The Way 2008 Crumbles, Cookie-Wise

Whatever you're doing, whether it's sipping beer and gnawing on a fried chicken leg in front of the TV, or wishing Ms. Kubelik were with you instead of that philandering bastard Sheldrake, or straining spaghetti with a tennis racket while you down the dregs of someone else's martini, or running out to the store for a last-minute order of those little cheese crackers you used to keep around the place... Secret Dead Blog wishes you a Happy New Year.

Me? I'll be hanging out with the Bride, the Brood, and a priest who loves to shoot guns, drink scotch, and talk about exorcisms. (It's a kind of a family tradition.)

See you on the flipside...

My Favorite Read of 2009 (so far)

I know, I'm a day early. But I picked up Josh Bazell's Beat the Reaper yesterday at Barnes & Noble, suckered in by the cover (along with a faint recollection of hearing about this novel at some point) and sucker-punched by these opening lines:

So I'm on my way to work and I stop to watch a pigeon fight a rat in the snow, and some fuckhead tries to mug me! Naturally there's a gun.

What follows is a raw, funny, violent thrill ride that blends two great tastes that are rarely tasted together: the medical thriller and the mob novel. (With a little bit of World War II revenge story thrown in for good measure.) You've got the medical- geekspeak of Michael Crichton mixed up with some fine, in-your-face attitude a la Don Winslow or Charlie Huston, sometimes in the same sentence:

I'm thinking too slowly to deal with the Squillante problem, though, so I crush a Moxfane with my fingertips and snort it out of the declivity you can make at the end of your wrist by sticking your thumb out as far from your hand as it will go.

Beat the Reaper is packed with great little weird throwaways like this. It's one of those rare novels where voice is king, and man, what a voice. Bazell also does a neat trick with a split narrative: present day events in the present-tense, and chapter-long flashbacks in past tense... which sounds like a mess, but he pulls it off beautifully. There's no pretentious, ooh-ma-look-at-me writing, but there is plenty of seriously smart writing, the kind that makes writers stop reading for a minute and seethe with jealousy. (At least this writer did.)

If you received any bookstore gift cards over the holidays, I heartily recommend exchanging some of them for this kick-ass novel.

In the Words of English Glam Rockers Slade...

... Merry Xmas, Everybody. Hope you find happiness waiting for you under the tree. And sometimes, happiness is a blue leisure suit.

Out Today: Iron Fist 3099

Rail vodka? Check. Cigs? Check. Lottery tickets? Check. Cardboard money envelopes for bratty nieces and nephews? Check. Immortal Iron Fist #21: Wah-Sing Rand and the Mandate of Heaven? What? You mean you haven't picked up this year's must-have Christmas Eve stocking stuffer? What's wrong with you, man? Have you no holiday spirit? Do you have a lump of dead tissue where your heart should be? Get to your local comic shop and take care of this immediately. (Yes, they're open today. Perfect for last-minute gifts!)

Buying the Kielbasa

Finally, Secret Dead Blog enters what I like to call the "Bill Crider Age."

More than two years ago, Mr. Crider brought the wonderful world of internet video to crime fiction, taping snazzy 15 to 30 (maybe even 60) second interviews with everyone from Allan Guthrie (who was caught shopping for a pink baby t-shirt) to Joe Lansdale to Victor Gischler to... well, a whole bunch of cool people.

It was fun. We all dug it.

Now that the Secret Dead Blog Family camcorder has died and gone to heaven (literally... the damned thing only records images bathed in this blazing white light), I bought a modern-day replacement: one of those Flip HD cameras everybody's yapping about. Our Flip arrived today, and as promised, I was shooting video within seconds. Above is a 13-second sample, shot at the Lachowitz Polish Market in Bridesburg, where the Secret Dead Blog Family was engaged in the biannual purchasing of the kielbasa (both fresh and smoked). Not bad for a tiny hunk of plastic, huh?

And... it's in the glory of HD. Does Crider bring you footage in HD? I think not.

Anyway, this is but a mere taste of what (probably) awaits you in 2009: short clips of weird shit shot on the Flip HD. I'll probably share some scenes from the Goodis Memorial in January. Definitely some clips from New York Comic Con in February. And beyond that... who knows? As they say, stay tuned.

A Goodis Gathering

Aaron Finestone asked me to pass this along: an invitation to a graveside memorial service for Philly noir legend David Goodis. (I'll definitely be there.)

"January cold came in from two rivers, formed four walls around Hart and closed in on him." —Black Friday

The night of January 25 is the anniversary of the death of David Loeb Goodis according to the Hebrew Calendar. In honor of the Great Philadelphia Noir Writer, Louis Boxer and Aaron Finestone are staging a gathering to remember David Goodis on the afternoon of January 25 at Roosevelt Memorial Park, 2701 Old Lincoln Highway, Trevose, PA 19053 (215-673-7500), just over the Bucks County line from Philadelphia. The grave is located at Section B-3, Lot 324, Grave 3.

After David's funeral, friends gathered at the Toddle House to remember David's outrageous humor and recount his devoted friendship. The Toddle House---at Broad and Belfield Streets in Logan---is now a vacant lot. We will re-enact the apres-funeral lunch at the Club House Diner, 2495 Street Road (between Knights and Mechanicsville Road, 215-639-4287) in Bensalem, a few minutes from Roosevelt Cemetery.

The memorial begins at 2 p.m. The luncheon begins at 3 p.m. At graveside we will read excerpts from David Goodis' coldest, most gripping works.

If you would be interested in attending, would you please email us (lboxer1@gmail.com and microbrewjournalism@gmail.com). Your email would not be binding. We just want to give an estimate to the restaurant.

What better way to spend a cold January afternoon.

Looking forward to seeing you January 25.

Hard Case Goes Widescreen

I love this cover to next September's Hard Case Crime release, Losers Live Longer, by Russell Atwood. HHC honcho Charles Ardai writes in his most recent e-mail newsletter:

The book will be printed and bound the ordinary way, but in order for you to read the cover properly you'll need to hold the book sideways. (There are a few examples of sideways covers back in the pulp days, and we thought it would be fun to do one in our line.)

I know that the Regency Books edition of Jim Thompson's The Grifters was printed sideways, but can anyone remember any others?

