I try not to write too many posts aimed mainly at writers, since most of the folks who read my blog aren’t fellow scribes. Occasionally, though, things happen in the world that compel me to address my writing brethren—to comfort and console them, to commiserate with them, and, every once in a while, to light a fire beneath their ass as well as my own.

Today is one of those fire-lighting times. (I almost went with “ass-fire times” but the image it conjured left much to be desired.)

Several writer colleagues of mine—particularly fiction writers—have expressed how torn they’ve been feeling lately about working on their novel or short story or any other form of creative writing. To be clear, these writers aren’t struggling with the writing itself; that is, they’re not having issues with coming up with ideas or getting into a flow. And it isn’t that they can’t find the time to write. Rather, they’re wrestling with the guilt they feel while writing. They’re questioning whether fiddling around in fictional worlds is something they—or anyone else—should be doing right now, considering the real world is in the grips of historic turmoil.

Such “writer’s guilt” is understandable. I completely get it. Hell, up until recently, I completely experienced it. However, I’m pleased to report it no longer has the same hold on me as it did a couple of months ago. It hasn’t been easy, but I’ve learned how to overcome the guilt that’s wreaking havoc on writers (and artists and musicians—and basically anyone else who takes pleasure in a creative pursuit) during these turbulent times.

Now, It’s important to point out that overcoming writer’s guilt is NOT the same as not giving a damn about anything other than your own writing. Not even close. Continuing to create in a world full of mayhem and hate is an act of courage, not of selfishness. Your imagination is a weapon that, when wielded properly, can heal humanity.

How so? I’m glad you asked. ...

 

Stories provide refuge for people in need of—and deserving of— escape. For many, the only way they can take their mind off of the harshest realities is through reading fiction. And not just fantasy or cozy fiction. I know lots of folks who turn to horror novels or psychological thrillers or some other dark genre to help provide cracks of light in a world that often feels pitch-black.

And to those of you who feel “reader’s guilt” while enjoying a good book, go easy on yourself. Escape does not equal apathy or complacency. I personally know several dedicated medical professionals and a few ambitious activists who, when on a break from treating patients or leading protests, sink into a novel, a short story, some poetry. They escape into new and different worlds so that they can live to fight another day in the world outside their windows.     

 

Stories remind readers of the strength of the human spirit. In addition to providing a healthy and necessary means of escape, stories refuel readers. Inspire them. Even transform them. Doesn’t matter if it’s an epic hero saga or a gritty crime novel; every well-told story introduces us—the reader—to a main character with the odds stacked against them and something or someone standing directly in the way of what they’re dying to achieve.

Stories give us underdogs who refuse to stay down. They give us “bad guys” looking to make amends. They give us low-life’s aiming sky high, losers we can’t help rooting for. Stories stick us in the shoes of a stranger we already know and then put us through hell. Put us through fire. Forge us.

Go ahead, just try reading a novel like Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier or Blood Standard by Laird Barron and NOT be moved by the tremendous grit and compassion such stories exude.   

  

Stories are a powerful medium for shedding light on and eliciting action around important social issues. You needn’t be a politically charged author-slash-activist to tap into the zeitgeist surrounding your story, thus adding power and agency to it and its characters. Few fiction enthusiasts enjoy being hit over the head with a writer’s political or social agenda, anyway. But unless your novel or short story is a radically fantastical one that takes place on a distant planet with alien beings in the distant future, it likely features humans living in a human world facing issues humans face—issues readers can relate to. Issues that captivate them and keep them riveted because they hit the reader right smack in “the feels.”

Authors like Attica Locke, Don Winslow and Alafair Burke write amazing, unputdownable crime fiction that isn’t necessarily about but centers around such systemic social issues as racism, police brutality, gun violence, and misogyny. These authors don’t write one-dimensional heroes who run around and solve major societal issues; rather they create multifaceted, flawed protagonists grinding it out in fictional worlds that mirror our real one. Worlds where humanity’s biggest problems are etched into the setting and inform each characters’ beliefs, thoughts and actions. More importantly, these authors demonstrate with great skill how it’s possible to tell captivating tales that entertain readers while simultaneously causing them to think about—and perhaps even take action around—things much bigger than the book they’re holding.   

   

A writer not writing is a danger to themselves and others. Sure, a novelist could quit writing entirely to focus all of their time on trying to fix or heal society— and doing so would be a noble endeavor—but not all noble endeavors are necessarily smart or feasible. (Don Quixote, anyone?) Studies have shown that if a writer quits writing abruptly out of guilt, there is a 100-percent chance they will go completely insane and murder everyone in their neighborhood. (The studies were conducted by Harvard or Stanford or some other really important university, I can’t recall exactly. All I know is they were definitely conducted somewhere prestigious and are not just something I’m making up to support my point.)   

Actually, just forget about the research I just cited and instead listen to Franz Kafka, who famously said: “A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity.” For those of you who think Kafka was just being dramatic when he said that, talk to just about any writer’s family. Talk to mine—ask them how I get whenever forced to go more than 48 hours without writing. There’s a reason why my wife invested in interior doors that lock from the outside.

Now, to be clear, I am NOT saying writers should be excused from caring about the pandemic or from being active, socially responsible citizens who stand up against injustice. In fact, if you’re a writer, I strongly encourage you to take occasional breaks from your writing to check on your neighbors and/or give blood and/or donate food and/or volunteer virtually—and to definitely educate yourself about systemic racism and what you can do to help end it.

Just be sure to then take all the humanity and the heartbreak and the strength of spirit you witness and experience, and incorporate it into a story that reminds us of what it means to be alive.

 

YOUR TURN: Any of you writers out there been struggling with guilt while working on your fiction? And for you normal people, er, I mean non-writers, have you been experiencing a similar type of guilt over a creative pursuit you normally enjoy? Share in the comments section below. Then get back to creating. 

 

I just want to lead off by saying violence never solves anything. That said, smashing things to bits can feel pretty damn good—especially when the things you’re smashing belong to the spouse who robbed you blind and destroyed your life just before losing theirs.

Don't worry, I'm not referring to anything from my life (though I do like smashing things to bits); rather to that of Odessa Scott—the protagonist from my upcoming (some day) crime thriller Into a Corner.

While we all have stuff to be furious about these days, few of us will ever become as furious as Odessa is throughout much of my book.  At the start of the book we learn her dead husband—before getting dead—drained all their accounts AND the accounts of Odessa's widowed mother (Mama), then ran off with the cash ... and his mistress. Odessa found all this out the next day, when her husband and his mistress and every cent Odessa and Mama ever earned exploded. Talk about a change of fortune. 

When you create a character who has a serious axe to grind with someone but that someone is already dead, you have to give your character an opportunity to vent in a healthy manner; otherwise they'll end up destroying themselves and all the innocent people around them before they reach even the middle of the story. Fortunately for Odessa, I came up with the idea of having her good friend Griff come up with the idea of giving Odessa the gift of catharsis ... by taking her to a "rage room" and letting her loose. For those of you who don't know what a rage room is, you are about to find out—and will likely want to visit (or create) one yourself afterward. If you do, remember to always wear a helmet and protective eyewear before beginning to obliterate everything in your path. Safety first.

