This Week's Reading

Maybe it's me, but this week seems unusually rich in good, free reads. Case in point:

1. Maxim Jakubowski's short essay on his friend (and noir legend) Derek Raymond/Robin Cook. No, not the medical thriller writer... ah, just read the essay at the Mulholland Books site and you'll see.

2. A free short story (also at the Mulholland Books site, but brought to you by Popcorn Fiction) by Secret Dead Blog favorite Charlie Huston. This doesn't make up for the fact that there will be no new Charlie Huston novel in 2011, but it does salve the wound a little. And Warren Ellis even squeezed a guest blog post out of Mr. Huston, which of course, was a must-read.

3. Ethan Iverson of The Bad Plus put together this annotated Donald Westlake bibiography that just blew me away. He's packed it with little nuggets of review, analysis, and correspondence with Westlake himself. I want Iverson to keep going until this baby is a short book. But until then, enjoy the current version.

Also: In the spirit of both free reads and Donald Westlake, the good folks at Oceanview Publishing, who recently produced Thrillers: 100 Must-Reads (edited by David Morrell and Hank Wagner), sent me a PDF of my short essay on Westlake/Richard Stark's first Parker novel, The Hunter. Want a copy? E-mail me at (duane DOT swier AT verizon DOT net) and I'll send it to you.