I don't always read books....

To coincide with the release of The Rogue Gentleman in paperback, the ebook is free until Friday! If you download it, all I ask in return is a review, whether or not you liked it.

THE ROGUE GENTLEMAN NOW IN PAPERBACK!

You've been waiting for it.....

THE ROGUE GENTLEMAN is now in paperback, available from Amazon.

Get your copy today!

Fleming Find: The Man With The Golden Gun

I wish I had my digital camera to post a picture of this but it's in a box somewhere....

Anyway I was browsing through a used bookshop I had never visited before, and low and behold I found a stack of Ian Fleming hardcovers! Wow! Never before have I found such a treasure. I have a partial set of Fleming hardcovers already, but they are reprints, and the publisher did not do the entire series. Only Golden Gun and Octopussy were left out of the line-up, and I pretty much never thought I'd have even a shot at completing the set, but now I'm jazzed to find Octopussy.

I'm sure this book is a reprint. It does not have a dust-jacket, but the price (under $10) was right, so I grabbed it.

The Man with the Golden Gun was Fleming's last book, as you probably know. He died before putting the finishing polish on the story, and it shows in spots. I think the first two chapters are some of the best in spy fiction, as Bond returns from a stint in Russia where he was brainwashed to kill M. It's a terrific sequence, full of tension and suspense; after that, Bond is off on what is described as a suicide mission, but the stakes never really rise to that level. It's a pedestrian mission, really. There's a good bit of shooting at the end, and the last chapter really does put a lid on Bond.

If this is all we ever had to finish the series, it's not a bad dose. It's not the best, but it's not the worst, and Heaven knows that Fleming phoned it in a few times while perfectly healthy (a giant squid in Dr. No? Really, Ian?) so we can cut him some slack here.

Of course, much later after Fleming died, came the continuations. I don't talk much about them, though I did like John Gardner's work, especially Licence Renewed, which I've always considered a home run. I think his first three Bond books were very good. We can nitpick those at a later date, perhaps. In fact, I'd like to. Better go get the Gardner reprints and see if I can find the first continuation, Colonel Sun.....the less I say about Raymond Benson's work, the better. Benson is a fine writer, but I didn't like his version of James Bond one bit.

So where's Octopussy hiding?

Published...Sort Of

A few months ago fellow thriller scribe Matt Hilton sent out a call for submissions for an ebook anthology he wanted to produce called Action: Pulse Pounding Tales Volume 2, which you can now buy on Amazon for your Kindle. I sent Matt a story called THE FIXER which I submitted under my new pen name of Dean Breckenridge. I thought this would be a great way to introduce the Breckenridge name as novels based on the characters in THE FIXER are on the way. An author never assumes he'll be accepted first shot out of the box so imagine my surprise when Matt wrote to tell me he not only wanted my story but, despite

my asking, did not require any revision.

THE FIXER is hard-boiled crime piece and features a character named Wolf who is a middleman between cops and crooks. Sometimes justice needs a little help, and that's when Wolf comes in. If you have nobody else to turn to or if you're getting a raw deal, he'll be there. He answers to nobody but himself so he has no problem ruffling feathers on either side. And ruffle them he does.

Personally, I don't think THE FIXER is all that great. It's a character piece that I wrote to "practice" with the new concept. I'm not even sure how it blends with the continuity established in the novel featuring these characters; I may expand it into a full novel at some point, or I may ignore it entirely. This is the third time in 13 years of selling stories that something I've written has been accepted as-is. Let that be a lesson to those of you trying to figure out what's wrong with your story when it comes back with a rejection. Chances are, there's nothing wrong with it at all. You need to keep sending it out until you find an editor who likes it. When it comes back, send it out again. Don't even mess with the manuscript for one second. Not one. Not one single second. Don't even look at it.