The following is an excerpt from Chapter 14 of Into A Corner. It shows how, when pushed too far, even an artist who's all about creation will fully embrace destruction.  

 

I swing the bat so hard, several of my thoracic vertebrae pop and crackle. The forty-inch glass screen implodes on impact. Shards skitter and glisten across the stained concrete floor. What’s left of the television screen is a web spun by a crystal spider. I stand there admiring the damage.  

Through the spectator portal, Griff gives me a double thumbs-up. “Hell yeah!” he shouts, barely audible behind the plexiglass and over the Wu-Tang song blaring out of the speakers. Lucky for him, I’m not wearing the earplugs the owner of this place offered me.

Griff taps the partition and points my attention toward the Kawasaki in the center of the wrecking room. I look at him and shake my head till my safety helmet rattles out of position. “Not yet!” I yell through the glass while readjusting my helmet and goggles. “Saving the worst for last.”

The digital display on the wall says I have eight minutes and thirty-seven seconds left to destroy everything around me.

I’m off to a damn good start. Wayne spent half his waking life and most of his sleeping one in front of that TV I just demolished. Beneath my All The Rage-issued white coveralls and work gloves is all the sweat.

Eight minutes and twenty-four seconds left and I line drive one of Wayne’s golf trophies off a table and against the cinder blocks of the side wall. The little gold man bounces back toward me with a crushed skull, a lacerated spine, and none of the granite that allowed him to stand around showing off his swing for years.

I show off mine and send two more trophies flying disfigured across the room while several members of the Wu-Tang Clan shout about how they “ain’t nuthin’ to fuck with.”

The song holds a special place in my heart.

This room is all about rage, but it’s hard to resist smiling as Griff cheers me on. He’s matched my every smash, crack, and shatter with a booming exclamation of support. If this keeps up, the worst years of my life will give him laryngitis.

Seven minutes and sixteen seconds and the last remaining wedding photo. The only one that didn’t go through the shredder in my studio months ago. I switch out my bat for a sledgehammer, then switch out the sledgehammer for a golf club because irony. Besides, ten pounds of steel to obliterate a marriage is overkill. Plus there’s no need to hurt myself. Getting injured over Wayne would raise my rage to a level not even a place built for it could handle.

I pick up the framed photo and fold its stand flush against the back of the frame, then lay it flat on the oak table. The tabletop is scarred with scratches, dents, and gouges from All The Rage’s previous satisfied maniacs.

Wu-Tang switches to The Clash. I raise the nine iron over my head machete-style and bring it down on the thin panel of glass no longer protecting Wayne’s face on the happiest day of his life. The opposite of wedding bells pierces the air as the frame’s edges detach and hurtle toward the four corners of the earth. Most of the glass panel is now scattered in assorted shapes and sizes across the table and floor. The rest of the glass is slivers and sand pinned between the head of the nine iron and the head of Wayne. My smile and wedding dress have escaped with just a few scratches and glass splinters. I go to lift the club but the edge of its head is stuck in a groove behind what’s left of Wayne’s face. A tug releases the weapon from the oak surface underneath and I smile like King Arthur, then search for what to slay next as I catch my breath.

Griff’s “woohoo!” and “go get it, girl!” competes with The Clash’s “Straight to Hell.” The song list was my creation. This has all been carefully thought out and choreographed. It’s the opposite of my life.

Out of the corner of my goggles, Ray, the owner of All The Rage, has joined Griff in the spectator portal. The two bump fists and start chatting like a silent movie. Ray looks like Denzel Washington and Bruce Lee had a baby and told that baby to work out a lot and shave its head when it got older.

With five minutes and fifty-three seconds left, I don’t need this kind of distraction.

Ray points at Griff’s new watch and says something while nodding. Griff nods with him, gives him a closer look at the watch, then points at me. I avert my eyes as the two of them peer through the window at my kindness and mayhem.

It’s time for the bowling ball. Wayne didn’t bowl. The ball isn’t his—it’s included in the Deluxe Destruction package. The blood-splatter pattern painted on the ball is a nice touch. Ray was kind enough to help Griff and me set Wayne’s stupid rare beer bottle collection up as a double-decker ten-pin bowling installation against the back wall when we arrived earlier. He even threw in a thin ceramic tile to separate the two layers of bottles, for free. But I didn’t come here to think about Ray or his generosity. Or his Zen-like ruggedness or his wild stallion glutes.

I pick up the bowling ball that’s not a bowling ball but Wayne’s severed head and stand close enough to the bottles to read their labels. Griff and Ray urge me on, roaring over The Clash’s chorus of hell as I take aim. With two fingers stuck through Wayne’s eye sockets, my thumb shoved up his nasal cavity and my weaker hand supporting the rest of his head, I step toward the glass pins, rear my arm back, and release.

Gutterball. But the smack and whirr of Wayne’s head hitting and rolling across the concrete floor before bashing against the cinderblock wall behind the bottles was almost worth the boos now coming from the spectator portal. Wayne’s decapitation rolls back to me. I bend over, pick it up, and turn around to stare down my taunters, but a tiny laugh escapes my scowl.

Ray’s beauty is ruining my temper tantrum. His kind eyes and smile are sucking the life out of my anger, spoiling my desire for violence and displaced aggression. So I turn around and think back to Wayne telling me he’ll be working late again hours before he exploded. I think back to seeing the checking account statement the next morning. I think back to hearing about who was in the car with him.

His head leaves my hand like a cannonball and turns the stacked bottles into a terrorist attack. Every microbrew Wayne ever bragged about now mimics what was left of the windshield in the photos the police showed me. Only this time I’m grinning the width of my goggles instead of shrieking like a brand-new widow.

“Strrriiiiike!” shouts Griff from the spectator portal. “Fuck yeah!” And if he doesn’t stop pounding his appreciation against the portal window, there’s going to be even more pieces of glass for Ray to clean up when we leave.

I turn around and flex, then do a little celebratory jig, shaking my booty a little more than I probably would if Griff were alone in the viewing booth. Ray gives me a thumbs-up and goddamn it another smile. If he doesn’t get the hell out here and leave us alone, fat chance of me mustering up the kind of unbridled fury I paid good money to finish off with.

I turn around and approach the Kawasaki. Griff and Ray slap their palms against the plexiglass and shout out inaudible words of encouragement. I do my best to block them out with thoughts of Wayne paying for the motorcycle with money he secretly siphoned from my dead father. Thoughts of Mama losing her house. Thoughts of Mama losing her mind.

The Clash switches to Rage Against the Machine just in time.

Three minutes and forty-one seconds and a crowbar. I pick it up from the weapon station and grasp it so tight it’s a part of me. Even with Zach de la Rocha shouting the heavy-metal rap of “Bombtrack” beyond the limits of the volume bar, my ears are hungry for louder. One swing of my steel appendage, and the Vulcan 900’s headlamp is a head-on collision. A swipe above the width of the handlebars beheads both mirrors like a Samurai and sends them sliding across the floor to mingle with the glass-and-ceramic remains of my previous victim.

More joyous cheers from the box seats force me to watch Wayne pulling up the driveway on this beast two years ago, calling me out to brag about its fierce power and beauty, promising me I won’t regret his unilateral decision.

He’s finally right.

