Blazing! Adventures Magazine issue Serial pt. 4 of 5

Blazing! Adventures Magazine Presents:


-Part 4 of -


THE BLACK MADONNA-

The Serial:

4 of 5-

Claude Ballz brings the tragedy of New Orleans to the front line of his exciting crime mystery!

Modern serial Pulp gets no greater than this!

Come for the Thrills! Stay for the Intrigue!


.....and as always............


ADVENTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Dash Courageous
Publisher
Blazing! Adventures Magazine

www.blazingadventuresmagazine.com

One Last Present

Who says you don't get anything good after December 25? Yes, tomorrow is supposed to be the deadline for e-mailing in your picks for the first annual Spinetingler Awards...

And what I discovered in the first round was that the e-mails kept coming after the deadline.

Between Christmas and New Year's, I expect some stragglers, so I'm extending the deadline until January 5, 2008. I've already received 580 e-mails. If yours isn't one of them, you've got a few more days to have your say.

For all the details, go here.

Happy holidays to all, and a very happy new year.

Best of 2007

Some new updates for you on www.sonsofspade.tk: a review of Songs of Innocence and a Best of 2007 in which I present you what I liked best this year. I'd love to hear what you think of my choices.

Have You Got A Gift For Your Favourite Authors Yet?

475 people have e-mailed their picks for the first annual Spinetingler Awards, and it's not too late to send in your choices. For all the details, click here.

Sean Chercover & Mark Coggins

On www.sonsofspade.tk today: a Q & A with Sean Chercover and a review of Candy from Stranges by Mark Coggins. Also, don't forget to vote for your favorite Prodigal Son!

Blazing! Adventures Magazine issue 4 submissions

Blazing! Adventures Magazine will be open for submissions starting 12/20 thru 1/20/08-

There will be three slots plus the slot for serials, open for issue 4.
Come & submit your best pulp, adventure, thriller, mystery, crime, spy, action, spicy romance that can come out of you fingertips!

Join the ADVENTURE! Partake of the SUSPENSE! Be apart of the THRILLS!

As always,

ADVENTURE!!!!!!!!!!!


Dash Courageous
Publisher
Blazing! Adventures Magazine

www.blazingadventuresmagazine.com

One last call for Hardluck Stories

One Last Call for Hardluck Stories

After a five year run Hardluck Stories will be shutting down, but we're going to go out with a bang with one final issue. The Theme is 30s Pulp Noir, editors are Ed Gorman and Dave Zeltserman, and illustrations will be by the incomparable Jean-Pierre Jacquet. Maximum story length is 4000 words, deadline: May 1st, 2008.

Pulp fiction was a major form of entertainment in the Twenties, Thirties and Forties of the last century. Its stories ranged from the gothic heroics of The Shadow to the street realism of Sam Spade.

And from pulp fiction evolved many of the stories and tropes we read and write today.

We're going to publish a Pulp Noir issue, stories that honor the traditions of those great and sometimes not-so-great magazines that once numbered more than three hundred.

Stories, as long as they're noir at heart, can reflect the whole range of pulp fiction from costumed heroes (Phantom Detective) to hard-boiled crime (Black Mask). We don't want camp or spoof and we've decided against private eye simply because we don't want to be inundated with one type of story.

Help us celebrate our ancestors. Let's make the Pulp issue a tribute to a vital and antertaining past, as well as making this one hell of an issue for Hardluck to go out on.

Still MORE Holiday Fiction.....

I hope every one is enjoying the Holiday Season.

Me? Well, I have been busy preparing for next week and well reading, writing and trying to sneak in some sleep along the way. One of the things that I love about the winter season is eggnog, the smell of home cooking and some really gritty noir. This week I have a few to share with you.

Over on Powder Burn Flash, Sandra Seamans offers us some fine noir cheer in her story JINGLE ALL THE WAY. I was truly touched by the Holiday season when this came across my desk.

Over on my longer fiction site Darkest Before the Dawn, Jochem Vandersteen offers a wonderful Noah Milano tale called REAL WILD CHILD. I have been a big fan of the Milano stories and it was a great holiday treat to be able to publish one of Jochem's stories.

Check out all these wonderful authors and their writing at the above sites.

Great new updates!

We've got a new Prodigal Son (Thomas Black), a new Q & A (Mark Coggins), a new Unborn Son, Weekly Wisecrack AND a poll in which you can vote which Prodigal Son featured this year you'd most like to see return... So, what are you waiting for? Come visit us at www.sonsofspade.tk !

