The Outfit Collective Sends Prize Books My Way

Back in early August, The Outfit: A Collective of Chicago Crime Writers ran a mini-contest, asking for stories of corrupt towns or cities. Late last year, I had been shaken down by a town in Connecticut for property taxes (two beater cars) for a period of time after I had left the state. It seemed pretty corrupt to me. So I told the story in the 200 word maximum (Hatchetville, Connecticut--scroll down at this link), was a co-winner, and then the only one who claimed his prize: a handful of signed books from The Outfit. Noted writer Sara Paretsky organized the contest, mailed the books, and sent a nice note. At my request (or perhaps by pre-planning), she included her recent memoir/meditation, Writing in an Age of Silence. I am looking forward to reading it. Paretsky has been a strong advocate for free speech and civil liberties. I am glad that she had the chance to write and publish this book. As much as I'm a reader, writer, and fan of crime fiction, I am glad to see a writer use her success to stretch--or step out of--the genre. (It would also be fair to say that Paretsky built her success by stretching the genre.)

Another Month, Another Post... and Crumley

Another month flew by here at the roiling offices of Levin at Large...

In the hard-boiled crime-writing world, the chatter appropriately is about James Crumley, who died this week. Other people will be saying (and have said) more thoughtful words. I liked Crumley's books quite a bit -- I've read most, but not all, of them. I reviewed The Right Madness for the Oregonian with a very positive review (for me) -- a chunk of which ended up as a blurb in the paperback edition. It's hard to know to what extent one's fondness for a writer corresponds to a broader literary-cultural measure. Crumley appropriately received attention well outside the borders of genre: the New York Times, LA Times, Washington Post, and other notable papers ran lengthy, celebratory obituaries. Of course, I'm sure the man would've liked more ink before his death. According to the Post, a couple of his kids live here in lovely Portland, Oregon. I had the honor of appearing in the collection Measures of Poison with Crumley. I can flatter myself that Crumley eyeballed the names of the other authors and briefly thought, "Who the hell is this Levin guy?"

Double Rejection

I had a mildly abrasive writerly experience today. I have a few stories that I think are worth circulating, and I try to keep at least one in submission somewhere. Today, I received not one, but two, rejections. The first was from the editor of the forthcoming Portland Noir volume--he rejected two stories. I still think that they are pretty good stories, but apparently not noir or Portland enough. I probably should've drafted something new, but I had sent in previously written stories that were more or less (apparently less) set in Portland, with something of the Portland vibe. My thought was to try to keep to long fiction since I've got a handful of good stories--and two published--under my belt. In any event, it's a disappointment not to be able to represent Portland, and I'll be curious to see the volume when it comes out. The other rejection came from Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine--not a surprise because the story was a bit of a lark and AHMM is very competitive. The response time was faster than usual. In the past, though, AHMM has offered a personal note of encouragement; this story received just the photocopied form letter (and AHMM even sent back my cover letter, too). Back to the drawing board or the salt mines or some such.

Reading Not Blogging: Bunker, van Gulik, Harrington

I blew through a few memorable works of crime fiction without commenting here, so a quick round-up. I read Kent Harrington's new novel, The Good Physician, and posted a review (scroll down) on Amazon. Harrington has this arresting, feverish style--his driven, often blunt prose reflects his protagonists' obsessions. His first two published books, Dark Ride and Dia De Los Muertos, are probably his best (I've missed reading at least one), but Physician has its moments.

Next, I read Edward Bunker's No Beast So Fierce (my copy, Dustin Hoffman on the cover, is titled Straight Time as a movie tie-in). Ex-con Max Dembo tries to go straight, but he falls back into the life, pulling off an escalating series of heists. Very gritty, this novel draws on Bunker's wide experience with the penal system. The brooding Dembo is also philosophical at times. No Beast (1973) is Bunker's first published novel; he died in 2005.

