“The Irishman” Trailer is Here!
Wow! Do I like this trailer for The Irishman? Aye, I do.
Category: Crime
The “Mindhunter” Season Two Trailer is Here!
Mindhunter Season Two drops on August 16th and looks to be even more interesting than Season One!
More Better Deals by Joe R. Lansdale!
Joe R. Lansdale is best known for his Hap & Leonard series of novels (and television series) but Lansdale’s stand alone novels are also excellent. Case in point, check out More Better Deals coming March 31, 2020.
Ed Edwards is in the used car business. A business built on adjusted odometers, extra-fine print, and the belief that “buyers better beware.” Burdened by an aging, alcoholic mother constantly on his case to do something worthier of his lighter skin tone and dreaming of a brighter future for himself and his plucky little sister, Ed is ready to get out of the game.
When Dave, his lazy, grease-stained boss at the eponymous dealership Smiling Dave’s sends him to repossess a Cadillac, Ed finally gets the chance to escape his miserable life.
The Cadillac in question was purchased by Frank Craig and his beautiful wife Nancy, owners of a local drive-in and pet cemetery. Fed up with her deadbeat husband and with unfulfilled desires of her own, Nancy suggests to Ed- in the throes of their salacious affair- that they kill Frank and claim his insurance policy. It is a tantalizing offer: the girl, the car, and not one, but two businesses. Ed could finally say goodbye to Smiling Dave’s, and maybe even send his sister to college. But does he have what it takes to see the plan through?
Told with Joe Lansdale’s trademark grit, wit, and dark humor, More Better Deals is a gripping tale of the strange characters and odd dealings that define 1960s East Texas.
Presenting Sly Stallone’s Balboa Productions
Matt Donnelly at Variety checks in with Sylvester Stallone’s Production Company Wants to Be the Blumhouse of Action Films and it is well worth a read. The piece talks about the goal of Sly creating Balboa Productions…
“My goal is for us to be the go-to place for action,” says Aftergood. He wants Balboa to follow the specialty model of Blumhouse, the company behind “Get Out” and “The Purge.” “I appreciate that statement is grandiose, but Blumhouse has done an extraordinary job owning the horror space,” says Aftergood. “There is no reason why we can’t own the action space in a similar way.”
The rationale behind Sly creating Balboa Productions…
“At one of our first meetings, I asked him why he wanted to do this,” Aftergood recalls. “Starting and running a company is a pain in the ass. I don’t care who you are or how many people are underneath you — at some point you have to answer a question about payroll, about office decor. In Stallone’s case, he seemed to have graduated past all of that.” Stallone answered with one word: legacy.
Balboa Productions that are in the pipeline…
- Arcane, a monster movie from director Corin Hardy
- The Gangster, the Cop, the Devil remake co-starring Sly
- The Bellhop, starring Iko Uwais star of The Raid: Redemption
- Samaritan starring Sly
- Biopic of black boxing legend Jack Johnson produced by Sly
- Nighthawks reboot for USA network based on Sly’s 1981 film
- The Tenderloin, a cop drama for History.
For all the details click over to Sylvester Stallone’s Production Company Wants to Be the Blumhouse of Action Films.
(The only thing missing is Sly’s adaptation of Hunter by James Byron Huggins. Cannot wait to see what Sly does with this great action/horror novel. It is a natural for him and Balboa Productions! – Craig)
Bob Burden’s Hitman for the Dead!
Hitman for the Dead.
Even without the cool Andrew Robinson art, the title would have brought me in for a closer look.
And it did.
ANTHONY HARKEN is a drifter, a detective of sorts, and a killer. While he kills the most evil kind of people – the unpunished murderers of the innocent – he knows he’s still a murderer, taking human life and operating totally outside the law.
In the world of good and evil, Harken has chosen sides, but in the world of normal, everyday life, he has chosen an extreme and dangerous path. He carries a gun, he does drugs (Yage), he kills, and lives detached from a society that has no idea that people like him are even among us.
