which means no inventory, no overhead. With that out of the way, I decided to do this. That said, I wouldn't have done so if I didn't think Grift would offer something different. I love Needle and Pulp Modern and other new-ish crime fiction magazines. But they are fiction-only. I wanted something that blended fiction and non-fiction.

There are outlets that do offer that mix; Crime Factory does it best. But I believe Grift is different from these, as much in tone as anything else. As I say in the submission guidelines, "Avoid things on either end of the intensity spectrum: we are not interested in cozies, nor are we impressed with stories drenched in buckets of blood with high body counts. Make us think, challenge us; it's not the size of the gun, it's what you do with it." I think this issue bears that out. There is a place for the ultra-violence of the so-called psycho-noirs -- and I read and enjoy it when it's done well -- I just don't want to publish it. Selfishly, I wanted to make the magazine that I want to read. I accomplished that. I hope enough other people share my sensibilities to make it a worthwhile endeavor.

3. The table of contents appear above. As I've said to you privately this is the most ambitious and extraordinary first issue of any kind I've ever seen. Was gathering all this material as daunting a job as I'd guess?

Thank you, Ed. That is high praise coming from you. It wasn't as daunting as one might expect. At my web site, Things I'd Rather Be Doing, I have interviewed and become friendly with many crime fiction writers over the years. After deciding to do this, I made a list of the people I knew that I wanted in this magazine. About half of them are in this first issue, and others have said that when they have something they think would fit, they'll submit it. The crime fiction community is full of nice, encouraging, supportive people who were willing to trust me with their work, despite having seen nothing more than a slick-looking web site. My hope is that their faith is justified by the final product, and that they and others will be willing to contribute in the future as a result.

4. What was your biggest obstacle in putting the issue to bed?

Time. A busy day job, two young kids full of energy, my own writing and reading... my romantic notions of chipping away at this in my free time quickly gave way to the reality that I would need to approach it like a part-time job. Now that I know the demands of getting an issue out, I hope to moderate that some, but I'm aware that to do this right, I'll need to dedicate significant time to it.

5. Since every magazine supposedly has a mission what do you see Grift's as being?

In short, to offer a good read. As I said above, I want this to offer a mix of insightful non-fiction and the best short fiction available. If someone reads the entire thing and wants more, I'll be happy. If they read something here and go in search of more from the people who contributed, I'll be ecstatic. I also want it to look great, and I'd be remiss if I didn't give a lot of credit to the designer, Tod Foley. He's an old friend who worked with me on that old music 'zine. We've both gotten a lot better since, and I'm excited for people to see the result.

6. What comes next for Grift?

If I'm able to manage it time-wise, we'll have two more issues in 2012, settling into a thrice-yearly schedule. I'd love to see more submissions on the non-fiction side of things. All but one non-fiction piece in this issue was solicited. They're great, and I think it makes for a nice blend, but the magazine will get stale quickly if the contents are limited to what I can conceive. I want long-form, New York Review of Books-style reviews that take an author's entire body of work into consideration when weighing a new work. I want essays that look at various eras, or sub-genres, or settings. I want probing interviews. I also would like to see more diversity in contributors. Save for interview subject Julie Morrigan, this is a magazine by and about white guys, mostly between the ages of 30-50. The big reason for that is that I received only one submission from a woman, and that one I hope to run in a subsequent issue. My hope is that once people see the magazine and what it offers, it will spark ideas and lead to a greater number of submissions.

The Mob In The Music & Night Club Business

Ed here: This runs maybe seven thousand words. Thanks to my friend Marty Greenberg I got interested in the history of show business. This article deals with some of its most sordid and violent times. It's worth a glimpse anyway. Mark Evanier soffered a link to it on his blog..