Probable Claus

If only there was a Punisher who, instead of waging a one-man war against the mob, waged a one-man war against drunk idiots who dress up like Santa Claus and chant "Ho Ho Ho" as they roam the streets of New York Fucking City. Because that would be cool to watch.

Has Anyone Ever...

... seen a character in a movie/novel/story/comic die by being impaled on a spire of St. Pat's Cathedral? Because... I mean... well, will you just look at that damned thing from 67 stories up?

Someday, Son, All of This Will Be Yours

For the record, the view from the Top of the Rock is fairly damn sweet. The kids were fascinated/terrified, which, to me, is what family holiday trips are all about.

Punishing Times

I know, I've been slow on the updates lately. I owe you an Iron Fist annotation. But I've been under the deadline gun all week, and the next few days look like more of the same. (It's been so bad, it looks like I won't even have a chance to see Punisher War Zone before it disappears from theaters.) So in the meantime... enjoy Dave Johnson's sweet cover from Punisher: Frank Castle #69, the fourth issue in my arc, "Six Hours to Kill." (And thanks to SDB reader Arsh Dhadwal for tipping me off to it early.)

Car Wars

There's a quick post over at Mystery*File (one of my favorite crimegeek sites) comparing James Sallis's kick-ass Drive and my own bank heist novel, The Wheelman. Both were published October 2005, thereby damning my novel to be known as "the other bank heist novel published in October 2005." But I'm very happy with Ted Fitzgerald's review, which you can check out right here.

Fight the Future

Today's new comics day (yes, on Thursday, no thanks to Thanksgiving), so be sure to pick up your copies of Cable #9 and Immortal Iron Fist #20.

I know budgets are extra tight these days, so huge thanks to all of you who spend the money on my stuff anyway, month after month.

Meanwhile, there's totally free sneak peak at Iron Fist #21 (a stand alone set in 3099) over at Marvel.com, as well as me nattering on about it. (Did I just use the word nattering?) Anyway, it hits Christmas Eve. Can you think of a better stocking stuffer for the nerd in your life?

My Childhood is Moldy

Behold: my birthright. It's a Tyco train set, along with a half-dozen or so plastic models of buildings. (There's a farm, gas station, split-level home, factory, church... in other words, the essentials.) Best as I can recall, this little fake town was set up under our family Christmas tree from Christmas 1972 until the early 1980s. Eventually we stopped setting up, though it seems to have made a reappearance somewhere around 1990, as evidenced by a set of tickets for a live Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle show I found in the box. (I have no idea. Must have been something my sisters attended.) I think about this train set around this time of the year, when we drag the Christmas decorations out of garage. I think: Man, I should ask my Dad if he still has that train set. Nothing reminds me of Christmas like that set.

Turns out, the Bride did the asking for me, and today, she carried three small, wet, moldy boxes into our house. My birthright.

I didn't know it was mine, but my Mom told the Bride the set had been purchased for me when I was a baby. So I was welcome to it.

Like everything from childhood, the set was a lot smaller than I remembered. I was imagining this huge, elaborate townscape... but instead, it's a fairly small collection of trains and models. And they were very wet. I don't know if they were left out in the rain one night or countless nights. Right now they're drying out in the laundry room.

I have serious doubts about the trains working. The model houses (the gas station especially) needs some hot glue and love. But I'm determined to set everything up this year under our tree, just so that someday I'll be able to bequeath a few small, wet, moldy boxes to my own son.

And the circle of life continues...

Opening Shots: The Vision

"Gloves of blood."

The Vision
by Dean Koontz
(Putnam, 1977)

My earlier post on Koontz and Cain reminded me of this novel. It's one of my favorites because it applies a spare Cain-like style to a supernatural horror story. In her Koontz bio, Katherine Ramsland writes that Koontz "had noticed how many contemporary horror novels were written in a dense, baroque style, and he pondered what it would be like to cross horror with the stripped-down language of the fast-paced detective fiction of the 1930s." This "experiment" became The Vision. If only more horror novels cooked like this one.

Koontz on Cain

One of the first books I read about writing was Dean Koontz's How to Write Best Selling Fiction (Writer's Digest Books, 1982). It must have been 1984 or 1985, when I was maybe 12 or 13, and I borrowed it from the Frankford Branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia. I picked up a copy a while back and last night, in a post-turkey haze, thumbed through it again. I was really happy to find this bit about James M. Cain:

The Postman Always Rings Twice is as readable and poignant and relevant as it was when it first saw print. Indeed, Postman reads as if it were written last week! Cain was so in touch with the people about whom he wrote, so intimately familiar with the fears and desires of the masses in the 1920s and 1930s, that he seems to have known not only how the common man and woman talked and thought at the time, but also how they would talk and think for decades to come. I am not aware of another American writer of our century whose books have been so utterly untouched by the passage of so many years, as have Cain's.

What was true in 1982 is still true today; Cain's novels (especially his earliest) are as crisp and raw as they were during the last time America tumbled a severe economic downturn (a.k.a., The Great Depression).

And Koontz's guide is still full of excellent advice. Copies are hard to track down these, but if you can find one, I heartily recommend it. The last chapter, "Read Read Read," was a real eye-opener, because it was as if Koontz was subconsciously planting a reading list (Bester, Chandler, Ellison, Hammett, Leonard, Levin, MacDonald, McBain, Stark) in my brain that I'd follow for the next, oh, 25 years.

Happy Thanksgiving, Everybody!

I present to you: another photographic absurdity from my childhood. Dig in!

Nerdery Update

Steve Ekstrom forced me to cough up the latest on my various comic projects, and the resulting Q&A can be found at Newsarama.com. (Possibly interesting aside: I was in the Marvel offices today when the above image, from Cable #11, was sent to Newsarama for inclusion in this Q&A.)

Well, There Goes the Workday

Google now has millions of classic photographs from Life Magazine in a searchable online database. Above: Dashiell Hammett smoking in Hollywood, circa 1937. Just one of the random gems I found in just a few minutes. Must write... must not search for photos all morning... must hit daily writing goal...

must

... stop

searching...

