“Some of us, by simple grace, sit on the merry-go-round enjoying the ride while others struggle just to stay on. The damned thing’s going too fast, their legs keep getting away from them, everything they have slides over the edge and is gone. These are the folks Nick Heeb writes about. Don’t try to make writing like this safe by saying it’s gritty or transgressive or classic noir. Those are words, and this is real.”

—James Sallis, author of Drive and the Lew Griffin cycle

This week Shotgun Honey is pleased to release the debut novel The Lucky Clover by Nick Heeb. The story is about a man who is drawn to misfortune, poor choices, and the remote roadside biker bar The Lucky Clover. As James Sallis suggests, Heeb has produced a book that doesn’t easily fit into one bucket, though elements may want you to quickly do so. Regardless of what you clasp onto, The Lucky Clover will drag you and its protagonist willingly or not to the end.

Available for direct order from Down & Out Books, Amazon and many online retailers in paperback and eBook.

Only a few days left of 2018, and I imagine many of you are ready to be done with it. I know there are a lot of aspects I’d like to leave behind. But in the publishing world, there’s always something to look forward to, and that’s more books.

• 01-18 | The Lucky Clover by Nick Heeb
  
• 02-08 | Main Bad Guy by Nick Kolakowski
  
• 03-08 | It’s Not My Cult! by A.X. Kalinchuk
  
• 04-12 | Load by Preston Lang
  
• 05-10 | The Furious Way by Aaron Philip Clark
  
• 06-07 | How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks by Jennifer Lee Thomson
  
• 07-12 | Honorary Jersey Girl by Albert Tucher
  
• 08-09 | 40 Nickels by R. Daniel Lester
  
• 09-06 | Chasing China White by Allan Leverone
  
• 10-25 | Shotgun Honey Presents: Call Me Danger
  
• 12-13 | Coal Black: Stories by Chris McGinley

2019 will be full of comedy and tragedy with many returning characters and authors. Enough variety that you’ll want to add at least one to your nightstand reading.

Many titles have been mentioned previously, and in the coming weeks and months we’ll be delving into each one individually. Two noteworthy additions come in the final quarter of 2019.

In 2018, unless you’ve been in hiding, you’ve probably run into Chris McGinley’s stories on various websites, including ours with “The Haint”. So we’re very happy to publish his first collection Coal Black: Stories in just under twelve months. As the title suggest, it’ll be packed with stories about rural Kentucky and Appalachia. I’m a fan and I hope you’ll be too.

In October is one of two special projects we’re working on for release in 2019. Shotgun Honey Presents: Call Me Danger is the return of our anthology series which kicked off our publishing endeavors with Both Barrels (2012), Reloaded (2013), and Locked and Loaded (2015). Keep your eyes out for information on submitting in next couple weeks.

If you’re a reviewer and you see a cover, title or author that piques your interest, feel free to reach out by emailing press@shotgunhoney.com. We’ll be sure get you an eARC when it’s available.

Thank you for your support and have a prosperous new year.

2019 is only a month away—boy did this year blow by—and for 2018 there is only one more book on the books, Rival Sons by Aidan Thorn releasing December 14 (I mention this as it was to release on the 7th). It’s been a rewarding year as far as working with talented folks, though it has been at times it’s been a juggling act. Part of that is working with all these talented folks, and being allowed to put their stories out there for the public. It’s also because I work full-time elsewhere and I am a full-time student (at 50 next  January), and then there’s just having shitty health.

My favorite part of the publishing is the creativity I can give to the covers.  If you look in the front of 99% of the books I produce the credit belongs to Bad Fido—it is me and I am it. I created Bad Fido with the hopes of doing covers (and related publishing necessities like websites) for people outside of Shotgun Honey. But, time hasn’t really be on my side. My style is so varied it would be fair I don’t have a style, but the designs I do come from the stories and not some house style I perceive I should have. I think flexibility is good. So if you have a book coming out in 2019 that doesn’t have a cover yet … I’m just saying.

This week Bad Fido, um me, is please to share covers for January and February releases by Nick Heeb and Nick Kolakowski (respectively).

In The Lucky Clover by Nick Heeb, we follow the Narrator who returns to his old haunt, The Lucky Clover, looking to forget and recover from his past life’s miseries and humiliations by drinking with good friends. He soon discovers the people closest to him had no interest in his honest intentions, and that violence is the only language spoken in this sparse and hard country he calls home.

The Narrator is a man of vice and his actions are fueled by drink and drug and too much time spent in The Lucky Clover. While the story is stark, much of the environment is left to our own encounters with the seedier side of life. Instead of focusing on the atmosphere of the roadside bar, I felt vice was the way to go with this cover. What do you think?

In 2017 the second Shotgun Honey/Down and Out release was A Brutal Bunch of Heartbroken Saps which introduced us to Bill and Fiona, whose true romance takes them to near death. This was followed up a year later with Slaughterhouse Blues. Those crazy lovebirds  Nick Kolakowski is a true provocateur of gonzo violence and mayhem. And this February (2019) Bill and Fiona return in their last book in the Love & Bullets trilogy titled Main Bad Guy.

