If I had a dime for every time my wife, Miranda, asked me to be more present or to pay closer attention or to get out of my own head, I’d be able to afford the divorce attorney I’m going to need if I don’t start heeding her requests.

In Miranda’s defense, she’s right.

In my defense, she married a novelist.

Now, before you decide to join Team Miranda and start yelling at me for not being present in my marriage, or you decide to join Team Greg and start insisting Miranda be less bossy and demanding, I need to clarify something: Miranda is bossy and demanding.

But with good reason.

You’d be bossy and demanding too if your spouse/significant other often didn’t respond to your questions or actively listen to your opinions/ideas/concerns or stepped in deer shit every single time you took a hike together.

It’s not that I don’t want to respond or to listen or to avoid animal excrement; it’s that I’m usually very busy discussing plot points with invisible people whenever my wife and I are alone. And these invisible people are even bossier and more demanding than she is. Fictional characters and muses always are.

Folks often joke about how novelists are “not all there”—implying we’re crazy, wacko, have a few screws loose. But the whole “insane author” thing is a just stereotype, one propagated by fictional writers like the one played by Jack Nicholson in The Shining, or by real writers like the one played by Virginia Woolf in, well, her tragically shortened life.

That said, it is true that most novelists are “not all there.” But I’m not talking about the chase-your-son-through-a hedge-maze-with-an-ax kind of “not all there”; I’m talking about the have-important-conversations-with-imaginary-people-in-the-presence- of-real-people kind of “not all there.” Big difference.

If I’ve just completed a three-hour writing session and I come out to the kitchen to make Miranda and I some lunch and she starts telling me about her morning or asking me about our upcoming weekend plans or why there’s a half-empty vodka bottle in my underwear drawer, it’s not likely I’ll catch everything she says or everything she picks up and throws at my head. My physical body may be standing right in front of her—nowhere near the manuscript on my laptop in my writing office—but most of my brain is still pondering the murder I just committed in Chapter 9. Miranda can’t expect my full attention in that moment or even hours or days after. Same way I can’t expect to have her full attention right after she finishes a nature hike or a 2000-piece jigsaw puzzle or something else she loves more than me. (I’m not saying I love writing more than I love my wife. Why would I admit that? She occasionally reads this blog.)

Many people may read this and think I’m suggesting writers should get special treatment, be given a pass on active listening and politeness and common decency, be allowed to be distracted all the time. Well, if that’s what you’re thinking after having read this, well, then I’ve succeeded in getting my message across.

Listen, I adore my wife, couldn't live without her. And I care about all of you. But c’mon—you can’t expect me to openly demonstrate it while I’m working on a novel or during the hours or days or months in between. That’s asking too much. That’s not respecting my condition, my affliction, my plight. That’s not taking into a count that, no matter how hard I try to take in everything you’re saying and doing and asking, I’m simply not all there.

 

Thanks for putting up with my (mostly) satirical rant. If anyone needs me, I’ll either be writing or half-listening to my wife while getting yelled at while thinking about writing.

Creative writing has given me more joy than I could have ever imagined and it is torture. No other activity fills me with such a strong sense of flow and purpose and pain and hopelessness. Wild horses couldn’t drag me away from writing except when it feels like I’ve been tied to several of them and they’re each galloping off in opposite directions.

Point is, aside from my family and my pets and my readers, there’s nothing I love more than writing novels and I hate it.

In keeping with such dichotomy, below are the five best and the five worst things about writing a novel:

 

5^th best: The quiet. Sitting in complete silence while putting characters through total hell is incredibly peaceful and satisfying. For me—a crime fiction and thriller writer—it’s like a deep form of meditation … only with a bit more murder.

 

 

5^th worst: The noise. Sometimes it’s almost as if the neighbor remodeling their house doesn’t understand how much more important the imaginary crime you’re working on is. Or like the kids outside laughing and playing don’t care that you’re this close to finishing Chapter 8. Or your spouse in the other room doesn’t realize how much her breathing is keeping you from pulling off a shocking twist. 

 

 

 

4^th best: The power and control. You needn’t be a megalomaniac to enjoy having the power to control every action your characters does, every word they say, every thought and emotion they think and feel. But it helps. Regardless, it’s hard not to wish you had the same power and control in the real world—especially with relatives during Thanksgiving. 

 

4^th worst: The lack of power and control. Fictional characters—not unlike real people—often develop a mind of their own and start taking you and your novel in directions you never imagined heading in and would be wise to avoid. Some days, a character—usually an important one, like the protagonist—won’t listen to a single word you say. Or worse, they won’t even show up, leaving you sitting there staring at a blank page or an unfinished scene like some idiot who should have listened to their mother when she advised they go to medical or law school instead of becoming a novelist.   