Mobsters, Scoundrels, Comedians and Rat Finks by Kliph Nesteroff

"The record business in those days was Mob controlled. It wasn't a fun business to be in." - Dick Curtis, Comedian

"A lot of people didn't like [comedian] Jackie Kannon. They didn't like his toughness." - Sol Weinstein, Gagwriter

"Then there was Morris Levy's endless supply of special girlfriends and his passion for gambling and prostitutes." - Tommy James, Lead Singer of The Shondells

The Mob ran the record biz. During the height of America's nightclub abundancy, the ruthless owner of New York's Birdland and Peppermint Lounge was one of the most powerful men in the scene. Morris Levy used his clubs to promote the acts on his record label and he used his record label to exploit his clubs. Immersed in these two worlds, it was natural that Morris Levy would encounter every stand-up comedian in the business.

As television became common in the early nineteen fifties, the majority of radio programming moved to the visual terrain. The scramble to fill radio's dead air gave birth to the disc jockey and the pop music hustle. Morris Levy ensured that his label, Roulette Records, was there to fill the void. Radio became pop music's round-the-clock infomercial, dictating which tracks would sell in record stores. Morris Levy was a master at ensuring his artists got airplay. That mastery involved a faculty of full-time thugs and their impressive collection of bedraggled baseball bats.

Joey Dee and The Starlighters were one of Levy's most profitable acts. "I'd get in the limo with George Goldner, an employee," says Joey. "He'd drive. It would be a couple ladies of the evening, hookers, in the back of the limo and we'd drive to these towns. They'd meet with the deejays, give them an envelope with cash in it, allow them their way with the girls in the car, and then go on to the next town. And the next town. And the next town. Our records were played. God forbid they took the money and didn't play the records. That's when the baseball bats came out... and worse."

Between 1960 and 1966 the biggest fad going in the LP world was comedy records. Labels big or small, comedians hopelessly funny or just downright hopeless, pressed albums. Levy thought nothing of giving a disc jockey an envelope full of cash and yet, he denied his recording artists the same courtesy. Major acts like Buddy Knox or Jimmie Rodgers found themselves nearly broke while their names were at the top of the charts. The Roulette comedians didn't fare any better. Unlike the musicians that signed a slanted contract, Roulette's comedians had no contract at all. Many had their act recorded clandestinely - and released to the market without permission. Any other record label would have faced a major lawsuit. Roulette Records was different. You got a problem with us? That's fine. Soon you're gonna have a problem with your legs.

For the rest go here:http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2012/03...

The Tragedy of Kevin Sorbo from Salon

Ed here: I always thought Sorbo was a pretty good B actor. I'm posting this because it's emblematic of how tough it is tob e an actor.

The tragedy of Kevin Sorbo
With a new straight-to-DVD offering, the "Hercules" star sinks to sad new lows VIDEO
BY BOB CALHOUN

Kevin Sorbo in "Tales of an Ancient Empire"

TOPICS:STRAIGHT TO DVD
Movie reviewers will often say that a film is "painful to watch." It's an expression that gets thrown around quite liberally, but it's actually very rare that a film is so incompetent that it might set off intracranial bleeding. "Tales of an Ancient Empire" is just such a film, and much of its ability to do irreparable damage comes from its near total lack of medium shots and wide angle shots.

And what's even more of a bummer is that I've been looking forward to this thing since I first saw "The Sword and the Sorcerer" when I was 13 years old. "Sword and the Sorcerer" had just about everything an adolescent nerd could want from R-rated fantasy flicks: disgusting demons that made peoples' heads explode, lots of bare breasts, a wicked sword that launched its blades like a hazardous toy, and a barbarian mercenary named Talon (Lee Horsley of TV's "Matt Huston") leading an army of swashbuckling johns recruited from a brothel to save a kingdom. In short, it was the best awful sword and sorcery film ever, and it even displayed generally competent filmmaking. But its end credits also promised that Talon would return in "Tales of Ancient Empire." He never did. My teenage years were ruined.