To be sure, he fills in where the law fails: he is a vigilante. He is judge, jury and executioner. And there is no guarantee that he is always right or that he, himself will not make a mistake someday and dispatch someone who was totally innocent.
Anthony is not the only “hit-man for the dead” out there. There are others.
If this sounds like something you’d like, you’re going to love this!
Bob Burden, the creative genius of Hitman for the Dead has created a website for the property. The site has all of the background info you could ask for, art and more. Oh, and the more includes a 25K word Hitman for the Dead novella that you can download for free!
I hope Burden runs with. I’d love to see more Hitman for the Dead prose stories and graphic novels. Fire up the Kickstarter now!
Dark Duet by Eric Beetner / Z-View
Dark Duet by Eric Beetner
TPB: 224 pages
Publisher: Down and Out Books
Dark Duet consists of two crime novellas, White Hot Pistol and Blood on Their Hands. You get two Eric Beetner yarns for the price of one!
First sentence of White Hot Pistol…
Nash remembered the first time he escaped this town.
The Overview of White Hot Pistol: Beware of Spoilers…
Nash had a plan. He was going to sneak back into the town that he’d left years before. He’d then get his sister, Jacy, out and away from her abusive step-father. It was supposed to be easy…
It should have been easy despite the fact that Nash was wanted for questioning in a homicide and her step-father was the town sheriff.
It could have been easy had Nash and Jacy not stumbled onto a drug deal gone bad.
On the run from the cops and the drug dealer’s crew, with bodies piling up and no hope for help, now nothing would be easy.
—
First sentence of Blood on Their Hands…
Garrett had no idea breaking and entering would be so easy.
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Garrett, against his better judgment, joins his two high school buddies when they break into the Smart Mart late one night. The plan is to scarf some beers, grab some snacks and slip back out.
Things go sideways when the men who own the store show up with the body of the guy they just killed. As the killers discuss how to dispose of the stiff, the boys make a run for it. Unfortunately, they’re seen and the chase is on.
What chance do high school kids have against grown killers? Not much. Blood on Their Hands takes place in the same town as White Hot Pistol and features a few of the same characters. Bravo to Beetner for a couple of twists that were logical but totally surprising.
If you like pulp, noir and stories that move, then Dark Duet is for you.
Rating: 4 of 5 stars.
“Point Blank” (2019) / Z-View
Point Blank (2019)
Director: Joe Lynch
Screenplay: Adam G. Simon based on characters created by Fred Cavayé
Stars: Frank Grillo, Anthony Mackie, Christian Cooke, Teyonah Parris and Marcia Gay Harden.
The Pitch: Let’s do an old-fashioned action-buddy movie where the buddies are thrown together and don’t get along.
Tagline: A Hell of a Day. A Hell of a Pair.
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Let me say from the start I liked Point Blank more than I thought I would and way more than most folks probably do.
An emergency room nurse (Mackie) finds himself teamed with an on-the-run thug (Grillo) in an effort to save the nurse’s kidnapped wife. If you enjoy movies like 48hrs, Lethal Weapon and Tango & Cash, then you should be good to go. I loved Point Blank and look forward to viewing it again.
Rating: 4 of 5 stars.
The “21 Bridges” Comic-Con Trailer is Here!
Here’s the 21 Bridges ComicCon Trailer. I like the looks of this one.
“The Killerman” Poster is Here!
The Killerman poster is here and I like it. Hope the movie is as good or better!
The Far Empty by J. Todd Scott / Z-View
The Far Empty by J. Todd Scott
Hardcover: 448 pages
Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons
First sentence…
My father has killed three men.
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
J. Todd Scott pulls us in from the first sentence and proceeds to unfold his story from the perspective of believable characters with a slow burn to a dramatic conclusion that leaves us satisfied and yet hoping for more. (Rest easy, more stories are coming about those who survive.)
The Far Empty is a modern day western-noir wrapped around a mystery (mysteries) with enough action and suspense to satisfy the most critical reader.
