Sunday, October 16, 2016
Ed Gorman: R.I.P.
I'm so lucky to have known Ed for such a long time. He was my editor when I was columnist with Mystery Scene Magazine. Haven't seen him in several years, but we stayed in touch via email. He will be missed.
Read Bill Crider's Tribute here.
Read The Rap Sheet with J. Kingston Pierce's tribute but links to several other tributes.
According to Wikipedia:
Ed Gorman (November 2, 1941 - October 14, 2016) was an American writer and short fiction anthologist who has published in almost every genre, but is best known for his work in the crime, mystery, western, and horror fields. His non-fiction work has appeared such places as The New York Times and Redbook. He contributed to many magazines and other publications including Xero, Black Lizard, Mystery Scene, Cemetery Dance, and the anthology Tales of Zorro.
After twenty-three years in advertising, public relations, writing political speeches and producing industrial films, Gorman published his first novel Rough Cut (1984) and soon after was able to quit his day job and dedicate himself to writing full-time (thanks to his wife Carol's full-time teaching job).
Gorman wrote in many different fields, but considered himself first and foremost a genre writer. In the 1970s Gorman was a winner of a short story contest sponsored by Charles Scribner & Sons. An editor there suggested he expand his winning story into a mainstream novel, but Gorman gave up after six months, saying, “I was bored out of my mind. I am a genre writer.”
Gorman’s novels and stories are often set in small Midwestern towns, like the fictional Black River Falls, Iowa (the Sam McCain series), or Cedar Rapids, Iowa (The Night Remembers). For his Dev Conrad series, Gorman drew upon his years as a political operative.
Gorman was one of the founders of Mystery Scene magazine, and served as editor and publisher until 2002. In comics, he wrote for DC, Dark Horse, and most recently Short, Scary Tales, which will be publishing adaptations of his novel Cage of Night (as Cage of Night) and the short story "Stalker" (as Gut-Shot).
Kirkus Reviews has called him "One of the most original crime writers around." The Bloomsbury Review noted: "He is the poet of dark suspense." The Oxford Book of American Crime Stories said: "His novels and stories provide fresh ideas characters and approaches." Jon Breen at Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine once noted, "Ed Gorman has the same infallible readability as writers like Lawrence Block, Max Allan Collins, Donald E. Westlake, Ed McBain, and John D. MacDonald."
Though he was known for a long time as "prolific," his writing career slowed considerably after he was diagnosed with the incurable cancer Multiple Myeloma in 2002.
Awards
He won a Spur Award for Best Short Fiction for his short story "The Face" in 1992. His fiction collection Cages was nominated for the 1995 Bram Stoker Award for Best Fiction Collection. His collection The Dark Fantastic was nominated for the same award in 2001. Gorman won the 1994 Anthony Award for Best Critical Work for The Fine Art Of Murder and has been nominated for multiple Anthonys in short story categories.He is a winner of the Life Achievement Award from the Private Eye Writers of America, The International Horror Writers Award, and been nominated for the Edgar Award.
See his bibliography here
Saturday, October 15, 2016
Friday, October 14, 2016
Laurie R. King Literary Salon: October 19
Laurie R. King is the third generation in her family native to the San Francisco area. She spent her childhood reading her way through libraries up and down the West Coast; her middle years raising children, renovating houses, traveling the world, and doing a BA and MA in theology. (Her long autobiography goes into detail about how she uses these interests.) King now lives a genteel life of crime, on California’s central coast. Her crime novels are both serial and stand-alone. First in the hearts of most readers comes Mary Russell, who met the retired Sherlock Holmes in 1915 and became his apprentice, then his partner. Beginning with The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, Russell and Holmes move through the Teens and Twenties in amiable discord, challenging each other to ever greater feats of detection.
In the Russell & Holmes stories, King explores ideas—the roots of conflict in the Middle East and Afghanistan; feminism and early Christianity; patriotism and individual responsibility—while also having a rousing good time. Various stories revisit The Hound of the Baskervilles and Kipling’s Kim, set a pair of Bedouin nomads down in a grand country house in England, and offer an insider’s view of the great quake and fire of 1906, all the while forging an unlikely relationship between two remarkably similar individuals who happen to be separated by age, sex, and background.
King’s Stuyvesant & Grey series, also historical, follows American ex-Bureau of Investigation agent Harris Stuyvesant, damaged young Captain Bennett Grey, and Grey’s sister Sarah as they move through Europe between the Wars.
Five King novels concern San Francisco homicide inspector Kate Martinelli, Kate’s SFPD partner Al Hawkin, and her life partner Lee Cooper. In the course of the stories, Kate has encountered a female Rembrandt, a modern-day Holy Fool, two difficult teenagers, and a manifestation of the goddess Kali.
King’s stand-alone suspense novels include A Darker Place, the story of a middle-aged professor of religion who investigates “cults” for the FBI, and encounters a movement that embraces the dangerous beliefs of alchemy. Folly tells of woodworker Rae Newborne, who comes to a deserted island to rebuild a house, and her life. Keeping Watch is the story of Rae’s friend Allen Carmichael, a Vietnam vet who draws on his combat experiences to rescue abused women and children—until he comes across a boy whose problems may rival his own. Califia’s Daughters (a paperback original by “Leigh Richards”) is a post-apocalyptic sort of tale set in a near future where women rule and men are fragile.
She has collaborated on nonfiction works including Crime & Thriller Writing and The Grand Game, and on several short story anthologies.
Thursday, October 13, 2016
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