My Blog

Mr. Monk and Mr. Bill

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Bill Crider made my day by praising my book MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE on his blog:

A lot of the book’s humor arises from Monk’s attempts to adjust to living away from his own environment, and
the whole plot is generated because Natalie’s young daughter is upset by the death of a firehouse dog. Monk declares he’ll find the killer, and the book is off to the races. I had a lot of fun reading this, and
if you’re in the mood for a couple of hours of pure entertainment, you probably would, too.

Thanks, Bill!

Western Noir

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Ed Gorman has quietly created his own unique genre — the western noir. I first discovered it when I read his book WOLF MOON. Here’s what I wrote when I read it a year ago this week:

I devoured WOLF MOON in one sitting. I really enjoyed it.
The book came out a few years ago and it’s unlike any western I’ve read
before.  Think of it as western noir, with an emphasis on noir, though
you wouldn’t know that from the standard "western" cover and "frontier"
font.  Sure, it takes place in the west and has all the expected genre
trappings…but it’s the kind of tale Charles Williams, Harry
Whittington, Dan J. Marlowe, Wade Miller, Vin Packer and Charles
Willeford like to tell. Dark and violent. Grim and doomed. It’s about a
bank robber who gets double-crossed, goes to prison, and seeks revenge.
Sounds pretty standard but trust me, it isn’t. The hero of this book is
an original…a guy who is literally rabid with revenge. I
can’t help but wonder how the book would have fared, and the attention
it might have garnered, if it was marketed as a weird twist on a dark
crime tale instead of western.

Now the folks over at Bookgasm have discovered Ed’s unique brand of noir with GHOST TOWN:

GhosttownThis being my first exposure to Gorman, I loved every second of it. Just
expecting a typical Western, I was blown away by how he turns the genre on
its ear like some of the Western writing of Elmore Leonard. I’m talking some
great scenes of double-crosses and a nice-sized body count. Like some of the
revisionist Western films that have come out in recent years, this book 
does not have a happy ending; it just makes you feel the empathy for  the
characters to which you have been exposed.

I wish Ed was getting more attention for these great books instead of having them relegated to the sadly neglected western shelf.

The Best

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The best producer of boxed sets of TV shows on DVD is Paul Brownstein. No one else comes close. His love of television is obvious in his brilliant work on DVD sets for shows like THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW, GUNSMOKE and now THE WILD WILD WEST. The prints are terrific, the menus are clever and vibrant, and he goes out of his way to jam-pack his sets with amazing, rare, and informative supplemental material.  His sets have all the usual stuff… and far, far more.  The GUNSMOKE set, for example, includes behind-the-scenes home movies from Dennis Weaver, appearances from James Arness and Dennis Weaver on THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW, an Amanda Blake interview on the MIKE DOUGLAS SHOW, Emmy Award appearances by the cast,  network promos, interviews from The Western Channel, a video of a  GUNSMOKE retrospective held at the Museum of Broadcasting, promos, bloopers, and a huge number of audio commentaries… and I’m only scratching the surface of what’s offered. 

This week, I bought his  THE WILD WILD WEST boxed set and, once again, he’s done incredible work. The set includes all the usual extras and so much more, like audio tracks from the original scoring sessions for the main title theme with alternate versions and aborted takes (a rare find which is worth the price of the set alone),  the original pilot main title sequence, network promos, and audio interviews with the composer, various writers,  the studio casting exec, special effects person. It’s a TV fan’s wet dream.

Some savvy studio should put Paul in charge of ALL their TV boxed sets…because he simply does it better than anybody.

Recommended Publishers

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A reader posed this question to me in an email:

I read your comments about Publish America, and so I thought I would write and ask what publishers you would recommend for an aspiring writer trying to get their first short novel published?

Reputable ones. It’s a simple as that.  Publish America isn’t one of them. They are a vanity press in disguise.

Here’s another piece of advice, since you’re asking: Don’t get involved with any publisher that asks you to pay to be published.  They should pay you, not the other way around.

I would also be extremely leary of  any publishers that are strictly print-on-demand. I’m not saying all the  non-pay-to-be-published POD presses are dishonest, far from it, some of their founders really love books and respect authors… but many of those "publishers" tend to be on very shaky commercial footing at best. Take what happened with Quiet Storm, for example.  On the other hand, Ellora’s Cave has become very successful and treats their authors well (though they have some of the most laughably horrible "covers" I’ve ever seen).

I’m No Help

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For some reason, Fridays is the day I seem to get the most blog-related email.  Here’s one from Kelly Cyr:

I read through your blog and find you extremely negative and cynical. You
also hold yourself well above the rest of us writers. Maybe you should find
another line of work. I don’t think writing suits you at all. Honey, I don’t
think you would be anyone enjoyable to be around at all. Go find another
occupation and get happier. The stuff you write only brings people down and
was of no help to me at all. 