With enough downward force to knock a lighter bike into hell, I bring the crowbar down on the gas tank and almost regret not heeding Ray’s earplug advice. The ringing makes it harder to hear the motivational distortion and screams of “Bombtrack,” but not even possible deafness can ruin the aluminum carnage for me. I grin at the huge dent and gash in the tank, imagining Wayne’s reaction. He gives me a smirk and asks if that’s the best I can do. My reply is another deathblow to the tank, then one to the taillight, two to the exhaust pipe, and who knows how many to the midsection. But enough to knock the motherfucker’s metal heart out.

One minute and fifty-three seconds and oxygen. Not enough of it. Not to fill my lungs or to lift a finger, let alone a crowbar.

So this is what total muscle failure feels like. Success.

The concrete cools my back through my coveralls and damp shirt. I didn’t realize how high the ceiling was before. My chest heaves toward it to bring air inside. Gas and oil fumes get mixed in despite me draining everything out last night. Now I understand why Ray rejected my request to bring my acetylene torch to this session.

My helmeted head falls to the side. Through the spokes of the rear wheel there’s the battered engine, lying motionless on the other side of the bike’s upright carcass.

Griff is overjoyed someplace I’m too tired to look.

Rage Against the Machine switches to Gloria Gaynor, but I’m still struggling to catch my breath. Having a coronary during “I Will Survive” would be humiliating and ruin an otherwise wonderful tantrum. I roll my head to the other side of the floor and catch Griff following Ray out of the viewing portal. Despite my urge to fake unconsciousness and steal a little CPR action from Ray, I sit up, then struggle to my feet and take in all the beauty of my unnatural disaster. Hurricane Odessa has been downgraded from a Category 5 to a mild tropical storm.

And time’s up. The buzzer on the digital display says so.

“You okay?” asks Griff, bounding from the padded door Ray’s holding open for him.

Doubled over, panting, I give Griff a raised fist and a “yup,” then return my torso to its fully upright position and pretend to breathe normally as Ray enters the wrecking room, closing the door behind him.

“You sure?” Griff asks.

I nod again and remove my helmet so he can see my eyes begging him to help me look like I have my shit together.

 

Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed the excerpt and are now counting the seconds until Into a Corner comes out, which should be sometime between Fall 2021 and Summer 2050—depending on my agent’s success landing a nice deal for it. (She’s starting the submission process very soon and she’s a rock star, so stay tuned.) If you’d like to learn a little more about—and read some additional pages from—the book, I posted an earlier excerpt a while back, and another one before that, and ANOTHER one even before that. (What can I say, I'm a giver.) 

As for cool crime novels that are available NOW, it just so happens I recommended a couple by badass authors in the latest issue of my newsletter today. Those books/authors include:

Coyote Songs by Gabino Iglesias. As poetic as it is visceral, Iglesias' second novel howls its song and rips into our social fabric and fabrications like few other books dare to do. It's a story as old as injustice but as fresh as tomorrow. Don't just take my word for it. Here's what Booklist has to say about this up-in-your-grill cult masterpiece: "Coyote Songs​ is gorgeously written, even when Iglesias is describing horrible things." 

 

 

 

 

 

Whisper Network by Chandler Baker. Yes, Chandler Baker lives in the same city as I do (Austin). No, I don't know her. But after reading this phenomenally sharp, smart and witty thriller, I'll likely seek her out (no, not in a creepy way) for an interview over drinks once COVID-19 calms the hell down. Furious and hilarious has always been a great combo in my book; if you feel the same, then be sure to check out Baker's. It's Outstanding.  Entertaining. Important. I'd list all the praise and accolades this novel has received, but that would require a book of its own. Read. It.    

 

 

 

Don’t want to miss out on my future recommendations for books by baddass Cri-Fi authors? Then I have another recommendation: Sign up for my newsletter! (Just enter your email address in the sign-up box near the top-right corner of this page. Trust me.)

I wasn’t going to post anything this week. After all, this blog is dedicated to crime fiction and the writing life; not to current events and social change. Thus I didn’t want to distract from the important conversations, essays and articles being led/written by individuals much more qualified than I to address the injustices and civil protests seen across America (and the globe) in recent weeks.

But then I thought maybe I could add to the conversation rather than distract from it by putting aside crime fiction this week and instead writing about my own experiences as an aspiring anti-racist. (No, by “aspiring” I don’t mean I was a racist and then tried not to be; rather that I’ve always considered myself to be an inclusive and open-minded humanist but have realized that, when it comes to race and institutional racism, I still have a lot to learn.) So, I started to write an open letter—to myself—calling myself out for past indiscretions during interactions with black (and other POC) friends and acquaintances. However, about a thousand words into my letter, I realized two things: 1) it was a rambling mess; and 2) I had somehow managed to take the critical events currently happening in and beyond the US … and make them about ME. 

So I nixed the letter, and did some more thinking. Then I realized there was a way—a simple one, really—for me to show support for the #BlackLivesMatter movement via my blog while also keeping the blog focused on crime fiction … all without making the whole damn thing about me.

So, without much further ado, I’m honored to share with you a list of 33 black authors of crime fiction everyone needs to read. Mind you, this is by no means an exhaustive list. Nor is it simply my list. While I have read and immensely enjoyed works by each of the featured authors, they are widely considered to be amongst the most influential and talented writers of their respective generation. Point is, each author listed is an outstanding writer (not just an outstanding black writer). I’ll leave it to you to explore each and discover some new favorite authors/books—and revisit some old ones.        

Wherever possible, I’ve provided links to the authors’ official websites so that readers may learn more about each writer and check out their books (and hopefully BUY some!). For the authors who don’t have a formal website, I’ve provided a link either to their Amazon page or to their profile page on the African American Literature Book Club’s website.

 

THE PIONEERS & LEGENDS

 

Chester Himes

Chester Bomar Himes was the twentieth century’s most prolific black writer and masterfully captured the spirit of his times, confronting sex, racism, and black identity. In his best-selling novel, If He Hollers Let Him Go, Himes created a brutally frank portrait of racial politics, but he became famous for his acclaimed Harlem Detective series. In 1958 he won France's Grand Prix de Littérature Policière. Two of his novels were made into feature films: Cotton Comes to Harlem directed by Ossie Davis in 1970 and A Rage in Harlem starring Gregory Hines and Danny Glover in 1991.

In 1969, fleeing oppression, Himes moved to Moraira, Spain, where he died in 1984 from Parkinson's Disease.

 

Eleanor Taylor Bland

Although Eleanor Taylor Bland was 48 when her first crime novel—Dead Time—was published in 1992, it's hard not to consider her a true pioneer of crime fiction. This is thanks largely to her groundbreaking protagonist, Marti MacAlister—a black female police detective working in a Midwestern American town. With MacAlister, Bland created a tough yet beloved heroine who defied the stereotypes of African American women in U.S. popular culture.

Bland was highly skilled at bringing in characters who had remained on the periphery of or completely missing from the crime fiction of her times. And in doing so, she greatly broadened the appeal of the genre and inspired countless authors of color to follow in her footsteps. Just as gritty and as resilient as her characters, Bland was diagnosed with Gardner's disease in the 1970s and was told she had only a few years to live. She fought that disease and had several bouts with cancer, and didn't succumb until June 2nd, 2010.    