The real find in my summer round-up was Robert van Gulik's The Given Day. This book had been sitting on a shelf for about four years, and I finally plucked it down. A diplomat, scholar, and polymath, Van Gulik (1910-67) is best known for his Judge Dee mystery novels (which I haven't read), set in first millennium China. Written in the early 1960s, The Given Day is set in post-war Amsterdam. The lone and lonely Dutchman Hendriks, still suffering from his wartime experiences in Java, becomes involved in a violent and mysterious criminal plot after playing the role of a good samaritan. Van Gulik beautifully weaves Zen into the book: Hendriks is trying to cope with the past and mulls over the teachings of his Japanese torturer. To my mind, The Given Day is an exceptional novel of post-war angst and perhaps recovery.

More Life Support from Richard Stark

I just read Dirty Money, the new Parker book by Richard Stark (aka Donald Westlake). At some point when I was taking a greater interest in crime fiction -- and involuntarily drifting away from academia -- I happened upon my first Parker book (which was not the first in the series). At that time, Westlake had taken about a 20-year hiatus from writing about Parker. Then, over a couple years, I read all the Parker books, every last one (about 16). Some I ordered online (in early e-commerce days), and a few I got by interlibrary loan. Parker is a heister, and I just couldn't get enough of watching him plan and carry out heists, and clean up afterwards. It was a sad day when I read the last one (Butcher's Moon, I think). Then in 1997, Westlake brought Stark and Parker back with Comeback, and I've read them all as they've come out.

There have been eight books in phase 2, all of them good, and some of them really good. I thought Parker was disappearing again a couple books back (Nobody Runs Forever), but Parker got back on track (as Westlake has said, everything eventually goes right for Parker -- he finds a parking space when he needs it -- whereas everything always goes wrong for Dortmunder, Westlake's comic heister). Dirty Money is the third book of an impromptu trilogy. Parker is still mopping up and getting out of the mess created in Nobody Runs Forever. Without quite a fresh heist -- and no amateur characters (a misanthrope plays a great part in the second of this trilogy, Ask the Parrot) -- Dirty Money lacks just a little bit of freshness and grounding. That's a very small complaint. Read this book, but if you haven't read other Parker books, maybe start with another. Eventually, I'll write here again about Westlake.

The Bank Job and Capers

Last weekend, I caught The Bank Job, which I liked quite a bit. Unlike other excessively fancy capers, this one doesn't seem to unravel when you think about it. The period touches -- 1970s London -- are also welcome. High tech has affected capers and crime fiction -- cell phones, computerized records, surveillance equipment, etc. -- so going back in time is one solution. Of course, for some, the technology offers a new set of challenges that make for a good yarn.

In the theater, two twenty-something women were sitting next to me, and one of them was a caper junkie. I like capers a lot (the Parker novels by Richard Stark (aka Donald Westlake) are among my favorite crime books) -- and have been trying to write one. I'm still trying to figure out exactly (or generally) why readers like them -- and I'm curious too if they have a strong audience (compared to other sub-genres of crime fiction). In part, people like capers for the same reason they like game shows: the money (and the fantasy of lots of money obtained quickly through smart thinking).

Life Support from Simenon

Arghh. Another month. I'm going to close up this blog shop (kiosk?) if I don't post at least once per calendar month. (And it would be hard to imagine setting the bar much lower.) At least while avoiding posting, I've managed to see a movie, read a few books, write a little, and sleep.

On a whim, I picked up a couple of Simenon's Maigret novels (in new elegant little Penguin editions) at the library. Simenon and I have had a thing going for a few years now, and I've read both Maigret and what he called his "romans durs" (hard novels), his non-Maigret, non-genre (called "psychological" by some) novels. Sometimes Simenon's novels lag, but generally, he is consistently vivid, dour, and entertaining.

