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Exclusive Interview: “Murder Town” Author Shelley Burr

 

It used to be that if someone was murdered in a house, no one would want to live there. And for some people, that’s still true.

But for others, being the site of a gruesome murder is a selling point. Or at least a reason to attend the open house.

It’s the decision to embrace or deny its murderous past that the town on Rainier has to grapple with in author Shelley Burr’s noir murder mystery thriller Murder Town (paperback, Kindle, audiobook). And a decision that the residents have to grapple with further when someone turns up dead.

In the following email interview, Burr discusses what inspired and influenced this murderous story.

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Exclusive Interview: “The Sum Of All Things” Author Seb Doubinsky

 

Over the last fifteen years, author Seb Doubinsky has written ten stand-alone novels in his dystopian noir and more series, the City-States Cycle, including the newest, the sci-fi and espionage-infused The Sum Of All Things (paperback, Kindle).

But while he went into writing The Sum thinking it would also be the end of the story, it seems this series has different ideas.

In the following email interview, Doubinsky talks about why The Sum was going to be the end of the City-States Cycle, why it’s not, and how thinking it would be influenced how he wrote it.

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Exclusive Interview: “Honolulu Noir” Editor Chris McKinney

 

When we think of Honolulu, Hawaii, we think of warm sunny beaches, not dark smokey alleys.

But it’s decidedly more of the latter that you’ll find in the short story anthology Honolulu Noir (paperback, Kindle), which is the latest installment of Akashic Books’ ongoing, geographically-based Noir series.

In the following email interview, Honolulu Noir editor Chris McKinney [Midnight, Water City] talks about what makes this series unique, how this collection was assembled, and what makes this collection different from, say, Havana Noir and Haiti Noir.

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Exclusive Interview: “The Jaguar Mask” Author Michael J. DeLuca

 

There’s been a lot of novels lately that are putting different spins on classic stories. There’s Madeline Miller’s Circe, a retelling of The Odyssey from the perspective of the titular sorceress, while Jennifer Saint’s Ariadne, puts a new spin of the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur.

But in Michael J. DeLuca’s surrealist fantasy noir novel The Jaguar Mask (paperback, Kindle), he’s not so much putting a different spin on a Mayan myth as he is imagining what that mythical figure would be up to these days.

In the following email interview, DeLuca discusses where he got the idea for The Jaguar Mask, as well as what influenced how he told this story.

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Exclusive Interview: “The Switch” Author April McCloud

 

If you’ve ever done it, you know: cat sitting for a friend is annoying. Stupid cats never stay still long enough for you to sit on them.

But for writer April McCloud, cat sitting for a friend wasn’t that bad, since it inspired her to write this new noir-ish cyberpunk sci-fi thriller novel The Switch (paperback, Kindle).

In the following email interview, she explains how that happened, as well as what else inspired and influenced this novel.

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Exclusive Interview: “These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart” Author Izzy Wasserstein

 

“I don’t generally set out to write about social and political topics,” writer Izzy Wasserstein says in the following email interview about her new novella These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart (paperback, Kindle), “but we’re living in a time of political upheaval, climate change, and rising authoritarianism. And as a trans woman, I’m constantly being reminded that my existence is political.”

Though in talking about this queer, noir technothriller, it’s clear that while Wasserstein didn’t necessarily set out to be social or political, this story wouldn’t have it any other way.

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Exclusive Interview: “Small Gods Of Calamity” Author Sam Kyung Yoo

 

When we think of ghosts, we usually think of dead people. Or that slimy guy from Ghostbusters.

But in Sam Kyung Yoo’s urban fantasy / supernatural noir / paranormal investigation novella Small Gods Of Calamity (paperback, Kindle), a full-time police detective and part-time spiritualist named Kim Han-gil is chasing a ghost worm.

In the following email interview, Kyung Yoo talks about what inspired and influenced this story, as well as their plans for more…but not about the worm. Some mysteries must remain mysterious

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Exclusive Interview: “Austin Noir” Co-Editor Scott Montgomery

 

For nearly 20 years, Brooklyn’s Akashic Books has published a series of geographically-based anthologies of noir short stories: Buffalo Noir, Belgrade Noir, Boston Noir, Baghdad Noir — and that isn’t even all of the “B”s. For the latest, though, they’re going for an “A” with Austin Noir (hardcover, paperback, Kindle, audiobook), which was edited by Hopeton Hay, Scott Montgomery, and Molly Odintz. In the following email interview, Montgomery discusses this series and his specific installment.

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Exclusive Interview: “The Long Shalom” Author Zachary Rosenberg

 

By calling his horror noir detective novel The Long Shalom (paperback, Kindle), writer Zachary Rosenberg knew some people might wonder if it was a parody. But as he explains in the following email interview about this otherwise serious story, while it does have some humor, it’s more the gallows kind than anything Mel Brooks-esque.