For this book, I took lead from the author and used a central image that is key to the plot and tone of the book. I won’t reveal it’s intent, but it’s going to be quite the ride to this unique courtship.

And of course, I took this opportunity to revisit the first to books of the series and provide some unison. What do you think? Better than the originals?

It’s sad to see the series end, but it’s not the end of Nick. He and I, and a talented bunch of other writers, have something really excited for the second half of 2019. More on that later…

This week I also caught up with posts that didn’t get posted. A couple weeks ago I went to the hospital to get an MRI and came out with Bronchitis. And having sworn I had pre-published all the stories for November, I didn’t check to see if the stories had published, preferring the comfort of bed. So big apologies to R.D. Sullivan and Joshua Wade Freeman. So their stories published late. So be sure to read “So Easy” by R.D. Sullivan and “Gas” by Joshua Wade Freeman.

When I first got a chance to read Face Value by William E. Wallace, I immediately connected with Eddie Pax, a man that works within the gray areas of society tracking down properties owned by bad men. Eddie was a classic pulp protagonist, and in a different generation William would have been a classic pulp writer comparable to Donald Westlake’s alter ego, Richard Stark. When I accepted Face Value I asked if there were more. Eddie had appeared in a few short stories, but in William’s mind the stories and the novels were endless. Potential always there. He was constantly writing, and I believe it was in the words that William found the strength to fight cancer. Even a few weeks prior to his death he talked about that next Eddie Pax novel. It’s a shame that novel never found completion, Eddie Pax was my kind of character. I’d rather have William here, instead.

I only knew William through his writing, though I feel I should call him Bill. That’s what his friends called him, and at least to me he made it really easy see him as a friend. Bill had many friends from his journo days, and he collected many as a crime writer and a champion of small press publishing. Bill published a few collections on his own, such is the marvel of publishing today, and then a couple books with All Due Respects, then rival and now sister publishing company, and his final book Face Value with us, Shotgun Honey. When he wasn’t writing, he was reading and he was supporting writers who are not often heard, marginalized by the marketing of the New York publishing houses. He wrote about books and authors he liked on his blog, Pulp Hack Confessions.

Today, I am honored, with the editorial guidance of Chris Rhatigan of All Due Respect, along with the support of Eric Campbell and Lance Wright of Down and Out Books, and the blessing of Margot Wallace, Bill’s wife, and Garth Wallace, Bill’s son, to release DEADLINES: A Tribute to William E. Wallace. This is a collection of stories — inspired by the career and stories of William E. Wallace — culled from writers and colleagues that Bill took time to champion. I thank these writers for their time, their stories, and their patience. 

The Contributors

Memories

Sarah M. Chen

I knew Bill more from his online presence than in person. He was such a generous and ardent supporter of the crime fiction community and his humorous posts were something I always enjoyed reading. Before knowing him online, however, I did get the chance to briefly meet him at LCC Portland. I immediately liked him. He was intelligent, kind, and witty. 

Eryk Pruitt

When pitching my first novel DIRTBAGS to agents, I forever felt the sting from one particular rejection that said only, “I thought you said this was supposed to be funny.” That one hurt. All my lonely thoughts crashed and crumbled at the shores when I read my first-ever Pulphack Confessions review which Bill titled: “A Laugh-A-Minute With The Funniest Serial Killer Novel I’ve Ever Read.” For the first time since I’d started writing, I felt like I’d connected with a reader. It’s still my favorite review ever. 

Jen Conley

William Wallace was a fantastic champion of my work. He was one of the first to review my story collection and I will always be grateful. I never got to meet him in person, but I wish I could’ve have. Rest in peace, William.

Travis Richardson

I “met” Bill virtually on July 3, 2014, after reading his story “Working Stiff” in Flash Fiction Offensive. I friended him on Facebook and we wrote each other about the noir/crime fiction community and how supportive the writers are unlike other competitive areas. We emailed a few times and talked through Facebook. He promoted fellow authors’ works and I always looked forward to reading his stories. I got to meet him in person at Renee Asher Pickup’s Book and Booze podcast reading in San Francisco. And later at Left Coast Crime in Portland. We both sat at Holly West and Josh Stallings’ table at the banquet dinner in 2015.