Talon still hasn't quite returned but director Albert Pyun has finally delivered something called "Tales of an Ancient Empire" after 30 whole years, during which he seems to have forgotten everything he had once known about filmmaking. White-haired Lee Horsley makes a cameo, but he's billed as "The Stranger" instead of Talon, for some reason. Kevin Sorbo plays the lead ne'er do well swordsman this time around, which really makes me worry about him. Why is he in this thing? Does he need the money that badly? Can't Starz give him a recurring role on "Spartacus: Shameful Amounts of Bloodletting" or at least that awful "Camelot" show? Sure, he's got some crow's feet around the eyes, but he still looks like the guy who flexed his way through six seasons of "Hercules: the Legendary Journeys." Please, somebody show Sorbo some love.

For the rest go here:
http://www.salon.com/2012/01/22/the_t...

Rendezvous in Veracruz by Carolyn Hart

Rendezvous in Veracruz by Carolyn Hart

When feisty American college student Maura intercepts a mysterious message, she soon finds herself caught up in the middle of an international crime spree. With no idea how many of her acquaintances are involved, she doesn't dare to trust anyone! Her only option is to go on the run in order to elude the ruthless criminals who will stop at nothing to protect their secret.

Paperback, 5.5 x 8.5, 170 pages
ISBN: 978-0983004042
$10.95

-----------------------------

Several months ago I reviewed Carolyn Hart's Escape from Paris. I enjoyed it very much. Both Escape and Rendezvous are early books in her career but they show how familiar she was even then with the standard tropes. In each she ingeniously took those tropes and made them very much her own.

Carolyn knows how to keep a tight grip on suspense while having some fun with the characters and the scenery. She makes the milieu a real part of the story.

This one isn't as dark as Escape but it's every bit the thriller. Carolyn has a good time contrasting the the sensible Lin with her friend the risk-taker Maura. Most of us have played both roles over the course of our lifetimes and Carolyn nails the contrasts.

I liked Maura a lot. This was published at a time when the paperback gothic meme was still on the air (yes there were gothics I liked)--you know, the helpless vaguely dumb heroine. Maura is the oppposite, in her own way a kick-ass heroine you'll enjoy.

Enjoy!

Halo for Hire: The Paul Pine Mysteries - Haffner Press

Ed here: I've blogged about Haffner Press' forthcoming ambitious Fredric Brown books but here's another collection of major importance. Like Fredric Brown Howard Browne needs to be re-discovered big time. I count these novels among the finest in the history of private detective fiction. And knowing how beautifully produced Haffner books are, the workmanship will be as masterful as the contents. For information on all the Haffner books-- remember not only Fredric Brown but also the Henry Kuttner mysteries are on the way--go here: info@haffnerpress.com

Halo for Hire: The Paul Pine Mysteries
Howard Browne
ISBN-13 9781893887695
600+ page Hardcover
$40.00

"Of all of Raymond Chandler's followers, the most Chandlerish of them all might have been Howard Browne. And Browne's private eye hero, PAUL PINE, is simply one of the great eyes, no matter how inspired by (or derivative of ) Chandler's Philip Marlowe he might have been.
Still, deriviative or not, the Pine books are well worth reading, and A Taste of Ashes (1957) is just a flat-out, stone-cold private eye classic. Pine is a former investigator for the Illinois State attorney's office in Chicago who works as a P.I. in Chicago. He's got the obligatory cynicism and snappy similes and metaphors down pat, though he tends to be a bit more down to earth than Marlowe, and often mocks his own tendencies to moroseness and world-weariness. And Browne was a stronger plotter than Chandler.
In 1985, almost thirty years after Pine's last appearance, Dennis McMillan published a book The Paper Gun. This volume collected the only previously-published Pine story, "So Dark For April," plus an incomplete Pine novel that Browne, in the forword, calls "a story complete in itself. But it is not the whole novel." He states that he had lost interest in the private eye genre, and so the story is only 122 pages in length, too long for a short story, but too short for a novel. —adapted from "Paul Pine" by Kevin Burton Smith from www.thrillingdetective.com
TABLE OF CONTENTS REVIEWS EXCERPTS
Halo for Blood
A Halo for Satan
Halo in Brass
"So Dark for April"
The Taste of Ashes
"The Paper Gun"

