Another Fist Bites the Dust

The Immortal Iron Fist #18 hits comic shops everywhere today. It's the second chapter in my four-part arc, "The Mortal Iron Fist," in which Kung Fu billionaire Danny Rand meets the creepy guy (with a monster in his neck) who claims that he's killed every previous Iron Fist. You can check out some truly grisly preview pages at Comic Book Resources. Pick up multiple copies for your Labor Day Weekend party!

Opening Shots: Somebody's Done For

There was no land in sight.

Some seventy feet above the water a famished seagull circled slowly, somewhat warily. It had spotted this thing that seemed to be bobbing listlessly on the surface and was evidently too weary to resist assault. The thing looked like meat, and the bird's empty belly sent an urgent directive to the white wings, something along the lines of let's go down there and grab a fast bite. But the gull's brain counseled in terms of caution. The only feasible move was to take a closer look.

Somebody's Done For
by David Goodis
(Banner, 1967)

This book, available for 60 cents, was on the racks right around the time my dad was preparing to go to Vietnam. Goodis would be dead a few months later.

David Goodis Goes to the Beach

Aaron Finestone emailed to tell me that he's posted this photo album of ultra-rare David Goodis photos, provided by Lou "NoirCon" Boxer. Goodis, of course, is Philadelphia's king of noir fiction, and above, he's seen goofing off on the beach at Atlantic City. I've seen some of these photos before (Lou showed 'em to me a while back), but some are completely new... and mesmerizing. You definitely need to check them out.

And in honor of the end of summer, and Goodis, and the Jersey Shore, I think I'll post the opening to Somebody's Done For, Goodis's last novel, and as far as I knew, one of his few Jersey Shore-based noirs.

Swierczy, Live, at the Keene Forum

Labor Day is almost upon us, and many of you are probably folding up the beach towels and headed to the shore for one last sunny, sand-flecked hurrah. (Unless you live in Australia, where it's winter.) I'm packing up the family truckster, too, but I'm not headed to the shore. I'm going over to my buddy Brian Keene's place... and you're all invited!

Keene's been one of my favorite writers ever since I picked up his zombie noir debut, The Rising. Thanks to last summer's Dark Hollow, I'll never be able to look at a goat the same way again. (Thanks, Brian.) Keene's latest is Ghost Walk, and next month he's debuting his Marvel Comics mini-series, Devil Slayer (preview sketches above). The man is ridiculously talented, and crazy prolific.

And now, for some strange reason, he's opening up the doors to his place for me. All week I'll be hanging out in Keene's "One on One" forum, answering questions and just shooting the crap. And while you're there, make sure you check out the rest of Keene's joint. That's right, go snooping through his missives, manifestos, communiques, comics, books, and maybe even his cigar collection. Okay, maybe not that. We don't want to overstay our welcome...

Smiling Back at You

There's a great piece in today's New York Times Magazine by Dexter Filkins (shown at left, filing a story while rockets explode around him in Falluja) who reported from Iraq from 2003 to 2006. When I worked as a reporter, I could never shake that awful feeling that I was intruding on people's lives. And in this passage, Filkins takes that feeling to a horrific extreme:

You go into these places, and you think they’re overrated, they are not nearly as dangerous as people say. Keep your head; keep the gunfire in front of you. You get close and come out unscathed every time, your face as youthful and as untroubled as before. The life of the reporter: always someone else’s pain. A woman in an Iraqi hospital cradles her son newly blinded, and a single tear rolls down her cheek. The cheek is so dry, and the tear moves so slowly that you focus on it for a while, the tear traveling across the wide desert plain. You need a corpse for the newspaper, so you take a bunch of marines to get one. Then suddenly it’s there, the warm liquid on your face, the death you have always avoided, smiling back at you as if it knew all along. Your fault.

You can read the whole story right here, which is also a preview of Filkins's forthcoming book, The Forever War.

The Tri-State Boys Come to Clinton

About 30 minutes from now I'll be headed north for a book signing with Jason Pinter and Dave White (shown at left) at the Clinton Book Shop (33 Main Street, Clinton, NJ, 908-735-8811). The fun starts at 6:30, but the three of us are meeting up at some nearby Irish joint. I've been through Clinton hundreds of times (I used to commute from Allentown to NYC, and Clinton's on the way) but I've never actually set foot in Clinton, so I'm looking forward to the experience. Stop by if you've got nothing else going on tonight. And, of course, you live near Clinton.

