New Book Review YOU KNOW WHO KILLED ME by Loren Estleman

    Loren D. Estleman's You Know Who Killed Me is one of his finest. When a man is murdered in his basement, his wife pays for billboards reading "YOU KNOW WHO KILLED ME!" Leads flood in, many of them useless, making the work of the nearby (and corrupt) Sheriff's department even more difficult. And this problem is compounded when an anonymous ten thousand dollar reward is posted.        
   Who doesn't want ten grand?
   As for the victim...a quiet man who maintained the computer that operated the city's traffic light. Not the sort of vic whose job or life makes him eligible for the Most Likely Vic list.
   But then the Sheriff's  department hires Walker to look into all the tips (Walker is deputized for the task) and see if there are any leads to be found in the bubbling swamp of tips.
   The novel is pure page turner, a minefield of twists and a vaudeville act of Walker's take on modern life. Estleman's books are tough but they are also funny as hell.
   But maybe the biggest surprise of all is on the first page. Walker, it seems, is in rehab for his addiction to alcohol and pain meds. His physical and mental health problems enrich the novel and give Walker an even more trenchant take on the fools--including himself--he must deal with.
  Publisher's Weekly gave it a starred review. It was well deserved.  Will surely be a Shamus award contender.

Rick Ollerman's December Newsletter for Stark House

Hello, Everyone—

Happy Holidays! As the season whips by and we all wish we could stop and slow down (What? It's just me?) and spend time with some good reading, we're going to do our best to help you out. A few years ago I read a quote by an older and well-known author who likes to sit down undisturbed with a book and read for up to six hours at a time: "Reading is serious business," he said. But it's also a wonderful way to spend your time. So, before I talk about the Return of the Black Cyber Monday through Friday and Even December Holiday Sale, I want to give a quick reminder that you can check out this newsletter--or any or our past ones--as web pages here.

Also, the offer of a free signed, numbered chapbook containing two of the essays I've written for Stark House introductions still stands should anyone see fit to place a review of TURNAROUND/SHALLOW SECRETS in a non-top secret location. Just send a link and your address and I'll send you a book....

Last bit of housekeeping, in last month's newsletter we gave you a look at the new Ed Gorman book we have coming out in just a few weeks. This features what many consider to be two of Ed's finest PI novels. I'm partial to the second one, THE NIGHT REMEMBERS, but it seems that plenty or people give the nod to THE AUTUMN DEAD. What a deal that you get both titles in the same book. Anyway, we're still working on the scheduling, but we are going to be putting out another edition of Ed's books, this one featuring two of his western titles, GRAVES' RETREAT and NIGHT OF SHADOWS. if you've never read Ed's westerns before, they're a wonderful blend of western genre characters wrapped up in modern noirish dramas. The setting may be western, but the themes are not your father's (or grandfather's) Zane Grey. If you "don't read westerns," give these a chance. What Ed does with the form will probably surprise you.

We're also working on another Algernon Blackwood novel, one of our not-so-much crime reprints. These books don't go out to our Crime Club members but many of the titles are proving very popular. These books are another opportunity to dip into another literary area where you might not be so familiar. After Edgar Allan Poe there was H. P. Lovecraft. Both men died young, but at the same time as Lovecraft, the longer-lived Blackwood was writing some of the most haunting ghost and supernatural stories in England. More on the upcoming book next time, but if you want to check out our other Blackwood offerings, you can always look here.

We're also planning on releasing Barry N. Malzberg's comic masterpiece, UNDERLAY, so again, stay tuned....