Maigret novels are, I think, generally admired for their portrayal of Maigret and his odd interior, and they are also cited for their roiling view of a shady Paris (less admired for their mysteries and detecting). That said, I've read several set in different places, where place--country villages, along canals, on the coast--informs character and action in compelling ways. The coincidence of place and character might be a version of Ruskin's pathetic fallacy, but it works well, and Maigret himself succumbs to the recognition that place is influencing his detecting, approach, spirit, and so on. The two I read recently (I'm still reading the second) make a nice contrasting pair in this regard. My Friend Maigret is set on a sunny Mediterranean island off the coast of Provence, a dreamy place that charms Maigret -- though he still reveals its seedy underbelly. The other novel, Inspector Cadaver, is set in a dismal, muddy, foggy village overwhelmed by class distinctions, rumors, and death. In many ways, one Simenon novel feels like the next, but this versatility is something to admire, and place seems to refresh his imagination. (Of course, I say this having read maybe only 15 of his books out of 400, so maybe the other 385 become stale.)

Intersections: Gothic, Crime Fiction, Noir... and Louise Welsh

Uh, I'm back (with something useful to say, but this post starts off a little pendantically, so please bear with me)... Crime fiction finds some of its roots in the tradition of the gothic novel, and the two variously converge and diverge. Poe wrote in a gothic vein and also invented the detective story, more or less. The earliest gothic novels presented mysteries in need of solution -- by rational or supernatural explanation. I'm not sure how this intertwining (or the awareness of it) impacts writers or readers. Some writers today, I think, understand clearly that they are mining overlapping genres; others probably don't think in these terms -- and it doesn't matter. For instance, a serial killer's lair might as well be the dungeon hidden below the castle in a gothic novel. Some gothic novels and crime novels also share similar atmospherics. The grim, foreboding, fated atmosphere of crime novels appropriately labeled "noir" seems a trace of the gothic tradition as well.

And so what? Some readers -- myself included -- enjoy certain gothic effects in their crime fiction. Other readers apparently do not. I recently read Louise Welsh's The Bullet Trick. A while back, I read her debut novel, The Cutting Room. Both books are quite compelling, sordid, and always supported by strong prose. They are crime novels with amateur detectives of sorts (a conjurer in Bullet Trick and an antiques man in Cutting Room), police, and mysteries to be solved. Welsh also mines the gothic tradition -- hidden rooms, props, catacombs of a sort beneath a used bookstore, and so on. Some of the emotional drama too seems gothic, as opposed to the cool understated emotion in some crime fiction. All of these elements work well together in Welsh's hands. I am curious though about Welsh's commercial success, particularly in the U.S. (She is a Scottish writer.) I think I happened on her first book because it won a UK award, but I hadn't heard any word of mouth. It might be that her books are victims to quirks in marketing; sadly, it could be that the dual elements of crime and gothic (in a realistic mode), which give her books their strength and originality (in part), also keep the books from finding some readers. It could be that they are not mysterious enough for some readers, not horrific enough for others, and too seedy for yet others.

Blogger's Block... and Then Some Blood

Okay, so I figured that I had blogged hard enough -- something astronomical like ten posts in five months -- so I took six weeks off. Two truths: (1) busy, busy, busy with client work, and traveling too; (2) an attack of anomie. I wish I could say that I have been busy with creative work (substantial or otherwise), but I can't make that claim.

To fulfill my (until now unstated) promise not to write a totally wallowing blog (partial wallowing is apparently okay), I will say something on said-blog topic of crime fiction and film (and I have something to say as well about book criticism more generally, but it will take me several months to wind up to it). Anyway, I finally saw There Will Be Blood on the big screen. I have a few quibbles, but as someone who is quite critical (curmudgeonly even), I should say plainly that this film is substantial and riveting -- the best movie I've seen since The Lives of Others (for which I felt more spectator than participant since it's German, whereas Blood is boldly a slice of the U.S.A.). Blood isn't a genre film, though it is rife with crime. It is bleak and stirring and seems squarely aimed at capturing some dark (empty) heart of the American spirit. I liked No Country for Old Men a lot (see previous post), but Blood makes No Country seem like a lark.