 

 

 

3^rd best: The “high.” They say the only thing that compares to a “writer’s high” is a heroin high. And writing is less damaging to the liver, heart and brain. Unless you’re doing it correctly.

 

 

3^rd worst: The lows. They say the only thing that compares to the overwhelming sense of anxiety and dread one experiences upon losing their writer’s high is the overflowing sense of anxiety and dread one experiences during heroin withdrawal. And at least extended heroin withdrawal usually causes death and thus an end to the suffering.

 

 

 

2^nd best: The incredible sense of accomplishment. Fact: The odds of being born are 400 trillion to 1. Fact: Only 0.3% of people born go on to write a book. Thus, if you’ve written a book, it’s a freaking MIRACLE. And if you’ve actually SOLD a few copies, well, now you’re just showing off.

 

 

2^nd worst: The soul-crushing sense of failure. Fact: The odds of landing a literary agent after finishing your novel are 1 in 1000. Fact: Even if you land an agent and the agent lands you a book deal, the average traditionally published book sells only 250-300 copies in its first year. And if you go the indie-route, keep in mind the average self-published book sells only 250-300 copies over the course of its entire lifetime. Thus, if you’re a writer getting pummeled with rejection notifications or putting up dismal numbers in the sales column, well … nobody cares—such failure is the norm! The natural thing is to quit … but writers don’t know how.     

 

 

 

The absolute best: The immortality. There’s nothing as fulfilling or as empowering as knowing this thing you’ve created using nothing but your drunken mind and fingertips is going to be around and tied directly to you forever, or at least until Amazon crashes beneath its own weight.  

 

 

The absolute worst: The immortality. There’s nothing as debilitating or as humiliating as knowing the two major plot holes and five flagrant typos inside this thing you’ve created are going to be around and tied directly to you forever —even after Amazon crashes, as people LOVE to talk about the egregious mistakes of others for all eternity.

 

 

 

Speaking of egregious mistakes, surely I’ve missed some really great and some really horrible things about writing a novel. For those of you who’ve written one, feel free to share some of your worst and best things about it. For those of you who haven’t written one, just make some sh*t up—that’s all writers ever do.

I have restless leg syndrome, ADHD, zero patience and thin skin, so of course I chose to be a novelist—something that requires being seated for long periods, focusing intently, and waiting months or years for rejection.

I know, it makes no sense. Fortunately, not making sense is trending these days, so my love of long fiction fits right in.

What makes even less sense is the fact that, up until very recently, I rarely even thought about writing short stories. Even the most avid novelists typically tinker around with "quick fiction" during breaks from whatever book they’re working on or whenever between novels. Me? Until a few months ago, I hadn’t written a short story since I’d been required to for a creative writing class back in college. That was nearly thirty years ago. (I attended college when I was six.)

It’s certainly not that I dislike short stories. The fact is, I read them all the time. (I like how they finish quickly and enable me to get back to working on my novels.) But yeah, I don’t know—I just never fell in love with writing them.

That’s all changed.

Long story short(ish), back in March the pandemic forced my agent to pause on sending my latest manuscript out to publishers in hopes of landing me a book deal. I realized it wasn’t going to be until after next fall (2021) before I could hope to see my next novel introduced to the world.

So I had a choice: I could just be patient and get started on my NEXT next novel while waiting for good news from my agent and then count down the many, many months until my book launch, OR I could start writing a series of short stories that would enable me to not only keep my writing muscles from atrophying but also keep my name fresh in readers' minds—before I get too old to remember what my name even is. And since I had already written my NEXT next novel (due out anytime between 2024 and the return of the dinosaurs), my decision was an easy one:

Go short.

And I’ve gotta say, I’m LOVING it. I’m also kicking myself for not having realized this sooner, for not having made short stories a regular part of my writing regimen all these years.

The list of reasons why I’m now enamored with short stories is long. I’ll keep it brief:

 

Short stories are a great way to revisit old fictional friends. It's a lot of fun hanging out with my previous protagonists and going on quick, new adventures with them. The difference between hanging out with them in a novel and hanging out with them in a short story is sort of like the difference between living with a friend for a year and going to Vegas with a friend for a wild weekend. You still get into a bunch of trouble and cause a lot of damage, but it's over with in a hurry—and frees you up to hang out with another crazy old friend the next weekend. (Or to make a new crazy friend and do fun, dangerous stuff with them.)