New interview and reviews at RTE

Blimey, it must be the week of the super-long titles -- how the heck are you going to get some of them on the spine of a book? And opinions were split among RTE reviewers this week over the success of these books in question.

Barbara Franchi enjoyed the late William J Buchanan's The Senator and the Sin Eater (you need to read the book to make sense of the title, Barbara says). I sniggered very happily all through The Rules of Modern Policing – 1973 Edition, which is a spin-off from the wonderful BBC show Life on Mars. If you enjoyed DCI Gene Hunt's bon mots, buy this book!

On the minus side, Linnea Dodson found Fran Rizer's A Tisket, A Tasket, A Fancy Stolen Casket to be fixated on the heroine's cleavage and her love life, as well as being full of very silly made-up swearing. And Christine Zibas says that Caridad Pineiro's South Beach Chicas Catch Their Man fails to deliver on either the romance or the mystery front.

Elsewhere, I was highly impressed with German writer Jakob Arjouni's Kismet, in which Turkish/German PI Kemal Kayankaya gets caught up in a violent protection racket. Carroll Johnson loved Clea Simon's Cries and Whiskers, which features rock 'n' roll reporter and cat lover Theda Krakow. And PJ Coldren says Rick Mofina's A Perfect Grave, featuring demoted journalist Jason Wade, is worth a look for the storytelling.

The versatile Greg Rucka, author of the Atticus Kodiak and Tara Chace series, as well as countless comics, is in the hot seat this week in the 'Sixty seconds with . . .' interview spot. And as usual there are plenty of free books up for grabs in our competition.

We shall be open again for business on Monday January 7. In the meantime, if you're bored over the festive period, you can browse some of the 6000+ reviews we have archived on the site.

Season's greetings and thanks for visiting us during 2007. See you in the New Year!

New review and Q & A!

There's a new review (Straits of Fortune) and a new Q & A (with Ronald Tierney) online at www.sonsofspade.tk. Come check it out!

More Great Holiday Fiction

I hope everyone is starting to enjoy the holiday season and find some time to relax with family and friends.

I have many things to be thankful for during this season and one of them is the great authors who have submitted some wonderful writing for all of to read.

Over on Powder Burn Flash, John DuMond offers us some fine noir cheer in his story CHRISTMAS BONUS. Pam Ward adds a wonderful little flash in TAKING CANDY FROM A BABY.

Over on my longer fiction site Darkest Before the Dawn, Jon Bassoff offers a wonderful tale that requires your reading in THEY'RE ALL MAD.

Check out all these wonderful authors and their writing at the above sites.

Submissions are now open for all interested. I would like to suggest a Holiday Noir theme for the remainder of the holiday season at Powder Burn Flash. So, yor slugging down that brady flavored eggnog or sipping Jack or Jamisons straight from the bottle take a few and write us some holiday cheer.

Voting Update: Spinetingler Awards

There are exactly twenty festive days left to cast your vote in the first annual Spinetingler Awards.

Already, 298 e-mails have arrived. It's anyones guess how many actual votes that is, as I haven't counted, but at a guess I'd say at least 800 votes, and already we've exceeded the number of e-mails received in the first round.

To be clear, if you recommended for nominations in the first round you can vote this round on the shortlist. The only condition is that you only vote once. As with the first round, multiple e-mails from the same e-mail address are removed from consideration.

What happens now? With the short story category popular vote will determine the winner. Same with the cover and publisher and special services categories. In the novel categories, popular vote will narrow the list to the top three, at which time editorial input will factor in. This is my safety net, to make sure that in the future nobody takes out 10,000 e-mail addresses and recommends themselves to the point of victory. (You really don't have to give me your name, address and phone number.) If the assessment of the editors is that the three books are of comparable quality, popular vote will determine the winner. Should the editors feel a book is nowhere near the level of quality of others in the category, it may be vetoed from winning by the judges.

It probably sounds more complicated than it is. It's just a safety net to ensure that it isn't strictly the most popular books that get the prize, but the most popular book that displays exceptional writing and storytelling. I don't care who publishes it or how it's published, but I do want the books that win to be great books.

None of this is much of an issue for these awards, because the nominees are all superb.

If you have been nominated in the novel categories, please contact me, as there are some of you I don't have contact information for and I need to sort out some details with you.

Oh, and for those of you who haven't voted yet? 7 of the 8 categories are still too close to call, and in reality, with 20 days left, anything can happen...