And now that I've kept you waiting, here's the big news of the month, our Second Annual Holiday Season. We've offered a number of sales this year, mostly in an attempt to make it easier for new Stark House readers to backfill their shelves, so I don't know when the next sale will be, but for now and through the month of December, here it is:

DECEMBER 2014

50% HOLIDAY SALE

 

Catherine Butzen: Thief of Midnight $15.95

Robert W. Chambers: The Slayer of Souls / The Maker of Moons $19.95

James Hadley Chase: Come Easy—Go Easy / In a Vain Shadow $19.95

Jada M. Davis: Midnight Road $19.95

Don Elliott/Robert Silverberg: Lust Queen / Lust Victim $19.95

 

Feldman & Gartenberg (ed): The Beat Generation & the Angry Young Men $19.95

A. S. Fleischman: The Sun Worshippers / Yellowleg $19.95

Arnold Hano: So I’m a Heel / Flint / The Big Out $23.95

Elisabeth Sanxay Holding: The Unfinished Crime / The Girl Who Had to Die $19.95

Russell James: Underground / Collected Stories $14.95

 

Stephen Marlowe: Violence is My Business / Turn Left for Murder $19.95

E. Phillips Oppenheim: Ghosts & Gamblers: The Further Uncollected Stories $19.95

Vin Packer: The Damnation of Adam Blessing / Alone at Night $19.95

Richard Powell: A Shot in the Dark / Shell Game $14.95

Bill Pronzini: Snowbound / Games $14.95

 

Peter Rabe: Kill the Boss Good-By / Mission for Vengeance $19.95

Douglas Sanderson: The Deadly Dames / A Dum-Dum for the President $19.95

Bill Shepard: California Cornerstone $14.95

Charlie Stella: Rough Riders $15.95

Cynthia Campbell Williams: This Fool’s Journey: Tarot Tales for Modern Minds $15.96

 

SALE PRICES:
$14.95: now $7.45

$15.95/$15.96: now $7.95

$19.95: now $9.95

$23.95: now $11.95

 

Shipping: $3 for 1^st book, 50c for each additional book (via media mail)

 

Additional information on individual books available atwww.starkhousepress.com

Order via: griffinskye3@sbcglobal.net; payment accepted via paypal.

Checks accepted via: Stark House Press, 1315 H St, Eureka, CA 95501

All books are trade paperback

---

I'll talk more next time about upcoming books, including two by the queen of suspense herself, Elisabeth Sanxay Holding, but in the meantime, we've given you plenty of new books to take a look at already. Write a review of Turnaround / Shallow Secrets and get your limited edition chapbook. Read some vintage crime stories with Edgar Wallace. Help fill out your Stark House collection with the current crop of sale books. And by all means, stretch a little if you're a fan of beautiful and haunting writing and pick up Andrew Coburn's Spouses & Other Crimes.

So, until next time, keep reading, and if you have any questions about the subscribing or unsubscribing to the newsletter, or orders for books, just drop us a line here.

Cheers,

Rick Ollerman
Associate Editor,
Stark House Press

We all know some pretty ego maniacal writers but whoa baby

Ayelet Waldman Throws Twitter Fit Over New York Times Most Notable Snub

The Huffington Post  | By Claire Fallon

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Bestselling author Ayelet Waldman treated Twitter to a public snit after her most recent novel, Love and Treasure, was not included in The New York Times' influential Most Notable Books list for 2014. Waldman, incensed at the exclusion of her book, tweeted at length about her disappointment and anger about the book not being deemed worthy of inclusion:

I am really not dealing well with having failed to make the @nytimes notable book list. Love & Treasure is a fucking great novel IISSM.

— Ayelet Waldman (@ayeletw) December 2, 2014

It's just so fucking demoralizing. You pour your heart into your work, you get awesome reviews, and then someone decides it's not "notable."

— Ayelet Waldman (@ayeletw) December 2, 2014

Waldman pointed out that her book had received a more favorable review in The New York Times than other (unnamed) books included in the list of notables, and went on to openly wonder why she should bother publishing a novel instead of simply keeping a journal, given such a lack of recognition.

Though Waldman eventually tweeted that there were "real problems in the world" and that she planned to "do something good for someone else" instead of complain, her following tweets entreated followers to pre-order her book's upcoming paperback edition. She pledged to make a donation -- of $1 -- for each pre-order. Waldman tweeted that her donation would go to "scholarmatch.com," presumably referring to ScholarMatch.org, a college scholarship assistance nonprofit founded by Dave Eggers.