 

Robert Beck (a.k.a., Iceberg Slim)

Iceberg Slim, also known as Robert Beck, was born in Chicago in 1918 and was initiated into the life of the pimp at age eighteen. He briefly attended the Tuskegee Institute but dropped out to return to the streets of the South Side, where he remained, pimping until he was forty-two. After several stints in jail he decided to give up the life and turned to writing.

Slim folded his life into the pages of seven autobiographical novels. Catapulted into the public eye, Slim became a new American hero, known for speaking the truth whether that truth was ugly, sexy, rude, or blunt. Slim died at age 73 in 1992—one day before the Los Angeles riots.

 

 

Barbara Neely

Barbara Neely was a novelist, short story writer and activist who wrote murder mysteries. Her first novel, Blanche on the Lam (1992), introduced the protagonist Blanche White, a middle-aged mother, domestic worker and amateur detective. The book earned Neely an Agatha Award for best first novel in 1992; an Anthony Award for first best novel in 1993; the Go on Girl! Award from the Black Women's Reading Club for the best debut novel; and a Macavity Award for first best mystery novel in 1993.

In December 2019, the Mystery Writers of America named her their 2020 Grand Master winner.

Neely also won two awards for her activism. They include “Community Works Social Action Award for Leadership and Activism for Women's Rights and Economic Justice” and “Fighting for Women's Voices Award”—both from the Coalition for Basic Human Needs.

Following a brief illness, Neely died just this a few months ago—on March 2, 2020—at the age of 78.

 

Grace F. Edwards

 Born and raised in Harlem, Grace F. Edwards was a beacon of hope, brilliance, and dedication within the New York literary scene. In 1992, Edwards became the first African American author signed to Doubleday.

She was the author of seven novels, including a four-book murder mysteries series featuring her best-known character, Mali Anderson. Edwards was the 1999 winner of the Fiction Honor Book award from the Black Caucus of the American Literary Association.

She earned her master’s degree in Creative Writing from the City University of New York, and was a YADDO fellow. Edwards served as a professor of Creative Writing at Hofstra University, Marymount Manhattan College, the College of New Rochelle, and Hunter College. In addition, she reviewed books for The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, and was the secretary of The Harlem Writers Guild. She stepped up to the role of director of the guild upon the death of its longtime leader, Bill Banks.

Edwards died of natural causes on February 25^th of this year.

 

THE CONTEMPORARY GREATS  

 

Attica Locke

Attica Locke’s latest novel Heaven, My Home (September 2019) is the sequel to Edgar Award-winning Bluebird, Bluebird. Her third novel, Pleasantville, was the winner of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction and was also long-listed for the Bailey’s Prize for Women’s Fiction. The Cutting Season was the winner of the Ernest Gaines Award for Literary Excellence.

Her first novel Black Water Rising was nominated for an Edgar Award, an NAACP Image Award, as well as a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and was short-listed for the Women’s Prize for Fiction.  A former fellow at the Sundance Institute’s Feature Filmmaker’s Lab, Locke works as a screenwriter as well.  Most recently, she was a writer and producer on Netflix’s When They See Us and the also the upcoming Hulu adaptation of Little Fires Everywhere. A native of Houston, Texas, Attica lives in Los Angeles, California, with her husband and daughter.

 

Walter Mosley

Walter Mosley is one of the most versatile and admired writers in America today. He is the author of more than 43 critically acclaimed books, including the major bestselling mystery series featuring Easy Rawlins.

His work has been translated into 23 languages and includes literary fiction, science fiction, political monographs, and a young adult novel. His short fiction has been widely published, and his nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times Magazine and The Nation, among other publications.

Mosley is the winner of numerous awards, including an O. Henry Award, a Grammy and PEN America’s Lifetime Achievement Award. He lives in New York City.

 

Kyra Davis

Kyra Davis is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Just One Night, Pure Sin and Sophie Katz series. Just One Night has been optioned for television by Anonymous.

Before publishing her first book, Sex, Murder And A Double Latte in 2005, Davis supported herself and her son as a marketing manager for a sports club. She studied at The Fashion Institute Of Design and Merchandising and Golden Gate University.

Davis now lives with her husband (director and screenwriter, Rod Lurie), her teenage son (proud science-geek and Hawaiian-Shirt-aficionado), dog (champion eater and guardian of the backyard…no squirrel will dare set foot in it) and gecko (the gecko doesn’t do much).

 

Gar Anthony Haywood

Gar Anthony Haywood is the Shamus and Anthony award-winning author of twelve crime novels, including the Aaron Gunner private eye series and the Joe and Dottie Loudermilk mysteries.

His short fiction has been included in the Best American Mystery Stories anthologies, and Booklist has called him “a writer who has always belonged in the upper echelon of American crime fiction.” 

He has written for network television and both the New York Times and Los Angeles Times. He and his wife Donna currently make their home in Denver, Colorado.

 

 

Dorothy Koomson

Dorothy Koomson is the award-winning author of fifteen novels.

The Ice Cream Girls and The Rose Petal Beach were both shortlisted for the popular fiction category of the British Book Awards in 2010 and 2013, respectively. Her gripping domestic crime thriller, Tell Me Your Secret, has been a UK Sunday Times Bestseller.

Koomson’s novels have been translated into over 30 languages,

After briefly living in Australia, Dorothy now lives in Brighton.

 

 

 

Glenville Lovell

Glenville Lovell is the author of four novels, several short stories and a number of prize-winning plays.

In 1995, his first novel, Fire in the Canes, was published by Soho Press to wide acclaim, as was his second novel, Song of Night, published in 1998.

Too Beautiful To Die, published by Putnam, introduced volatile black ex-cop Blades Overstreet as a new though somewhat reluctant hero, and garnered praise and comparisons to some of the most illustrious names in the mystery/thriller genre. This was followed by Love and Death in Brooklyn.

Born in a chattel house in Parish Land, Christ Church, a village on the island of Barbados, he grew up surrounded by sugar cane, shadows and word-magicians. With storytelling all around him: in kitchens, under flamboyant trees at night, in rum shops, he spent as much time picking dunks and golden apples from his backyard as he did "pickin' words from big-people mouths," as his grandmother used to say. Many of these stories turned up in his first novel Fire in the Canes.

Lovell now lives in New York and is currently working on a new Blades Overstreet book and another novel set in Barbados.

 

Paula L. Woods

Paula L. Woods is the author of Inner City Blues and Stormy Weather. Inner City Blues won the Macavity Award for best first mystery, and was followed by other novels featuring its heroine—L.A. policewoman Charlotte Justice.

Woods has also edited an anthology of African-American crime literature and co-edited (with Felix H. Liddell) three anthologies of African American literature illustrated with African American fine art

She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and her boxer.

 

 

Valerie Wilson Wesley

Valerie Wilson Wesley is the author of A Glimmer of Death (an Odessa Jones Mystery), to be published next year, as well as the popular Tamara Hayle Mystery series, three novels, and two paranormal romances under the pen name Savanna Welles. 

Her novels and mysteries are published in Germany, France and the UK. In 2000, she received the Best Book award from the American Library Black Caucus Association—for her novel Ain’t Nobody’s Business If I Do. 

