Men Dig Scars
By E.A. Aymar
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Author's Note
New Releases (That I'm Excited About!)
Two Writers You Should Read
Events
It's Contest Time!
Other Writing
Men Dig Scars
I took a month off! Did you miss me? It's rare that I take time off, but I had a bunch of things going on (more on that below) and I got a little too busy. I'm sorry. But check out the "Other Writing" section of this newsletter for why I was busy. It's pretty cool.
Anyway, I recorded a podcast for a series put on by Sisters in Crime and, in it, I talked about writing female heroes as a male writer. Although it's something I've talked about before, it's still not a question to which I have an easy answer. For some reason, I'm just more drawn to writing (and reading) female protagonists.
There are several reasons for this, and they all vary in importance depending on outside factors. For one, as a man, there's little mystery to writing men. The emotional challenge simply isn't there. And female-written crime fiction tends to have a much more dynamic and introspective approach. While I am a fan of Lee Child's prose, Jack Reacher always struck me as a somewhat unattractive character. And there are a lot of aspiring Jack Reachers in crime fiction - quiet, brutally violent men who are probably socio/pschopaths...but also surprisingly good-hearted. Not many writers can write this character and, as Lee did for years, make their stories compelling.
But something about that dichotomy troubles me. Jack Reacher, and the alpha male in crime fiction, is written to be "the perfect man." He's tall, good-looking, sexually active (always straight, of course), protective, intelligent. And violent. And haunted. But, you know, attractively. If his trauma prohibits him from relationships, it certainly doesn't stop him from being fuckable. That would be a step too far.
Over the years, I've studied various forms of martial arts, and one thing always struck me - when talking to men studying martial arts, they desperately want to someday fight. More than anything, the thought of using what they learned, particularly in the perfect situation where they were stopping one of society's ills, brought a glowing sense of excitement they probably couldn't have found anywhere else. It is, of course, a fantasy.
This fantastical desire for violence is a hallmark of American male crime fiction...and I get it. It can be well done. We're currently going through a superhero movie phase, and each of these movies (which I unreservedly love) are full of cartoon violence. This is a love introduced to us as children, that violence can be quite cool and even fun.
But I think I expect more from books.
Books should provide a deeper examination than movies or TV shows can offer. Artistically, we can't compete with many of the elements that TV and movies provide (or their audience). But what books can offer is introspection, a deeper, more naked rendering of psychology. I think, when we skate on the surface, we do a disservice to our characters, to ourselves as writers, and to our readers.
And, most importantly, to the people who have suffered violence, and are unable to find empathy in a culture that is quick to dismiss them in favor of its ongoing, damaging fantasy.
EA
My short story, "The Search for Eric Garcia," was nominated for an Anthony Award! Which is a really nice surprise especially because, as someone who loves short stories, I'm very hard on myself when it comes to my own. So this was quite an honor. The Anthonys will be presented at this year's Bouchercon conference but, until then, you can read my story in Midnight Hour, an anthology written by members of Crime Writers of Color (and nominated in the category of Best Anthology). Check it out HERE.
(NOTE: I'm going to make this newsletter all pretty, someday, and when I do, I'll add the covers for these books. Until then, it's titles and descriptions. Also, good thing because that would take me FOREVER and this one is double-packed since I missed a month, d'oh.)
One Shot Harry
Gary Phillips
LOS ANGELES, 1963: African American Korean War veteran Harry Ingram earns a living as a news photographer and occasional process server: chasing police radio calls and dodging baseball bats. With racial tensions running high on the eve of Martin Luther King’s Freedom Rally, Ingram risks becoming a victim at every crime scene he photographs.
When Ingram hears about a deadly automobile accident on his police scanner, he recognizes the vehicle described as belonging to his good friend and old army buddy, a white jazz trumpeter. The LAPD declares the car crash an accident, but when Ingram develops his photos, he sees signs of foul play. Ingram feels compelled to play detective, even if it means putting his own life on the line. Armed with his wits, his camera, and occasionally his Colt .45, “One-Shot” Harry plunges headfirst into the seamy underbelly of LA society, tangling with racists, leftists, gangsters, zealots, and lovers, all in the hope of finding something resembling justice for a friend.
The Fervor
Alma Katsu
1944: As World War II rages on, the threat has come to the home front. In a remote corner of Idaho, Meiko Briggs and her daughter, Aiko, are desperate to return home. Following Meiko's husband's enlistment as an air force pilot in the Pacific months prior, Meiko and Aiko were taken from their home in Seattle and sent to one of the internment camps in the Midwest. It didn’t matter that Aiko was American-born: They were Japanese, and therefore considered a threat by the American government.