When Chris Cherry, a new deputy in Murfee, Texas, finds the handcuffed, skeletal remains of a body in a remote area not far from the Mexico/Texas border, he starts an investigation. It’s an investigation that will uncover secrets best left hidden and may cost him his life.
The Far Empty hooked me from the first sentence. I loved every page and give it my highest recommendation. J. Todd Scott is the real deal.
Rating:
The Last Good Guy by T. Jefferson Parker
Coming on August 13th from T. Jefferson Parker is The Last Good Guy.
In this electrifying new thriller from three-time Edgar Award winner and New York Times bestseller T. Jefferson Parker, Private Investigator Roland Ford hunts for a missing teenager and uncovers a dark conspiracy in his most personal case yet.
When hired by a beautiful and enigmatic woman to find her missing younger sister, private investigator Roland Ford immediately senses that the case is not what it seems. He is soon swept up in a web of lies and secrets as he searches for the teenager, and even his new client cannot be trusted. His investigation leads him to a secretive charter school, skinhead thugs, a cadre of American Nazis hidden in a desert compound, an arch-conservative celebrity evangelist–and, finally, to the girl herself. The Last Good Guy is Ford’s most challenging case to date, one that will leave him questioning everything he thought he knew about decency, honesty, and the battle between good and evil…if it doesn’t kill him first.
Love that title and T. Jefferson always delivers. The Last Good Guy is on my to-buy list. If it makes yours, then click here.
Trouble is What I Do by Walter Mosley
Walter Mosley is coming back with a new Leonid McGill yarn. Trouble is What I Do is such a classic title. Here’s the synopsis…
From innovative bestselling novelist Walter Mosley comes the return of the beloved Leonid McGill detective series featuring a morally ambiguous P.I. who solves crimes and whose victims are society’s most downtrodden.
Leonid McGill’s spent a lifetime building up his reputation in the New York investigative scene. His seemingly infallible instinct and inside knowledge of the crime world make him the ideal man to help when Phillip Worry comes knocking.
Phillip “Catfish” Worry is a 92-year-old Mississippi bluesman who needs Leonid’s help with a simple task: deliver a letter revealing the black lineage of a wealthy heiress and her corrupt father. Unsurprisingly, the opportunity to do a simple favor while shocking the prevailing elite is too much for Leonid to resist.
But when a famed and feared assassin puts a hit on Catfish, Leonid has no choice but to confront the ghost of his own felonious past. Working to protect his client, and his own family, Leonid must reach the heiress on the eve of her wedding before her powerful father kills those who hold their family’s secret.
Joined by a team of young and tough aspiring investigators, Leonid must gain the trust of wary socialites, outsmart vengeful thugs, and, above all, serve the truth– no matter the cost.
Trouble is What I Do is available for pre-order now. Deal me in.
Dark Duet: Two Noir Novellas by Eric Beetner
I just put in my order for Dark Duet: Two Noir Novellas by Eric Beetner.
For the first time in print two novellas in the pulp paperback tradition of fast and no-punches-pulled noir.
In White Hot Pistol Jacy needs to get out of town and away from her stepfather, Brian. The only one she can turn to is her estranged brother, Nash. But getting away won’t be easy. Throw in a bag of cash, dark family secrets and a town cop who doesn’t want them to leave–who also happens to be the very man they’re trying to escape–and you’ve got a pulpy ride down the dark alleys of Noir. First time in paperback.
In Blood on Their Hands Garret and his friends get more than they bargained for with a teenage prank gone wrong. Now killers are after them and the one man who could help them can never know. Friendships will be tested and these young men will see what they’re really made of and if they’ll even make it out of their teen years alive. It’s a violent coming-of-age story and pulp fiction at its action-packed best. Never before published.
If this sounds like something you’d dig, here’s your shovel.
“The Informer” Trailer and Poster!
The Informer trailer is here!
The “Burn” Poster and Trailer are Here!
Here is the Burn poster and trailer!
