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Now Available!: My third River City crime novel Beneath a Weeping Sky is now available from Gray Dog Press!
Read the first chapter FREE! Click HERE
KPND Interview! I was interviewed by Jonny Knight from KPND Radio about the River City series. Listen to the first part here and the second part here
Now Available! A new, revised edition of my first River City crime novel Under a Raging Moon is now available from Gray Dog Press! Read the first chapter FREE! Click HERE
Now Available! My second River City crime novel Heroes Often Fail is now available from Gray Dog Press!
Read the first chapter FREE! Click HERE
For more information, read entries about these stories in my BLOG. River City stories are marked with (RC)
| Prank Call link | Dreamspell Revenge Anthology, 2010 |
| Antonio Scazzetti gets out of prison and looks for vengeance. | |
| This story came from an idea (and an early draft) years ago. It changed radically as I started work on it again. I wanted to explore the revenge theme, both as a process and to examine its value as a human endeavor...or weakness. | |
| Walter's Night link | Yellow Mama, April 2010 |
| Walter is a small man with a problem -- his imagination. | |
| This story is sort of a dark homage to 'The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.' | |
| What Comes Around link | Crime and Suspense, TBD |
| You never know what part of your life might be the axis upon which your destiny turns. | |
| I always wondered about bullies. Do the bullied become bullies? Or do they reject it entirely? And how much of what we experience as children and adolescents sets the path for us as adults? Lastly, what piece of karma becomes our fate? If you are 99% good and 1% bad, could that 1% be the axis upon which your destiny turns? | |
| For the Sake of Art link | LL Dreamspell Vampire Anthology, 2010 |
| The modern world catches up to a 500 year old vampire. | |
| I originally wrote this story in the early 1990s. Upir Novak is a Czech vampire with a love for art. He also owes the IRS taxes. This story, set in 1991, is about why he cares to keep his art and how he deals with the tax evasion charges. | |
| The Bastard Mummy (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Winter 2009 |
| Who stole the bastard mummy? | |
| This is a Detective Finch and Elias mystery. | |
| In Your Warm and Darkened Grave link | Deadlines (anthology) November 2008 |
| A certain kind of love... | |
| This is the story of a vampiress and her manservant. Originally published in Crimson Highway, October 2006. | |
| Rescuing Isaac (RC) link | Hardcore Hardboiled, Summer 2008 |
| How do you break a guy out of jail in this day and age? | |
| Dominic Bracco, featured in the The Meat-cutter's Wife, is back. And he's got a problem. His best earner got arrested for robbery and is sitting in jail, looking down a ten year hitch in Walla Walla prison. Dom worries he might cut a deal. So he decides to break the kid out. This anthology was comprised of stories judged to be the best of Thuglit, Volume One (anthology). Originally published in Thuglit, March 2006 (Issue #6) | |
| Dead Even (RC) link | Medium of Murder Anthology, April 2008 |
| Another Dominic Bracco story. In this one, he must do a favor for his Uncle Angelo. | |
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This story pits Bracco and a fake medium against a real gypsy and her protective family. *2008 Derringer Award Finalist |
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| Egyptian Eyes and Irish Lies (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Winter 2008 |
| Shae brokers a deal between wannabe IRA men and the real IRA. | |
| This story is the fourth and final episode in the Shae and Laddie series. Chronologically, it happens first. | |
| A New Life (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Fall 2008 |
| Shae flees Ireland to Canada to start a new life. | |
| This story is the third episode in the Shae and Laddie series. Chronologically, it happens before Laddie. | |
| Laddie (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Summer 2008 |
| How much does Shae love Laddie? What will she do for him? | |
| This is the second episode in the Shae and Laddie series. Chronologically, it happens before Shae. | |
| Shae (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Spring 2008 |
| Two lovers decide to rob a bank. | |
| I was in my car, listening to Christmas music on the radio, when some girl called in and got emotional on the air about her dysfunctional family. While I listened, an image formed of a guy sitting at a table with a glass of whiskey, missing someone... This is the last stage of a four-story arc, told in reverse. It includes "Laddie", "A New Life", and ends (begins?) with "Egyptian Eyes and Irish Lies." All four will be published in MYSTERICAL-E, beginning with the Spring 2008 issue. | |
| And a Fall Cometh (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Winter 2007 |
| Paul is a boxer who laid a bet on himself after turning down a mobster's offer to take a dive. He has to collect his money and get out of River City. | |
| This story is the sequel to events in the SEVEN BY SEVEN story "Pride Goeth." | |
| Home for Christmas (RC) link | Carols and Crimes, Gifts and Grifters Anthology, 2007 |
| Detective Katie MacLeod investigates a burglary/theft on Christmas Day. | |
| This story takes place Christmas 2006. | |
| Cassie (RC) link | Yellow Mama, 2007 |
| Stefan Kopriva's lover returns with a problem. | |
| This story takes place immediately after Waist Deep in March 2005 and then also a few months after Five For Fighting And A Murder Misconduct. It features Stefan Kopriva, first seen in Under A Raging Moon, set in 1994. Here, he tries to help out an old lover. | |
| Cheater link | Flashshot, September 12, 2007 |
| People hate being accused of things...especially when they're true. | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| Everbody Hates Him link | Flashshot, August 28, 2007 |
| Who does everyone hate? The dentist. | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| This T-Shirt Talks link | Flashshot, August 19, 2007 |
| What if your T-shirt talked to you? What would it say? | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| From the Roof (RC) link | Amazon Shorts, Summer 2007 |
| Two cops, one a training officer and the other a rookie, watch the action on a busy drug corner from the roof of the State Theater. | |