Interesting background on The Eiger Sanction & Clint Eastwood

From Wikipedia

Casting
The rights to the film were bought by Universal in 1972, soon after the book was published, and it was originally a Richard Zanuck and David Brown production. Paul Newman was intended for Jonathan Hemlock. After reading the script, Newman declined, believing the film too violent.[4] With concerns over early scripts, Eastwood contacted novelist Warren Murphy (known for his The Destroyer assassin series) in Connecticut in February 1974 for assistance despite his having never read the book or written for a film before.[5] Murphy read the novel and agreed to write the script but was not happy with the tone of the novel which he believed patronized readers.[5] A draft by Murphy emerged in late March and a revised script was completed a month later.[6] George Kennedy, who had recently finished filming Thunderbolt and Lightfoot with Eastwood was cast as Big Ben Bowman, Hemlock's friend and secret adversary, Jack Cassidy cast as Miles Mellough, and Thayer David as "Dragon." Vonetta McGee of Thomasine and Bushrod was cast as the African-American female C2 operative, Jemima Brown.[7]
[edit]Filming


The Eiger
In the summer of 1974, Eastwood travelled to Yosemite National Park where he was trained in mountain climbing by Mike Hoover, a mountaineering cinematographer, technical adviser, and an Academy Award-nominated professional mountaineer from Jackson, Wyoming.[8] Filming in Grindelwald, Switzerland began on August 12, 1974 with a team of climbing experts and advisers from America, England, Germany, Switzerland, and Canada.[7] The climbers were based at the Hotel Bellevue des Alpes at Kleine Scheidegg.[9] The Eiger at 13,041 feet is not as tall as other mountains in the Swiss Alps, but it is treacherous climbing.[N 2] Eastwood's decision to brave the mountain was disapproved by Dougal Haston, director of the International School of Mountaineering, who had lost climbers on the Eiger, and by cameraman Frank Stanley, who thought that to climb a perilous mountain to shoot a film was unnecessary.[9] According to cameraman Rexford Metz, it was a boyhood fantasy of Eastwood's to climb such a mountain, and he enjoyed displaying heroic machismo.[10]

A number of accidents occurred during the filming of The Eiger Sanction. A twenty-seven-year old English climber, David Knowles, who was a body double and photographer, was killed during a rock fall, with Hoover narrowly escaping with his life.[11] Eastwood almost abandoned the project but proceeded because he did not want Knowles to have died in vain.[12] Eastwood insisted on doing all his own climbing and stunts. Frank Stanley also fell but survived and used a wheelchair for some time.[13] Stanley, who completed filming under pressure from Eastwood, blamed Eastwood for the accident because of lack of preparation, describing him as a director and actor as a "very impatient man who doesn't really plan his pictures or do any homework. He figures he can go right in and sail through these things."[14] Stanley was never hired by Eastwood or Malpaso Productions again. Several other accidents and events apparently took place during the filming, but were hidden from the public by the producers.[12]

Speaking with Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, Eastwood discussed the stunt in which he dangled from a mountain on the end of a cable:
I didn't want to use a stunt man, because I wanted to use a telephoto lens and zoom in slowly all the way to my face—so you could see it was really me. I put on a little disguise and slipped into a sneak preview of the film to see how people liked it. When I was hanging up there in the air, the woman in front of me said to her friend, 'Gee, I wonder how they did that?' and her friend said, 'Special effects.'[15]

Forgotten Books: Savages by Bill Pronzini

SAVAGES by Bill Pronzini

F. Paul Wilson once noted that private eye fiction offers the reader a snapshot of a certain time and place. We read Raymond Chandler not only for his fine prose but also for his portraits of Hollywood in the Thirties and Forties. Ross Macdonald showed us a very different Los Angeles due to the differences in time and temperment. And if you want to know what it was like on the angry lower-class streets of Depression Hollywoodland, you could do worse than read a lesser writer named John K. Butler, whose hardboiled cab driver functioned as a private eye without a license.

