A few things

My second column is up on DaRK PaRTY ReVIEW, which by the way, is a finalist for a 2008 Weblog Award for Best Culture Blog! Congrats to GFS3 for that!

Bill Crider provides a very early review of my second "man out of prison" novel being published by Serpent's Tail, Pariah. Very early in that the book's not out in the UK until Jan. 15th, and probably won't be in the States until June.

Small Crimes is also in some fine company in the Jan-Feb 2009 issue of Bookmarks Magazine. The six crime novels they rate as excellent:

The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly
Once Were Cops by Ken Bruen
Trigger City by Sean Chercover (and Sean, still waiting for my signed copy!)
A Most Wanted Man by John le Carre
Cold in Hand by John Harvey
Small Crimes by Dave Zeltserman

And their critical summary for Small Crimes:

Published as a paperback original, Small Crimes just might be a small "piece of crime-noir genius," says the reviewer from the Washington Post, and other critics generally agree. Not only does the novel have clean, simple prose, ample suspense and twists, and a fast-paced plot--standard fare; it also offers brilliant psychological insight into tortured souls, and on a deeper level, it is a moralistic tale about how small crimes beget larger ones. A couple of reviewers note some stock background characters, but overall, Small Crimes convincingly depicts the wide-ranging effects of police corruption in small-town America.

Stuff

A bunch of stuff to reflect on.

Usually I try to keep this blog nonpolitical, but have to give my editorial view of the biggest ripoff any of us have ever seen. In 2008 a bunch of greedy SOBs betting on mortgage defaults helped drive the economy into a deep recession and the stock market into free fall, resulting in millions of lost jobs, and millions having their retirement funds cut in half or worse. The bailout plan, which seemed to make sense--buy out bad mortgages so the banks can start lending again, was badly bungled with the plan changing into giving billions to banks without any oversight or accountability. These SOBs should be going to jail over what happened, but they won't. The one glimmer of hope we have is that soon Bush will be out and Obama in. Can't happen fast enough.

2008 was also a year of major contractions and changes in the publishing industry, none of which bodes well for authors. We've heard a lot of reasons why this happening: the bad economy, more people playing video games or spending their reading time on the Internet, people with less free time in general, less readers, the effect of the Internet in creating a massive flea market/used bookstore which is cutting deeply into new book sales, the decline of brick & mortar bookstores. All of these may or may not be real factors. I don't know. My gut tells me that society is better off with brick & mortar bookstores run by people who care about books, and that these stores need to be supported. I also think publishers would do better if they trusted their readers more and tried to publish good books as opposed to what they think are the most "commercially viable". Editors need to be making decisions instead of marketing boards. Somehow publishers need to once again look at books as books as opposed to a commercial packages. Until they do I don't think things are going to get better for these publishers.

I read some really good books in 2008. 4 of Derek Raymond's fantastic factory series books. Crimini, an anthology of noir stories by Italian authors. Sleeping Dogs by Ed Gorman, as well as the finished draft of very dark but excellent Gold Medal-type book that Ed recently completed, Cottonwood by Scott Phillips, Dirty Money by Richard Stark, Somebody Owes Me Money by Stark's alter ego, Donald Westlake. And quite a few others.

2008 was also my year of living dangerously (and what a year to choose to do this!). I quit my job at the end of 2007 to write full time, more on how I expected Pariah to do than Small Crimes. I always felt readers would like Small Crimes if they knew about it, but it's such a crapshoot putting books out, more and more these days with less newspaper review space than ever before. A lot of good books get published that just never get the attention they deserve. I got lucky, though, with Small Crimes. Good London reviews, great starred review from Publisher's Weekly, some great web reviews, as well as readers who were excited enough by the book to blog about it, and a big thanks to all readers who did this-as well as to all reviewers for taking the time to read my book! I especially owe a huge thanks to Ed Gorman--this was a book he believed in early on, and he's been doing everything he can to get people to pay attention to it, including interviewing me recently for Mystery Scene. Still, even with all that going on it was looking like except for an early review from the Lansing State Journal I was going to be shut out of the US newspapers, but then an extraordinary review in the Washington Post by Maureen Corrigan, then her picking the book for NPR's best crime and mystery novels of 2008 seemed to turn the corner for Small Crimes.

Some Small Crime mentions. I was honored to see Small Crimes top Bruce Grossman's impressive "books that were great in 2008" list on Bookgasm. Also making Juri Nummelin's Best list on his Pulpetti blog, Vince Keenan's Best Books of 2008, C.T. Henry's top 10 reads of 2008 on his Mystery Bookshelf, and a really nice mention on DaRK PaRTY ReVIEW's favorites of 2008.