Mother and daughter attempt to hold on to elements of their old life in the camp when a mysterious disease begins to spread among those interned. What starts as a minor cold quickly becomes spontaneous fits of violence and aggression, even death. And when a disconcerting team of doctors arrive, nearly more threatening than the illness itself, Meiko and her daughter team up with a newspaper reporter and widowed missionary to investigate, and it becomes clear to them that something more sinister is afoot, a demon from the stories of Meiko’s childhood, hell-bent on infiltrating their already strange world.
Bitter Roots
Ellen Crosby
In just over a week vineyard owner Lucie Montgomery and winemaker Quinn Santori will be married in a ceremony overlooking what should be acres of lush flowering grapevines. Instead they are confronted by an ugly swathe of slowly dying vines and a nursery owner who denies responsibility for selling the diseased plants. With neighboring vineyards facing the same problem, accusations fly and the ugly stand-off between supplier and growers looks set to escalate into open warfare.
When Eve Kerr, a stunning blonde who works at the nursery, is found dead a few days later, everyone wonders if someone in the winemaking community went too far. What especially troubles Lucie is why Eve secretly arranged to meet Quinn on the day she was murdered - and whether Lucie's soon-to-be husband knows something he's not telling her.
Then a catastrophic storm blows through, destroying everything in its path. With no power, no phones, and no wedding venue, Lucie needs to find out who killed Eve and what her death had to do with Quinn.
Sniffing Out Danger
Elizabeth Heiter
When former big-city cop Ava Callan stumbles upon a bomb, she seizes the chance to prove herself. Not only to the small-town police department where she's transitioning to become a K-9 handler…but especially to charming lead investigator Eli Thorne. The only thing more explosive than her chemistry with the out-of-town captain? The danger menacing them at every turn…
Child Zero
Chris Holm
It began four years ago with a worldwide uptick of bacterial infections: meningitis in Frankfurt, cholera in Johannesburg, tuberculosis in New Delhi. Although the outbreaks spread aggressively and proved impervious to our drugs of last resort, public health officials initially dismissed them as unrelated.
They were wrong. Antibiotic resistance soon roiled across the globe. Diseases long thought beaten came surging back. The death toll skyrocketed. Then New York City was ravaged by the most heinous act of bioterror the world had ever seen, perpetrated by a new brand of extremist bent on pushing humanity to extinction.
Detective Jacob Gibson, who lost his wife in the 8/17 attack, is home caring for his sick daughter when his partner summons him to a sprawling shantytown in Central Park, the apparent site of a mass murder. Jake is startled to discover that, despite a life of abject squalor, the victims died in perfect health—and his only hope of finding answers is a twelve-year-old boy on the run from some very dangerous men.
My Summer Darlings
May Cobb
A woman in the forest thinks she’s going to die.
I know he’s coming back for me.
Jen Hansen, Kittie Spears, and Cynthia Nichols have been friends since childhood. They are now approaching forty and their lives have changed, but their insular East Texas town has not. They stay sane by drinking wine in the afternoons, dishing about other women in the neighborhood, and bonding over the heartache of their own encroaching middle age and raising ungrateful teens.
Then Will Harding comes to town, moving into one of the neighborhood’s grandest homes. Mysterious and charming, he seems like the answer to each woman’s prayers. He’s a source of fascination for Jen, Kittie, and Cynthia, but none of them are ready for the way Will disrupts their lives.
As Will grows closer with each of the women, their fascination twists into obsession, threatening their friendships and their families. When he abruptly pulls away, each woman scrambles to discover the source of his affection. But what they’ll uncover is far more sinister and deadly than any of them could have ever imagined.
Blue Billy
Laura Ellen Scott
I am the dirt. I am the grave.
I don’t meditate nor drink. I don’t write manifestos.
I turn people into bodies.
So begins the confession of a boogeyman that no one believes in. As he settles into the abandoned Magic River Café, Blue Billy doesn’t care that it has deteriorated into an abandoned, filth-ridden shack on the banks of a rancid backwater. This is his home, now. Or it could be, if it weren’t for three women out to prove that he is real.
