Bruce DeSilva's Blog, page 51

Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island" Now! It's Crime-Writing Legend Robert Randisi

Robert Randisi

Robert Randisi is nothing if not prolific. He's written more than 500 novels and hundreds of short stories. That is not a misprint.

I'm just writing my third one now, and he's younger than me. Of course, he's been doing it for decades, and I'm just getting started. (I wanted to give him a running start.)

Bob, as I learned to call him when we met at Bouchercon a couple of months ago, is best known for his crime novels, but he has also written bunches of westerns. His work has appeared under his own name and under a passel of pseudonyms including W.B. Longley, Robert Lake, Spenser Fortune, Tom Cutter, Cole Weston, and a bunch more I can't remember just now.

He's the guy who started Mystery Scene Magazine and is the founder of the Private Eye Writers of America (the group that hands out the Shamus Awards).

Among his huge body of work, I particularly like his "Rat Pack" mystery series.

Rogue Island, winner of both the Edgar and Macavity Awards, is available in hardcover, trade paperback, Kindle, and downloadable audio editions. You can find them here.

Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island" Now! It's Irish Crime Novelist John Connolly

John Connolly

John Connolly is the author of ten Charlie Parker crime novels including the recently released The Burning Soul.

Parker first appeared in Every Dead Thing in 1999 and has become a favorite of discerning readers. Connolly has also written novels for young adults and hosts an internet radio show, "ABC to XTC." on RTE 2XM.

I met him recently at the Bouchercon crime writing conference in St. Louis.

Rogue Island, winner of both the Edgar and Macavity Awards, is available here in trade paperback, Kindle, and downloadable audio editions.

A few hardcovers are still available here and there, but they are in short supply.

Salute Your Local Bookstore: The Musical

My friend Parnell Hall, author of Stanley Hastings private eye novels and two other mystery series, has been making humorous, do-it-your-self videos about writing and the book business.  The latest, a look at the e-book revolution and what it's doing to local bookstores, can be found here.

The video is filled with famous mystery writers. How many of them do you recognize?

Yes, I'm in it, but you'll miss me if you blink.

 

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Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island" Now. It's PI Writer Jeremiah Healy!

Jeremiah Healy

Jeremiah Healy is the creator of the John Francis Cuddy private eye series. Writing as Terry Devane, he is also the author of the Mairead O'Clare legal thrillers.  Both series are set in Boston.

Healy has written 18 novels in all, as well as dozens of short stories. He's a past president of the International Association of Crime Writers. I met him in September at the Bouchercon crime writing conference in St. Louis.

Rogue Island, which won the coveted Edgar Award, as well as the Macavity Award, for best first novel, is available here in trade paperback, Kindle, and downloadable audio editions.

Non-Stop Suspense in Chester Campbell's New Sid Chance Mystery

The Good, the Bad and the Murderous is the second book in the Sid Chance mystery series by Nashville-based mystery writer Chester D. Campbell, who has also written five Greg McKenzie mysteries.

For the uninitiated: Sid is a Vietnam veteran and a former park ranger whose battles with thugs growing marijuana on federal land almost got him killed. He also worked as a small-town sheriff before going into the private eye business.

In  The Good, The Bad and The Murderous,  Sid takes up the cause of a young black man who is charged with murder shortly after being released from prison. The story ends up involving drug smuggling and police corruption. Best of all, Sid gets help along the way from some quirky characters including a former woman boxing champ.

Readers will appreciate being in the hands of a thriller writer who really knows what he's doing.

The book is available in trade paperback and for the Kindle here.  It is also available  for various formats here.

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Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island"! It's Roslund and Hellstrom.

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Rosulnd & Hellstrom

Roslund and Hellstrom are the authors of five best-selling books in their native Sweden. An English translation of their latest book, Three Seconds, was recently released in the U.S.

Anders Roslund, a veteran journalist, is the creator of Kulterkanna, Sweden's top rated cultural TV show. Börge Hellström is a former prison inmate who founded a criminal rehabilitation program.

They tell me that Börge comes up with many of the gritty plot elements and that Anders does most of the writing.

Rogue Island, winner of both the Edgar and the Macavity Awards,  is available in trade paperback, Kindle, and downloadable audio editions that can all be found here.

Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island" Now! It's Award-Winning Crime Novelist Bill Loehfelm.

Bill Loehfelm

Bill Loehfelm's brilliant first novel, Fresh Kills, won the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. Since then he's written two more fine crime novels, Bloodroot and The Devil She Knows.

Bill's books, all set on his native Staten Island, N.Y., are superbly written hardboiled novels with an evocative sense of place. He now lives in New Orleans with his wife, the writer AC Lambeth. Recently he completed a short story for the forthcoming "Staten Island Noir" anthology that is being edited by my wife, Patricia Smith.

Rogue Island, winner of the prestigious Edgar and Macavity Awards, is available here in trade paperback, Kindle and downloadable audio editions.

