"You know what? The bastard blows me out of the water. This guy writes Maine like Ardai writes New York. If you're not reading him, you don't know what you're missing." --Chris F. Holm, author of "The Collector" series, The Killing Kind, and Red Right Hand.

"A refreshingly new voice in noir." --Ed Kurtz, author of Nothing You Can Do and The Rib From Which I Remake the World.

"A glorious boilermaker of noir and East Coast gothic. The action is taut as a sprung snare and Bagley tightens the screws with every page." -- Laird Barron, author of Swift to Chase and Blood Standard.




Monday, May 11, 2009

Publishers Weekly on UNCAGE ME

They didn't mention my story, but I didn't expect they would since I'm one of those "unfamiliar names." I can only hope that "Welcome to Wal-Mart, Motherfucker" wasn't one of the stories they considered "duds." Overall, it's a good review.


Uncage Me
Edited by Jen Jordan. Bleak House (www.bleakhousebooks.com), $24.95 (296p) ISBN 978-1-60648-015-1; $14.95 paper ISBN 978-1-60648-016-8

While John Connolly (The Reapers) rightly notes in his introduction that this all-original anthology isn't for the fainthearted, noir lovers will find plenty to savor among the 22 stories from both familiar and unfamiliar names. Steven Torres offers the most moving selection, “The Biography of Stoop, the Thief,” in which a 14-year-old boy tries to save the mother who abandoned him for a life on the streets as a substance abuser. Tim Maleeny's “Prisoner of Love” not only features twists and betrayals but manages to make an ambiguous resolution satisfying rather than frustrating. There are some duds, like Maxim Jakubowski's shocker “We Mate in the Dark,” with its pointless savagery, but on the whole the contributors demonstrate the ability to create believable and memorable characters as well as settings in a few pages. (July).

Review ©2009 Publishers Weekly.

1 comment:

Kieran Shea said...

some duds? those snarky buggers...