Wilson is a former executive editor of Essence magazine.

 

Penny Mickelbury

Penny Mickelbury’s many books reflect her continued interest in the things that sparked her imagination as a child: History and Mystery. She's author of the Mimi Patterson/Gianna Maglione Mysteries—five books and counting—published by Bywater Books. In addition, Mickelbury has two novels of historical fiction, with more to come. 

Mickelbury is the recipient of the Audre Lorde Estate Grant and a Residency at the Hedgebrook Women Writers Retreat. She was also a 2019 Inductee with the Washington Post Metro Seven into the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame. 

She lives in Los Angeles, CA, and her favorite activities are—no kidding—reading and writing. She also loves travel, yoga and swimming.

 

Frankie Y. Bailey

Frankie Y. Bailey, PhD, is a professor in the School of Criminal Justice University at Albany (SUNY). She studies crime history, and crime and mass media/popular culture and material culture. She is the author of five mysteries featuring amateur sleuth Lizzie Stuart and two police procedurals novels featuring Albany police detective Hannah Stuart.

Whether she is engaged in academic research and non-fiction writing or researching and writing crime fiction, Frankie’s mantra is “dig deeper.” She believes, “Every crime deserves context.” When making presentations to her varied audiences, she strives to engage, inform, and serve as a catalyst for lively discussions about social issues.

 

 

Robert Greer

Robert Greer is, first and foremost a professor of pathology, medicine, surgery, and dentistry at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center where he specializes in head and neck pathology and cancer research—but he’s also a damn fine crime writer. In 1986 he founded The High Plains Literary Review and continues to serve as its editor-in-chief. Greer has had dozens of short stories appear in national literary magazines, and has written numerous novels, including the popular The C.J. Floyd Mystery Series.

In 1983, Dr. Greer’s research group was the first in the world to report a synergistic link between smokeless tobacco use and human papillomaviruses in certain cancers of the mouth. That research is the basis for the plot of his novel The Devil's Hatband (Book 1 in the CJ Floyd series).

In addition to writing, medicine, and research, Greer reviews books for a Denver National Public Radio affiliate, KUVO, and raises cattle on a ranch in Wyoming.

 

Persia Walker

Persia Walker is a native New Yorker who has spent a good deal of her life living abroad, including years in Germany, Brazil and Poland.

Walker has had a lot of jobs. She’s worked as a radio announcer, news writer, a freelance editor, book cover designer, real estate agent and diplomat-cum-armchair detective. (Really? Yes, really.)

Her books reflect her fascination with history and her love of those old black-and-white movies, a.k.a. film noir. Her stories are set in New York City, most likely because, despite her attempts at settling elsewhere, she really is a New Yorker at heart.

“New York,” she says, “is like that old lover you can’t quite get rid of. You know the kind. Most everybody has or has had one. You keep trying to end the whole thing, permanently, but it just keeps drawing you back.”

Walker is back in the United States, living in the Washington DC area with her extremely lovable marmalade tabby named “Sunday.” Walker has no plans to move overseas ever again. Then, again … hmm.

 

Terris McMahan Grimes

Terris McMahan Grimes is an award-winning author. Somebody Else’s Child, the first book in her Theresa Galloway mystery series, won an unprecedented double Anthony Awards for best first novel and best paperback original. She has also the won the Chester Himes Black Mystery Writers Award. Grimes’ work tends to focus on the African American family, particularly mother/daughter relationships.

Grimes grew up in West Oakland, where her novel Smelling Herself is set. She walked the same streets to and from Thompkins Elementary School that Bernadine—the hero of Smelling Herself—walked. Grimes has fond memories of growing up in the Chestnut Court Apartment Complex and graduating from McClymonds High School.

She earned a BA Degree in English from California State University, Chico, and is an alumna of the Master of Fine Arts, Creative Writing Program at Antioch University, Los Angeles. She writes from her home studio in Sacramento, California.

 

Leye Adenle

Leye Adenle, winner of the first ever Prix Marianne in 2016, is a Nigerian writer living and working in London. His short story “The Assassination” in the anthology Sunshine Noir was a finalist for the 2017 CWA short story dagger award. His novels include the critically acclaimed Easy Motion Tourist and When Trouble Sleeps.

Leye has written several short stories under his own name, and over a hundred satirical pieces under various other names.

Leye comes from a family of writers, the most famous of whom was his grandfather, Oba Adeleye Adenle I, a former king of Oshogbo in South West Nigeria. Leye has no intentions of ever becoming King.

 

THE RISING STARS 

 

Rachel Howzell Hall

Rachel Howzell Hall is the author of seven novels, including the critically-acclaimed Detective Elouise Norton series. Her standalone thriller They All Fall Down was published in April 2019 and pays homage to Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None. The third in her Lou Norton series, Trail of Echoes, received a coveted Kirkus Star and was one of Kirkus Reviews’ “Books That Kept Us Up All Night.”

Her novels Land of Shadows and Skies of Ash (Forge) were included on the Los Angeles Times' “Books to Read This Summer” for 2014 and 2015, and the New York Times called Lou Norton “a formidable fighter—someone you want on your side.” Lou was also recently included in The Guardian's Top 10 Female Detectives in Fiction." Hall is also collaborating with James Patterson and BookShots on “The Good Sister” in the New York Times bestselling The Family Lawyer.

A featured writer on NPR's acclaimed Crime in the City series and the National Endowment for the Arts weekly podcast, Hall has also served as a mentor in AWP's Writer to Writer Program and is currently on the board of directors of the Mystery Writers of America. She was named one of Apple iBooks' “10 Authors to Read in 2017.”

She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.

 

S.A. Cosby

S.A. Cosby is an Anthony award winning writer from Southeastern Virginia. His upcoming novel Blacktop Wasteland (due out July 14, 2020) has already garnered rave reviews from the likes of Walter Mosley, Lee Child, and Dennis Lehane, and is widely expected to by Cosby’s breakout book. His previous books—Brotherhood of the Blade and My Darkest Prayer—were no slouches themselves.

Cosby’s short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines. His short story “The Grass Beneath My Feet” won the Anthony Award for Best Short Story in 2019. 

Cosby’s writing has been called “gritty and heartbreaking” as well as “dark, thrilling and tragic.” His style and tone is influenced by his varied life experiences, which include but are not limited to being a bouncer, construction worker, retail manager, and—for six hours—a mascot for a major fast food chain inside the world's hottest costume.

When he isn't crafting tales of murder and mayhem, he assists the dedicated staff at J.K.Redmind Funeral home as a mortician's assistant. He is also known as one hell of a chess player.

 

Oyinkan Braithwaite

Oyinkan Braithwaite is the author of My Sister, the Serial Killer, which won the 2019 LA Times Award for Best Crime Thriller, the 2019 Morning News Tournament of Books, the 2019 Amazon Publishing Reader’s Award for Best Debut Novel, and the 2019 Anthony Award for Best First Novel. The book was also shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2019, as well as for the Goodreads Choice Awards 2019 in the Mystery & Thriller and Debut Novel categories, not to mention being shortlisted for the British Book Awards 2020 in two categories, and for the Book Bloggers’ Choice Awards 2020.