A Book I Want to Read Right Now, Damnit

Yesterday Bookseller.com (and the Rap Sheet) reported that UK publishing house Quercus picked up the rights to a long-lost Mario Puzo novel: Six Graves to Munich. It was published under a pen name ("Mario Cleri") just a year before The Godfather. Not only do I love the sound of this, but I'm a fan of those late 1960s Banner paperbacks, which include David Goodis's last novel, Somebody's Done For, a cool reprint of David Karp's Hardman, as well as Gil Brewer's The Tease and Sin For Me. And Puzo/Cleri novel looks just as cheesy/cool. But can a used copy be found anywhere online? Nope. Looks like I'm going to have to wait until next June to check this out... and even then, I'm sure it'll feature some sleek, perfect bestseller-y kind of cover, a far cry from the pulpy glory of the original Banner cover.

Philadelphia Confidential

Today I spent some time looking through some microfilm copies of the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin from 1959. Back then, the Bulletin was Philly's top newspaper, and I figured that flipping through a few issues would give me a feel for the city at that time. Boy did it. Here are some of the headlines from a single week's worth of stories:

Woman Seized In Murder Plot
Secretary Planned to Hire Killer

Docker Chokes One Man, Beats 2d to Death
"I Gave Him All I Had" Attacker Tells the Police

Another Girl Is Slashed
She Is Cut on Head In North Phila. Street

GI Admits Slashing Debbie, 7 Others
Was Seized In Molesting Of 2 Boys

Chained to Bed in Plant, Girl Job Seeker Tells Police

Slashed to Death In Fight Over Check

Boy, 14, Kills Grandmother With Ice Pick
Victim, 82, Had Reported Him As Runaway

I had no idea that slashing was so popular in the late 1950s.

Photo from PhillyHistory.org.

My February Comics

Here's what is on deck from me at Marvel this coming February (my birthday month, coincidentally). Your eyes are not deceiving you; there are five issues here, all in one short month. This makes me seem ridiculously prolific -- but honest, these were written at different times over the past year.

PUNISHER: FRANK CASTLE #67
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Penciled by MICHEL LACOMBE
Cover by DAVE JOHNSON
“SIX HOURS TO KILL, PART 2: FIELD DAY”
W.C. Fields once mused that he’d rather be dead than play Philadelphia. Well, if you cross paths with Frank Castle, you’ll be able to have it both ways. Castle has been injected with a slow-acting poison that will kill him in less than hours—but don’t think he’s going to spend them moping around. As long as blood is still pumping through his rock-hard veins, the Punisher plans on killing as many dirtbags as possible. But the Philadelphia underworld isn’t going to roll over so easily. Neither is the top-secret black bag ops unit that dosed Frank. And don’t forget the Mayor of Philadelphia, who only sees one way of saving his already-shaky political career: killing Frank way before his six hours are up.
32 PGS./Explicit Content ...$3.99

DEAD OF NIGHT FEATURING WEREWOLF BY NIGHT #2 (of 4)
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Pencils & Cover by MICO SUAYAN
Jack Russell is in serious trouble. The police have made him their prime suspect in a brutal murder...and they don’t even realize the full moon turns him into a vicious, blood-thirsty predator! But Jack is innocent – at least as far as he can remember – and with the clock ticking and the authorities on his trail, he goes looking for answers...and redemption! It’s a gruesome, grisly MAX take on one of Marvel’s horror legends, by Duane Swierczynski (IMMORTAL IRON FIST) and Mico Suayan (MOON KNIGHT)!
32 PGS./Explicit Content ...$3.99


IMMORTAL IRON FIST #23
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Penciled by TRAVEL FOREMAN
Cover by PATRICK ZIRCHER
Danny and the Immortal Weapons from the Seven Capital Cities of Heaven begin to discover the shocking, shameful secrets of the Capital City of Hell. But what does it mean for K’un-Lun, and for our world? And how will each of them overcome the absolute worst and most terrifying enemies they’ve ever faced? It’s kung fu super hero horror action by Duane Swierczynski and Travel Foreman!
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$2.99


CABLE #11
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Pencils by JAMIE McKELVIE
Cover by ARIEL OLIVETTI
“WASTELAND BLUES,” PART 1 OF 2
Deep in the future, Cable and the now seven-year-old mutant messiah find themselves in the middle of humanity’s last stand. And humanity loses! Cable is forced to timeslide into an uncertain future, hoping to find survivors, or food, or water… anything. But the longer Cable and the girl wander, the greater the devastation. As they fight to survive out in the barren wastelands, the girl starts to ask Cable the tough questions he’s been dreading—namely: who am I, and why do some people want me dead?
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$2.99


Finally, February brings a brand-new mini-series, announced here for the first time (and of special interest to Cable/X-Men fans):

X-MEN: THE TIMES AND LIFE OF LUCAS BISHOP #1 (OF 3)
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Pencils by LARRY STROHMAN
Cover by ARIEL OLIVETTI
"Memories of the Monster"
By now you know that Lucas Bishop—former cop, renegade X-Man—refuses to rest until he's killed the so-called "mutant messiah." But do you know why? To answer that question you have to look into Bishop's past…which actually means jumping 50 years into the future, when his parents barely escaped a nuclear holocaust, only to land in the most brutal "mutant relocation" camp in the world. There, a young Bishop first heard the horror stories about the green-eyed monster that ushered in the the downfall of mutantkind, and swore vengeance -- embarking on a life-long, time-hopping mission that begins here, in this special three-part mini-series. You haven't heard the "Messiah Complex" story until you've heard Bishop's side of the story…
32 PGS./Rated T+… $3.99

The Clown

People often ask me why I write such dark/weird stuff. And I've never had a really good answer... until now. Just stumbled across this photo of myself, at what? Maybe a year old, if that? I'm in my bedroom at 4738 Darrah Street, which was the middle room. And on the wall behind me is the clown my father painted.

This was no ordinary clown. If you click on the photo to see a bigger version, you might notice the shelf the clown is holding with arms that come right out of the fucking wall. Arms that could conceivably drop the shelf and reach down for that innocent toddler sitting there with a dazed expression on his face.

People, I grew up thinking those arms were going to come out of the fucking wall and grab me.

Look at me. I'm so scared, I don't even realize that I have some kind of wrapped gift in my hands. I'm not thinking about gifts or toys; I'm thinking about the clown. That the moment I turn my head even a few inches to the left is the moment it's going to come out of the fucking wall and grab me.

And check out the clown's face. This is no jolly entertainer. This is a crazy man on a drug/booze bender who decided to slap on some facepaint and scare the living crap out of whomever he encountered.

