Thomas Pluck's Blog, page 22
May 30, 2015
Get Plucked: now available for pre-order – and a chance to win Dark City Lights!
How’d you like to Get Plucked?
My newest story collection includes a tribute to Elmore Leonard, where a computer nerd and an Island barmaid race against the mob; a shifty construction foreman encounters zombies and sex dungeons in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy; visitors review the Overlook hotel from THE SHINING; a psychotic virus hunter plans to unleash apocalypse during the panic of 2012; a kid who hides in the woods to scare urban legend hunters gets a surprise of his own, and eight more twisted, dark and funny tales.
You can pre-order it for Kindle now. If you e-mail your Amazon receipt to me at goombahgumbo [at] gmail [dot] com (use an @ and . where appropriate) you’ll be entered in a raffle to win a trade paperback of DARK CITY LlGHTS: New York Stories, edited by Lawrence Block. It contains my story “The Big Snip,” and stories by 22 other authors, including LB himself.
Also, share it on Twitter, tag it with #getplucked and I’ll count another entry. Same if you share it on Facebook, just tag me or my Writer Thomas Pluck page and it will be counted.
You have until June 9th, when Get Plucked is released into the wild; that also happens to be my birthday. My “magnum” birthday, the 44th, where I will shave my beard off into a Magnum P.I. mustache and drink a magnum of champagne (or more likely, enjoy a beer and a burger at the pub with friends, but you never know).
So Get Get Plucked, for some of my best stories, and a chance to win Dark City Lights!
Tagged: Get Plucked
May 29, 2015
SignWave: An Aftershock Novel by Andrew Vachss
When the Burke series ended, Andrew Vachss wasted no time in crafting another gripping series: Dell and Dolly, a former legionnaire and a retired nurse from Doctors Without Borders who escape into the Pacific Northwest, only to find a battleground just as treacherous as the African war zone in which they met: suburban America.
Kirkus calls the books “meditations on the Zen of violence,” but to me they capture the fierce flame of unforgettable characters. Dell and Dolly are warriors to the core, and Dell has no compunctions about putting heads on pikes to warn invaders aware from their village–though he does so figuratively, with Vachss’s trademark paranoid spycraft, a realistic imperative for anyone operating in our surveillance society.
Each book explores a different facet of the dark heart of town life: Aftershock focused on rape culture in high school, and one girl’s explosive response; Shockwave, on the permanent homeless population, those who care for, or prey on them, and the equally hidden racial hate groups that operate among us; and Signwave moves up the food chain to pit Dolly vs. a hedge fund manager who comes to town promoting “Art” and “Culture” while “protecting the environment,” who may be a lot more than he seems.
Vachss excels at exposing abusive power relationships that our society has come to accept as normal, and baring them for what they are. Signwave is no exception. The trip through Dell’s mind is worth the price of admission- you never get a better “tour guide through hell” than when you’re reading a Vachss novel- but the poignant barbs that expose the rotten core of corruption we have come to embrace are what drives this new series, as dark and gripping as anything he has ever written.
Releases in June. Preorder your copy here. Read an EXCERPT on Andrew Vachss’s website.
Or, to quote Andrew from Facebook, ask your local library to order you a copy.
Tagged: Andrew Vachss
May 22, 2015
BOLO Books reviews Dark City Lights
BOLO books gave a great review to Dark City Lights:
“Next we have The Big Snip by Thomas Pluck. This story is a seamless blend of dark humor and serious social commentary. Told in gritty and realistic details, the occasional moments of humor … provide much-needed relief from an otherwise tense and graphic story.”
They also loved SJ Rozan’s story and Erin Faye’s debut publication- so if you haven’t checked it out, do so!
I have signed copies available (signed by me). If you’d like to purchase one, contact me via the Contact Form. You can also order it from Amazon, your favorite e-tailer, or from your local bookstore.
Tagged: Dark City Lights
May 20, 2015
Noir at the Bar New Jersey!