In addition, My Sister, the Serial Killer was long-listed for the Booker Prize 2019, and for the 2020 Dublin Literary Award. The novel is being translated into 30 languages and has also been optioned for film.

Braithwaite is a graduate of Creative Writing and Law from Kingston University.

 

Tracy Clark

Tracy Clark is a native Chicagoan who writes mysteries set in her hometown while working as an editor in the newspaper industry. She is a graduate of Mundelein College, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, and the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she earned her MA.

Since reading her first Nancy Drew mystery, Clark has dreamed of crafting mysteries of her own, mysteries that feature strong, intelligent, independent female characters, and those who share their world. Cass Raines, ex-cop turned intrepid PI, is such a character.

In addition to her Cass Raines novels, Clark’s short story “For Services Rendered,” appears in the anthology Shades of Black: Crime and Mystery Stories by African-American Authors.

Clark is currently writing her next Cass Raines mystery and binge-watching “Game of Thrones”.

 

Kellye Garrett

Kellye Garrett writes the Detective by Day mysteries about a semi-famous, mega-broke black actress who takes on the deadliest role of her life: Private Detective. The first book in the series, Hollywood Homicide, won the Agatha, Anthony, Lefty, and the Independent Publisher (“IPPY”) awards for best first novel, and was named one of BookBub’s “Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time.”

The second book in the series, Hollywood Ending, was featured on the TODAY show’s “Best Summer Reads of 2019” and was nominated for both an Anthony and a Lefty award.

Prior to writing novels, Kellye spent eight years working in Hollywood, including a stint writing for Cold Case. She now works for a leading media company and serves on the Board of Directors for Sisters in Crime. She also is a co-founder of Crime Writers of Color.

 

John Vercher

John Vercher’s debut novel, Three-Fifths, was published in September 2019 by Agora—the diversity-focused imprint of Polis Books—and was named one of the best books of 2019 by the Chicago Tribune. In addition, the novel was listed as a Best Debut Novel by CrimeReads, and was a 2020 nominee for a Lefty Award (for Best Debut Novel) as well as an Edgar Award for Best First Novel.

Vercher is a contributing writer for Cognoscenti—the thoughts and opinions page of WBUR Boston. Two of his essays published on race, identity, and parenting were picked up by NPR, and he has appeared on WBUR’s Weekend Edition. His non-fiction work has also appeared in Entropy Magazine and CrimeReads.

Vercher lives in the Philadelphia area with his wife and two sons. He has a Bachelor’s in English from the University of Pittsburgh and an MFA in Creative Writing from the Mountainview Master of Fine Arts program, and served as an adjunct faculty member at Chestnut Hill College in Philadelphia.

 

Alexia Gordon

A writer since childhood, Gordon continued writing through college but put literary endeavors on hold to finish medical school and Family Medicine residency training. Her medical career established, she returned to writing fiction.

Gordon won a Lefty Award and multiple Lone Star Literary Bloggers’ Choice Awards, was nominated for an Agatha Award, became a finalist for a Silver Falchion Award, and was chosen one of Suspense Magazine’s best debuts of 2016.

She is a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, and the Crime Writers of Color. Gordon is represented by Paula Munier of Talcott Notch Literary Services, LLC and published by Henery Press.

She blogs with the Miss Demeanors—one of “Writers’ Digest‘s 2017 Best 101 Websites for Writers”—and with the Femmes Fatales, and she hosts the Cozy Corner podcast.

Originally from the Mid-Atlantic region, Gordon bounced around the country chasing jobs. She landed in Chicagoland, where she indulges her love of classical music, fine whiskies, travel, and ghost stories.

 

Stephen Mack Jones

Hammett Award and Nero Prize-winning novelist Stephen Mack Jones is the author of the critically acclaimed thrillers August Snow and Lives Laid Away—the latter of which was short-listed for the CWA-UK “Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award.”

Once-upon-a-time he worked in advertising and marketing communications for which he is deeply sorry and promises never to do that again. Mr. Jones lives in suburban Detroit and has three adult children that mostly like him. He's at either one most days--except Thursdays. Thursdays are reserved for pie. And writing. Mostly pie.

 

Rachel Edwards

Rachel Edwards debut psychological thriller, Darling, has received high praise from countless big names in the crime fiction world ever since the book’s launch in May 2018.

Edwards born and raised in the UK by her Jamaican mother and Nigerian father. She is delighted to have been “born on three continents at once,” and identifies as many things: a black British author; a wife and stepmother; a London-loving resident of the Shires; a heartbroken Europhile and a diehard Soul II Soul fan.

Rachel read French with English at King’s College London. After a graduate stint in publishing, her break into fiction came in her twenties when she was engaged to craft literary sauce for her first editor, Rowan Pelling. She then won a national fiction award from The Arts Council which comprised mentoring from the acclaimed novelist Catherine Johnson. She has since written for Marie Claire and many other publications, freelancing for more than ten years until 2016 when she chose to focus full-time on her fiction.

 

Lauren Wilkinson

Lauren Wilkinson’s debut novel, American Spy, was a Washington Post bestseller, an NAACP Image Award nominee, an Anthony award nominee, and an Edgar Award nominee. It was short-listed for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize, was a Barnes & Noble Book of the Month, a PBS book club pick, and was included on Barack Obama’s 2019 Recommended Reading List.

Lauren earned an MFA in fiction and literary translation from Columbia University, and has taught writing at Columbia and the Fashion Institute of Technology. She was a Center for Fiction Emerging Writer’s Fellow, and has received support from both the MacDowell Colony and the Djerassi Resident Artists Program. Her writing has appeared in Granta, The Believer, New York magazine and The New York Times, among other publications. Lauren splits her time between New York and Los Angeles where she works as a writer for television.  (Author photo by Niqui Carter)

 

Cheryl A. Head

Originally from Detroit, Cheryl A. Head now lives on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., where she has navigated a successful career as a writer, television producer, filmmaker, broadcast executive and media funder. Her self-published debut novel, Long Way Home: A World War II Novel, was a 2015 Next Generation Indie Book Award finalist in both the African American Literature and Historical Fiction categories.

Head's Charlie Mack Motown Mystery series (published by Bywater Books) was a 2017 Lammy finalist. Book five of the acclaimed series, Find Me When I'm Lost, is due out July 28.

When not writing fiction, Head consults on a wide range of diversity issues. She is currently the Director of Inclusion for the board of the Golden Crown Literary Society (GCLS) whose mission is education and the promotion and recognition of lesbian literature.

 

Nikki Dolson

Nikki Dolson is a highly respected author of primarily of short fiction. Her work has been published in such crime fiction zines as Shotgun Honey, Tough, Thuglit, and Bartleby Snopes.

In addition to her short fiction, Dolson wrote the novel, All Things Violent, and  has put together a short story collection, Love and Other Criminal Behavior, which will be out in just a few days—June 16. (Available for pre-order now.)

 

 

 

Jason Overstreet

Jason Overstreet’s debut novel, The Striver’s Row Spy, and his follow-up spy thriller, Beneath the Darkest Sky, achieved critical acclaim and place the author firmly on the map of rising stars in crime fiction.

Overstreet grew up in Colorado, Texas, and New Mexico. He attended two Southern California universities, earning a B.A. and M.S. before spending ten years in the field of education. After attending UCLA’s Professional Program in Screenwriting, he turned to writing fiction full time. He lives in Los Angeles.

