The Tattletales will be published by Prism Thread Books on July 1st barring a cosmic accident caused by a being the name of which we should not take in vain. I struggled in the vineyards of art next to commerceās temple, implacable and insistent and coined, for nigh over a year, with doubts and excrescences of worry, and I wrought out of stone a tableau of invincible men, men corruptible and yearning in their corruption for things of the spirit which will not be slaked, not ascensions but those that are declining into the earth. I did not describe the earth but the action of men and women toiling thereto, under the sunās oppressive hammer strokes until they was thin with it. I donāt say, I donāt! We are stowaways, barnacles on the Amazonian dreadnought.
Alright enough of that. Iāve been reading a lot of Faulkner just now, just finished reading The Hamlet which is one of my favorites of his. And Cormac McCarthy just died. Iād read the first four or five books of his, all the ones before but not including Blood Meridian. Iām on a quest now to read that book and try to split the hairs of the argumentation about what the differences are between Faulkner and McCarthy, because it seems like McCarthy has always been either, as some argue, a great synthesizer of American literature or he is doing a pastiche, mainly of a writer such as Faulkner. This is not speaking ill of the dead because to my way of thinking, the vein of writing that Faulkner opened up is so rich that others could come after him and still mine it. Iām going to read Blood Meridian with maximum openness to what makes it a special and highly resonant book on its own, that people rave over. Iām not sure itās formally innovative but maybe in its content. I donāt know. Iāll get back to you.
Meanwhile, yes, I have a novel coming out on July 1st that I am self-publishing. I donāt care if itās a foolish act, Iāve always been a fool. Iām doing this to get a book out and publish or perish, that whole game, but a lot of it frankly is to publish a book dedicated to my father who is getting up there in years. I want him to read it and be entertained by it while heās still alive. Itās a crime novel, set mainly in Helena, Montana in 1951, and already I regret not describing the landscapes more than I did. But itās about the people. Iāve got this idea that I should write four or five conventional genre novels, and publish at least two of them, to clear the decks for writing something more experimental and psychedelic if you will. Blood Trip and The Tattletales are those two crime novels. This is all part of my master plan.
Here is some info about The Tattletales:
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āThe TattletalesĀ is 1950s noir with a solid helping of humor. More Westlake than Chandlerā¦a fun read from Jesse Hilson who knows a thing or two about snappy dialogue.ā
āM.E. Proctor, crime author
āHilson pens western noir that twangs, sizzles, and ultimately swings.ā
āRussell Thayer, author of the āGunselleā seriesĀ
āPitch perfect genre movementā¦[Hilson] creates characters as deep as oceansā¦vivid visions of larger than life despicable criminals you canāt help but relish.ā
āGwen Hilton, author ofĀ Sent to the Silkworm House
SOMEBODYāS GOT A BIG MOUTH ā
BUT WHO
Former rodeo rider and cattle ranch hand Big Joe Scramm doesnāt. Heās got a side business he canāt afford to have anyone telling stories about. Especially to the law. And if violence is required to have some silence, so be it. To make matters worse, Joeās wife Sophie is a hot number who he fears may be giving it away. Hiring pool-hall private eye Darryl Winter to report on Sophieās whereabouts might just keep her in check. But at the local charm school, Winterās attendance record was sparseā¦
Everyoneās watching everyone else, trust is in short supply, and death is only one misstep away. No one likes a tattletale.
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Anyway, thatās my spiel. Please think about checking it out when it comes out. āWe are barnacles on the Amazonian dreadnoughtā: translation itās going to be published and available on Amazon, Iām sorry to say. I am doing this as a self-published author so my marketing arm is atrophied and has a limited range of motion. No preorder set up, might do a half-assed preorder where people if they want a book can contact me directly although I frankly have to say I donāt relish the thought of going to the post office and mailing out books. This probably makes me a bad āauthorpreneur.ā When July 1st gets closer and I get a better sense of how many copies I might be able to get, maybe we can talk about it. Unfortunately in the event of sending out books in the mail I would probably only want to do domestic USA mail. Iām working on it. It was enough to write the book and arrange publication. I have to reap the book reviewerās revenge because while I have reviewed many peoplesā books over the past few years, there are a lot of books I havenāt reviewed, for whatever reason, enough so that thereās hypocritical egg on my face when I go to ask others to review my books. Itās a community but itās not always a just, egalitarian one where sleights go forgotten.
Will Prism Thread Books publish again after this? I donāt know. I hope so. And yet after Adam Johnsonās Cialis, Verdi, Gin, Jag there were times when I said to myself that would be it, that Prism Thread came into and out of existence briefly for one purpose. Well it has done so again. I told myself back then that Iād only get involved with publishing a book if the book absolutely had to be put out there, that it was motivating enough to overcome my epic inertia and desire to avoid this kind of effort. I also said that if I did it again that it would be my own book so if I fucked it up I would only be ruining my friendship with myself and not somebody elseās hard work as a creator. We shall see if I fucked up. I think the book is good, I think itāll be a page turner. I want to entertain and enchant readers. Next stop: western noir land.
I had the privilege to read an advance copy and this is a great story. I love the not-very-bright detective, Winter! I hope you'll give him another run in the alley, Jesse!