I won’t be reading at this one, but a lot of great writers will be. Many have asked me to host a NJ Noir at the Bar event; last year, Jen Conley and Mark Krajnak stepped up and held one at The Saint in Asbury Park, and invited me to read. It was a great time. Now Jen is hosting a second one, at Tumulty’s in New Brunswick (a classic bar that features in Dave White’s latest Jackson Donne novel, NOT EVEN PAST) and Dave will be reading, among others. Mark will be there photographing the event, he does great work, they’re both great people. I’ll be at an undisclosed location, or I would be reading there myself!
So if you want a regular Noir event in New Jersey, hoof it to Tumulty’s and give them your support. They do a great job, there are 14 great authors reading at this one, you don’t want to miss it.
Tagged: Noir at the Bar
May 18, 2015
Mad Max: Fury Road
As a huge fan of the Mad Max movies, I had low expectations for Fury Road. It had been talked about for so long, and went through many iterations- or at least, the Internet rumor mill did. It was going to be all CG, like the Happy Feet movies! (also directed by George Miller). Mel Gibson would return! Or worse, it would take all the worst parts of Thunderdome and run with it.
Well, George Miller and company made a movie, that for pure action enjoyment, blows all the other three Max movies away. Now, The Road Warrior will always be my favorite. (I reviewed Mad Max, Road Warrior, and Thunderdome here). I saw Mad Max 2 when I was twelve, and it scarred by brain. Any car chase I write is inspired by its insanity. But side to side, there is no comparison. The stunts are bigger, the chase neverending, and the world of the film is immense. Road Warrior felt like one settlement was all that remained. Fury Road gives us a bleak continent.
The story kicks off with Max captured by the war boys of the Citadel, a water station run by Immortan Joe, whose young killers worship him like a god. He’s built a new mythology out of metal album covers and when his lieutenant Imperator Furiosa (Cherlize Theron) goes rogue, with Max along for the ride, the movie is a two hour balls-out car chase of war rigs, Big Daddy Roth monster hot rods on monster truck and battle tank frames, and hornet’s nests of nomadic bikers. The world, and the characters, are painted in such detail that the lack of exposition is no matter. This is a tapestry, not a history book. My favorite characters were a band of woman on motorcycles with rifles, young and old, survivors who fight like the Night Witches of World War II.
Tom Hardy makes a fine Mad Max. He’s a favorite actor of mine, daring, a fiery star of emotion, who’s played iconic British gangsters and violent men with incredible power. Here he wavers between ice cold killer and leather-clad Buster Keaton on an out of control murder convoy. The movie is equally his and Theron’s; as always, we get very little backstory on Max. If you want backstory, watch the other movies! Theron’s Furiosa is equally cryptic, and they make a brutal team of reluctant equals. The movie is relentless, but I’d watch it if it were twice as long. I’d watch a prequel about the bad-ass biker women. I’d watch another movie with Furiosa and Max. I’d watch George Miller set a bag of dog crap on fire and ring Hollywood’s doorbell, because he made a better action movie than the Marvel toy-selling machine and the DC grit-shit-show has been doing for the last decade.
Unshackle your imagination with bolt cutters and burn out on a fury road…
I wasn’t going to mention it, but some “man website” was trying to make manly real man-men boycott the movie because it’s “feminist” or whatever. The movie has bad-ass women in being bad-ass, and it made their peepees feel small. I don’t take “the manosphere” seriously (how can you, with a name like that?) but I found this takedown site hilarious. We Hunted The Mammoth takes down the boycotters’ whining here.
Tagged: 10s, Mad Max, Movies
May 17, 2015
May 10, 2015
A Mother’s Day story: Tiger Mother
Made-up holiday or not, today we honor all the good mothers who raised us. This story was originally written for Patti Abbott’s charity challenge, and was inspired by a 1930’s Harlem painting by Reginald Marsh. (Incidentally, Marsh lived in an artist colony in my hometown of Nutley). Happy mother’s day, here’s a real mother for ya.
Tiger Mother
by Thomas Pluck
When her boy Lewis didn’t come home that evening, Caldonia Peele prayed he wouldn’t break her heart. When he didn’t slink in weary-eyed in his slept-in clothes that morning, her chest fluttered with worry. But when he didn’t tiptoe into church, her heart went cold.