I know my Dad meant well. Instead of buying some lame kiddie furnishings, he took the time to create this one-of-a-kind image on the wall of his first-born son's bedroom. Maybe he thought it would be funny. Maybe he thought the clown would become my imaginary playmate. Or, maybe he dropped one too many tabs of LSD in Vietnam.

Still, I suppose I do owe my career to my Dad and that clown. Because at the heart of everything I write, beneath the plot and characters and dialogue and rest of that fancy nonsense, down at the most primal level, there is only this:

There are clowns.

And they have arms that can come out of the fucking walls and grab you.

Two Months Until Six Hours

Wizard Universe.com just posted some sneak peeks at Michel Lacombe's art for Punisher: Frank Castle #66, the first issue of our story arc, "Six Hours to Kill." You'll be able to read the whole darn thing January 21, 2009.

A Quantum of Free Time

Over a week without a post? Lame, I know. But I've been hit with a couple of deadlines at the same time, and most days, the thought of slapping a few extra words into this little white rectangle seemed about as appealing as crawling across a few extra inches of broken glass. I mean, it's no big deal, I'm already bleeding... but there's no pressing need, either.

Ever since I became a full-time freelance comic book writer/novelist/whatever, I've tried to hit a daily goal, and it is this: five comic script pages and at least one thousand words of a novel/fiction. The daily emails, proofreading, corrections, edits, Q&As... that's all extra. At the core of my writing day are those five script pages, and those thousand words (which is about four pages of double-spaced typed text).

I figured if I could keep that up, I'd be on fire. Five script pages x four days = twenty pages, which is just two pages shy of a full comic script. And one thousand words a day x 30 days x 2 months = first draft of a decent-sized short novel (60,000 words).

So do I hit my daily goal? Well...

I've found that my fancy "daily goal" plan doesn't factor in what I call the "recharging my batteries" factor. When on deadline, I can write like a demon for a few days, back to back. I might crank out as many as 10 script pages, or 2 or 3,000 words of fiction. But if I try to push it that an extra day, my brain refuses to give me anything useable.

And that's the problem: I'm still a creature of deadlines. I do work ahead, and I do manage to hit my daily more often than not. But my brain really doesn't kick into high gear until the clock is ticking. Which works... until I experience something like the last two weeks, when there were several clocks ticking all at once -- each slightly out of phase with each other -- and the noise made me want to leap from a church bell tower. Scripts aren't due a week at a time; sometimes, I need to produce two in a given week. When this happens, there is no time for recharging batteries. There is no try; there is only do.

All I can say is: thank God I love the doing.

Secret Dead Blog Recommends: Once Were Cops

Ken Bruen's novels are the closest thing we have to hardboiled poetry. Once Were Cops, his latest knockout standalone, muscles it even further in that direction, to the point where you're not sure where novel ends and poetry begins.

You can see it the moment you open the book. The pages aren't dense with paragraphs; there are shotgun-pattern blasts of sentences, dialogue, and sometimes, single words. You don't read it so much as let it assault you.

Ken's genius is that he packs so much meaning into each little pellet of birdshot.

He only describes something when he means it, not when he wants to fill out a graph or a page. He breaks out the dialogue so that you can really hear it, not breeze by it. He drags you into some psycho's world, and damn if you're not there, listening to him mumble in your mind.

Ken happens to be blogging this week at Moments in Crime, St. Martin's Minotaur's house blog, and in a post earlier this week, he revealed a bit of his process:

Like my novels, I actually write much lengthier entries and then root out all that sounds off.

I read it aloud and if it doesn't have that jagged tone of real speech, bin it.

Ken bins only the filler, never the killer. Once Were Cops has a beautiful twisting plot that never telegraphs its punches, as well as a collection of unsavory and sadistic fuckers that you somehow compel you to stay with them, no matter what unsavory and sadistic things they do. (And God, what they do in this novel...)

I can't recommend this one enough.

Michael Crichton, RIP

Not a good couple of months for mystery/thriller writers (or their fans), I've got to say. First James Crumley, then Tony Hillerman, and now Michael Crichton. Oddly enough, my first Crichton wasn't one of his thrillers, but his non-fiction collection, Travels, which I read just after my senior year of high school. It absolutely fascinated me, and almost made me wish I was pursuing a life of medicine (despite the fact that the sight of blood makes me dizzy) and/or traveling the world instead of wasting my time pursuing an English degree. I was a fan of Jurassic Park before the movies, and have my review from the La Salle Collegian to prove it. I also remember being embarrased when the father of a friend of mine pointed out that the author's last name was pronounced "cry-ton," not "crick-tin."

Last night I picked up Zero Cool, a Hard Case reprint of a early Crichton novel (published under the name John Lange) and was again knocked out by how good Crichton was so early in his career. I'm pretty sure he wrote these early thrillers while in medical school. (Which is depressing to a guy who has nothing but a bunch of partial manuscripts to show for his undergrad years.)

I'm sad that we're not going to be seeing any new Crichton books, but grateful for the ones we have. I wonder how Travels holds up, nearly 20 years later...

Swierczy Annotates: Immortal Iron Fist #19

Okay, so we're going to try the annotation thing. Got my copy of Immortal Iron Fist #19 cracked open; let's see what jumps out at me.

(Obligatory Spoiler Warning: This annotation might give away some plot points. So read the issue first. Seriously. It'll make this so much cooler.)

Pages 1-3
The Thunderer's Army vs. the Ch'i-Lin in 1878.
Just want to note, for the record, how much I love Russ Heath. I first encountered his stuff in the pages of the Warren horror comics, and never dreamed I'd have the chance to work with him. That is all. Please pardon the gushing. (But c'mon; look at that Ch'iLin running through the snow on page 3! How freakin' cool is that?)

Page 4
Danny takes a call.
Part of the genius of Travel Foreman is his small, intricate, action-packed panels. At the bottom of this page Travel added an extra panel or two to show Danny on his way to Harlem, and I had to recalibrate the captions. But that was totally fine with me, because the sequence is so much better for it.

Page 6
Danny's students turn on each other.
As originally conceived in my beatsheet, this was going to be about the students attacking Danny and Luke Cage. Who couldn't really fight back because... well, their attackers were kids. But my editor, Warren Simons, wasn't totally sold on it; at the end of the day, he argued, it was still a bunch of kids attacking two of the toughest MFs in New York City. So I brooded for a while, and came up with what you see here. This is what a good editor does: forces you to come up with something better.