Blog on Life Support... and No Country for Old Men

The lifelessness of this blog will soon render it the blog equivalent of those dead, fly-bothered bodies near the start of No Country for Old Men.

Anyway, nearly three weeks ago, I was going to write about No Country, and now that it's won all those Academy Awards (so I read), I'll finally offer a few words. My initial response was that No Country felt like a secular Flannery O'Connor on steroids (which is what I also said about Harry Crews' great novel, A Feast of Sneaks -- which is probably more like O'Connor on steroids, booze, meanness, and PCP, or something). I didn't, however, read the novel No Country, though my dictionary and I have read a couple other books by Cormac McCarthy. Back to my O'Connor statement: the villain with the wacky haircut in No Country is interested in fate and balance, in meanness as a sort of fulfillment (a la O'Connor's Misfit in "A Good Man is Hard to Find.") and justification for this life on earth. He is ostensibly after money, but that seems like a secondary concern. Unlike, O'Connor -- and unlike traditional crime fare -- No Country does not move toward a clean or at least generically expected end. I don't want to spoil that ending, so I won't say anything more specific, but I would add that its narrative line makes it admirable and troubling, but it will make the film less fulfilling for some viewers. It's worth noting that the film looks great, and there are some fine scenes and great Coen brothers' dialogue. No Country may not be warrant the highest praise it received, but it shouldn't be missed by those who like their crime and violence served neat.

No Country for... Bill Crider

This week, I enjoyed two criminal experiences from Texas. One featured West Texas, the other East Texas. One was cheery -- or at least good-hearted -- and the other was uber-bleak. I'll start in East Texas with Bill Crider's Too Late to Die, which won the Anthony in 1987 for best first novel. Bill Crider wrote some kind words about my story, "Wilson's Man" (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine January 2008), on a blog dedicated to short crime fiction (Nasty. Brutish. Short.), and I thought, well, I should read one of his books (and it was embarrassing that I hadn't already). (I used to be a regular on a listserv dedicated to hard-boiled crime fiction called "Rara-Avis," and Bill was a constant fount of knowledge there; he also writes the "Blog Bytes" column for EQMM and is a tireless blogger himself; Bill and I also share academic backgrounds, though he voluntarily retired from academe, whereas I was summarily neglected out of it; and now Bill is going to think I'm stalking him.)

Too Late to Die is the first in what has become a long series featuring Bracklin County sheriff, Dan Rhodes. It is a gently humorous, colorful procedural/whodunit that also includes a few good doses of action (I would say it is medium-boiled). The plot revolves around a few strangely connected (or disconnected) murders and some other crimes and shenanigans. Sheriff Rhodes pursues his investigation, his re-election, and a new girlfriend, all at the same time. Rhodes is likable, and he is supported by a cast of quirky figures, some rustic, some smooth, some loony, and some deadly. The book moves at a fast clip, and like the often great Gold Medals paperbacks of yore, it's all wrapped up in under 200 pages. I only mention length because I have become increasingly fond of tight books and increasingly impatient with the bloat that creeps into many books today. Just now, February 2008, the fifteenth Sheriff Dan Rhodes book is coming out; it's called, "Of All Sad Words," and I'm guessing this new one is worth reading, too.

My recent West Texas experience came via the movie, No Country for Old Men. Incredibly brutal, unpredictable, and highly recommended, but I've run out of steam. I'll write about it next time.

Before the Devil Knows that You Can't Keep Up a Blog

A few weeks back, I caught Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. I have a few misgivings about it, but generally I'd say that it is necessary viewing for crime film enthusiasts (it involves a jewelry store heist). It's really bleak, and in that sense, is ultimately an exercise in brightly lit noir. Also, the writer (Kelly Masterson) and presumably the director (Sidney Lumet) spent some time thinking about traditional -- Greek and Shakespearian -- tragedy. (To emphasize the point, there is a scene with a children's school play -- it's King Lear, I think (which would never be performed by young children).) Of crime films at the end of 2007/early 2008, I liked Eastern Promises better (November 25 blog post) than Devil, but I'm supposed to see No Country for Old Men soon.