Today the definitive take on San Francisco and environs are the Nameless novels and stories by Bill Pronzini. The influence here, if there is a singuar one, would be Hammett and not Chandler. Nameless is working class, competent and only occasionally up for doing the kind of favors that the more romantic Marlowe did so often. Nameless, like the Contintental Op, is a professional not a dashing knight.

A few decades from now the Nameless books will give readers a fascinating look at the past thirty-forty years of life in San Francisco. The social upheavels, the econmically and culturally stratified society, the endless experiments in modern living.

And you can find all this and much more in the latest Nameless novel SAVAGES. Pronzini tells three stories here. He goes back to work for a wealthy client he never much liked only after she convinces him that there's at least a possibility that her sister was murdered by her husband, a man Nameless couldn't turn anything sinister about when he first investigated him. Nameless not only comes to suspect the husband but several other people who were in the life of the dead woman. He draws these characters with clear and deserved contempt.

The second story deals with an arsonist pursued by Jake Runyon, the partner in Nameless' agency. The trail leads him to a small town where the feel is that of a western town of a hundred years ago. Pronzini, writer of many fine westerns, seems especially at home here with the good lawman and the bad lawman and the townspeople eager to get stampeded into believing any piece of gossip they hear. Interesting that he mixes this sensibility with that of young people into drugs, violence and MTV ennui.

The third story concerns Nameless' woman Kerry and the aftermath of her surgery for breast cancer. She's been pronounced all right but nobody who's had cancer ever quite believes that. Pronzini is especially adept at dealing realistically and unsentimentally with the subject.

Thus we encounter three kinds of savages here--those of the city elite--those of rural blue collar life--and those of the human body, the cancer cells that destroy without fear or favor.

Another excellent entry in one of the most consistently excellent series of the past forty years.

FRank Langella Remembers His Rita Hayworth

Frank Langella Remembers His Rita Hayworth From The Daily Beast

It is 2 a.m. and I am alone in the dark with her again.

by Frank Langella | March 12, 2012 1:00 AM EDT
On my television set tonight, in the black-and-white movie Gilda, Rita Hayworth is seducing Glenn Ford, heartbreakingly refuting the old adage "the camera never lies." It is close to 40 years now since last we were together, and the woman I had known in real life is, for me, still the single most tragic example of how far from the real person an image can be.

She was a Goddess on screen, about as desirable a woman as any man could want—perfection in feminine allure. From the moment I saw her, she haunted my imagination. And from the moment we met in the lobby of a small hotel in the tiny town of Guanajuato, Mexico, in 1972, until her death from Alzheimer's disease 15 years later, she continued to haunt it, eliciting a far more profound emotion than lust.

My agent at that time, David Begelman, had talked me into a Western titled The Wrath of God—aptly named—to be shot entirely in Mexico. It would star Robert Mitchum, with Rita in the "and" position, set off in a billing box at the end of the actor credits. She was by then finished in pictures and the word was that Mitch had insisted on her, possibly for old times' sake, the rumor being they had once had a tumble or two.

Mitch would play a runaway priest. I would be the town's despot, who swears revenge on all priests for murdering my father, and Rita would be my mother, a God-fearing matron who never lets go of a set of rosary beads. What was I thinking? Well ... I was thinking: Rita/Gilda.

And there she is, tiny and scattered, standing in front of me, a rain hat on her head. She shoots out her hand and smiles. "Hey, I know you," she says. "I've seen ya in the movies. You're gonna be my son." I spout all the clichés: how excited I am to meet her and work with her, etc.

She tears off the rain hat, frantically runs her fingers through the once-lustrous auburn hair, now shorter and more sparse, shakes it out, pulls at it, and whips her head back and forth in an exaggerated "no," flailing her hands in the air as if shooing away an army of flies.