Page 8
Enter the Weapons.
In my very first draft of my very first Iron Fist script (#17), I had the Immortal Weapons (Fat Cobra, Bride of Nine Spiders, et al) at Danny's birthday party. I wanted to reassure longtime IF fans that I was definitely keeping the Weapons around. But Warren suggested we wait on revealing them, and I'm so glad we did.

Also: those terse descriptions are a tip o' the mask to Matt Fraction.

Pages 9-10
Ch'i-Lin vs. Danny and the Weapons vs. the Students
I try to give Travel an action-packed spread whenever possible, because he's so damned good at them.

Page 14
Zhou talks his master.
I based this page on some conversations I've had with some of my previous bosses. (Seriously.)

Page 15, Panel 2
Danny talks to Ernst.
Finally... at long last... Iron Fist fans everywhere can enjoy a topless shot of the very hirsute Ernst Erskine. (As Simon and Garfunkel once said: "I'm just tryin' to keep the customer satisfied.") I was also dying to bring Ernst back for a little cameo; I don't think he has much time left on earth.

Page 17, Panel 2
Orson escapes the Ch'i-Lin.
Some readers have asked if Orson started using heroin because of the Ch'i-Lin; I think it was for a bunch of reasons... including the Ch'i-Lin. Check out the nice detail Travel includes in the second panel here: the very, very faint imprint of the dragon on Orson's chest, like it's ready to vanish for good.

Page 18, Panel 9
Searching Zhou's apartment.
Another great Travel extra here: one of Dog Brother's dogs, sniffing around. Not scripted; wish I'd thought of it.

Page 19
Nadine and Danny.
In my beatsheet, I had Nadine sneaking up on Danny with a needle. But that seemed a bit implausible, even though I love me a good needle scene. So I went with coffee. I'm a big fan of using ordinary household objects (dental floss, paperclips, coffee) as murder weapons.

Page 20, Panel 3
Nadine.
Very nice bit of lettering here.

Page 20, Panel 7
Zhou and Nadine.
When my wife is being sweet-yet-sarcastic, she calls me "my love." So yes, I partially based the Iron Fist Slayer on my wife.

A Nerd and His Process, Pt. 2

In the last installment, I left you hanging at the beatsheet. (Didn't read the previous installment? Go! Go now! We'll wait for you.) A beatsheet is basically an outline, detailing the major story "beats" in an issue.

Some writers whip out something quick and dirty; others (I've heard) go nuts with detail. I land somewhere between the two extremes. To me, the point is to show your editor what you have in mind, and what will happen on each page. Broad strokes, but with some level of detail that will reassure the editor that, yes, you have thought about this at some length, and you're not just pulling it out of your ass a few minutes before deadline.

I usually break it down into scenes, starting with how many pages I think it'll take. For instance (from my beatsheet for Immortal Iron Fist #19):

[3 pages]

New York City. Now.

Danny suits up into his Iron Fist gear and speeds across the city, leaping over rooftops, through buildings—all of that cool shit.

Danny and Cage meet outside the school. Danny looks down at his fist, which is flickering out. “He’s here.”

And then—

Out of the shadows, dozens of screaming children attack. Danny’s own students. But they’re mesmerized, just like the West Texas townsfolk were mesmerized, and the San Francisco strikers were mesmerized.

It's just a rough idea of what'll happen on those pages. If you've read Iron Fist #19, you'll see that these pages play out differently. That's because when I reached the scripting stage (and revision stage), I let the story open up, and tried to listen to my characters, instead of forcing them into my little beats. But again, at this stage, it's still broad-strokesville.

I'll throw in a little dialogue, just to give my editor a little variety. Dialogue is easy to read; I used to be an editor, and know what it's like to slog through graph after graph of narrative.

My beatsheets tend to be 1,000 words or so, sometimes a little longer. (I just checked the most recent beatsheet I turned in, for Punisher: Frank Castle #69: it was 1,025 words.)

The page counts are my best guesstimate. Sometimes, in the heat of scripting, I'll want to open up an action scene so the artist can go crazy. But again, all the page count does is tell your editor that yeah, you thought about pacing, and here's how you see it playing out.

Interestingly, I don't outline (or beatsheet) my novels. With The Wheelman and Severance Package especially, I was just winging it. Outlining tends to kill the fun for me.

But in comics, I find it essential. (And other comic creators I've met over the past year say the same thing.) I once tried to wing a script without doing a beatsheet, and it was like baking a cake without flour: the thing just fell apart in my hands. Even if I end up changing a lot of what appears in the beatsheet, I still have to go through the process.

Imagine there's a hunk of clay in front of you. You work it until the thing vaguely resembles a human being. Yep, there's the head, the torso, the arms and legs. Got it all in front of you, right? But now it's time for the fine details, to really make this thing look real--the shape of the eyes, the thickness of the fingers, the muscles of the legs. The things that will make people stop and enjoy your work.

Well, consider the beatsheet to be the vague human shape. The next part, of course, is the scriptwriting, which we'll hit in the next installment. Check back soon...

A Nerd and His Process, Pt. 1

Yesterday I asked if readers would be interested in seeing regular posts with "DVD extra-style" commentary/annotation for the comics I write. I was very surprised by the reaction. (I would have been happy with a single "meh, whatever, loser.") So look for my first, on Immortal Iron Fist #19, in a few days.

But I thought it would be smart to kick things off by answering a question that "Marty" posted in the comments yesterday:

Please also--if possible--talk a little about what it takes to plan out and write a comic.

You got it, Marty. (Feel free to stop reading if I start putting you all to sleep.) But let start with a caveat: this just one guy's process, not The Process. I'm still very new at this comic scripting thing. I've been doing it for about a year and a half now, and if my math is right, I've just started working on my 30th script. So yeah... still kind of green.

But this is what works for me, and if makes any sense to you guys, all the better.

Every issue starts with a pitch. If I'm invited to pitch a one-shot issue, I'll usually give the editor three or four ideas, no more than a paragraph each. For example, here the pitch I sent Axel Alonso for a Punisher Max one-shot. It would eventually be published as "Force of Nature," but at the time (March 2007) I was calling it "Wrecked":

The Punisher: Wrecked
Three Jersey wiseguys decide to go casting for bluefish off Wildwood Crest. A few miles out, both engines sputter… and stop. Their communication gear is fucked, too. They immediately know what happened: the goddamned Punisher. Water fills the boat. They set up a life raft. A storm front moves in. We spent the next 30 pages with these poor bastards, fighting for survival on the open water, accusing each other of selling them out to Frank Castle, unearthing some long-buried grudges, watching them die… until we hit a twist ending not even the Punisher could have called.