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Crime Novelist Timothy Hallinan Interviews Me

Timothy Hallinan

Timothy Hallinan, one of the best crime writers around, interviewed me for his blog today. You can find the whole interview here.

Meanwhile, here's a taste:

Bruce DeSilva is the kind of writer other writers would hate if he weren't such a good guy.

I mean, come on.  Forty years of journalism experience, much of it spent in the dizzying heights of the Associated Press, editing stories that won everything from a Pulitzer on down. Decides to write a book.  Wins absolutely everything in sight, including the Edgar and the Macavity.  Hangs around with me prior to the awards presentation so that my not winning has a special sting, that feeling that the thunderbolt just missed. Except that ROGUE ISLAND is a really wonderful book and deserves everything it gets.

I asked Bruce to come aboard and talk about it all, and he said yes.  So here he is.

What did you bring to ROGUE ISLAND from your years in print journalism?

Hundreds of things, really, but I'll limit my answer to this: Journalism taught me how vital reporting – especially investigative reporting – is to the health of the American democracy. Investigative reporting is time-consuming and expensive; and as newspapers continue to shrivel, no other institution (certainly not TV or news Websites) has demonstrated the will, the ethics and the financial commitment required to do it consistently, honestly, and well. The hero of ROGUE ISLAND is an investigative reporter at a dying newspaper. I hope that as readers see the dedication and skill with which he works, they will better appreciate what is being lost as great local and metropolitan newspapers pass into history. I tried to make the novel both a compelling crime story and a lyrical epitaph for the business that I love.

Crime Writer Paul D. Brazill on DEBT

Paul D. Brazill and I are guest blogging on one another's sites today. I hope you'll take a moment to read his thoughtful piece.

I grew up with debt.

One of my earliest memories is of going with my sister  to Blooms' pawn brokers; a dark and dingy shop that you entered from a cobble-stoned back street, so as to avoid the shame of being seen going in.

And I clearly remember regularly sticking my skinny kid's fingers into the back of the television's coin powered metre to snaffle enough coins to put the gas or electric on.

Or searching down the back of sofa for Embassy cigarette coupons to take to the corner shop and exchange for chopped pork that could be used for sandwiches. And when the rent man cometh he didn't always geteth paid.

So, that may be why I love these two rough and ready Polish films; both starring Andrzej Chyra; both about debt; both based on painfully true events.

The Debt ( 1999), directed by Krzystof Krause and written by Krause and  Jerzy Morawski, stars Robert Gonera, Jacek Boruch and the splendid Andrzej  Chyra.

It takes place in Poland's dark economic hinterland after the fall of communism and tells the story of Adam and Stefan, a couple of bright young men from Warsaw, who come up with the smart idea of manufacturing Italian scooters in Poland and making a fortune from the Italians.

They first go to the bank for a loan and are refused but they encounter  a well- off  acquaintance, Gerard(Chyra),who offers to lend them the funds in exchange for a share of the company profits.

So far, so good but when they later decide that Gerard is asking for too much and back out of the proposal things really go pear shaped.

Gerard bizarrely starts harassing them for the money that he never even lent them, saying that they were already too far into the deal to back out. It then becomes painfully clear that Gerard is a vicious gangster and things spiral horribly out of control from then on.

The Debt is like a knee to the groin – a naturalistic, hard hitting and chilling story with a great, scary performance from Chyra..

The Debt Collector (2005), is directed by Feliks Falk with a screenplay by  Grzegorz Loszewski.

Andrzej Chyra plays Lucek a hard-hearted debt collector, working in one of Poland's most deprived areas, who mercilessly repossesses anything he can – including vital machines from hospitals and even a statue of the Virgin Mary.

But, as the film progresses, Lucek  starts to have doubts and he pulls so hard on the strings of his life that the whole thing unravels as he experiences an 'epiphany'  that turns him into a decent human being.

The Debt Collector is also grimly naturalistic and very well acted but, although it does have a more optimistic ending then The Debt, it's just as effective in showing the hard side of life.

Bio: Spinetingler Award nominee Paul D. Brazill was born in England and is currently on the lam in Poland. He has had stories in various publications and anthologies, including The Mammoth Book Of Best British Crime 2011. He writes for Pulp Metal Magazine and Mean Streets. He is member of The Hardboiled Collective. His blog, You Would Say That, Wouldn't You? is here: http://pdbrazill.blogspot.com/

Look Who's Reading "Rogue Island" Now! It's Best-Selling Author Robert Crais

Robert Crais

Robert Crais is the author of the best-selling Elvis Cole and Joe Pike crime novels set in Southern California. The books are outstanding, combining a hardboiled sensibility with a great sense of humor.

Crais got his start writing for television (Miami Vice, Cagney & Lacey, and Hill Street Blues.) His latest novel, The Sentry, features tough-guy Joe Pike, and it's terrific — one of the best crime novels of the year.

I photographed Robert when we met at the Bouchercon crime writers conference in St. Louis last month.

Rogue Island is available in trade paperback, Kindle, and downloadable audio editions here.