Shocking! Another Post... Mystery Writers of America

For a mixture of reasons (pride, self-motivation, seeking pragmatic information and guidance), I joined Mystery Writers of America (paid my $95) once my story "Wilson's Man" hit the stands in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. It is a professional organization, and I qualify because I have been paid cash money by a third party for crime/mystery fiction. I appeared in the January 2008 "Fresh Blood" section (a list of new members) of MWA's newsletter, The Third Degree. I am also automatically a member of the Northwest Chapter, though its activities seem to take place almost exclusively in Seattle (which would mean a three-hour drive for a dinner meeting). I may try to go to the main MWA symposium and banquet in New York in late April/early May. My unlikely goal would be to finish a draft of a full-length caper that I have been working on in advance of the event.

For me, the jury is still out on MWA. I am hoping that it will provide more opportunities to submit to anthologies (I have a few good stories completed and waiting in the wings). I am on one MWA listserv and can get on another (I just have to contact the national office). The organization seems active and positive, a real community--more rewarding than the National Book Critics Circle to which I pay dues as well. Many of MWA's active, visible members seem to be more accomplished versions of myself: published by smaller presses, active as writers in their communities, etc., but not well known and usually without a major publisher.

The Blog of Death... and News Coverage

Okay. I shouldn't be a blogger. Apparently, to misquote Flannery O'Connor (from "A Good Man is Hard to Find"), I would be a good blogger if there were somebody here to shoot me every minute of my life. My Borsalino is off to good, regular bloggers.

My 15 minutes of Ellery Queen fame are over -- the next issue is out. The Oregonian (the state's main paper and, incidentally, owned by Advance Publications (The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Wired, etc.)), however, ran a cute story about me, my story, and the difficulty of finding Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine on the newsstand. Here it is, with the paper's three headlines; it's part of a longer neighborhood round-up, so I hope this constitutes fair use; thanks too to Oregonian freelancer David Santen for his legwork:

KEEPING IT WEIRD
Rose City Park >>
Mystery writer's work... vanishes

Northeast Portland resident Doug Levin earns his bread by writing: annual reports, ghost writing, the occasional book review for The Oregonian -- the stuff that pays the bills.

But in each life lies a little mystery. For Levin, it's "Wilson's Man," appearing in this month's issue of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Levin stands in good company on the table of contents, alongside works by Dashiell Hammett and Joyce Carol Oates.

The obligatory "on newsstands now" line should go here, but a cursory search of shelves at Broadway Books, Murder by the Book and The Press Club finds the venerable publication MIA. Thus: on newsstands somewhere. -- J. DAVID SANTEN Jr.

"Wilson's Man" in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine

My story "Wilson's Man" is now on the stands (but not for long) in the latest (January 2008) Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine (fondly called EQMM; the digest-size magazine is usually available at Borders, Barnes & Noble, and places with a good periodical selection). The acceptance (and now appearance) of the story was a big boost to my confidence -- and perhaps to my creative productivity. As the image to the right shows, my name didn't make it to the cover -- Dashiell Hammett and Joyce Carol Oates beat me out.

The story was written in October 2003, an indication of how long the submission, rejection, acceptance, and publication process can take. Since that time, I've written a handful of other stories, some of which I think are as good as or better than "Wilson's Man," though they have been rejected from a number of places. I have two other finished stories that I never sent out, and a few unfinished stories (as well as unfinished longer works). Mystery writer Bill Crider, who participates in a blog (Nasty. Brutish. Short.) that reviews short fiction, had some very kind words to say about "Wilson's Man."

