Coming up next
Coming from Keylight Books
The Knives Before Christmas (A Santa-in-Training Mystery)
A Looming of Owls (The NEW Enigma team thrillers)
So, what exactly is 'Pulp Mystery'?
Anyone who's been following me as a writer for any amount of time knows I've been working at finding my little niche of the publishing world for a while now. I started out as an adventure writer, then moved onto thrillers. I avoided mysteries because for the last 30 years, I've worked professionally as a forensic death investigator for a medical examiner's Office...and let's face it, the last thing I wanted to do when I got off work was spend more time dealing with my job (even in a fiction world).
That changed a few years ago when my literary hero and mentor, Warren Murphy, co-creator of Remo Williams and The Destroyer series, encouraged me to try my hand at crime fiction and mysteries. He was my hero, after all. So, how could I say no? And so, I did. And discovered I loved it. Still, I had no interest in writing mysteries set in a realistic, gritty, depressing world. As both a reader and a writer, I found myself drawn to the lighthearted, humorous whodunnits of cozy and traditional mysteries. And so, I set out to join the ranks of cozy mystery authors. Unfortunately, I have no interest in baking or knitting or gardening or any of the other hobbies that the amateur sleuths of cozies are known for. What's more, I'm a male author, writing male protagonists. It's not a recipe that is necessarily conventional among the cozy mystery world. And so, I never quite found my place among fellow cozy mystery authors. And definitely not among agents or publishers, who found most of my concepts to be too far out there. Too on the fringe. Too different to fit in any marketable category.
I pondered that issue for a while. Then, it hit me. My stories all have one thing in common. The strange. The unusual. A touch of horror. A touch of sci-fi. Add to that, I have a love of retro and it all became clear. I wrote pulp mysteries. What's pulp? Think The Shadow! Think Doc Savage, Tarzan, Conan! Think Solomon Kane or The Phantom or Flash Gordon. Imagine mysteries set in retro flying saucers. Whodunnits with a Cthulhu backdrop. Some might call it 'Weird Detective' fiction, and I suppose there's a bit of Carnacki the Ghostfinder detective in what I'm talking about. But it's more than that. It's mysteries beyond your wildest imagination! It's Outer Limits and Weird tales. It's the Thin Man meets the Mummy! That's what I write. That's what's in store for you if you buy any of my books...especially those I haven't written yet!