2019: The Year in Writing

I’ve never been accused of being a great writer or a prolific writer, but in 2019 I approached “working” writer status. I had four original crime short stories published. Three were published in related crime anthologies edited by Paul Bishop and published by Wolfpack:

“No Chips, No Bonus” appeared in Pattern of Behavior;

“Awake” appeared in Criminal Tendencies; and

“Junkyard” appeared in Bandit Territory.

The fourth story, “121”, appeared in Rick Ollerman’s Down & Out: The Magazine, Vol. 2, Iss. 1. Three of the tales—“No Chips, No Bonus”, “Junkyard”, and “121”—featured a washed out former FBI agent named Jimmy Ford working security in a nowhere casino town on the Utah-Nevada border. I have more plans for Jimmy and we’ll see where he goes.  

I wrote an Introduction for Stark House’s omnibus edition of Lionel White’s Coffin for a Hood / Operation—Murder. I wrote five or six reviews for Justin Marriott’s terrific Men of Violence. And there were my usual contributions, which I’m proud of, to Mystery Scene Magazine: Five Short & Sweet columns; a dozen or more book reviews; and a feature article about mysteries that take place in circuses and carnivals titled, “Hey Rube! The Mystery is at the Circus”

Overall, 2019 was a pretty good writing year and I hope 2020 will shape up even better.