I tried to set up the story as quickly as possible ending with a little tease that, if it did its job, would have Axel calling to ask: "So... what's the twist ending?" (Note: at the time of the pitch, I didn't have one. But I made sure I did by the time Axel called.)

If it's a story arc, I'll do a much longer synopsis, maybe two to three pages, detailing the major plot points, giving a feel for the characters and what they're up against. But since I live in Philadelphia, just a quick train ride away from NYC, I try to visit the Marvel office to pitch to Axel or Warren Simons (my Iron Fist editor) in person. Not to sell them hard on the thing, or ply them with booze (though that helps), but to let the idea breathe a bit, and give us the opportunity to kick the tires. Sometimes a stray thought from Axel or Warren will take root in my mind, then blossom on the train ride home. Sometimes they'll point out the serious logic flaws, saving me a lot of future grief. And sometimes... just sometimes... I'll nail it in one line, and see their eyes light up, and boom, that's all the encouragement I need. That happened most recently with an upcoming Iron Fist story arc:

Me: "You know the Eighth City? Well, it's actually [REDACTED]."

Warren: "Dude! Go write it."

This step in the process can be that quick... or it can take several weeks of back and forth and fine-tuning and rethinking and all of that fun stuff. When it's finally approved, it comes time for the second major step: the beatsheet.

And more about that in part 2, coming soon...

New Swierczy Comics, and a Question

Just a little reminder that Immortal Iron Fist #19 is available today in comic book stores everywhere. It's the third part (of four) detailing Danny Rand's brutal struggle against the creepy dude with the monster in his throat. If you've been craving a little Fat Cobra in your diet, you might want to check this one out.

Also out today: a reprint of Wolverine Annual #2, in case you missed it the first time. It also makes an excellent Halloween present.

And now for that question: I was kicking around the idea of doing posts where I'd annotate my comics a little. No spoilers, just some DVD extra-type material, explaining why I made a particular choice, sharing a bit of trivia, revealing what #$%@! really stands for, etc. Any interest? I know I'd want to read something like this... but then again, I have strange ideas about things.

Let me know in the comments below, okay?

Opening Shots: "My Lips Destroy"

May Twentieth... I met her last night. I met her last night, and I'm marrying her tomorrow.

"My Lips Destroy"
by Cornell Woolrich
From the collection Beyond the Night
(Avon, 1959)

What I love about this one is its simple components. Little more than a dateline and two short sentences—one of them repeated, even. And it's impossible to stop reading.

A Look Inside the Castle

Newsarama today features four pages from the forthcoming Punisher: Frank Castle #66, which is the first issue in my "Six Hours to Kill" arc. The art is by the mad Canadian genius Michel Lacombe, who you may remember from my Punisher one-shot, "Force of Nature." Check it out!

Your January '09 Nerdery Preview

Somehow, I have four comics... yes, four... appearing in January 2009, and the preview blurbs were just released.

The first two are my usual monthy titles. One's the conclusion of a story arc, the other, the beginning of a new story arc:

CABLE #10
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Pencils & Cover by ARIEL OLIVETTI
“WAITING FOR THE END OF THE WORLD,”CONCLUSION
In the present, Cyclops, Emma and Beast have been ambushed by Bishop and a nasty little surprise he’s smuggled into the X-Men HQ. Meanwhile, hundreds of years in the future, Cable realizes what the former X-Man has done to the planet -- all in an effort to make sure Cable and the four-year-old mutant messiah never, ever return to the present. Once again, the rules of the hunt have been completely rewritten, and the future of mutantkind has never looked more uncertain.
32 PGS./Rated T+ …$2.99

IMMORTAL IRON FIST #22
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKi
Penciled by TRAVEL FOREMAN
Cover by PATRICK ZIRCHER
Iron Fist and the Immortal Weapons kick off another dimension-spanning adventure! Think you know everything there is to know about the Seven Capital Cities of Heaven? Well, maybe you do. But a couple of arcs ago we did tease there being an EIGHTH city...oh that’s right...Duane Swierczynski and Travel Foreman are taking it there!
32 PGS./Rated T+ ...$2.99

And the new titles are the first issues of two mini-series... both long in the making, and both under the MAX imprint:

PUNISHER: FRANK CASTLE #66
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Penciled by MICHEL LACOMBE
Cover by DAVE JOHNSON
“SIX HOURS TO KILL," PART 1
The Punisher always knew he’d die on the job. But he didn’t know he’d have an expiration date. After busting up a slave ring in downtown Philadelphia, Frank Castle has been tricked, trapped, gassed, strapped to a table and injected with a serum that will turn him into a 220-pound corpse by dawn -- six hours from now. The people who grabbed him want him to do a simple little job and then they’ll give him the antidote -- simple, right? Guess again. The Punisher is nobody’s errand boy. There’s only one thing he wants to do before he dies: Take as many bastards as he can with him.
32 PGS./Explicit Content ...$3.99

DEAD OF NIGHT FEATURING WEREWOLF BY NIGHT #1 (of 4)
Written by DUANE SWIERCZYNSKI
Pencils and Cover by MICO SUAYAN
For 28 days of the month, Jack Russell leads a normal life. He’s got a beautiful wife and a baby on the way. He’s the picture of happiness. On day 29, however, he turns into an uncontrollable, bloodthirsty monster. But as the saying goes, the best-laid plans of wolves and men...
32 PGS./Cardstock Cover/Parental Advisory ...$3.99

The Punisher series you already know about; I'm one of three crime novelists tackling Frank Castle in the wake of Garth Ennis. Right now Gregg Hurwitz is kicking ass with the title, and after my five issue run (#66-70), Victor Gischler will be donning the black t-shirt with the white skull. My story's called "Six Hours to Kill," and it's set on the mean streets of Philadelphia.