Crocus Rowe is a parolee with anger issues, who finds herself on the run after she assaults a professor over his unspeakable crimes. When the professor winds up in a refrigerator submerged in the ironically named Magic River, things look bad for Crocus, whose first call is to Alma Bell, a memoirist and much-maligned Blue Billy “expert” from New Royal University’s notorious Crime Writing Program. Haunted by the unsolved 1992 murder of her best friend, Alma will go to any lengths to prove that Blue Billy is responsible. And then there’s Tara Rowe, Crocus’s damaged cousin. As one of Blue Billy’s rare survivors, she’s endured years of experimental therapy and exploitation to become the person she is today: Blue Billy’s stalker.
Children still whisper “Blue Billy” around the campfire, but if Crocus, Alma, and Tara can uncover the truth behind New Royal’s darkest mystery, they may just put an end to the legend, once and for all.
When the Earth Shall Be No More
Kathryn O'Sullivan and Paul Awad
Environmental scientist Constance Roy is one of forty-nine refugees rescued from Earth's destruction and transported to the ark spaceship Orb by an automaton race called the Curators. Twelve months have passed since their rescue. But now, with the ship's orbit decaying, the refugees seem doomed to crash into Jupiter's fiery belly.
In a parallel universe on present-day Earth, another version of Constance seeks answers to the questions that have haunted her since childhood: How and why did her mother die? The head of a mysterious corporation housed at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility can give her the answers, but not without a price.
Two timestreams collide when the Constance on Earth discovers that Nicolas, her son, has the ability to save the Orb and its inhabitants. Now she must battle treacherous Curators wishing to destroy Nicolas, while on the Orb, another Constance must fight to save the ship from Jupiter's fatal pull.
Only together can they save their son - and future generations of humankind.
The Younger Wife
Sally Hepworth
THE HUSBAND
A heart surgeon at the top of his field, Stephen Aston is getting married again. But first he must divorce his current wife, even though she can no longer speak for herself.
THE DAUGHTERS
Tully and Rachel Aston look upon their father's fiancée, Heather, as nothing but an interloper. Heather is younger than both of them. Clearly, she's after their father's money.
THE FORMER WIFE
With their mother in a precarious position, Tully and Rachel are determined to get to the truth about their family's secrets, the new wife closing in, and who their father really is.
THE YOUNGER WIFE
Heather has secrets of her own. Will getting to the truth unleash the most dangerous impulses in all of them?
Strangers We Know
Elle Marr
Adopted when she was only days old, Ivy Hon knows little about her lineage. But when she's stricken with a mystery illness, the results of a genetic test to identify the cause attract the FBI. According to Ivy's DNA, she's related to the Full Moon Killer, who has terrorized the Pacific Northwest for decades. Ivy is the FBI's hope to stop the enigmatic predator from killing again.
When an online search connects Ivy with her younger cousin, she heads to rural Rock Island, Washington, to meet the woman. Motivated by a secret desire to unmask a murderous relative, Ivy reaches out to what's left of a family of strangers.
Discovering her mother's tragic fate and her father's disappearance is just the beginning. As Ivy ventures into a serial killer's home territory, she realizes that she may be the next victim of poisonous blood ties.
The Train
James Grady
This Train races us through America's heartland, carrying secrets. There is treasure in the cargo car, along with an invisible puppeteer. There is a coder named Nora, Mugzy, the yippy dog, and Ross, the too-curious poet. On board, it's a countdown to murder...
On this train there is a silver madman, a targeted banker, and crises of conscience. This train harbors the "perfect" couple's conspiracies, the chaos of being a teenager, and parenthood alongside the wows of being nine. There is a widow and a wannabe, and the sleaziest billionaire.
On this train, there is the suicide ticket, the bomb, sex, love, and loneliness. The heist. Revenge. Redemption.
This Train is a ticking clock, roaring through forty-seven fictional hours of non-stop suspense and action, through the challenges of now: Racism. Sexism. Global warming. What it means to be alive.
This train carries all of us. All aboard!
Two Nights in Lisbon
Chris Pavone
You think you know a person . . .
Ariel Pryce wakes up in Lisbon, alone. Her husband is gone--no warning, no note, not answering his phone. Something is wrong.
She starts with hotel security, then the police, then the American embassy, at each confronting questions she can't fully answer: What exactly is John doing in Lisbon? Why would he drag her along on his business trip? Who would want to harm him? And why does Ariel know so little about her new--much younger--husband?
The clock is ticking. Ariel is increasingly frustrated and desperate, running out of time, and the one person in the world who can help is the one person she least wants to ask.