New feature and new Prodigal Sons update!

Sons of Spade not only presents a review of ‘Shallow Graves’ by Lori G. Armstrong but also gives you a new regular feature: Weekly Wisecrack, this time it’s taken from Straits of Fortune by Anthony Gagliano. Also, Steven Womack stops by and tells us why we haven't been seeing Harry James Denton since Murder Manual in 1998. Read all about it at www.sonsofspade.tk !

New interview and reviews at RTE

If cliffhanger endings drive you bonkers, steer clear of David Hagberg's otherwise engrossing Dance with the Dragon, says reviewer Christine Zibas who's rapidly gaining the crown of thriller queen at RTE!

And there's an unresolved ending of a much sadder kind. Michael Dibdin, creator of Aurelio Zen, died earlier this year. And at the end of End Games Denise Pickles points out that our hero is left standing on a railway station, forever separated from his other half.

On the continuing series front this week Denise battled past the gore in John Sandford's Invisible Prey and welcomed the humour that balanced it. PJ Coldren, meanwhile, enjoyed the off-beat characters in Mark Coggins's Runoff. And Linnea Dodson says Carola Dunn's The Bloody Tower is absolutely charming, if decidedly light on plot.

And for the thoroughly unusual read of the week, go for Christborne Shillingford's Most Wanted, a series of short stories set in Dominica and featuring a (very) amateur detective!

Our 'Sixty seconds with . . .' interview this week is with UK writer Dreda Say Mitchell. If you haven't read her latest book, Killer Tune, you might want to remedy that soon. It's definitely one of my books of the year!

Once you've read the reviews and interview, go and check the new prize draw books – and come back later in the week for the next batch.

Q & A with Thomas Keevers on Sons of Spade

There's a new Q & A online, this time with Thomas Keevers of the Mike Duncavan novels. Also there's a review of Deadly Beloved by Max Allan Collins, featuring Ms. Tree. Visit www.sonsofspade.tk!

Pulp Pusher Updates

Pulp Pusher updates with the lastest in our Pushed For Answers series featuring Dutch author, Jochem Vandersteen who introduces us to his street protagonist Noah Milano. Also, new fiction from Go To Helena Handbasket author Donna Moore. Check it ... here

New interview and reviews at RTE

There's an unusual debut novel reviewed this week at RTE from outrageous UK comedian Julian Clary. Denise Pickles says Murder Most Fab is highly entertaining, but probably won't change your view of Clary!

And there are a couple of out of the ordinary thrillers this week. Maddy Van Hertbruggen could have lived without the Princess Diana angle in Tom Cain's The Accident Man, but says otherwise it's a fast-paced and complex book. And our medical expert Denise Pickles gives her seal of approval to Michael Palmer's The Fifth Vial.

Martin Suter's A Deal with the Devil is another fine offering from small UK publishers Arcadia, who are building up an impressive track record of translated European crime novels. This one sits in the suspense camp and is set in a remote Alpine village. If you like Patricia Highsmith, give this one a go.

On the existing series front this week Barbara Franchi welcomes Rumpole Misbehaves, and bemoans the fact that Leo McKern is no longer around to play John Mortimer's larger than life hero. And I enjoyed Stuart Pawson's Grief Encounters, although it's not the strongest in the Charlie Priest series (too much of the baddies and not enough of Charlie and his crew!)

Our cosy queens Sharon and AL Katz have been doing over-time this week and recommend Nancy J Cohen's Killer Knots, Laurien Berenson's Hounded to Death and Helen Barer's Fitness Kills which focus on hairdressers, dog shows and fitness spas respectively!

In the 'Sixty seconds with . . .' hot seat this week is Martin O'Brien, author of one of my favourite series. His hero, former French rugby player-turned-cop Daniel Jacquot, makes me envious every time I read one of the books, as he swans around southern France with a good lunch at every turn!

And get a shift on if you haven't entered the super-duper bumper draw to win books by Denise Mina, Arnaldur Indridason and Deborah Turrell Atkinson, as it ends this week. And there'll be another along to take its place.

Blazing! Adventures Magazine Presents:

-Part 3 of-

THE BLACK MADONNA-

The Serial:

Claude Ballz brings the mystery to an incredible level, making it a must read to find out how!
Modern Pulp gets no better than this tale of treasure and intrigue, masked in the veil of modern day Louisiana!

Come for the action! Stay for the excitement!

.....and as always............

ADVENTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Dash Courageous
Publisher
Blazing! Adventures Magazine