 

 

 

Juno Rushdan

Juno Rushdan draws from real-life inspiration as a former U.S. Air Force Intelligence Officer to craft sizzling romantic thrillers. However, you won’t find any classified leaks here. Her stories are pure fiction about kick-ass heroes and strong heroines fighting for their lives—as well as their happily-ever-after. Rushdan’s Final Hour series has enjoyed both commercial and critical success.

Although a native New Yorker, Rushdan’s wanderlust has taken her across the globe. She considers herself blessed to have a husband who shares her passion for travel, movies, and fantastic food. Rushdan has visited more than twenty different countries and has lived in England and Germany. She currently resides in Virginia with her supportive hubby, two dynamic children, and spoiled rescue dogs.

 

Jacob Ross

Jacob Ross is a novelist, short story writer, editor and creative writing tutor. His crime fiction novel, The Bone Readers won the inaugural Jhalak Prize in 2017. His literary novel Pynter Bender was published to much critical literary acclaim and was shortlisted for the 2009 Commonwealth Writers Regional Prize and chosen as one of the British Authors Club’s top three Best First Novels. His latest book is Tell No-One About This, a collection of stories written over a span of forty years, including from "Song for Simone" (1986) and "A Way to Catch the Dust" (1999) and more than a dozen new ones. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and has been a judge of the V.S. Pritchett Memorial Prize, the Olive Cook, Scott Moncrieff and Tom-Gallon Literary Awards. Jacob is Associate Fiction Editor at Peepal Tree Press, and the editor of Closure, Contemporary Black British short stories.

 

Thank you very much for taking the time to check out the trailblazing, talented and ascending authors listed above … and thank you for (hopefully) adding to the diversity of your bookshelves. I can honestly say that when I started reading crime fiction from the perspective of black (and other POC) writers and their characters, I discovered entirely new worlds—and not just FICTIONAL ones.

As I mentioned earlier, this is not an exhaustive list. Consider it an active, evolving one—so feel free to share the names of any black authors of crime fiction you’d like to add. You can do so via the comments section below, or, if you prefer, you can send me the name(s) of the author(s) via email HERE, and I’ll add them to the appropriate category above.)    

Some might think it’s odd to blog about how a pandemic that’s still going on in real life will shape future works of fiction. And I agree. But hey, I also think it’s odd to have huge beach barbecues and house parties while a pandemic’s still going on in real life, yet THAT doesn’t seem to be stopping people.

At least this blog post won’t infect anyone. (That is, assuming nobody who already is infected prints out this post and licks it before handing it to their least favorite person. [More on that later on in this post.]) Besides, it’s only natural for a writer to think about the effect COVID-19 may have on the genre they write in. Especially a writer who has been cooped up for months with a year's supply of liquor.

So yeah, I have been thinking about how crime fiction might change and morph and evolve as the world changes and morphs and evolves. And today I’m going to blog about it. Now, some folks will say I’m doing so in a desperate attempt to create a bunch of buzz around the new crime fiction subgenres I’ve listed below while I secretly work on novels in those subgenres in hopes of becoming a mega-bestselling author in the near future. Really? That would be ridiculous—nobody reads my blog. 

Regardless, I hereby present three new crime fiction subgenres that, with any luck, will emerge from the coronavirus pandemic as hot literary trends:  

 

1) Quarantine Murder Mysteries. These books will be sort of like the traditional country house murder mysteries of yesteryear—only with a lot more hand sanitizer.

Few things are more thrilling than a good “closed-circle” murder. There’s an elevated sense of suspense and reader engagement when the list of possible suspects is very limited but where each suspect has a seemingly strong motive. Add in the fact that every character is related and has been cooped up together for weeks or months or possibly even two straight Thanksgivings, and the tension becomes thick enough to choke someone before dismembering them. As if that weren’t already enough to keep readers of quarantined murder mysteries riveted, each scene will be informed by a killer virus lurking outside every window, forbidding any character from letting off steam at a gym, yoga studio or monster-truck event. And don’t forget the added tension caused by characters having to home-school any kids who may be in the story.

From the inciting incident all the way through to the final chapter, a well executed quarantine murder mystery will leave readers guessing who done it?

Was it the wife, in the bedroom, using a golf club?      

Or the mother, in the family room, using an algebra book?

Or the brother, in the bathroom, using an iPad with the browser found open to Pornhub?

What’s more, quarantine murder mysteries will provide ample opportunities for shocking twists. Like, maybe the murderer turns out not to be someone quarantined in the house but rather a Favor driver who got stiffed on a tip after risking their life to bring the victim a measely quart of Kung Pao chicken. Or, even more shocking, maybe the murder turns out not be a murder after all—maybe it was an accidental poisoning caused by the victim injecting Lysol into their own ass after watching the news.

 

2) Supermarket Thrillers. Since the coronavirus started hogging all the headlines a few months ago, Grocery shopping has gone from being an uneventful weekly errand to Mission Almost Impossible. Expect to see this not only reflected but prominently featured in the thrillers of the very near future.

Think Jack Reacher kicking ass at Albertsons—all while remaining at least six feet away from any ass that needs kicking.

While an entire novel set inside a supermarket would have been scoffed at or completely ignored by publishers and readers alike back in early January, today such books would hit the international bestseller list faster than their protagonists will move through a produce department. The high stakes along with the non-stop action and suspense will have readers on the edge of their plastic-covered seats inside their underground bunker.

The heroes in supermarket thrillers will face peril on every page. Every food item they touch could mean the end not just of them but of civilization as we know it. All it would take is one false move, a single lapse in concentration: Maybe the hero loses focus at the deli counter and rubs their eye without thinking; or slides their facemask down to scratch a nose itch after having just handled several peaches; or uses their mouth to pull off a disposable glove while busy using the other hand to send a text to headquarters alerting them that they’ve made it out of the store alive.

Oh, and the fight scenes. They’ll be magnificent—not just because of the creative fighting methods the hero will need to use in order to throttle their nemesis without touching them, but also because there will be more than one nemesis. There’ll be dozens—basically anyone in the store who refuses to wear a mask or to adhere to social distancing rules or who tries to buy more than the allotted amount of toilet paper.

 

3) Bioterrorism Noir. When it comes to crime fiction, I’m most drawn to the darker characters: the lowlifes; the villains; the weirdos; the anti-heroes. Maybe my interest in and affinity for the “criminal mind” simply means I have moral ambiguity in my genes. Or perhaps it has more to do with me not being breastfed as a child. Regardless, I love me some noir. Transgressive tales where the protagonist is perfectly and often tragically flawed, someone you can’t resist rooting for in a book but whom you wouldn’t be caught dead with in real life.

Bioterrorism noir will go beyond even that—it will feature protagonists you can’t resist rooting for but whom you likely would be caught dead with in real life. That’s because the protagonists in bioterrorism noir will carry out all the dangerous and deadly acts that people like you and me merely fantasize about during a pandemic.

