Horse Power Giveaway

Can I cop to loving James Lee Burke and Dave Robicheaux here? An alcoholic detective plagued by Catholic guilt and tragedy, doggedly limping to the finish? All that set up is great, but c'mon, Burke is a prose-master who deserves to be mentioned alongside the likes of Woodrell/ Gay/ McCarthy/ Franklin. His writing is muscular and lush and keeps me coming back to the well, but... can we knock it off with the Robicheaux books please? Can he just be retired or die? 'Cause every time he's trotted out for another round of dangerous games it dilutes the pleasure I take in his tales. I go, c'mon are you kidding? Again? It just discredits the otherwise believable fictional universe he inhabits. This is what I'm moaning about at Ransom Notes.

Speaking of those particular prose masters, anybody out there read Robert Olmstead before? His Civil War set novel Coal Black Horse is the only thing I have, but damn strooooong shit. Cross-dressing-lice-infected bandits, raping preachers, Homer and acres-wide gore pools like the Bender's basement wrapped up in pertified speechy biblical-tones and applied with chicken fat to the mythic American nineteenth century.

I enjoyed this book so much, I'm going to give you a copy.

S'right, I'm putting my bucks where my blog is and all you gotta do is let somebody else know about it. Send me a link to your own blog, Twitter, Facebook feed or full page ad in your local paper telling people that I'm giving away books at the Hardboiled Wonderland and you'll be entered. And folks, if you don't win this one, I've got a bunch more coming up as we get closer to NoirCon in November. I'll draw a winner Friday.

Speaking of NoirCon, have you seen the lineup for that beast? Can't wait. And regarding N@B, prepare and alibi for Thursday, October 21. Just added Johnathan Woods to the event which casts a decidedly weird cast to the evening. It's gonna be nuts.