For those who don't know, EQMM has a long proud history, publishing notable writers such as Highsmith, Faulkner, Hemingway, Westlake, Mailer, Simenon, etc. I believe EQMM was the first magazine to publish Borges in English. Today, the magazine publishes a mix of crime fiction, including one story in translation each issue, and a fair amount of stories by British and Canadian writers. EQMM has also just added a "Black Mask" revival section. Because no one really makes a living writing short crime fiction, the stories are arguably less constrained by market forces than novels; this translates into a fair amount of strong, original writing.

Falling Even Further... and Eastern Promises

Okay, I've stumbled at the outset. I've got scintillating informed opinions to share -- I just can't get them out of my head. Before I move to more blatant self-promotion, I have a recommendation: David Cronenberg's new movie, Eastern Promises. Cronenberg's last three films (this one, A History of Violence, and Spider) have been far less idiosyncratic than his previous work. His masterpiece is still Dead Ringers -- polished but also bizarre and original (and I know at least one person who complained that he thought he was going to see a thriller and was stuck with an art film). Eastern Promises is a good straightforward crime yarn. It has a good plot, pretty good performances, nice visual details, some stunning and brutal scenes, and virtually no fat.

Falling Down on the Job... and Charles Willeford

Okay, I've already fallen down on the blogging effort. It was an exciting week: my story in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine finally came out (more on that later), so I became eligible for and sent my membership fee to the Mystery Writers of America. At this point, my hope is to have the opportunity through the MWA to submit some stories (waiting in the wings) to anthologies.

I became interested in crime fiction at first as a means of procrastination while in graduate school. Through a strange set of circumstances, I ended up writing and delivering a conference paper on Charles Willeford, with the focus on his 1960 novel, The Woman Chaser. (The novel was the source of a really great 1999 movie of the same title.) A couple years later, I wrote the biographical essay on Willeford for the standard reference work, the Dictionary of Literary Biography (Volume 226, American Hard-Boiled Writers). And then I had the honor of being invited to Florida to talk about Willeford when a number of his papers were donated and exhibited at the Florida Center of the Book. I think my biographical essay provides a good background on Willeford, though it likely has its mistakes. Even more detail on Willeford is provided in Don Herron's book, Willeford. I'll say more about Willeford in a future post. All of his books are good, but some are more, for lack of a better word, accessible. Miami Blues might be his most straightforward crime novel (a police procedural). When it came out, Donald Westlake (another of my favorites, in Richard Stark mode, but more later) really raved about it. An early, very dark Willeford novel, Pick-Up, can be found in the second volume of the Library of America volume, Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s.

My Dram of Poison

Before I begin to issue supposedly blog-worthy pronouncements, I am going to use a few posts to establish my quasi-credibility. Eventually, I suppose I'll just sum up my few academic and professional accomplishments in my profile. As a fiction writer, I enjoyed the enormous privilege of seeing my first published story, "Fire Lines," appear in Measures of Poison (2002), from Dennis McMillan Publications. I'm a homunculus squeezed among several crime-writing giants such as James Crumley, George P. Pelecanos, Michael Connelly, Howard Browne, Charles Willeford, Jon A. Jackson, James Sallis, and several others. Since that time, I've done a fair amount of fiction writing, on and off with mixed success, and finally a second story, "Wilson's Man" is due out soon in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. More on that later, perhaps...

A Placeholding Welcome

Okay, this might be a bad idea, writing a blog. A cry for help. An endless form of procrastination. Eventually, I mean for this blog to serve as a small piece of self-promotion, and I hope, some useful comments for readers who share like interests (crime fiction, at least at first). For now, this post is it. A placeholder. A placeholder with one quick courtesy: I am the other Doug Levin, or a Doug Levin, but not the Doug Levin. The Doug Levin is a captain of industry who runs a technology company called Black Duck Software. He has a different blog, called Blougtopia. He looks like he's a nice guy and maybe even not too geeky for someone who runs a software company. I could ghostwrite for him -- and still sign my own name.