Oh, come on, don’t pretend like you haven’t imagined being able to purposely infect people you feel the world might be better off without (even if they go away only for a few weeks of quarantining). Don’t act like you haven’t entertained the notion of targeting … oh, I don’t know … rapists and pedophiles who are still on the loose, or politicians you loathe with every fiber of your being, or the guy you saw lick his fingers before turning the pages of a magazine in your doctor’s waiting room. Or politicians you loathe with every fiber of your being. (Did I already mention that one?)

Soon there will be loads of great novels featuring a main character who isn't afraid to take the law—and a deadly virus—into their own hands. Perhaps the character will be a member of a secret organization that’s developed an accurate and efficient virus-delivery system to ensure that innocent bystanders aren’t infected. Or a rogue vigilante with a personal score to settle using a vial of the virus stolen from a lab. Or maybe just Bob from Accounting who has gotten used to working from home and can’t bear the idea of spending hours in rush-hour traffic ever again, so he contracts the virus on purpose and walks around mask-less coughing on everyone he sees.

Bioterrorism noir novels will elicit fear and paranoia among regular, everyday citizens—sort of the same way Jaws did among beachgoers. 

"Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the world."

 

YOUR turn! What subgenres do you think might emerge from the pandemic? Which of the ones listed above would you be most likely to read? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below. Or don’t—I’m not the boss of you.

NOTE: Some of you may be interested in a subgenre that wasn’t listed in this post but is no less compelling: it’s called the Sardonically Twisted Greg Levin Crime Thrillers subgenre. Be sure to check out the books that fall under this yet-to-be-discovered but fantastic category by clicking HERE.

Folks who subscribe to my crime fiction/author newsletter (newly named “Prose & Cons”) know I revamped the whole thing two weeks ago because, well, my subscribers deserved something better from me. Something they’d truly look forward to receiving. Something that, without taking up much of their time, would entertain them, grab them, make them laugh—maybe even inspire them. Something that would enable us to connect more, and help me discover the kinds of things they want to hear and read about.

God knows we all could use a little more entertainment, laughter, inspiration and connection right now.

(What’s that? You currently don’t subscribe to my newsletter but would like to know what the hell I’m talking about above? Then simply type your email address in the little box just above the “Sign-Up” icon just off to the right on this page (or at the top if you're on a mobile device). Go on, you know you wanna—it comes with a cool free ebook!) 

I received a lot of beautifully written replies to the "what's on your mind?" question I posed in the first issue of the revamped newsletter. The power and authenticity of these replies hit me right in the feels and renewed my faith in humanity (or at least in the humanity of my subscribers). Seriously though, I'm grateful to those of you who were so candid and generous in your sharing about how you’re faring during this global pandemic we’re all doing our best to endure.  

And I'm grateful to everyone for being here right now, reading this post—a post written by a relatively obscure author of crime fiction and thrillers. With the world in such a state of flux and confusion, it’s hard for most people to get excited about crime fiction and thrillers.

Or so I thought. ...

I recently found myself asking a mirror, “How can I expect people to continue reading fiction filled with dark themes and dangerous characters when there seems to be so much darkness and danger going on right outside their tightly shuttered windows?” But the more pressing question was, “How can I go on writing such fiction?”

Then something weird happened; the following day I noticed a small spike in book sales—without me even running a price promotion or having a new novel out. At first I just assumed my mother had purchased several extra copies of my books online to help ensure I had enough money for a sack of potatoes and a package of non-existent toilet paper. But I checked and it turned out it wasn’t Mom who’d bought my books. (It also turned out she was pissed I’d called merely to ask about my stupid books and not to check on how she and Dad were doing.) It wasn’t until the next day—after I’d noticed a couple more book sales—that I realized something. Something that warmed my heart and gave me hope. And that something is this: People are twisted.

Just like I am.

But we’re twisted in a good way. (Well, mostly.) Still, I decided to look deeper. I wanted to know what is it that compels so many of us to read and/or write dark fiction during hellish times rather than dive into much cozier books? It can’t be that we’re all sociopaths, right? RIGHT?

Right! Here’s the thing, while none of us wants to have to deal with ever-increasing tension and life-threatening situations and high-risk stakes in our own actual lives, we can’t help but be drawn to stories featuring such danger and uncertainty. Why? Because it makes us feel alive. It’s invigorating to experience high tension and suspense from the kind of safe distance fiction provides; it’s riveting to root for people we’ll never meet (since they’re imaginary) who are up against impossible odds; and it’s life-affirming and inspiring when those people we’re rooting for find a way to overcome those odds—or at least try their damnedest to do so.

Such books—dark as they may be—provide a light. They reveal the toughness of the human spirit in a rough and often morally ambiguous world. They remind us we are each protagonists in our own story.

Every day, when we dare to take that first step out of bed, we face tension and suspense. We go up against what can often seem like insurmountable odds.

We find a way.

 

What have you read lately that punched you in the gut and had you on the edge of your seat trembling while also inspiring you, refueling you, restoring your faith in humanity? If you're looking for a few recommendations for novels that'll do exactly that, here you go:

 

Not a Sound by Heather Gudenkauf. I get that you may not think a book about a nurse who loses everything after a terrible accident—including her hearing and sanity—could possibly be uplifting in any way, and now you're wondering why I'd recommend it. I'll tell you why: Because of the extraordinary grit and determination the main character exhibits as she builds her life back up ... only to have it start to unravel again while she deals with the murder of a friend and tries to bring the killer to justice. This is a chilling psychological thriller, but one filled with raw heart and hope.

 

 

 

My Darkest Prayer by S.A. Cosby. A gritty literary explosion of of corruption, sex, violence and vengeance—written with love. Speaking of love, you'll fall for not only the book's dangerous protagonist but also its dangerously talented author, S.A. Cosby. Both are forces to be reckoned with. Beneath all the sleaze and mayhem and destruction in this shockingly good neo-noir debut is a giant, tender heart—one that beats hard enough to break bones. Rarely does justice ever hurt so good. (So good, in fact, it has me—and LOTS of other readers—eagerly counting the days until Cosby's next novel, Blacktop Wasteland, drops in July.) 

 

 

 

Roachkiller and Other Stories by Richie Narvaez. When you're living through a pandemic that makes it seem like the world's falling apart, it's wonderful to find a rare, shining gem amidst the rubble. I'm familiar with and greatly enjoy Richie Narvaez's work (including his deliciously sardonic debut novel Hipster Death Rattle), but somehow Roachkiller—his fresh, magnificent collection of short noir fiction—had flown under my radar until very recently. Named one of BookRiot's 100 Must-Read Works of Noir, it's the perfect cure for crime fiction fans whom the pandemic has left short on reading time and on cash (the Kindle version costs just $1.99!). Each tale is dark and strange yet extremely soulful, featuring hardluck losers you can't resist rooting for. Download a copy today—you won't be disappointed (well, not while reading the book, anyway; as for how you'll feel once you're done and start listening to the world news, well—just don't listen!).   

Speaking of affordable crime fiction that doesn't short-change you on quality, a handful of excellent small-press publishers are currently running big price promotions—to help ensure that readers can continue reading great books during this difficult time. Two such publishers are:

Down & Out Books, which is running a "Social Distancing Digital Book Sale" now,  discounting 39 of its most recently published ebook titles—with some priced as low as 99¢!

Fahrenheit Press, which is featuring a different FREE e-book EVERY DAY for anyone who can't afford to buy books during this crisis.