 

 

Short stories are perfect for giving new novel ideas a test run. Used to be whenever trying to decide whether or not a particular idea was novel-worthy, I’d desperately shake a Magic 8-Ball and see what answer would appear in the window of the wise plastic sphere: “It is decidedly so” or “Don’t count on it” or “Ask again later” or “Enough with the writing—get a REAL job, Greg” (Turns out my father had secretly tinkered with my Magic 8-Ball). As you probably already know, reading the words on a tiny polyhedron floating in a mysterious liquid isn’t the best way to make important decisions.

I’ve since discovered I can test out any potential book idea by writing a short story about it and seeing if it grabs me—and readers—enough to invest three hundred pages towards it. And while writing a short story takes longer than shaking a novelty gift, it’s a much more accurate predictor. Plus it doesn’t make a mess when I throw it against a wall in frustration. 

  

      

Short stories can go big—FAST.  Where in a novel you need to take time to establish the setting and explore the entire three-act structure and fully develop the protagonist along with several other key characters, such is not the case in a short story. The latter allows—and practically begs—you to not only start off in media res (in the middle of the action) but stay there right in the thick of the fun for most of the story—then ramp up from there with a shocking twist or two. When well executed, a short story takes a reader from totally captivated to completely riveted to “Whoa, she saved the entire world from Dr. Evil Genius’ tornado machine AND it turns out she was dead the whole time!” in less than half an hour. 

  

 

Short stories are ripe for experimentation. While it may be risky to invest years of your life to writing an epic existentialist sci-fi-cri saga about a man from the future who travels back to the present and finds out he’s his own son, but writing such an absurdist tale as a short story could be a lot of fun—and probably won’t destroy your writing career. This is not to suggest you shouldn’t flex your creative muscles and play around with high concepts in your long fiction, too; I’m merely saying don’t write an epic existentialist sci-fi saga about a man from the future who travels back to the present and finds out he’s his own son.

I love drinking bourbon with my muse and brainstorming truly wild, inventive story ideas that will take me only a few days to write before I realize how insane they are and how much of a drinking problem my muse has.  

 

 

Short stories provide quick gratification. Who has time to always write/read thirty chapters before revealing/discovering who the killer is? Sure, a great thriller or mystery novel is a wonderful accomplishment for an author and a rewarding read for a reader, but sometimes we all just need a good “quickie” to satisfy our literary yearnings. As much as I adore digging my way out from under a giant narrative arc and getting tossed about by a herd of wild, untamed twists for weeks or months on end, there’s something extremely gratifying about hopping into the writing/reading raft then shooting the rapids and finishing in time for lunch.

 

 

Short stories offer swift revenge. You know how you can’t help but fantasize about murder after your mechanic totally screws you on your car repair or your neighbor continuously disrupts your life with their power-tool obsession or a mask-less stranger coughs on you in the produce section of the supermarket? No? Well then you haven’t lived! Fiction is a wonderful way to kill people who piss you off, but very few writers besides Stephen King have the speed and skill to write an entire murderous novel every time somebody ruins their day. Short stories provide an immediate and healthy outlet for all our natural homicidal urges.

Got a neighbor who won’t lay off his circular saw while you’re trying to think? Simply write an eight-page tale about the mysterious murder and dismemberment of a tool junkie. Can’t get over how much your contractor charged you for the bathroom remodel he never finished? Write a short story about a serial killing tool junkie who dismembers contractors with his circular saw.

This way, the horrible people you encounter die only on paper and you get to feel better while avoiding prison. Everybody wins!

 

As infatuated as I’ve become with short stories, I’ll never abandon long fiction. Novels will always be my first love—at least until my mind goes and I can't remember what happened in a previous sentence let alone a previous chapter.

So ... what was I saying? 

For some truly stellar short crime fiction/noir, be sure to check out the sites/zines listed below. (Many thanks to Chris Rhatigan—editor of the crime fiction journal All Due Respect and the co-publisher of All Due Respect Books—for his help in compiling this killer list.)

• Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine
• Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine
• Mystery Tribune
• Noir Nation
• Shotgun Honey
• All Due Respect
• Mystery Weekly
• Crimespree Magazine
• Rock and a Hard Place
• Pulp Modern
• Switchblade
• Tough
• Punk Noir Magazine
• Ink Heist
• Over My Dead Body
• Coffin Hop Press
• Crimewave
• Suspense Magazine
• The Dark City Magazine
• Beat to a Pulp
• Big Pulp
• EconoClash Review
• Yellow Mama
• Mysterical-E

The first time I encountered S.A. Cosby’s writing, he was speaking it. I was attending a “Noir at the Bar” event at the Bouchercon crime fiction convention in Dallas last year, and Cosby gave a reading that tore the house down.

