Posts Tagged ‘Chicago Lightning’

Crying “Wolf”

Tuesday, January 10th, 2012

“Wolf,” the second of my horror-tinged radio plays for Fangoria’s Dreadtime Stories, is available for a free listen right here, all through January. Producer Carl Amari, as usual, did a great job.

Amazon is making a number of the Nate Heller novels available on Kindle at bargain prices, for a limited time. Steal of the deal is STOLEN AWAY at $1.99. A number of others are available for well under their usual eight bucks or so, for example…

Also, the first four Quarry novels from Perfect Crime are finally available on e-book. All five are available at Amazon at $4.99.

Perfect Crime’s Nolan reprints are imminent, and received a nice advance notice from the Violent World of Parker.

I’ve done a number of interviews lately, but this one from Comic Book Resources – which is slight comics-centric – strikes me as one of the best. It was an actual phone interview (not an e-mail one) and the interviewer asked solid questions and my answers don’t stink up the joint. Give it a look.

I am also proud to announce that in a forum choosing the best Batman writer of all time, I am coming in with a perfect score: zero. That really hurts, or it would if my BATMAN issues hadn’t sold so well.

Ron Fortier, himself a keen pulpmeister, had nice things to say about CHICAGO LIGHTNING.

Finally, I’d like to share a few photos from our recent trip to St. Louis, where we visited the Star Trek exhibit at the St. Louis Science Center. Consider carefully the shot of me channeling my inner Shatner – new author photo, you think?

Star Trek Experience
Star Trek Experience

M.A.C.

How You Can Help

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012

Okay, so it’s 2012, and I know what you’re wondering – what can I do to help Max Allan Collins. “Buying all of his books just isn’t enough,” you’re saying to yourself. “What more can I do?”

Thanks for asking. And the answer is one that applies to every writer you like to read, not just me. With publishing in chaos right now, nothing matters more than grass-roots word of mouth, Internet-style. If you like a book you’ve read (particularly the books by me), comment at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other sites. These don’t have to be full-fledged reviews – just a line or two and a rating.

At Amazon, those ratings are key. Amazon pays attention to customer ratings – they make decisions based upon them – and of course browsers are often swayed by the star-rating of a book. Unfortunately, Amazon ratings are one of those places where democracy goes a little too far – there is little or no supervision. Routinely people give books lousy ratings (recently Return to Perdition suffered because of this) due to the reader having problems with receiving a damaged copy or other complaints having to do with mailing or other aspects of service – not the content of the book. You can balance this out – for any writer you like – by posting a brief review…again, a positive line or two and a high star rating will do it. If you have a blog or any kind of site where you review books, be sure to post those reviews on Amazon (Barnes and Noble, too).

And if you see an unfair or in particular an inaccurate review on any web site, write a comment in response. I’m not saying argue with somebody’s taste – just their fairness or accuracy. I do this myself, and a lot of people (including my son Nate) tell me not to. But I don’t respond to negative reviews unless they are unfair or especially inaccurate.

These are challenging times for authors. Support them not only by buying their stuff, but commenting favorably on it. If you’re disappointed with a book, you should also comment, but strive to fair, accurate and avoid glibness. If you accuse a writer of something – using cliches, maybe, or poor dialogue or anything really – be sure to give examples. Avoid what we used to call in English class “glittering generalities.”

Here are some nice things that appeared on the web over the last week or so.

Terry and I made a Best 10 Graphic Novels list for Return to Perdition. Once again, I consider such lists nonsense, useless, pointless and offensive…unless I am on one.

Dick Tracy

Read online at Go Comics

The current team on DICK TRACY gave me a nice shout-out in the strip recently. Thanks, guys!

Here’s a thoughtful if a little patronizing review of CHICAGO LIGHTNING. Look below the review for my comment.

Every now and then a CRIMINAL MINDS novel gets review. Here’s a nice example.

This is actually the first writing for me of 2012. I’m doing this update in advance a day or so, because Barb and I (and Toaster, who we’ve been dog-sitting) are about to head to St. Louis to see Nate and his girl Abby. We’ll spend several days there, and probably will see the English-language version of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO. Recently we’ve seen the new MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE (outstanding), the new Downey Holmes movie (I fell asleep), TINTIN (wonderful) and, on Blu-Ray, ATTACK THE BLOCK, one of my favorite films of the year. I am dismayed to see the abysmal DRIVE topping many Best of film lists for 2011. I told you those lists were worthless.

M.A.C.

Mike Danger Loses A Friend

Tuesday, December 20th, 2011

For those of you out of the comics scene loop, I’m sorry to report that Eduardo Barretto passed away recently. Eduardo was the initial artist on the MIKE DANGER comic book, drawing the first six issues, and while other good artists followed, nobody came close to his classic approach. He also drew my Eliot Ness/Batman graphic novel, SCAR OF THE BAT, providing the best Bat-art I ever got.