I started using the Breckenridge name for hard-boiled pieces while I will continue to churn out thrillers under my real name. I think there should be separate brands, if you will, for each type of story, since they are different from each other, and those who read thrillers may not like crime stories and the other way around. The hard-boiled stories that have previously appeared as by Brian Drake will reappear under that name once I get some new covers--soon, I promise--as there is no reason to put them out under the new name when readers are used to seeing them under mine. But from now on, that won't be the case.

Anyway, should you be interested, ACTION 2 includes a terrific cast of writers who you should keep your eyes on, such as my pal Paul D. Brazill who has been kind enough to mention my work on his blog. Matt Hilton is tops, too, by the way. Why he hasn't had wider recognition I do not understand, but his Joe Hunter character is somebody you want on your side. I've often said that British writers are better than American writers, and he proves the point once again. So thank you, Matt, for the opportunity; I hope ACTION 2 brings you the audience you deserve.

How JJ Abrams Created Star Trek Into Darkness

The following is a never-before-heard discussion between director JJ Abrams and screenwriter Roberto Orci about creating the new Star Trek movie. This article contains bad language and spoilers so don't say I didn't warn you.

JJ Abrams: "So what are we going to do for the next Star Trek movie? I'm thinking of just calling it Star Trek 2. Because it's, like, the second movie. See how I did that right there?"

Roberto Orci: "That would be silly--there's already been a Star Trek 2."

JJ Abrams: "But this is the new timeline, so it's Star Trek 2, Timeline 2, and we can--"

Roberto Orci: "Can't it just be a normal Star Trek movie?"

JJ Abrams: "It's gotta have flash and dash and explosions and stuff because the audience can't follow a normal story. They're all ADDHDD what-ever-the-D kids, remember? But seriously, what are we going to do?"

Roberto Orci: "Let's do something original that Star Trek hasn't done before. It's the first voyage of the new crew, they're uncertain about how they might handle the challenge, and we really throw something tough at them. We can have some action but it should make you think--"

JJ Abrams: "Thinking is too hard, man. How about this: Maybe the Enterprise can go to a planet where all the women are blonde and wear black underwear and just stand around. We'll shoot it in high-def. Half naked blonde chicks will look great on the IMAX screen."

Roberto Orci: "Um, JJ--"

JJ Abrams: "No, no, no, I got an idea. Let's make the bad guy Khan, let's kill Kirk instead of Spock because that would be a cool twist...oh and let's make Khan a white British guy so we avoid any racial stuff because he's supposed to be, you know, like, all Indian and ethnic or something, and after we kill Kirk we bring him back to life so nobody starts crying, and boom-chicka-wow-wow there's our movie. Cash the check, bang some chicks, make another one. You in?"

Roberto Orci: "But, um, that's kinda like what's already been done."

JJ Abrams: "So what? Everybody who remembers is old and the studio doesn't care about them. We're going after the young people who weren't even born when that other version was made."

Roberto Orci: "Well, um, I guess--"

JJ Abrams: "Oh, and let's have Spock kiss Uhura. That's hot right there. Some Vulcan-on-black action, man, that's what we need."


Roberto Orci: "But what's the story?"

JJ Abrams: "I don't know. They fly into space, have some laser battles....what else do you need?"

Roberto Orci: "I don't think its' a good idea, JJ."

JJ Abrams: "I'm not paying you to think, dumb ass. Forget the story, forget originality, forget anything deep. I want blondes in their underwear, Vulcans kissing black chicks, a white Khan, and lots of explosions. Gene Roddenberry can go fuck himself."

Roberto Orci: "Um, he's dead, JJ."

JJ Abrams: "Then that would be hard for him, wouldn't it?"

I Don't Need No Rules for Writing

How often do you listen to advice? Any kind of advice? And how often do you ignore it? I think as we get older we ignore more. We've already heard a ton of it by a certain point and as we go forward the old advice stored in our memories is really no different than any new advice we may be given; we also get to the point where we say, "Fuh-get it," and damn the torpedoes because advice is like opinions and we all know what opinions are like.