The fresh booming voice, the electrical charge and the emotional thrum I and the rest of the audience heard is the same voice and charge and thrum a reader “hears” whenever reading Cosby’s work themselves. This goes double for his stunning and widely acclaimed new novel, Blacktop Wasteland (Flatiron Books). I’d need a whole separate website to fit all the raving testimonials the book and Cosby have received from some of the biggest names in crime fiction since it launched last month. Here’s just a tiny sample:

“Blacktop Wasteland is an urgent, timely, pitch-perfect jolt of American noir. S. A. Cosby is a welcome, refreshing new voice in crime literature.” ―Dennis Lehane

“…S. A. Cosby reinvents the American crime novel. … Blacktop Wasteland thrums and races―it’s an intoxicating thrill of a ride.” —Walter Mosley

“Sensationally good―new, fresh, real, authentic, twisty, with characters and dilemmas that will break your heart. More than recommended.” ―Lee Child

Now, you may be thinking, Wow, why would a big new breakout novelist like Cosby waste his valuable time doing an interview with someone like Greg? It’s okay—I thought the same thing. But then I remembered how generous, humble and good-natured Cosby has been with me—and everyone —ever since I met him on Twitter last year, and I realized it’s no surprise at all that he agreed to be here today.

So let’s get to it! 

 

Welcome, S.A.! And huge KUDOS on Blacktop Wasteland. I can’t remember the last time I saw a neo-noir novel garner as much praise and accolades as your book has. (Well deserved, I must add.) Has all the attention and buzz been a dream come true, or totally terrifying? Or both?     

SA: It’s been an amalgamation of fear, excitement, surrealness, and a smidge of inebriation.  

 

When did you know you had something really special cooking with this book?  

SA: Like most writers, I often think I’m just barely treading water, but I will say there is a section towards the end of the book where I felt like maybe just maybe this story was pretty good. If you’ve read the book its the scene with Ronnie and Bug in the cornfield. That was when I thought I’d found the rhythm. 

 

I have read that scene, by the way, and yeah, it’s damn good. Moving on: The book—like the muscle cars featured in it—is a fast machine that takes readers on a wild, dangerous ride. How much research was involved in nailing the life of a world-class getaway driver? Was it your love of cars that compelled you to write the book, or was something even bigger driving you? 

SA: I grew up around cars and shade-tree mechanics who liked to test there engine building skills against each other from time to time in drag races, so I had a somewhat tertiary appreciation for high-level driving. In addition to that, I’m a huge fan of chase movies or films with great chase scenes But I also wanted to talk about the complexities of tragic and toxic masculinity and how those issues intersect with how we find our own identity.  

 

Is there something in particular you hope readers will take away from reading Blacktop Wasteland, or do you simply want them to enjoy the ride?  

SA: I hope readers will gain a bit of an understanding about how desperate generational poverty can make a person. A lot of people will tell you to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps but ignore the fact you are barefoot. But I hope it’s also a fun ride. As they say, a spoonful of honey makes the medicine go down.

 

Switching gears a little, do you feel enough is being done with regard to diversity in publishing—specifically with regard to bringing new voices to crime fiction? What more would you like to see?

SA: I think there have been great strides in bringing more diverse voices to the table, but my hope is that this movement isn’t viewed as a trend. It needs to become a part of the general fabric of the publishing business.

 

I personally love reading and writing noir—stories told from the perspective of “criminals” who have a heart. What does noir mean to you? What do you like most about writing it?  

SA: I think noir can be defined as bad people doing bad things for the right reasons. I find that fascinating. The ways we compartmentalize our morality for what we consider the greater good. In a way, that is similar to the term hardboiled—but to me the difference is that in a hardboiled story the hero survives and perseveres. In a noir tale the hero is damaged, broken on the inside in ways that never heal. 

 

The only thing more captivating than reading your writing, S.A., is having YOU read your writing out loud. You've developed quite a reputation for powerful and entertaining public reads—is that something you've had to work hard at or does it come naturally to you? 

SA: Well I was a drama club kid in school, so I guess I retained a little bit of the performance bug from my days reciting Shakespeare, lol. But I always attempt to write in a way that replicates actual speech, so I often read what I've written out loud to myself so doing a live reading comes pretty naturally to me.

 

Who are a few of your favorite authors and/or biggest influences as a writer?

SA: As far as crime fiction goes I have to say Walter Mosley and Dennis Lehane. They are on my Mount Rushmore of crime fiction. But one of my early influences was Stephen King. His naturalistic style and plain-spoken syntax, even while describing Eldritch horrors had a big impact on me. Also, I was influenced by the late Ernest J. Gaines, a masterful writer of the black southern experience. 

