Book 'em.

If you frequent or directly represent an independent mystery bookstore and would like the store to carry The Lineup, I would be happy to make the same arrangement we have with Houston's Murder By the Book. E-mail me at g_so AT yahoo DOT com.

From Charles Ardai

The award-winning author and co-founder of Hard Case Crime on The Lineup #1:

Like the best crime fiction, the best poetry concerns itself with mortality and anguish, and The Lineup explores this terrain with a candor and fearlessness that is sure to shake readers from their slumber. You can keep your 400-page tomes with their windy, discursive narrators -- this is the real stuff, as concentrated and corrosive as a shot of 190-proof Everclear.

Caught on Camera

At last night's Robert Crais Chasing Darkness signing at Mysterious Bookshop. Photo: Joe Guglielmelli (l to r, Anthony Rainone, Richie Narvaez, Gerald So)

I had to leave the festivities early, but Anthony and Richie gave Crais a copy of The Lineup, which he received with enthusiasm and said he would read on the plane.

Meet The Lineup Editors

Richie Narvaez, Anthony Rainone, and I will be at Mysterious Bookshop tomorrow (July 22) 6:30-8:00 PM. Robert Crais will also be there discussing and signing his latest Elvis Cole novel, Chasing Darkness. See how I've spun this?

Crime Always Pays. But Poetry? Fuggedaboudit.

Declan Burke blogs about The Lineup over at Crime Always Pays. Check it out. He even posted my poem.

Funny about Crime

Over at AsininePoetry.com, we are in the last weeks of our 12th asinine poetry contest: asinine crime poems! FIRST PRIZE: $100.

Here's the 411:

BECOME THE SHAKESPEARE OF CRIME!
Or, rather, the Capone of poetry. We're calling you out to write poems in a niche category of poetry--the crime poem. That is, poems about crime. Everything from arson to extortion to murder to zebra-napping, true to fictional. Written in the asinine MO (i.e., funny haha). Can you do it? Are you chicken? Give it a shot. Whatcha gotta lose?

Our guest judge: Tim McLoughlin, the Godfather of Noir and author of Heart of the Old Country. He also edited Brooklyn Noir, first in the Akashic Publishing's Noir Series, as well as Brooklyn Noir 2 and 3.

The top three winning poems will all be considered for publication in the next issue of The Lineup!

One dollar per entry. You may enter up to THREE times. E-mail or snail. No checks please! Go here for more deetz.

DEADLINE VERY SOON: August 1, 2008.

Stay sharp!

Not the Usual (Poetry) Suspects

“You ask me, those guys are doing God's work, taking poetry back from the beret set.”
—Chris F. Holm

I know what you’re thinking. Yeah, I do.

Ewww, poetry. I hate poetry. All that stuff about Greek urns, lilacs in dooryards and Hiawatha. Symbolism? Rhyme and meter? Booooooring. Poetry sucks.

If you believe that’s all there is to poetry, then I pity you. You’re missing out on a lot of great writing. You’ve missed Charles Bukowski, Hayden Carruth, Victor Hernández Cruz, Martín Espada, Louise Glück, Mary Oliver, Sharon Olds, Tim Seibles, Anne Sexton, Charles Simic, Patricia Smith, Christopher Watkins, James Wright, Kevin Young and far too many others. But it’s not too late, my friend.

One way to wrap your head around some of the good stuff is to order your very own copy of The Lineup: Poems on Crime. Our first annual anthology has poems by the likes of Ken Bruen, Sarah Cortez, Daniel Hatadi, R. Narvaez and Sandra Seamans. Do you think Ken Bruen would write poetry if it did not kick serious ass?

But crime poetry? That’s just, like, weird.

You’ll find everything you love about crime fiction in these poems: murderers, shylocks, dope fiends, bent cops, good cops, punk-ass kids, kidnappers and just plain old normal folks who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. As far as I know, The Lineup is the first-ever anthology of crime poems. It’s literary history in the making. This is noir poetry, buddy. The hard-boiled stuff. It’s a hell of a lot of fun to read, too.

The Lineup arrives at Houston's Murder By The Book

Just got word from Murder By the Book Assistant Manager David Thompson that The Lineup is in-store.

David is also the owner of Busted Flush Press, publisher of the innovative noir anthologies Damn Near Dead and A Hell of a Woman, as well as sought-after reprints like Vicki Hendricks' Miami Purity and Reed Farrel Coleman's first Moe Prager mystery, Walking the Perfect Square.

Rapping about The Lineup

The Rap Sheet editor J. Kingston Pierce, who was kind enough to blurb The Lineup, invited me to wax a bit about the project's history, and about the place of crime in poetry. You can read the result here.

Buy Now!

The Lineup is officially on sale at Lulu! Click on the "Buy Now" link in the right sidebar. Thank you, one and all. I'll begin mailing contributor, blurber, and advertiser copies tomorrow.

Pre-Ordering

I received the 4-copy reorder yesterday, and it looked swell. Richie and I have ordered complimentary copies for the contributors and blurbers, and the book will be available to all of Lulu next week.