That's what I think, nowadays, when it comes to writing. I enjoy reading about a writer's routines and how he or she planned (or didn't plan) a particular book, but when it comes to their "rules on writing" which we see a lot, I have no use for their remarks. When I was young, I certainly did. Boy did I! I thought there was a secret in there somewhere and if I sifted through enough advice, I would find it. Instead I found a lot of tips that helped me when I was starting out. Those tips improved my reading as well so I could see what authors followed those rules and which ones didn't. After so many years, I have decided that "rules on writing" are only for the writers who write those rules and really don't apply to anybody else. Are you listening, Elmore Leonard?

On this wonderful website, Brain Pickings, you'll find a ton of information about writers on writing and their rules for it. We still need this stuff because there are always people starting out, either teens like me back in the day or grown-ups who have finally decided that now's the time to write "that darn book."

But I look at these articles now the way a seasoned veteran looks at a cadre of rookies. You smile as you think of all the neat stuff they're about to learn, and you feel satisfied that you yourself have learned enough that, while you should always refresh so as to never get rusty (and that's an important point), you also know enough now to make up your own rules.

Which, in my case, I only have one. Tell the story in the best way possible. If that means using an adverb, then I'm using every adverb I can think of and if Stephen King doesn't like it, fuh-get him.

Too Much Black Mask?

There was a time when I thought the hard-boiled writing style, as pioneered in Black Mask magazine, was the only way to write. I'm certainly not the only one, nor am I the only one to extol the virtues of the magazine and the writers who wrote for it and how they wrote, both individually and as a group. But I got to thinking today...has Black Mask been too much of an influence? Have today's crime writers neglected the development of their own voice in order to continue a writing tradition that doesn't necessary work all the time?

I think I almost fell into that trap. The stripped down style of Hammett. Chandler, Stark, et al, was wonderful to read and I worked hard to emulate it. Allegedly, I did it very well. The editors who bought my first handful of stories thought so, and even one who turned a story down said I had a "talent for this sort of thing" but as I moved from my 20s to my 30s I started reading different authors (like Leslie Charteris and PG Wodehouse and F. Scott Fitzgerald) and found a whole new way of storytelling that was just as wonderful as the hard-boiled style (you could make a case that Fitzgerald stripped his prose a little, but not to the same point Hammett did).

Based on reading Charteris alone, I started writing The Rogue Gentleman, and while there is still a mix of the hard-boiled in spots, the writing is much more filled out than what I had previously done. I wasn't comparing myself to Dashiell Hammett or Paul Cain or Frederick Nebel or any of the other hard-boiled masters. I was finding my own way and, I think, finally developing a voice that sounded like my own. Allegedly, I've done well with it.

With all of the adoration given to Black Mask and the hard-boiled style, is it choking off greater creative effort? Hard-boiled certainly teaches you the basics. Less is more. Get the action going. Be clear, pay attention to important details, have realistic motivations. But at some point, those training wheels have to be taken off and the writer must find his own voice. To continuously try to keep the tradition alive for the sake of the tradition itself doesn't do the crime and mystery genre any favors, and only continues the idea that hard-boiled fiction consists of dummies in trench coats and hats who talk out of the side of their mouths and carry a gat in each hand and end every sentence with "sister" or some other wise crack and lines like, "I got hit with a brick as heavy as Texas and after that the lights went out. I woke up with a slight headache that a couple of beers took care of, picked up my coat and hat, and went to find the fat man so I could give him back the brick."

Hard-boiled doesn't work all the time. Sometimes you need the extra details, the emotions, all the things that Joe Shaw said to cut. Sometimes you don't need them, too. Finding that balance is the key. I think I've found it, though I reserve the right to go back to the pure hard-boiled style when I feel like it. Because, while it's a good way to teach writing, it's also friggin' FUN.