Cruel to Be Kindle

Okay, maybe it's a little strange that this is the post immediately following the one about the glories of my new, yet old-fashioned ink-on-paper library. But a few people have asked me about this, so it is my duty to report: Severance Package is now available in an Amazon Kindle edition. You can download it right this very second, if you were so inclined.

Do I have a Kindle? No. Do I plan on buying one? Oh... I don't know. While I love the idea of having 200 books in one little device at all times, it seems devoid of all of all the little things I love about ink-on-paper books. The cheesy die-cut covers. The smell of aging pages. Over-the-top and/or ridiculous back cover copy. The feel of a nicely-assembled tome in my hands.

And let's not forget the sublime joy I've been enjoying this week: running my eyes over the spines of my collection. Don't think you have quite the same experience scrolling down a screen, no matter how sharp the "electronic paper."

But what the hell do I know. I think I was born 30 years too late. I had my way, every paperback would be designed like a God Medal. What do you guys think? Any of you have a Kindle?

Because You Asked... New Secret Dead Blog HQ Revealed, Pt. 2!

And now here's the opposite side of the room: the book collection. As I mentioned earlier, this is the first time my books have been in one place; they used to be scattered all the hell over the house. This here is the meat of the collection. You can't see my graphic novel/nonfiction collection (behind me as I snapped this photo), and yes, I do have a dozen or more containers of books at a storage facility. But this is my favorite stuff, painstakingly gathered since high school, or purchased within the past year, and intended for near future reading. A quick tour of the highlights:

1. This is the horror bookshelf. Got my Kings, my Barkers, Koontzes, Laymons, Keenes, Littles, etc., along with a stack of horror paperbacks that were some of my earliest book purchases: Robert Dunbar's The Pines, Robert Cormier's Fade, Rex Miller's Slob, Nancy Collins' Sunglasses After Midnight, among others.

2. Let's see... this is kind of modern crime, for lack of a better description. An assortment of cool noir and hardboiled stuff, with a lot of Ellroy, Willeford, Block, Pelecanos, Connelly, Winslow, Starr... and some Cornell Woolrich, just to keep the rest of 'em in line.

3. Sci-Fi/Fantasy-land. Up top is Dick and Bester. Sturgeon. Matheson. Beaumont. Then another shelf of modern crime/noir before we hit Harlan Ellison, then Jim Thompson and Raymond Chandler. Hey, look, I just shelved these best I could as soon as the cases were assembled and balanced and shimmed. It's not perfect.

4. Just want to point out the bottom shelf, which contains my Fredric Brown collection. By no means complete, but pretty damn healthy. I love Brown.

5. My cat Holly, named for Buddy Holly. She's been around for 13 years now. A constant fixture in the office, but I never mention her, because I don't want to be the kind of guy who mentions his fucking cat all the time.

6. Another mixed collection. Up top is a ton of Westlake/Stark, then my Lansdales and Schows, followed by some Bruen and Huston, then James M. Cain, Goodis and Hammett, with other classic crime/noir mixed in there.

7. Ah, my babies. Up top: the complete Hard Case Crime collection, followed a nice stack of Black Lizards, followed by my vintage paperback collection. At the very bottom: my John D. MacDonald collection. So much good stuff in here, and I'm especially happy to have it on shelves finally; until recently, it lived in two plastic containers.

Finally, I must mention that my lovely Bride assembled every damn bookcase you see in this photo. I carried them into the house, but she did the heavy allen wrenching while I wrestled with a script deadline. If this isn't true love, I don't know what is.

Because You Asked... New Secret Dead Blog HQ Revealed!

Here's the new Mission Control. I know, it looks very neat, and you probably think this is just because I've just set up my new office. Writers are supposed to be sloppy, right? Wrong. As the Bride can tell you, I'm ridiculously anal about my desk. Everything on it must be properly aligned, otherwise I can't work. The desk is a reflection of my mind, and things have to be in order. Just to fuck with me, the Bride will often leave certain items dropped oh so casually on my desktop. Or she'll push my mousepad to one side. Or tilt the screen. Spill a box of matches everywhere. And it drives me insane, especially when I have to instantly count every little fucking match in 1.3 seconds.