"Oh, cut it out. Cut it out," she says in a high-pitched, impatient tone, jamming the hat back on and fleeing the lobby.

Once on the set she is a total pro. Ready to go, eager to do her best. But the lines won't come. No matter how hard she tries, she can't retain the simplest phrase. In our first scene together, I approach her at prayer in a church and ask, "Why are you here?" Her line is "Because God is here." But she can't do it. Take after take she is unable to retain those four words. Oblivious to the rising tension and unkind remarks from the crew, she presses on. "Let's do it again," she says. "I'll get it."

For the rest go here: http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek...

King City by Lee Goldberg

Pre-order now available May 15 King City [Kindle Edition]
Digital List Price: $9.99 What's this?
Print List Price: $14.95
Kindle Price: $7.99 includes free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet

"Lee Goldberg's King City brings the sensibility of a western to the contemporary crime novel and the result is exhilarating, compelling, and a thrill to read. Tom Wade is an iconic hero with a strong, personal code trying bring order to a lawless frontier...which just happens to be smack in the middle of a dying, industrial American city. He's an unforgettable and deeply compelling character in the most original crime novel to come along in years," -Janet Evanovich, international bestselling author

"King City is a book that only Lee Goldberg could have written. He's got the high-velocity prose of a best-seller, coupled with the highly visual elements that make his television writing so compelling. Factor in the terrific characters and some very cogent takes on human nature, and you've got a rollicking thriller. King City is a pleasure from start to finish." T. Jefferson Parker, New York Times bestselling author of The Jaguar and The Border Lords

"King City is Walking Tall, Die Hard, and Dirty Harry all rolled into one. Hard-driving action and all the satisfaction of a well-told story about a righteous man of courage facing seemingly insurmountable odds. You'll love it."-Jan Burke, bestselling author of Disturbance and Liar

"I could tell you that Lee Goldberg's King City is one of the best reads of the year or that Lee is one of my favorite writers for so many reasons--plotting, character, or his incredible sense of humor--but that might ruin the surprise of reading King City for yourself. Suffice to say that Goldberg is one infinitely readable master of crime fiction, and King City is Lee at his best." -Craig Johnson, New York Times bestselling author of The Cold Dish and Hell is Empty

"King City like a 1969 Detroit muscle car. It's powerful, nasty, loud, and a heck of a lot of fun. Lee Goldberg is at his atmospheric best here, creating a world so authentic the sights, sounds and smells seem to explode from the pages. Detective Tom Wade is a fast, funny three-dimensional protagonist and following him through the cesspool of King City and its outrageous inhabitants is endlessly entertaining." Paul Guyot, writer/supervising producer of the TV series "Leverage"

"King City effortlessly blends the archetypal gunslinger of the Old West, riding into the lawless town to clean up the bad guys, with a modern tale of police corruption, urban decay and neglect....It's a fast-paced exploration of the decline of the blue-collar industrial heartland of America, and the cop who will not stand by and let that happen on his watch. Fans of the late Robert B Parker will delight in King City, which has the same great dialogue and nicely judged wry humour....A sit-down, straight-through read. Superb." -Zoe Sharp, author of Hard Knocks
Product Description
Major Crimes Unit detective Tom Wade secretly worked with the Feds to nail seven of his fellow cops for corruption…turning him into a pariah in the police department. So he's exiled to patrol a beat in King City's deadliest neighborhood… with no back-up, no resources, and no hope of survival.

Now Wade fights to tame the lawless, poverty-stricken wasteland…while investigating a string of brutal murders of young women. It's a case that takes him from the squalor of the inner-city to the manicured enclaves of the privileged, revealing the sordid and deadly ways the two worlds are intertwined…making his enemies even more determined to crush him.

But for Tom Wade, backing down is never an option...even if it will cost him his life. It's one reason why bestselling author Janet Evanovich calls Wade "an unforgettable and deeply compelling character in the most original crime novel to come along in years."

See all Editorial Reviews