Never Coming Home
Hannah Mary McKinnon
First comes love. Then comes murder.
Lucas Forester didn't hate his wife. Michelle was brilliant, sophisticated and beautiful. Sure, she had extravagant spending habits, that petty attitude, a total disregard for anyone below her status. But she also had a lot to offer. Most notably: wealth that only the one percent could comprehend.
For years, Lucas has been honing a flawless plan to inherit Michelle's fortune. Unfortunately, it involves taking a hit out on her.
Every track is covered, no trace left behind, and now Lucas plays the grieving husband so well he deserves an award. But when a shocking photo and cryptic note show up on his doorstep, Lucas goes from hunter to prey.
Someone is on to him. And they're closing in.
Dance Among the Flames
Tori Eldridge
Across forty years, three continents, and a past incident in 1560 France, Serafina Olegario tests the boundaries of love, power, and corruption as she fights to escape her life of poverty and abuse. Serafina's quest begins in Brazil when she's possessed by the warrior goddess Yansã, who emboldens her to fight yet threatens to consume her spirit. Fueled by power and enticed by Exú, an immortal trickster and intermediary to the gods, Serafina turns to the seductive magic of Quimbanda. It's dangerous to dance in the fire. But when you come from nothing, you have nothing to lose.
KD McCrite, who also writes as Sydney Hope Archer (it's an open secret! I'm not revealing anything here) was one of the first people I met when I started publishing. Kind, supportive, open, and a proven, versatile writer of any number of styles, I've always admired KD's approach to her craft and was honored to blurb her latest thriller, Before Shannon Died. A study of psychology and friendship and religion, it's a fascinating book and...and I should probably let my blurb do the talkin':
"Heartbreaking and beautiful, Before Shannon Died fiercely, unapologetically tells a complicated story of family, love, betrayal, and religion. Archer hits on every emotional note. I was mesmerized by the story, thought about the book when I wasn't reading it, was happy when I returned. There's wisdom and grace in these pages, hard-earned but lovely, and delivered with a sure hand. I'm glad Before Shannon came into my life. I won't forget it."
And a writer KD recommends?
Prolific, intelligent, and imaginative—these keys make a great author. Add insight, humor, sense of place, and characters who live, and you have a writing machine. Gordon Bonnet is such a machine. A scientist, a teacher, an artist, a jokester, and an animal lover, he’s able to blend these parts of himself into each of his books.
His speculative fiction with mind-bending plots takes the characters and their readers into unexpected places full of danger and seemingly impossible obstacles. The reader will actually begin to wonder how the lead character can possibly survive.
Have you ever wondered where household things go when they seem to disappear off the counter, out of the clothes dryer, off the coffee table? In Bonnet’s book, The Shambles, we stumble into that weird world along with Tucker Ferguson to discover a civilization fraught with lost people in a place filled with lost things and broken hearts. For a change of genre, "The Snowe Agency" is a mystery series with Bonnet’s unusual touch: all five detectives at the agency have some sort of psychic ability, each unique to that detective. Plenty of mystery and humor in this series, and you won’t be sorry you read it. The first of this seven-book series is Poison the Well.
Bonnet’s newest book is a mind-blowing thriller. Descent Into Ulthoa takes the protagonist into a mysterious, forbidding woods where you go in, but you likely will never come out. Peopled with a cast of fearsome characters, we urge our protagonist onward while wanting to warn him of trickery and terror. As always, Bonnet gives us a satisfying end to the tale and leaves us wanting him to tell us another story.
To learn more about these authors, click on the photos above.
The Sisters in Crime Podcast
As I mentioned in the Author's Note, I recorded a podcast with Sisters in Crime, and the wonderful Julie Hennrikus, a week or so ago. It should be available this month but, for now, click HERE to listen to their other interviews. It's really good! I've been totally into podcasts lately (at the expense of music, sigh), and this is one of the podcasts I have to check out the moment a new episode is available.
It's contest time! The monthly contest winner wins copies of the books listed in my "Two Writers You Should Read" segment. And the winner is...
olemiss__@gmail.com
Congrats, and keep your eye out for a separate e-mail from me!
Hey, did I mention that I wrote a column for the Washington Post last month? Talk about burying the lede! But it's true, and I'll write more about that experience next month. It's just that I had violence on my mind and this newsletter is a good place for me to work stuff like that out.
Anyway, I wrote a crime fiction roundup for the Post about four outstanding titles (all by women writers) and you can check it out HERE.
Until next time, much love and happy reading!