Anyway, sorry to disappoint. Let's move on with a little annotation.

1. This is where I keep paper outlines, notes, etc. until I'm ready to deal with them. (In this photo, you're looking at top secret beat sheets for future issues of Immortal Iron Fist.) Don't know why I put them on top of my printer. I just do.

2. My paper At-A-Glance dayminder book. Fuck iCal and all of that shit. I keep appointments old school.

3. The place where my beverage sits. In the morning, it's Diet Coke. Midday, a glass of juice. Evening, a beer and/or scotch. Right now: tall can of Sapporo. The can doubles as a weapon, which I like.

4. The screen that will someday be responsible for my total blindness.

5. Where the magic happens. (No, not that magic.)

6. This mug has been holding my pens and pencils since 1993, and it was stolen from McGlinchey's, my favorite dive bar in Philly. A mug of sweet beer in one of these things would run you 60 cents, which is how I was able to afford booze during my late college/early job days. Still, I figured McGlinchey's owed me a little something special, so late one drunken night I finished the last sip and shoved this heavy glass sweetheart into my bag.

Opening Shots: Bright Lights, Big City

You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning. But here you are, and you cannot say that the terrain is entirely unfamiliar, although the details are fuzzy. You are at a nightclub talking to a girl with a shaved head.

Bright Lights, Big City
By Jay McInerney
(Vintage, 1984)

I read this one in high school--maybe it was 1987 or early 1988. I wanted to work at a magazine very, very badly after finishing it. And lo! I ended up working as a fact-checker, just like the protagonist. Which goes to show you that high school students shouldn't read contemporary lit; it fucks you up for life. One other thing: in the copy I bought, McInerney's author photo was blurred on the right side, which made me think he had some kind of horrible, Harvey Dent-esque facial deformity.

The Package Deal

Today (or late last night, technically) Variety broke the news that I've been dying to share for, oh, two months now: Lionsgate has bought the rights to my novel, Severance Package, with Marc Platt and Adam Siegel (of Wanted fame) producing.

Even better: I've been hired to co-write the screenplay with Brett Simon (Assassination of a High School President), who will be directing.

Sharp-eyed Secret Dead Blog readers may have noticed an abundance of Hollywood/L.A. photos around these parts recently; that's because I've spent quite a bit of time out there this summer, mostly meeting with Brett and hammering out adaptation ideas. We've been having a blast, and hopefully that enthusiasm will make its way into the eventual screenplay. That's not to say that adapting your own work is the easiest thing in the world. The crap you can pull in a novel doesn't translate easy to film. (Like, say, putting your heroine in a coma for half of a novel. Cool in print; boring as shit on screen.)

Anyway, now that this cat is out of the bag, I'll share as much of the experience as I can on this blog. Namely, because I'd want to read about it, too. And believe me, I know the deal: many books are called, few are chosen. A million things can go wrong. This all could evaporate... like, tomorrow. But I have a really good feeling about this team. And it's already been fun.

Meanwhile, the only diva-like demand I've made (to Brett) is that this classic 80s hit single play over the end credits. (Mostly to piss off Ed Pettit.)

Brett kind of just looked at me funny.

Illustration by Dennis Calero.

Opening Shots: Yellow Medicine

After two weeks of being shuffled around to similar bland cells, bland interrogation rooms, and bland Federal types asking dull-as-dishwater questions about my "contacts in the criminal underworld," Agent Rome finally walked into the room. I'd wondered when that would happen. I was worried about Drew, hoping she had made it back to safety. I wondered how the murder of Graham, my ex-brother-in-law and boss, would be received at home—both in Yellow Medicine County and with his family down South. I wondered how many people would blame me. Maybe Rome had the answers.