I’ll share a secret with you, Kelly. I’m not half as talented as most of the writers I know and I live in fear that some day people are going to figure that out. You’re obviously way ahead of the pack on that one. 

But I have to correct you on a couple of other things:  I am the happiest guy you will ever meet. I am lucky enough to have a wonderful and supportive family, lots of friends, good health, and a career doing what I love (despite my obvious lack of talent).

I’m sorry that my work saddens you. If you came here looking for help with your career, your relationships, or your pursuit of inner peace, you definitely came to the wrong place. My blog isn’t an advice column and I’m not Walter Scott. This is my collection of rantings, ramblings, and opinions on this and that. Sometimes I answer questions, but I’m not here to help you sell your script, get your book published,  train your dog to fetch, discover spiritual enlightenment, or become multiply orgasmic (though I am told reading my DIAGNOSIS MURDER books helps a lot with that). I’m here because I’m procrastinating when I should be writing. Try my brother Tod’s blog instead or write a letter to Parade.

Easy Rawlins Going to HBO

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Variety reports that HBO Films is making a feature film version of Walter Mosley’s novel LITTLE SCARLET. Jeffrey Wright and Mos Def have been signed to star  though, in an unusual twist, it’s undecided at this point who will play PI Easy Rawlins and who will play Mouse, his sociopathic sidekick (Denzel Washington played Easy and Don Cheadle was Mouse  in the 1995 feature version of DEVIL IN A BLUE DRESS). Mosley is writing the script himself and my friend Debra Martin Chase (who I worked with for two seasons on the Lifetime TV series MISSING) will produce.

Thingies III

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I’m the oldest of four children. My 11 year-old daughter suddenly
realized, in the wake of her "Human Growth and Development Class," what
this meant.

"Grandma had sex four times? I can’t imagine even doing it once!"

Showkillers

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I’ve said it here a couple of times before — Jason Gedrick and Eric Balfour are showkillers.  Apparently Alan Sepinwall, TV Critic for the Star-Ledger, agrees with me:

For professional purposes, Gedrick’s fascinating to me as the reigning
champion among active male Show Killers on television (Paula Marshall,
I believe, is the female titleholder at the moment), one of those
people who, year after year after year, winds up in a project that’s
destined to fail.

Alan analyzes each of Gedrick’s failures and offers his take on what went wrong.

24 coming to a theatre near you

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24 is becoming a movie. Variety reports that Fox has signed creators Robert Cochran and Joel Surnow, and my old friend Howard Gordon, to write the movie, which will be produced by Brian Grazer.

Execs at 20th should have a draft of the script in their hands by early winter, insiders said. Once they see the script — and look at ratings for the first few episodes of season six, which kicks off in January — they’ll be able to make a decision on greenlighting production of the film.

Under the most optimistic scenario, feature would be greenlit early next year and lense next spring and summer during the hiatus between season six and a likely seventh season of "24."

Current plan calls for the "24" feature to abandon the real-time conceit of the TV show, making Sutherland’s Jack Bauer, rather than the clock, the star.

This success of 24 couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of guys. I only know Joel Surnow and Robert Cochran casually… we all worked on shows for Steve Cannell at the same time so we bumped into each other a lot in the Cannell building and prepping shows up in Vancouver.  But Howard Gordon and I have known each other for twenty years.

I still remember when Howard was running both a fax delivery business and a SAT preparation course out of his Venice apartment. Two of his SAT instructors were Conan O’Brien and Greg Daniels, showrunner of THE OFFICE…who were writing partners and working on NOT NECESSARILY THE NEWS.

Howard and his then-writing partner Alex Gansa and Bill Rabkin & I all started out at the same time as freelancers on SPENSER FOR HIRE and grew up in the TV business together. 

Howard, Alex, Bill and I hung out a lot together during those earlier years but, as often happens, our lives got complicated and we saw each other less and less.  We all got busy on shows,  got married (though we all attended each others weddings), and three of us had kids. Now it’s been way too long since we’ve been in touch.  Even so, Bill and I carry on the tradition of naming a bad guy in every series we do "Gordon Gansa."

I’ve got to give Howard and Alex a call this week…

Remaindered

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My short story REMAINDERED is now available on Amazon for a mere 49 cents.

Whether you are a bestselling author or a writer toiling in mid-list obscurity, your books will eventually end up remaindered to the bargain bin at Barnes & Noble. The fear, of course, is that your career will eventually end up remaindered, too. I got the idea for this dark-comic mystery while actually living the humiliating booksigning experience that opens the story….