Many in the literary community responded with some measure of derision or measured criticism to Waldman's rant. Some suggested these disappointments are typically best expressed in private, while others gleefully riffed on the perceived self-absorption and entitlement in her tweets:

Patrick Ness ‪@Patrick_Ness

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Ayelet Waldman incensed that all ‪#tbt photographs aren't of her book. "No back has been thrown even CLOSE to the quality of mine."

9:22 AM - 4 Dec 2014

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Gabriel Roth ‪@gabrielroth

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Every writer has an Ayelet Waldman inside him/her, most of us just keep it under wraps

http://www.

dailydot.com/entertainment/

ayelet-waldman-throws-fit-over-year-end-list/

…

9:16 AM - 4 Dec 2014

Bestselling author throws fit after snub in meaningless New York Ti...

Ayelet Waldman, author of several successful novels and a bestselling book about how hard it is to be a mom, has never come across well online. Whether she’s stoking rage with a con...

The Daily Dot ‪@dailydot

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Waldman did not retreat in the face of mockery, tweeting that her rant was "honest" and that her pledge to donate was only positive:

Ayelet Waldman ‪@ayeletw

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What do (some of) you do? Spend your lives on twitter being snarky and cruel? When's the last time you did something for someone else?

9:53 AM - 4 Dec 2014

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Ayelet Waldman ‪@ayeletw

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You know the difference between me and you? I express the hurt, and then channel it into something useful, like scholarship donations.

9:52 AM - 4 Dec 2014

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Anyone expecting embarrassment or regret from Waldman would have to be unfamiliar with her history of stoking public controversy. Waldman, who is married to acclaimed author Michael Chabon, sparked a national firestorm with a 2005 Modern Love column in The New York Times in which she claimed she loved her husband more than their children. She did not back down after the ensuing backlash, and 10 years later she reiterated that she had no regrets about the essay.

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Forgotten Books: How Like An Angel Margaret Millar

Forgotten Books: How Like An Angel Margaret Millar

How Like an Angel by Margaret Millar

I've always held the opinion that some writers are just too good for the mass market. This is a true of a number of literary writers but it's also true of at least one writer of crime fiction, the late Margret Millar. For all her many deserved awards, she never became the enormous commercial success she deserved to be.

For me she's the single most elegant stylist who ever shaped a mystery story. You revel in her sentences. She used wit and black humor in the direst of novels long before it was fashionable in the genre. And she was a better (and much fairer) bamboozler than Agatha Christie.

I recently reread her How Like and Angel and its richness, its darkness, its perverse wit make me repeat what I've said many times before--if this isn't the perfect mystery novel, it comes damned close.

Private eye Joe Quinn, having gambled away all his money, begins hitchhiking from Reno to Caifornia. Along the way he sees the Tower, the symbol of a religious cult that eventually offers him not only shelter but a chance to put his skills to use. Sister Blessing asks him to find a man named Patrick O'Gorman. The man is dead. Which makes Quinn suspicious of why she wants him located.

Among its many pleasures is the way this novel, published in the early sixties, anticipates some of the fringe cults that would grow out of the flower power days. There's more than a touch of ole Charlie Manson in the Tower. Millar does world building here--not unlike a science fiction writer at work--giving us a look at a group of varied individuals who have been driven here because they could not cope with the world and its cruelty and deceits. Some are insane, some are sweet and pathetic and a few are diabolical. There is great strangeness here and Millar presents it with poetic force and humor.

The mystery itself is truly baffling. In following it down Quinn goes into a nearby town reconstruct the curious history of O`Gorman. Who was he really? The daylight town scenes contrast with the shadowy ones at the Tower but it is in the daylight that the true darkness of Quinn’s journey is exposed. It always puts me in mind of the end of Whatever Happened To Baby Jane—when Jane escapes the gloom of their house to reach the beach—the searing sunlight crueler to her than anything her sister did. Night suddenly seems a blessing.

Just about everybody who’s ever read Margaret Millar has wondered why she isn’t known at least half as well as her husband Ken Millar/Ross Macdonald. In her own way she was certainly his equal.