There have been black writers writing black detectives since the beginning of the 20th century. There were black Holmes’ and black Marlowes and black Marples, policemen, amateur sleuths, and private eyes, coexisting with their “mainstream” counterparts almost since the beginning of modern crime fiction, but they were ignored, unseen, unpublished. These black writers, these pioneers,…
Our book, I Got A Monster: The Rise and Fall of America’s Most Corrupt Police Squad, explores the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), a gun-seizing unit praised for getting guns off the streets and supposedly stopping crime while simultaneously creating crime and running what one cop later called a “criminal enterprise” within…
Does fiction matter when reality is so harrowing? Albert Camus, author of The Stranger, said “fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth.” But is fiction, especially genre fiction — mysteries, thrillers, suspense, and romance — the place to talk about serious issues such as the contentious immigration debate or racism, or should…
The Jones Men was a thrilling novel to discover. A lost “cult” novel from the 1970s, written by veteran journalist Vern E. Smith, it is a story of the drug trade on the streets of Detroit, and it absolutely blew me away when I read it forty years after its initial publication. The novel crackles…
Read this exclusive guest post from Max Allan Collins, author of Better Dead, comparing his own Nate Heller series to finishing Mickey Spillane's posthumous Mike Hammer manuscripts, and then make sure you're signed in and comment for a chance to win a copy of his newest Nate Heller thriller! I have been writing about my fictional P.I.…
The golden age of the fictional villain—twirling his moustache, laughing Frenchly, tying women to train tracks—was the 19th century. In that innocent age, you could actually spook readers with a one-dimensional madman; you didn’t have to bother much with a motivation (unless it was money). But then the modern era came along and started producing…
Filmmaker and sometime mystery writer Nelson George (The Plot Against Hip Hop and Night Work) wrote a commentary in the February 15, 2013, New York Times, “Still Too Good, Too Bad or Invisible.” The piece focused on the portrayal of black leading men in recent movies, including Quentin Tarantino’s lauded and lambasted Django Unchained, for…
The Audies, sponsored by the Audio Publishers Association (APA), recognize “distinction in audiobooks and spoken word entertainment.” They offer awards in many, many different categories, and of course, we wanted to highlight both Mystery and Thriller/Suspense categories specifically for crime fans. However, since we also discuss things like horror, pulp, historical conspiracy, tales of military…