Werewolf By Night, however, is the "secret horror project with Warren Simons" that's had me almost severing my tongue for over a year now as I struggled to keep my mouth shut. This was (I think) the very first character I pitched when Warren approached me to write for Marvel. It's appropriate, because Werewolf By Night (a.k.a. Jack Russell) was the first Marvel character I ever met, in the form of a book-and-record set (at left) I received one Christmas. It scared the living fuck out of me, and probably kick-started my love of horror. One image, in particular, never left my brain: that of the werewolf, leaping over a fence, as a bullet shred his furry bicep. It was the real world smacking into the horror world, and it was the launchig pad for this new story.

I'll blog more about it when we're closer to the pub date, but it's finally nice to be able to talk about it.

Paperbacked

Yesterday, Philly Poe Guy and I made our second annual trip to Gary Lovisi's NYC Vintage Paperback & Collectable Book Expo to get our hardcore book nerdin' on. (For the record: Sunday morning is the best time to drive from Philly to NYC. It takes something like 90 minutes, from turnpike to tunnel. The rest of the week? Take the train.) We shopped for about an hour and a half, and I walked away with...

The Philadelphia Murder Story (Leslie Ford). Hands down, the find of the day. Only $1, with a cool Philly map on the back! (I bought nine others on this list for a buck each, too.) BTW, if you click on the map above, I used to live near #6: the Warwick Hotel.

The Pitfall (Jay J. Dratler) Just read about this one in Kevin Johnson's The Dark Page. Looks cool. Never heard of Dratler before.

Winter Kill and Giveaway (Steve Fisher). I've been looking for more Fisher after enjoying the Hard Case reprint of No House Limit. He was buddies with Cornell Woolrich, back in the day.

The Name of the Game Is Death (Dan J. Marlowe). I own the Black Lizard edition; this is the original Gold Medal edition, which is allegedly different. We'll see...

One Endless Hour (Marlowe). I have a later Gold Medal edition, but this is an earlier one, with cooler cover art. Me: sucker for cover art.

Shake Him Till He Rattles (Malcom Braly). Ed Gorman recommends Braly. Ed speaks, I listen.

The Lurking Man (Gerald Butler). I loved Butler's Kiss the Blood off My Hands. This was originally published under the title Mad With Much Heart. And no, this is not the dude who starred in 300.

The Hoodlum, a.k.a. Kiss of Death (Eleazar Lipsky). Picked this up because of the film noir connection, but also because it's a Lion paperback, and my collection has far to few Lions.

The Case of the Violent Virgin/The Case of the Bouncing Betty (Michael Avallone). An Ace Double Novel from the "Fastest Typewriter in the East." I've hawked books from Avallone's old desk at Port Richmond Books.

Stop This Man! (Peter Rabe). Early Rabe. Ridiculous yet awesome title. ("Wait, which man? Ohhhh... this man.")

Lady in Peril/Wired for Scandal (Lester Dent/Floyd Wallace). Another Ace Double. Dent wrote the Doc Savage novels, and far too few hardboiled stories under his own name.

I Should Have Stayed Home (Horace McCoy). Passed up this paperback last year, regretted it. Found it again this year.

The Bedroom Bolero (Avallone). More Avallone. Way sleazy-looking.

Creeps by Night (edited by Dashiell Hammett). A collection of horror stories introduced by Hammett, who probably cranked out his essay in 10 minutes between gin gimlets. But still... it's Hammett.

Bring Him Back Dead/There Was a Crooked Man (Day Keene). Al "Sunshine" Guthrie's favorite paperback writer. And it's a rare Lancer Books "2 for 1" edition, which was probably Lancer trying to eat Avon's lunch and gagging.

The Scarf and Terror (Robert Bloch). Joe Lansdale's favorite paperback suspense writer. I've been looking for the former for a while; never heard of the latter. I wonder if it was reprinted under a different title.

Duel and Other Horror Stories of the Road (edited by William Pattrick). Impulse buy, with contributions from Richard Matheson, Stephen King, Roald Dahl, Jack Finney, and... Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? A road story? Really?

Do Not Murder Before Christmas (Jack Iams). Me: sucker for holiday mystery novels. And you know what? I read half of this last night, and it's flat-out fantastic. The action is set in an unnamed city, but I swear it reads an awful lot like Philadelphia. I did some internet digging this morning (when I should have been writing) and learned that Iams was a lifelong journalist, and his son, David Iams, was the longtime Philadelphia Inquirer society columnist. Need to do more research on this. We might have another forgotten Philly mystery writer on our hands... stay tuned.

Chicago Confidential (Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer). I have the New York and Washington D.C. editions of this non-fiction series; now the trinity is compelte!

Murder on Delivery (Spencer Dean). I read about this series somewhere. Can't remember where. Picked it up anyway. It was a buck!

Obit Delayed (Helen Nielsen). Nielsen's great. I have some of her Black Lizard reprints.

Scratch a Thief/My Pal, the Killer (John Trinian/Chester Warwick). The second title is flat-out awesome.

The Mourner (Richard Stark). Own it... but not in this Pocket edition!

Color Him Dead (Charles Runyon). Went through a Runyon kick a year ago; this is one I haven't read.

Shoot the Works, What Really Happened, Murder by Proxy, The Uncomplaining Corpses (Brett Halliday). I'll never pass up a Mike Shayne for a buck a piece.

I also picked up some Gryphon Books (Lovisi's own publishing house):

Paperback Parade #69
Paperback Parade #70
Antique Trader Collectible Paperback Price Guide (by Gary Lovisi)
Hardboiled #38
If You Have Tears, by Howard Browne

Anybody out there read any of the above? Anybody know more about Jack Iams?

Opening Shots: Giveaway

"I admit I have this habit of noticing dames."

Giveaway
by Steve Fisher
(Bantam, October 1955)

Fisher is the author of the classic I Wake Up Screaming, and the recent Hard Case Crime reprint, No House Limit. Book cover scan from the excellent BookScans Database.

The Long Set-Up

One thing I didn't buy at B'Con, but very much wanted to: a fine first edition of Joseph Moncure March's hardboiled boxing poem, The Set-Up (which was turned into a 1949 film noir starring Robert Ryan and Audrey Totter). It was the original 1928 Covici hardcover, complete with ultra-rare dust jacket. Alas, at $1250, I would have returned home to Philadelphia a divorced man.

So I did the next best thing: found a beat-up used copy, third printing, at Amazon.com. No dustjacket, but then again, it was only $25 (about a fiftieth of the price). It arrived yesterday, and inside were two details that made it so much cooler than the $1250 edition.