Our final meeting was for breakfast in Berkeley on June 2016. I was in the Bay Area to watch an Oakland A’s game for Father’s Day. Bill’s diagnosis was grim and I wanted to see him again if he was up for it. We arranged to meet that Saturday for brunch. After being surprised to see him at a Joe Clifford book launch at Pegasus Books the night before, we met Saturday morning. We had brunch the following morning. Bill talked about some characters he met while reporting, authors he loved, concerns about the state of the publishing industry and the diminishing short story market and his health. He didn’t eat much as he had no appetite. While he had grown thin and looked tired, his eyes were alive. After our meal, we sat outside and talked a little longer before he needed to head home. He signed my copy of “Hangman’s Dozen” and I gave him a hug. A few days later he sent me the following message that broke my heart…

“You’ll be interested to know that you are the last person other than my docs and family I have seen since we had lunch. My son had tix for us to go to the MST3K reunion at a theater in Emeryville last night, but I couldn’t manage it. Looks like I am going to be spending most of the rest of my life shuffling around home and writing or down at Kaiser for treatment or labs. Of practically all the people I know who are writers, I am happiest you were one of the last I got to see in person. . .”

I am so glad he was wrong and had another seven more months to live. In those months he put his life out on Facebook for his friends to see. Writing, playing his guitar, reading stories and giving reviews, and still sending out words of encouragement to the crime writing community. Brave and generous to the end. When Bill passed, it still came as a shock. I miss Bill. A fantastic writer, advocate, and friend.

Will Viharo

Will contributed most of the photos, and those moments are captured memories that we are thankful for.

Thank You, Bill

William E. Wallace was an exceptional talent and a passionate man. This wonderful collection cannot begin to express his contribution to our community or the void left behind in his passing. Bill called himself a hack, but his talents extended beyond his own writings, elevating those around him.

Thank you for contributing to Shotgun Honey with your short stories and allowing me to give Eddie Pax one good story of his own.

Thank you to all the authors who contributors, to co-editor Chris Rhatigan, and our publisher Down & Out Books. And to Margot and Garth Wallace our condolences and gratitude for allowing us to celebrate Bill the only way we know how.

DEADLINES: A Tribute to William E. Wallace is a charitable anthology whose proceeds will be donated in Bill’s name to The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

This week I promised myself I wasn’t going to spend much time on social media, specifically Facebook, because I have a couple term papers due. I know that’s a strange thing to hear from a college educated gent like myself, but truth is the first time around I did it for the folks and note myself. Otherwise, I’d probably be college professor like so many of the writers I get to publish. There is something pleasing in working with someone and facilitate a story to the published product. So maybe I’ll become a professor yet. I hear they get a lot of coeds.

Though I promised to stay off social media, I’m glad I didn’t. I managed to catch a Q&A with James Lee Burke following a short reading on a Facebook Live. Live is the new instant video post that Facebook allows you to do, that is if you didn’t already know. I first read James Lee Burke by way of my grandfather who was an avid most of his life and moreso in his elder years. Mr. Burke sprung into the world when my grandfather would have been a teen, but the two men had a lot in common. Hard work ethics and big tales. I always thought my grandfather could have made a good writer, but that’s where he and Mr. Burke differ. My grandfather believed in arts as quality leisure, but did not feel it made for a meaningful employment. Partly why I didn’t follow my guts and dedicate myself to writing when I first found I had a knack for it. He warmed up to the idea in the later years and I was a bit shameful that I never finished that first book to show him who and what I really was meant to be.

That aside, James Lee Burke is a national treasure and if you haven’t read his Dave Robicheaux series, then you ought to get on it. The man has a way of making words flow as natural as breath and sharp as steel. And I don’t normally recommend audio books, but they are useful on trips, and to hear the great Will Patton (honestly, I believe he is a fantastic character actor and second man) read the words of James Lee Burke—this man was made to read novels by James Lee Burke for us to enjoy—it is transcendent. A perfect pairing. But as you will hear from the excerpt of White Doves at Morning at the top of the video, Mr. Burke is no slacker. Enjoy.

I was considering announcing a book that I’ll be producing for next year with James Ray Tuck Jr that will be released in conjunction with Down & Out Books, and… Well that’s all I’m going to say at this time because I’m a bastard. It’s important and I hope it turns into something special. Next week will be pedal to the medal for me as I use my staycation to produce some books, and hopefully write some fiction of my own.

Oh, have you listened to the latest WriterTypes? The latest hits Crimespree Magazine‘s first Murder and Mayhem Chicago conference. This episode is hosted by Crimespree Magazine and has another Shotgun Honey story, this episode Carnivore by Carmen Jaramillo. Check it!

In Case You Missed It

The Kid by Mark Cowling

The kid was driving. Enrique. He was new but there was no one else I’d want behind the wheel. He did nothing erratic, nothing impulsive. Steady speed — neither too fast or too slow. Just a nondescript truck cutting through the backstreets of Oakland.”

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Back to Tall Pines by Spencer Fleury

When she heard the job offer on her answering machine, her heart sank. Virgil reminded her – again – how much they needed the money. “But it’s the most depressing thing I can think of,” she said. He just snorted. “Naw. There’s worse.” Easy for you to say, asshole. You don’t have to do it.

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We are always open to submissions. So if you want to be like one of the folks mentioned above, hit us up at the Submissions Manager.

Until next time, all the best.