Bad and Beautiful

Bad as in the first word of the title for my upcoming novel Bad Thoughts, Beautiful as in the stunning cover my publisher settled on*. So far I've been lucky--both the Point Blank and Meridiano Zero covers for my first novel, Fast Lane, have been works of art. Now just waiting to see what Serpent's Tail comes up with for Small Crimes.

*the photo for the cover was taken by a good friend and an amazingly talented artist, Laurie Pzena.

Cast of Small Crimes, part 7

Another one of Joe.

Cast of Small Crimes, part 6

Another one of Joe.

Cast of Small Crimes, part 5

Clara Coakley, Phil Coakley's daughter. In this drawing, Jean-Pierre was experimenting with a more "Leonard Cohen" look for Joe Denton.

250-word Flash Fiction

I originally posted this on the unfortunately now defunct Flashing in the Gutters. At less than 250 words I think it works well as a fully-realized story. One of these days I might look at rewriting this as a 60,000 word novel.

Danny Smith by Dave Zeltserman

I can’t get Danny Smith off my mind…

He was a good-looking kid. Well-mannered, soft-spoken, just an overall good kid. Only twenty-four years old. Six months ago he hired me to find his birth parents. You see, he was adopted, had great parents, but he wanted to know his roots. There was something familiar looking about him, made me think I had seen him before. The reason for that was his birth dad turned out to be Sam Lombardo, top guy in the Boston Mob. It didn’t take me too long to find that out. It turns out Lombardo had a one-night fling with a dancer, never knew he had this other son. When I told him about Danny, he told me what he would do to me if this kid ever bothered him.

That was six months ago.

Two weeks ago I heard Lombardo was on his death bed, dying of congestive heart failure, and word was he was going down fast. His goons brought me to to see him. Lombardo wanted to know about Danny. I thought he just wanted to make peace with his son before he died.

A week ago Danny’s parents called me. They were frantic. Danny had disappeared. They had no idea where he was.

Three days ago I heard through the grapevine that Lombardo had found a heart donor. A good match, too. Transplant looks like its going to be a success.

I can’t get Danny Smith off my mind…

Cast of Small Crimes, part 4

Toni, a stripper with not quite a heart of gold. For the movie version, think Eva Langoria.

Femme Fatales on Hardluck Stories

The Femme Fatale issue of Hardluck Stories is now online. Guest edited by O'Neil De Noux, with original noirish femme fatale stories by Michael Bracken, Trey Barker, Pearce Hanson, Stephen D. Rogers, George Wilhite, John J. Wilson, Patricia Abbott, Matt Spencer, Garnett Elliot, T. P. Keating, Rafe McGregor, Mary Elizabeth Merrem Shaw and Terry White, and illustrated by Jean-Pierre Jacquet, this is one collection of Hardluck Stories you don't want to miss!

Cast of Small Crimes, part 3

Manny Vassey, a 56 year-old local mobster who's dying of stomach cancer, and if the DA is able to coax a death-bed confession out of him, Joe and a lot other people are going away to prison.

Manny has long been a been one of my favorite bad guys, appearing in three earlier short stories: Next Time (Hardboiled #22), Triple Cross, and Nothing But Jerks. Here I've turned him into more of a flesh and blood character, taken him out of Chicago and moved him to fictional Bradley, Vermont.

Cast of Small Crimes, part 2

DA Phil Coakley, the man Joe Denton stabbed 13 times in the face, and now that Joe's out of jail he wants his pound of flesh back! When I was writing Small Crimes I pictured Coakley looking somewhat like Billy Bob Thorton . Jean-Pierre drew him almost as a younger Whitey Bulger. Here's how Joe describes the damage he did to Coakley's face when he finds Coakley waiting for him outside of jail:

When I moved closer to him, I could see the scarring along his face more plainly, and it was all I could do to keep from looking away. The damage was far worse up close. He looked almost as if someone had played tic tac toe on his face. As if he were some grotesque caricature from a Dick Tracy comic strip. Parts of his face were uneven with other parts, and that chunk of flesh missing from his nose, Jesus Christ. As tough as doing so was, I kept my eyes straight on him.

some short crime fiction

Some of my short crime fiction that's either been published recently or will be available soon:

Dave Stevens, I Presume? -- March 2007 Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine --read review

Nine-Ball Lessons -- Bullet #7, one of my more thuggish stories about life lessons gleaned from a game of nine-ball between two mob guys.

A Rage Issue -- Thuglit #11 -- another of my more thuggish stories, this one inspired when a Phil Leotardo look-alike backed into me in traffic.

A View from the Mirador -- March/April 2007 Futures -- this one is written in a light, bantering cozy-type style, but is easily the sickest story I've ever written.