* * *
“He’s at the age, Callie,” Mabel said. They both worked at the Harlem post office. Seen each other through three husbands, four children, a riot, and a burst appendix.
Caldonia and Mabel navigated the Convent Avenue throngs after church. Had to get to Sylvia’s quick if you wanted a table. Their children walked behind them in their Sunday best. Jerome, Mabel’s second husband, walked alongside.
“I’m not about to lose my Lewis like his no-account father.”
Lewis Senior was gone five years now, same as Mabel’s first husband. Hard times drove men to gambling and drink, made them quick with their hands.
When they came to the corner Jerome said, “I didn’t think much of it, but I saw your boy with Cat Ferris. I hear he rolls dice behind Netty’s place. I can go ask for him, you like.”
“Thank you kindly, but I’ll handle my own business. Mabe. Will you watch Tara while I’m gone?”
Mabel scrunched up her nose as if offended to be asked. “Course I will.”
Caldonia turned on her heel, yellow taffeta a-twirl, and bent to stroke her daughter’s braids. Tara smiled. Going on five, cute as the buttons on her hand-sewn dress. “I’ll be good, Mama.”
“I know you will.”
“Netty’s can be rough,” Jerome said. “You should leave your purse.”
Caldonia smirked and tapped her carnelian hat pin. “Let ’em try.”
* * *
Nettie’s was by the Hudson, tucked behind a mechanic shop that had sold black market tires during the big war. Caldonia walked with purpose, face firm and lip curled. Angry her boy had been lured astray.
Soon as her boy turned thirteen, his eyes were tugged to their corners by the sight of rough men on stoops, calling out to women walking by, whistling at the fancy cars rolling down Broadway. Looking for a man to fill the hole his father left. Maybe Lewis missed the hard knuckles and cruel smiles.
The jukebox shook the clapboard walls outside Nettie’s. A fat man perched on a stool by the door, like a stout mushroom after September rain. One wooden leg and two mismatched shoes. Alf Nettis shook his head as Caldonia strutted to the door.
“Your man ain’t here, and if he was, he’s gone now.”
“I’m here for my boy Lewis. I’m told he’s with Cat Ferris, one of your regular customers.”
“Where’d you hear that nonsense?”
“Everyone knows he rolls dice in back of your place.”
“Anyone knows that, they’re lying. Don’t serve boys, only men.”
“A churchgoing man told me otherwise,” she said. “His word’s worth a damn sight more than yours.”
The alleyway was filled with bald tires and trash. Only way in was through the door. Or maybe the car shop. Caldonia pointed her chin that way.
“Maybe you prayed, your boy’ll be home when you get there,” Alf called.
Caldonia felt her slender fingers turn to fists. She spun and stomped to an inch from his face.
“Alfred Nettis, unless you want me to burn up every disability check you get from now on, you will stand aside.”
His sleepy eyes had skin tags around them like flies, swatted by his girlish lashes. They blinked.
“You have a cruel soul, Caldonia Peele,” Alf whispered. “What your Jesus think about that?”
“He says the Lord helps those that help themselves,” she said, and sashayed past.
* * *
The joint was crammed with hunched-over men nursing dirty glasses, a low buzz of mutter and chuckle muddling the ears like the scent of unwashed bodies and whiskey did the nose.
There was a brief silence as drinkers assured themselves their wife wasn’t the one invading the place. The bartender, lean as his brother was fat, sneered and wiped out a dirty glass with a dirtier rag.
She paid them no mind and ducked out the back door.
* * *
The caged-in yard was a mess of lawn beaten down by feet. Cat Ferris sprawled in a Chrysler’s leather bench seat planted in the grass, resplendent in his turquoise suit. Before him, Lewis ran dice for three men huddled over a slab of slate. Lewis wore his Sunday shirt and shoes, suit coat folded beside him.
Caldonia cocked her hips and planted a fist on each. “Hope you ain’t betting that suit of yours,” she said. “That’s my property.”