 

I’m sure you have your hands full with this big launch for Blacktop Wasteland, but can you share a little about what you’re working on now?  

SA: Currently I’m in the editing stage of my next book, a revenge novel tentatively titled Razorblade Tears, about two fathers—one black, one white, both ex cons—who return to their violent ways to investigate the murders of their married gay sons who were murdered in what appears to be a hate crime. While seeking vengeance the two men also attempt to redeem themselves for their callous way they treated their sons because of their sexuality.  

 

Is there anything you were hoping I’d ask but didn’t?  

SA: I was wondering if you were going to ask how I came up with the title, lol. It's a play on T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land.

 

Cool—I love that poem and I own the book. Still, I dig YOUR book even more, S.A. Thanks for taking the time to chat about it, and for sharing your insight. Wishing you continued success with your writing career—which is currently a rocket blasting straight through the stratosphere. Please remember the rest of us here on Earth!

SA: Ha—thanks for thinking of me, Greg. Be well!

 

To learn more about S.A. Cosby and his books, follow him on Twitter  and Facebook, and be sure to check out his Amazon author page.

There are few things I enjoy more than reading and writing (and talking and blogging and dreaming about) crime fiction. However, it recently dawned on me I may have a bit of a problem. What tipped me off was when my family took me aside and told me, “You have a bit of a problem.”

They said I spend too much time in my writing office thinking up unique new murder methods and shocking twists. At first I was angry and defensive. I insisted I had no problem, told them they didn’t know what they were talking about, said if they didn’t drop it they’d each be killed in my next novel. That’s when I began to wonder if maybe they were right.

So I went into my writing office to think about it—but I ended up working on a thriller instead. Later that day though, I gave what my family said some serious thought. I wondered if I did, indeed, have a problem. After examining my daily routine and seeing how much of my life was spent writing and reading and thinking about heists and homicide and body disposal and forensics and firearms and motives and revenge and vigilantism, I realized something critical: I was right. My family didn’t know what they were talking about.

I don’t have a crime fiction problem—I’m simply a crime fiction addict. And who says that’s a problem? Being addicted to crime fiction is cool, fun, exciting—even healthy. It’s much safer than being addicted to drugs or alcohol, and much less exhausting than being addicted to sex.

I’m proud of my addiction. Constantly reading and writing crime fiction keeps me creative, inquisitive and, most importantly, out of prison. Now, are there more productive and lucrative things I could do with my time? Perhaps. Is my fascination with criminal behavior and murder creepy? I doubt it. Should the fact that my family doesn’t feel safe with me around sharp objects or poison be a concern? Nah.

Since you’re currently reading a blog by a relatively obscure crime fiction author, you may be wondering if you, too, are an addict. Let’s hope so. To find out for sure, I’ve put together a list of key signs of crime fiction addiction. Good luck!

 

1) You google the best ways to kill a person way more often than you google the best ways to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

 

 

 

 

2) When watching any movie—even a rom-com or a Disney flick—you place bets on who will get murdered first.

 

 

 

 

3) Whenever a friend has a bad break-up and expresses how painful it is seeing their ex move on, you hint that there are numerous ways to stop that.

 

 

 

 

4) You point out every windowless white van you see on the road—and often follow it.

 

 

 

 

5) Every time you get pulled over, you’re convinced you’re about to be killed by a sociopath impersonating a police officer.

 

 

 

 

6) After an argument with your spouse/partner, you get into ANOTHER argument about what was the "inciting incident" that ignited everything.

 

 

 

 

7) You often complain about how your life doesn’t have any shocking twists and that everything is always exactly as it seems.

 

 

 

 

8) You use police tape whenever one of your books goes missing, then you start pondering suspects and motives.

 

 

 

 

9) You refuse to sit by any young woman on any damn train.

 

 

 

 

10) If a friend tells you something bad happened to them and that it wasn’t their fault, all you think is “unreliable narrator.”

 

 

 

 

11) You yawn whenever someone tells you one of your mutual acquaintances died of natural causes.

 

 

 

 

12) You know every function of every part of every type of firearm despite having never even held a BB gun.

 

 

 

 

13) Whenever a friend is telling you how their weekend went, you interrupt them to point out there needs to be more tension, higher stakes, and at least one dead body.

 

 

 

 

So, based on my highly scientific and extensively researched list of criteria, are YOU addicted to crime fiction? Are there any other signs of cri-fi addiction you’d like to add?