Tag Archives: Andrew Vachss

Noir Con or bust guest post #5 Protectors: Stories to Benefit PROTECT

For my fifth ‘Noir Con or bust’ guest post, I’d like to welcome New Jersey based crime writer Thomas Pluck.

Pluck’s stories have appeared in PANK, Crime Factory, Spinetingler, Beat to a Pulp, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, The Utne Reader, to name a few.

I’ve been pimping my own work a lot lately, but I was keen to get Pluck to write a guest post so I could shill for his latest project Protectors: Stories to Benefit PROTECT, which he’s the editor ofSeriously, this anthology contains some seriously good writing talent doing a mixture of crime, science fiction, Western, noir and other stories. I mean serious. There’s a copy on my Kindle.

I’d try and explain why there’s other good reasons you should buy the book, but Pluck does a better than me. Read his post, then buy the book. 

“Hemingway once wrote, ‘The world is a fine place, and worth fighting
for.’ I believe in the second part.”

That’s from the screenplay of Seven, written by Andrew Kevin Walker. I
don’t know if Hemingway actually wrote what he said he did, but that’s
a great line and it explains how I can write hardboiled fiction and
not eat a gun in the morning. As writers, we peer into the dark heart
of humanity and the abyss winks right back.… Read more

Crime fiction criminals

By definition, the majority of crime fiction characters are criminals or at least commit illegal and/or immoral acts. But books where the main character is a full-time professional criminal are surprisingly few and far between. Here’s a selection of some of the best.

It’s worth noting that when this post originally appeared on the Crime Fiction Lover website, readers came up with several good additions, including Andrew Vachss’s Burke, Charlie Huston’s Henry Thornton, Lawrence Block’s hitman character Keller and Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley. I had originally thought of including the James Ellroy character Dudley Smith (“Knock, knock, who’s there, Dudley Smith, so reds beware”), but he’s a bent cop so not eligible. However, Ellroy’s Pete Bondurant would definitely make the cut.

Please leave a comment if you can think of any others.

Parker by Richard Stark (aka Donald Westlake)

The 24 books written between 1962 and 2010 featuring the professional thief known as Parker remain some of the best crime fiction ever written. Sixteen Parker novels appeared between 1962 and 1974. Westlake took a rest from the character until 1997, then wrote another eight Parker books.

Parker is a career criminal who steals things for a living. Get in his way on a job or try to double cross him afterwards and he’ll hurt you.… Read more