My collaborations with Eduardo were long distance, and we only met once, briefly, at a San Diego Comic Con. He was about to go into a meeting with an editor, and we pretty much passed like ships in the night. But I loved his work and regret I didn’t get a chance to work with him again. He was on the very short list of artists I suggested for ROAD TO PERDITION.

There were a lot of nice write-ups about Eduardo in the wake of his passing, but here’s a nice representative one.

Crimespree 44

I am pleased and honored to be a cover boy again, this time on CRIMESPREE 44. The interview, conducted by editor Jon Jordan himself, has some glitches and typos but is otherwise a particularly good one, I think, thanks to Jon’s questioning. If you can’t pick up a copy at a mystery bookstore, you can just pay $6 through Paypal to Jon@crimespreemag.com, or send a check for $6 to:

Crimespree Magazine
536 South 5th St
Milwaukee WI 53204.

It’s also available as an e-book from either Amazon or Barnes & Noble online.

My pal Leonard Maltin called recently to say how much he liked BYE BYE, BABY. He even included it in his seasonal wrap-up on new and notable Hollywood-oriented books.

At Bookreporter.com, several regular reviewers were asked to present best 10 books of the year, and Tom Callahan included BYE BYE, BABY on his.

We also received some Best of 2011 honors at the cool Sons of Spade site.

I was asked to write about one of my favorite authors, Ed McBain, for Amazon, and you can find my piece (and others) right here. If you like my work and McBain’s, you’ll want to take a look.

A nice CONSUMMATA review popped up here. That little book has generated nice online buzz (and was recently part of a Titan giveaway promotion at Ain’t It Cool News); no link, ‘cause the contest’s over….

You may find this review of the graphic novel ROAD TO PERDITION of interest. It’s quite insightful, but has the unusual perspective of a reviewer who likes the book but does not like the film. I like the film a lot, but I am always up for hearing from people who like the book better….

That gifted comics scribe John Ostrander said some nice things about CHICAGO LIGHTNING.

Finally, let me wish you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas this week, and a happy holidays in general. This has been a rough year in many ways – the loss of Eduardo Barretto is a reminder of other losses, including Chuck Bunn from Crusin’ and my longtime film collaborator Mike Cornelison. My mom at her nursing home no longer recognizes Barb and me. I have always gotten misty-eyed at that line in “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” that says we’ll all be together “if the fates allow.” The fates have been kinder in other years.

Still, I am remarkably blessed. I have a beautiful, funny, talented, supportive wife in Barb – did I mention beautiful? – and a talented, funny, supportive son in Nate (I would call him “handsome,” but as much as we look alike, that would be inappropriate). My career manages to roll along nicely despite a marketplace that resembles a back-alley in Iraq. I have so many friends, many of whom collaborate with me – like Jane Spillane, Matt Clemens and Phil Dingeldein, among many others (you know who you are, or anyway I hope you do) – who make my life a particularly full and happy one. Among those friends are the readers who support my work and stop by this weekly update. I raise a rum-spiked glass of egg nog to you all.

M.A.C.

Lightning Strikes

Tuesday, November 29th, 2011
The Simon & Kirby Library: Crime

CHICAGO LIGHTNING did very well on its Kindle Deal of the Day 99-cent sale – something like 8000 copies. For a short story collection, that’s amazing, even at the discount. If you prefer a real, physical object (it’s called a book), you should pick this up. Also, the audio version read by Dan John Miller really is fun.

The Simon and Kirby CRIME comics collection from Titan hit the New York Times list, another amazing accomplishment, for which I can take zero credit, though my intro is getting some nice comments in reviews.

I am wrapping up SPILLANE ON SCREEN (I’ll ship it out this week) and starting serious work on SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENT, the Jack and Maggie Starr novel for Hard Case Crime. I am delighted to be returning to this series. The cover is by Glenn Orbik (can’t share it yet, but it’s an eye-popper) and Terry Beatty will do interior chapter illos and a fake EC-style cover as a frontispiece.

Thanksgiving here was low-key and very enjoyable, with Nate and his girl friend Abby joining us (as well as our granddog, Toaster) and Barb cooked a fantastic traditional turkey dinner. We watched lots of movies, also episodes of AUCTION HUNTERS (a good rival to STORAGE WARS), saw the very good ARTHUR CHRISTMAS (after suffering through an abysmal Justin Bieber video that almost ruined a good movie), and did very minimal Black Friday shopping (picked up some cheap Blu-rays at Walmart, mostly for Riff Trax purposes).

On Saturday night, at the VFW Hall in Lone Tree, Iowa, for an anniversary party, Crusin’ had its first gig with new bass player, Brian Van Winkle, who did a fine job. It’s going to be a very good version of the band.

See you next week with less personal stuff, apologies for which are mitigated by the holiday season.

M.A.C.