Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Spring is Sprung, The Grass is Riz...

For those of you wondering where the Spring issue of The Thrilling Detective Web Site is, don't bother.. . it's here.

Call the neighbours, wake up the kids, tell Granma to put her bifocals on.

And we're only a few weeks late, not a few months, so we're definitely doing a little better. Not better enough to actually, regularly blog -- I see my last blog here was about the last issue, but trust me, I'm feeling good about now.

We've got some new stories for you, and a big hunk of a think-piece I'm still trying to get my head around, but it's good to be back.

Of course, none of this would be possible without my partner-in-crime, fiction editor, Gerald So, and the contributors for this issue, all of whom once again waited -- and waited and waited -- for me to get my act together. 

As always, Gerald has acted as gatekeeper, only letting in the worthy. This go-round we kick off with "Love is for Suckers" by Robert Petyo, about a private eye who isn't sure anymore who's watching who and who's zoomin' who. Next up is "Terra Bella" by Robert Stevens, a decidely bucolic tale that shows there's more than cowshit that smells bad in the sticks. Our old pal Jim Winter returns with "Love Don't Mean a Thing," a nasty little tale of love, hate and revenge, featuring his long-time series gumshoe Nick Kepler.

Also in this issue we have "East of A," a classic Payton Sherwood reprint by Russell Atwood that originally appeared in the June 1996 issue of EQMM. And we wrap up things with an excerpt from The Big Wake-Up, the upcoming novel by Mark Coggins, featuring his San Francisco eye August Riordan.

But that's not all -- we've also got a great non-fiction piece making its Thrilling Detective debut. "A Man Must Do What He Must: Hammett's Pragmatism" is an unapologetic think-piece by Josef Hoffmann that makes no bones about its thesis: Hammett wasn't a Communist; he was a pragmatist.

And, uh, there'sa whole shit load of other stuff coming, including about three or four months of bits and pieces that have accumulated in my in box. Be patient -- I'll get to it.

And of course we're always looking for contributions. Reviews, editorials, trivua, comments, blah blah blah. Don't worry, I don't bite.

Well, hardly...

4 Comments:

Blogger Guillaume said...

At last! I was waiting for it, was starting to despair actually. I think I have been through all the good titles in the local library, I needed to get my teeth on something else than serial killers stories (I can't stand those). I also love the new issues for their cover. This one is classy.

9:54 AM, April 29, 2009  
Blogger Kevin Burton Smith said...

Classy? And yet many of the MIKE SHAYNE covers in its last few years were actually pretty tacky...

Still, I have a ton of them tucked away in a friend's attic in Montreal.

The PQ years were actually very good for us Anglo Montrealers who prowled used bookstores. At one point in the mid-eighties, there were four or five used bookstores within a few blocks on Sherbrooke in NDG, and another six or seven between Peel and Atwater. Oh, and Russell books across from the Gazette was a great spot for old Fawcett and Dell paperbacks... Shell Scotts and Mike Shaynes from the fifties and sixties for a quarter apiece! And Mike Shayne Mystery Magazines and Manhunts for a dime!!!!

10:19 PM, May 15, 2009  
Blogger Guillaume said...

Classy might not have been the best term, it might actually have been the most inacurate one I could come up with, but I love the cover anyway.

Well, I'm glad you think the PQ time was not all bad, although I doubt they had anything to do with it. The PQ years were also very good for crime fiction in Quebec, although it had nothing to do with them: we got Omertà, the greatest (and maybe one and only) crime tv series in our television history in the 90s, we also had a gang war that and simultaneous police hunt that could have inspired generations of crime writers.

3:27 AM, May 17, 2009  
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2:28 AM, January 15, 2010  

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