N@B Newsletter Vol. 1

Cameron Ashley - First name (alphabetically) amongst the collective I like to call The Wizards of Oz, alongside Crime Factory folks like Liam Jose, Andrew Nette and David Honeybone. CF magazine continues to put out first-rate content - fiction and non - and CF books just released the brannew edition to their Single Shot series, Freight by Ed Kurtz and have announced another due next year. Y'know what else? The debut novel by Jimmy Callaway, Lupo Danish Never Has Nightmares (if that title sounds familiar, lookit the Uncle B's Drive-In Fiction novella anthology from a couple years back - Danish won't be the first piece from that book to get the the novel-length expansion - nor probably the last). Look for it on BS lists everywhere this time next year. But c'mon, man. I want my Ashley fiction too. Here's hoping Cam puts out some more of his own stuff soon. I itch. 

Jedidiah Ayres - Didn't do shit this year. Not quite true. Just below the surface bullshit that you won't see for a while. Still, I got to do some swell events around St. Louis and several out of town that included gigs in Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Indiana and Pennsylvania - literary hot-spots, all. It's been gratifying seeing people respond well to Peckerwood and to those of you who had a problem with the book's ending, I feel you and yes, it's always been part one of a two-part saga in my mind. Comeuppance and other words are being organized for several characters in the sequel/finel Shitbird. I do things slow, though. Not sure when to expect that. New short fiction coming from me in a handful of books in 2015. So there's that. 

Laura Benedict - Holy craps. This lady, man. Good year for her. Bliss House was well received - how well? well enough that two sequels have been announced! She's scary and scary good. Take it from somebody else who knows scary - Richard Thomas. In his latest LitReactor piece Richard named Laura's story When I Make Love to the Bug Man as one of his top 10 reads of the year. Check it out at Pank magazine and then I feel confident you'll buy the hell out of her books.

Pinckney Benedict - Pinckney made a repeat appearance at the year's lone St. Louis N@B event and put the hurt on the good folks in attendance with his own brand of beautality in the dog-fightingest story of the night. Good golly, the fella isn't cranking out content, but when it does land you better believe he means it. Fuuuuck. Whatever's next, I'm in. 

Frank Bill - Oh not much, only revived James O'Barr's The Crow. What's next? Look for The Salvaged and the Savage early in 2016, but if you can't wait, listen to this excerpt from N@B-Corydon on the Booked Podcast. 

William Boyle - Dude's shit is blowing up. Looking the fuck forward to his story collection Death Don't Have No Mercy. And now you are too.

Jane Bradley - Word is her next novel The Snow Queen of Atlanta is finished and making the rounds. If you read her contribution One Good Thing from Noir at the Bar vol. 2 then you've some idea of why this news makes me goofy in the pants and tingly in the head. Meantime, go try You Believers or one of her short story collections Are We Lucky Yet? or Power Lines. 

David Cirillo - Has been building Terminal, a Kindle serial, and quietly turning out other strange tales that can be found for your eReader on Amazon.

S.L. Coney - I'm sharing space with Coney in at least one not yet announced book in 2015, and meantime Shaw's finished writing a nasty ass murder book and begun another that might melt a face or two. Can't wait till there's more to announce.

Hilary Davidson - Proved there was more than Moore to her fiction writing (I already knew that) with Blood Always Tells. 

Sean Doolittle - Surging ahead with the power and (unfortunately) the speed of a glacier, the big screen treatment of Sean's novel The Cleanup tentatively titled Beg the Devil (okay, that title's pretty badass) has some interesting casting rumors on its IMdB page. Which will hit first, the movie or Sean's next book? I dunno. Which will hit harder? That one's a no-brainer.

J. Christopher Dupuy - Is mysterious... and has disappeared off the face of the earth. So check for him around  the nipples - that's always a good bet. Rumor has it, a long-time-coming novel is ready for to take on the Big Six New York Literati, which is a car right? So, I'm confused. I'm off to the nipples with some questions.

Les Edgerton - Everybody turned on to Pete and Tommy in A Streetcar Not Named Desire, Les's contribution to Noir at the Bar Vol. 2, will be pleased to know that their full story is now available from Down & Out Books. The Genuine, Imitation, Plastic Kidnapping will make you feel bad for laughing.

C.J. Edwards - Working hard on all fronts, professional, domestic and literary, Edwards has been one of those behind the merger of publishing giants Full Dark City Press and All Due Respect Books, plus good news on his novel that you've been reading bits of for years... I dunno the when, but it's on the way and gonna leave a mark. Check out the piece Guilty Footprints that originally appeared in American Blue: Real Stories by Real Cops.

Matthew C. Funk - N@B alum number one to have the Exhibit A stick broke off inside their soft pink parts rebounded with aplomb selling his debut novel City of NO to Dark House Press (and fellow N@B fella Richard Thomas), so bully for both of em.  

Jesus Angel Garcia - Here's one you don't see every day: dude writes a religion/sex/southern culture satire and tours the country with a performance art bit, writes songs based on his own novel, forms band around same songs and then goes full steam ahead with the music. Soon you'll hear some kid at a dirty bluegrass festival say "I heard the singer from Three Times Bad wrote a book!" He did, son. Yes he did. Will he write another? Let's hope so.