“Mama,” Lewis gasped.
The dice men laughed, and Ferris leaned back, baring golden fangs. “Your boy’s a man now, Mrs. Peele. He’s about to run off like his father did. Man can’t take a six-foot hellion telling him what to do.” He took a long pull at his can of Rheingold.
Caldonia’s cheeks went to stone as she saw her boy blush.
“My boy was a man, he wouldn’t be fawning over a coward in a silk shirt.”
“Who you callin’ a coward, woman?”
She slipped the .32 from her purse and fired, punching a ragged hole in the seat by Ferris’s crotch. Ferris kicked and squirmed into himself, spraying himself with beer foam. A dark stain spread across his slacks. Before the report was done echoing off the tin roof, the dice men had snatched their bills and scattered.
Lewis huddled in the grass, hands covering his head.
“Get your suit on, son. We’re going to supper.”
Lewis threw on his jacket, straightened his tie.
Caldonia offered him her arm, and they walked out primly.
###
Here’s the painting, by Reginald Marsh:
Tagged: Harlem, Mother's Day, Patti Abbott, Tiger Mother
May 9, 2015
Noir at the Bar 5/17: Dark City Lights takeover
Join me and…
Jill Block
Tom Callahan
Peter Carlaftes
Jane Dentinger
Kat Georges
Peter Hochstein
Brian Koppelman
Annette Meyers
…as we read from Dark City Lights and other works of noir. We’ll be giving away copies, and selling them, but you can get yours from order it from Amazon, or from your local bookstore.
Tagged: Dark City Lights, Noir at the Bar
May 8, 2015
LB & the Bear
He drives the truck. That makes me the monkey.
That’s Lawrence Block and myself, at the Dark City Lights: New York Stories launch party last night, held at The Mysterious Bookshop. If you haven’t been there, it’s like a cathedral to crime fiction; make your pilgrimage. They have everything. I grabbed a few copies of LB’s books- Borderline and The Crime of Our Lives- and GBH, by Ted Lewis, a fantastic crime novel from 1980 that reads like new. (If you enjoyed Get Carter, this is his masterpiece.)
Signing books with LB, Tom Callahan, Ed Parks, Erin Mitchell, S.J. Rozan, Parnell Hall, Brian Koppelman, Reed Farrel Coleman, Jerrold Mundis, Annette Meyers, Jill Block (a chip off the old… I’m sure she’s never heard that before) and publishers Peter Carlaftes and Kat Georges, was rather dreamlike. It also helps that Otto Penzler and Ian Kearn throw a great reading, well-stocked with Brooklyn Brewery suds and bottles of vino. I met editor Jaime Lewis, who worked with Preston & Child, whose Cabinet of Curiosities remains one of my favorite thrillers. Greg Rossi dropped in, and Jason Starr, and I told a lot of new folks about Noir at the Bar.
Speaking of- the next Noir at the Bar event at Shade in Manhattan (corner of West 3rd & Sullivan, right near Washington Square park) is 5/17, and will include readings from Dark City Lights. It’s a Three Rooms Press takeover! On June 7th we go back to normal, and have a great lineup, including Rob Hart reading from his debut novel NEW YORKED. Remember to join the Noir at the Bar mailing list (link is to your right) if you don’t want to miss one.
And I was profiled by The Montclair Times, about Dark City Lights. They got the name of my next project wrong–it’s “Death to Hipsters”–but it was nice talking about the town and how it inspires me.
Tagged: Lawrence Block
May 2, 2015
join us beneath the DARK CITY LIGHTS
If you want to see what 23 writers do when Lawrence Block, the crime-writer King of New York, asks them to write about the 8 million stories in the Empire city, this is the book to read.
You can order it from Amazon, your favorite e-tailer, or from your local bookstore.
And don’t forget to join us on Thursday May 7th at the Mysterious Bookshop at 6:30pm, for a signing and the official launch party. Lawrence Block, myself, and 16 other contributors will be there.
Tagged: Books, Dark City Lights, Lawrence Block
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