Ed Gorman's Blog, page 260

The boy in the balloon

From Tom Piccirilii:

Hey Ed: so an experimental helium balloon built by a storm chaser in his backyard took off with his six-year-old son inside. Family lives five minutes from us. Talk about life mirroring fiction. It's my story "Between the Dark and the Daylight"!

Balloon finally landed after two and a half hours in the air and having traveled something like 100 miles, sometimes as high as 10,000 feet. Kid wasn't in it. The news copters started following within 20 minutes of it lifting...

A Revoltin' Development?

By Jeff Rivera on Oct 14, 2009 03:30 PM
From Galleycat

As the publishing industry undergoes economic changes and lay-offs, a growing number of former editors from major publishing houses have taken their love for guiding and developing writing talent to another level; they have become literary agents.

Because successful literary agents must possess an understanding of the publishing world while they maintain relationships within the industry, former editors can easily transition into the world o...

Max Allan Collins Quarry In The Middle

If the novels about hit-man Quarry continue to be this good, they may rival Max Allan Collins' most famous series, the Nathan Heller books.

The two series have one thing in common, that being Collins' skill in bringing past eras alive. In Quarry In The Middle Quarry is at work doing the Reagan administration. Collins' snapshots of that time--from hair style to attitudes--are almost as entertaining as the story itself. He does sociology on the run, defining the various kinds of hierarchies ...

I finally beat Bill Crider to a story

Texas man found asleep with corpse inside closet

Oct 12th, 2009 | HOUSTON -- A Houston man found asleep with a corpse inside a closet of a vacant home has been charged with misdemeanor drug offenses, authorities said Monday. Cody Jean Plant, 21, was discovered Sunday after the owner of the house reported hearing voices and seeing signs of forced entry at the home in Cypress, about 25 miles northwest of Houston, according to a Harris County Precinct 4 Constable official. Authorities did not imm...

The co-authored Frankenstein

Thanks to Cinema Retro for the link:

Cinema Retro: The original 1818 edition of the novel Frankenstein was published anonymously. Five years later, its author - Mary Shelley- decided to put her name on all future editions of the work, capitalizing on the sensation it caused in the literary world. From the start, however, there were skeptics who doubted that an 18 year-old woman could have conceived such sinister goings-on. Shelley tinkered with future printings of the novel and never hid the f...

Stuart Kaminsky; Leonard Cohen; Gerald Kersh

Stuart Kaminsky died yesterday. I didn't know him well at all but when I was starting out going on twenty-seven or so years ago I wrote him a letter telling him how much I loved the Toby Peters books and how I'd published a lot of crap in the down market men's field but now wanted to try mystery novels. He wrote back with advice I still honor today. I still love the Toby books and almost all of his other books, too. I'm not sure why but his death shocked me more than any other recent one. I'm...

MAX ALLAN COLLINS TALKS ABOUT HIS HIT MAN QUARRY

[image error]

The Max All Collins website and blog new and updated by Max and his son Nathan http://www.maxallancollins.com/blog/

THE INTERVIEW:

Before we start discussing the history of Quarry how about you telling us how the noted novelist Richard Yates helped you get your MFA at the University of Iowa's Writer's Workshop?

I lived in Muscatine, Iowa -- still do, as you know -- with a real sense of this famous writing school being in my back yard. In high school I was really into what was then called "bla...

Paranormal Activity

Hero's Complex (LA Times) ran a very interesting article on how carefully the movie Paranormal Activity (The next "Blair Witch Project") is being marketed. I like stuff like this. Once an ad man always a...


'Paranormal Activity,' a study in careful execution
October 8, 2009 | 9:17 am
John Horn, who covers film for the Los Angeles Times, has been mapping the curious path of "Paranormal Activity," the dirt-cheap horror film that may shape up as one of the unexpected success stories of 2009. Here'...

Forgotten Books: In Dubious Battle

It's bracing to remember, in this time when mega-corporations control our lives, to recall a time when people fought back against those who enslaved them.

In Dubious Battle by John Steinbeck, a novel I prefer to the preachy and over-calculated Grapes of Wrath, is set in a tiny California town where apple pickers are angry at the growers' association for cutting wages by fifteen cents. The year is 1936 and the forces of the rich and powerful are at war with the powerless workers. Mac and Jim a...

A fine writer and a great guy

Tim Powers is well known in science fiction and fantasy circles but it appears that a much wider audience awaits him. As I said in the title Tim is a fine writer and a great guy. Congratulations, Tim.

Here's from the LA Times' Hero's Complex today:


Surprised author Tim Powers finds himself setting sail with 'Pirates of the Caribbean'
October 6, 2009 | 7:28 am

Last month, Johnny Depp walked on stage at the Anaheim Convention Center in his Jack Sparrow costume and delighted a surprised audience o...