My writing goals for 2008 were to write 3 books. I slacked off and only wrote 2 1/2. I did end 2008 on a high note when I was approached to write an introduction for Seymour Shubin's next book, The Hunch. For those of you out there unfamiliar with Shubin, his 1953 "Anyone's My Name" is a noir masterpiece, every bit as great as Jim Thompson's "Killer Inside Me" (which was written the same year). Seymour Shubin has written some terrific crime novels--the Edgar-nominated "The Captain", Hardcase Crime's "Witness to Myself", "The Man From Yesterday", just to mention a few. "The Hunch" is a worthy addition to these excellent books, and it was an honor for me to write the introduction for it.

Over at Ed Gorman's blog

I'd like to thank Ed for profiling me on his blog, as well as reprinting a good chunk of our interview that we did for Mystery Scene, and especially for sharing his thoughts on the second book of my Serpent's Tail "man out of prison" series, Pariah, which is being published next month in the UK (probably in the US next June).

Wishing all a happy holiday season, and a healthy and prosperous New Year!

A nice Hanukkah gift

The Boston Globe reviews Small Crimes:

"Small Crimes" is a strong piece of work, lean and spare, but muscular where a noir novel should be, with a strong central character whom we alternately admire and despise.

Read the whole review here.

Best part of being reviewed by the Globe, my parents who live in Brookline and have been reading the Globe for probably over 50 years, now get to brag to all their friends about it.

End of the road for Fast Lane

Fast Lane is a book I have a lot of affection for, and given emails I've received over the years from members of the hardboiled/noir reading group, Rara Avis, it's a book that hardboiled and noir fans really dig also. This was not only the first book I ever wrote, but it was also the first piece of fiction I ever wrote that I intended for publication, and in some ways its also one of my more ambitious books with it being both psychotic noir and hardboiled PI deconstruction, while also being thematically about the corrosive effects of child abuse as its passed from one generation to the next. While the writing at times is kind of rough, it's also very high energy and it fits the book. Given all that, I've decided to take it out of print, and purchasing of new copies should be turned off by middle of January.

I have no qualms with the publisher, Point Blank Press. They are what they are--a small POD house that has very limited distribution and almost no marketing, but my hope is to someday be able to find a home for Fast Lane--either in its current form, or maybe as a graphic novel--where it can end up better marketed and distributed. With Small Crimes selling as fast as Serpent's Tail is able to print and ship copies here, and with Pariah coming out soon---which is the book that both myself, my publisher and editor at Serpent's Tail are really excited about, I think it's worth taking the chance. I hope it happens, 'cause I have little doubt that given the right home, Fast Lane would find its audience.

More Small Crimes on the web

Poisoned Pen Bookstore has come up with their best of 2008 lists, and I was happy to see Patrick Milliken, who is their resident hardboiled/noir aficionado, as well as the editor for the upcoming Phoenix Noir (Akashic Books), included Small Crimes in his list.

C.T. Henry over at his Mystery Bookshelf includes Small Crimes in his Holiday Gift Guide, as well saying some good stuff about it:

"The writing is taut, and Zeltserman keeps you guessing in this excellently crafted thriller. While Joe tries to go straight, circumstances always seem to work against him. You keep asking yourself: How’s Joe going to get out of this one? The twists and turns of the novel are very entertaining, and the ending is pitch perfect. Highly Recommended!"

My name wrong again

BookBitch probably has the most creative misspelling of my name that I've seen yet (Zeletserman), but they're highly recommending Small Crimes in their review, so all's good. More on the web, former Chicago Tribune book reviewer, Dick Adler, who gets my name right, has some nice things to say about Small Crimes over at his blog, The Knowledgeable Blogger, including: "Great plot twists, a family straight from hell, lots of sharp and often hilarious writing. Who could ask for anything more?" Also, Steven Sill over at I Love A Mystery feels Small Crimes is noir at its best. And finally,The South African paper, The Citizen, reviews Small Crimes, and also likes it.

Grilled in Mystery Scene

My ribs are still sore from the tattooing Ed Gorman performed with his brass knuckles, but give the guy and his methods credit, he got the truth out of me and it's all there in the pages of the current issue of Mystery Scene Magazine.

Seriously, I owe a huge thanks to Ed Gorman for doing the interview, and to Kate Stine for running it.

My favorite 2008 Best Book lists so far...

What can I say? It has to be NPR's Top Crime and Mystery Novels of 2008 and The Washington Post's Best Books of 2008, especially their mystery and thriller selections ;)