Yellow Medicine
by Anthony Neil Smith
(Bleak House, 2008)

Goin' West

I'm headed for Texas early (and I mean early) tomorrow for an appearance at both Bedrock City Comics (at 3 p.m.) and Murder by the Book (4:30). If you're anywhere in the Houston area, stop by and say hello. Signing at MBTB has become something of an annual tradition; my first time was spring 2005, when I somehow wormed my way into the very first "Noir Night" featuring Ken Bruen, Jason Starr, J.D. Rhoades and Allan Guthrie. And let me tell you, there's nothing more fun than watching a pale Scot stumble around, blinking, in the extreme Texas sun and heat. Ah, the memories.

Secret Dead Blog Goes Subterranean

Well, the move is almost complete. I'm reporting to you live from the bottom of Secret Dead Blog HQ, where main operations have relocated in the wake of Operation Daughter Needs Her Own Room All of a Sudden.

And I must say: I'm really digging the new digs.

See, since oh, 2000 or so, the Secret Dead Blog Library has been scattered. A bookcase here, a pile of books there... with no cohesion to speak of. Until today, if I wanted to read something from the SF collection, I had to report to the bedroom. A vintage crime paperback? A bin in the basement. A graphic novel? Good luck... could be the bedroom, the basement, or the office.

But now... at long last... everything is in one convenient, central location. Namely: the basement, which the executive board of Secret Dead Blog decided to have "finished" (meaning: drywall, ceiling, rug) last winter. And my God is it beautiful.

It is not complete; there are still two bookcases to purchase and assemble. But if you could only gaze upon the stacks in their pre-natal state, like Roy Batty watching attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, or C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate... such is the glory of my book collection, at long last, in one place...

Cable #6 Out Today

And it happens to be the perfect jumping-on point, if for some reason you've missed the first five issues, or don't know much about this "Cable" business, or wonder why, if Cable's such a big deal, he wasn't in any of the movies. Well, this issue features Cyclops... who was totally in all three movies. (Okay, he kind of got bumped off quick in the last one. But still...)

For everyone who has been keeping up with their Cables: here's an oversized issue that checks in with Cyclops and the rest of the X-Men in the wake of Cable's jump into the timestream along with mutantkind's last hope. You can find some preview pages right here.

Update the First: Dave Richards fired some Cable questions my way over at CBR.com.

Update the Second: See many of the impossibly handsome X-Men editors and writers over at C.B. Cebulski's blog. (Note: This was snapped mere hours after surviving the strongest Southern California earthquake in six years. Look how at ease we are!)

Opening Shots: The Silver Bear

The last day of the cruelest month, and appropriately it rains. Not the spring rain of life and rebirth, not for me. Death. In my life, always death. I am young; if you saw me on the street, you might think, "what a nice, clean-cut young man. I'll bet he works in advertising or perhaps a nice accounting firm. I'll bet he's married and is just starting a family. I'll bet his parents raised him well." But you would be wrong. I am old in a thousand ways. I have seen things and done things that would make you rush instinctively to your child's bedroom and hug him tight to your chest, breathing quick in short bursts like a misfiring engine, and repeat over and over, "It's okay, baby. It's okay. Everything's okay."

The Silver Bear
by Derek Haas
(Pegasus Books, 2008)

NoirCon 2: This Time, It's Personal

Prepare your children! Warn your spouses! From the laboratory of mad noir genius Dr. Louis Boxer comes the official word...

NoirCon 2010 – International Noir
November 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th

Johnny Temple – Recipient of the Jay and Deen Kogan Award for Excellence in Publishing
George Pelecanos – Recipient of the David L. Goodis Award

NoirCon 2010 Headquarters:
Society Hill Playhouse
507 South 8th Street
Philadelphia, PA 19147

Website: www.NoirCon.com
Contact: info@noircon.com

Registration Information:
$180 (Award Banquet included) BEFORE December 31, 2009
$200 (Award Banquet included) AFTER January 1, 2010
$50 (Award Banquet for Spouse of Registrant)
$50 Last Call Panel – Sunday for Non-registrants
$160 per night at the Doubletree Hotel Philadelphia

NoirCon Hotel:
Doubletree Hotel Philadelphia
237 South Broad Street
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
19107-5686
215-893-1600

“Years down the pike, the boast will be: 'NoirCon. I was there.’” --Ken Bruen

(Photo of the Alto Nido by the Bride.)