First: the book was clearly a gift, because inside it was inscribed:

To Hal, my friend
Xmas '28

Frank

Second: there was a little stamp on the inside back cover, indicating that Frank bought this copy at the Hollywood Book Store (see above). I know exactly where this store used to be. The Hollywood Hotel was on the northwest corner of Hollywood and Highland*, now a huge entertainment/shopping/tourist complex. Across the street (according to the stamp) is a collection of tourist shop, just down the block from the El Capitan movie theater.

So back in 1928, some guy named Frank wandered into this shop in the heart of Hollywood and picked up The Set-Up for his friend Hal. God knows what happened to Hal. But his copy somehow ended up in a used bookstore, and offered for online sale. Now it's going to be in my collection until I die, and maybe someday somebody else will pick it up, and wonder about Hal and Frank.

I love stuff like this.

(* In last month's Immortal Iron Fist: Orson Randall and the Death Queen of California, much of the early action takes right around Hollywood and Highland... in 1928.)

Secret Dead Blog Recommends...

... Kevin Johnson's The Dark Page, which I picked up at B'Con last week. It's an oversized, gorgeous survey of classic mystery and crime novels (and otherwise) that were adapted into 1940s noir films. With each entry comes a full page, full color photo of the first edition of these novels. I've been savoring this book for over a week now. It's like porn for noir/pulpheads. And while the price is a bit dear ($95), especially in these lean times (hey! just like the 1940s!), I ask you: How much blood or plasma do you really need, anyway?

... Tom Piccirilli's brand-spankin' new blog, The Cold Spot. Bookmark it. Savor it. Pic's the man.

... Hulu.com for making David Cronenberg's Naked Lunch available online for free. I saw this fucked-up freakfest back in my college days, and watching it again last week (when I should have been writing) was a blast.

... the Iliad Bookshop in lovely downtown Burbank, California. I've been meaning to mention this shop ever since visiting it a few weeks ago. At the time, I was bookless in Universal City., having whipped through Stephen Hunter's Night of Thunder in record time. I was also carless, so I couldn't drive out to either the Mystery Bookstore or Books to Die For for reinforcements. But a quick Google search brought up the Iliad, and my God was the $7 cab ride to the joint worth it. Rows and rows and rows of crime, horror and sci-fi paperbacks. I ended up buying more than the TSA would allow me for the return flight, so I ended up having an entire box shipped home. If you are anywhere near the Iliad, report to it immediately. But leave the collection of vintage paperbacks alone. I want first dibs next time I'm back in L.A.

... Stephen Hunter's recent Washington Post piece about this weekend's Noir City D.C. film festival is worth reading just for his definition of film noir alone ("the sensation of the fly, the wonder at the spider"). And to bring things full circle: Hunter name-checks Johnson's The Dark Page.

Secret Dead Blog also recommends Milky Way Midnight, scotch on the rocks, Kitty Foyle, peanut butter, Quaker Grits with extra sugar, V8 and the musical stylings of Rocky Burnette, though not necessarily in that order.

"When I Finally Caught Up with Kermit the Frog, He Was Drinking Beer with an Alcoholic Felt Dog Named Rowlf..."

Over at Popcorn Junkies, Travis Leamons reports on an upcoming Muppet movie called The Happytime Murders. As the title might half-imply, this is not meant for kids. It's a genuine murder mystery, with booze and dead (felt) bodies and everything, set in a Roger Rabbit-ish world where humans and Muppets co-exist. Here's hoping it works. I've been dying to pitch my idea for A Muppet Dante's Inferno for years.

Reliable Sources Claim: BOW-cher-CAHN

This is a few days late... but Bouchercon was a lot of fun. Baltimore itself (shown above in a photograph I took last Friday) kind of reminds me of Philly, but with hills and much better crabcakes.

Poe Boy and I picked up Scott Phillips and made it down to B'Mo in record time. We didn't stay at the main B'Con hotel, but rather the overflow hotel next door--which turned out to be the former Lord Baltimore Hotel, a gorgeous vertical slab of 1920s swank.

As usual, B'Con is an insane swirl of people. People you've known for years. People you want to meet. People who want to meet you. People you've only met online. People you meet, and want to meet again. People you forgot you wanted to meet. People who meet by chance. All kinds of people.

Which means that it's really difficult to make your way to a panel down the hall without stopping and having a half-dozen conversations. This is not a bad thing; these are conversations with smart, cool, funny people. But it is an exhausting thing. After the first few hours, I really needed to go back to the room and just sit on my bed, stare at the weird gashes in the ceiling (no kidding, there were gashes in the ceiling, kind of like a rabid animal wanted to get up to the ninth floor in a hurry) and say absolutely nothing.

This is either evidence that I'm still the shy kid I was in grade school, or that I've been working freelance from my basement too long.

Some highlights:

* At a dinner for the DHS Galaxy of Stars (i.e., the clients of uber-stud agent David Hale Smith), a woman at the next table was convinced that I was someone famous. When I stepped outside to make a phone call, she even asked DHS if I was someone famous. I can only assume he laughed, and assured her that no, I was not someone famous. When I returned, DHS told me what I had happened, and I turned to look at the woman. The spell was broken; she told me I no longer looked like someone famous. Only my profile looked somewhat famous.

* I made Victor Gischler my last-minute plus one at the St. Martin's Minotaur cocktail party. I filled out my name tag with my real name; Gischler filled out his name tag with the word "Asshole." And he wore it the whole time. Gischler's my hero.

* During a lull in the St. Martin's party, I looked over to see DHS giving me the finger. I responded by grabbing my crotch. We have an awesome agent/client relationship.

* I would not bother with Fort Knox or some cash depository in the southwest. If I were to ever pull an 11-man group heist, I'd knock over Geppi's Entertainment Museum, which is packed with things that would look great on my office walls.

But the biggest highlight of all was meeting a lot of people who have enjoyed my books and comics or read this blog, and took the time to tell me. That means more to me than you may realize.

Even more than Gischler with "asshole" pasted to his shirt.

Opening Shots: Citizen Vince

One day you know more dead people than live ones.

Citizen Vince
by Jess Walter
(Regan Books, 2005)

This is one of those novels I want to re-read every year, just to revel in the voice. Highly recommended.