| The veteran, Glen Bates, is a very minor character in Under A Raging Moon. He appears in other books, as well, including Waist Deep and Some Degree of Murder. He is also the unnamed main character in the short story, "Take a Hand," published in Koboca Publishing's anthology The EX Factor. The rookie, Romeo McClaren, also appears in Some Degree of Murder. The events in "From the Roof" take place shortly after Some Degree of Murder while McClaren is still in the training car. | |
| In the Shadow of El Paso (RC) link | Map of Murder Anthology, February 2007 |
| Carl is a police officer in the small town of La Sombra, north of El Paso, Texas. Keeping the peace is never easy when a beautiful woman is involved. | |
| This story was inspired by the Marty Robbins song. There were two markets available at the same time when I wrote it--a magazine with a western/border theme and "Map of Murder," an anthology. Like Earl Staggs once told me--an anthology is nice because it goes on the shelf! | |
| Last Day in Paradise (RC) link | Amazon Shorts, Spring 2007 |
| Officer Katie McLeod's final day on patrol. | |
| Katie gets promoted to detective in 2004. This story is about her last patrol shift. It's also about the patrol experience, including things unique to female officers. | |
| Running Into Darkness (RC) link | Never Safe Anthology, February 2007 |
| What's the most dangerous thing a cop does? Is it a traffic stop? Or a foot pursuit into the darkness of the city at night? | |
| This story tells about a seminal event in the River City timeline from the perspective of Officer Paul Hiero. After you read this, try out The Meat-cutter's Wife for the other side of the story. | |
| The Sign of the Burning Moon | Mouthfull of Bullets, December 2006 |
| A particularly vivid moonrise has an impact on the conscience of a weak-willed man. | |
| This story was originally written for a contest at Clarity of Night. It did not win. The original version was under 250 words. I reworked it a bit and this published version is a little over 500 words. | |
| Labor in Vain link | Long Story Short, December 2006 |
| A dreaded trip to the hospital. | |
| This story is a literary take on a very painful experience. | |
| Helping out (RC) link | The Ex-Factor Anthology, October 2006 |
| "You're a cop, right?" These are the words that you don't like to hear, because you just know what's coming next. Someone is going to ask you to do something, and the end result will either be you ending up in a jackpot or them being disappointed. Or both. |
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| Something as simple as helping out an acquaintance can start you down the twisting, turning path...especially when it's someone's ex! | |
| Take A Hand (RC) link | The Ex-Factor Anthology, October 2006 |
| "Dad? I need help." A retired cop steps in when his adult son is in a jam...thanks to the cop's ex-wife! |
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| The EX-Factor focuses on revenge and/or poetic justice on bad ex's, which this story includes. But the real emphasis is on the the father/son relationship. | |
| Core Issue (RC) link | The Ex-Factor Anthology, October 2006 |
| A simple tale of man meets woman, woman is a mess so man leaves woman. Woman sees a shrink and gets better. Man wants woman back. She says no. Man seeks revenge | |
| Detective Elias is lead on this case, assisted by Tower, who sits in for a vacationing Finch. | |
| Three Days of Christmas (RC) link | By the Chimney with Care Anthology, 2006 |
| A thief steals Christmas presents and Katie McLeod investigates. | |
| This story takes place Christmas 2005. | |
| Finch and Elias (RC) link | Amazon Shorts, Fall 2006 |
| This story is a sequel of sorts to Be My Santa Baby and has characters from The Meat-Cutter's Wife and Rescuing Isaac. Finch is the main character in The Worst Door and both characters star in The Bastard Mummy. | |
| Lowest Point (RC) | 5th Story Review, September 2006 |
| Stefan Kopriva investigates a suicide. | |
| This story was originally a chapter in "Under A Raging Moon." I revised it to make it a stand alone short story. 5th Story Review ceased publication. I eventually used this scene in the fourth River City crime novel, "And Every Man Has to Die," though not with Kopriva and Kahn as the responding officers. Curiously, the scene was a better fit and more pivotal to this book than it was in its original incarnation. | |
| The Short Till (RC) link | Mouthfull of Bullets, Fall 2006 (debut issue) |
| Atlas Brown is an ex-con who thinks he's smarter than he really is. When he's interviewed about some scams at the video store where he works, he figures he'll talk to the investigator. After all, he's smarter than the guy, right? | |
| Officer Will Reiser, now retired, is the investigator in this story. Mouthfull of Bullets is now defunct, but his story was featured in the anthology Mouthfull of Bullets: Year One. | |
| In Your Warm and Darkened Grave link | Crimson Highway, October 2006 (special preview issue) |
| A man who serves a female vampire wishes to join her in undeath. Some things you shouldn't want. | |
| I originally wrote this story in the early 1990s, along with two other vampire stories (one is still unpublished). Crimson Highway no longer exists but the publisher, Comet Press, moved on to anthologies. This story was featured in Deadlines! | |
| The Cleaner (RC) | The Writers Post Journal, August 2006 |
| A crime scene cleaner discovers something that changes his life forever. | |
| No one ever hears about the guy who comes in after the murder or suicide and cleans things up. This character believes he could've been a police officer because he's good at figuring things out. When he comes across something on a murder scene cleanup, he gets his chance to do so. This magazine is now out of print...and unfortunately, I never got my contributor's copy. If anyone has one... | |
| Five For Fighting And A Murder Misconduct (RC) link | Futures Mystery Anthology Magazine, July/August 2006 |
| Stefan Kopriva works a case for a River City hockey player. | |
| This takes place in the late Fall of 2005, about seven months after Waist Deep. | |
| Inside Out Job (RC) link | Flashshot, July 25, 2006 |
| A robber seems to know just a little too much. | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| Lost My License (RC) link | Flashshot, July 14, 2006 |
| A patrol officer makes a traffic stop on a woman who has, you guessed it, lost her license. | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| De-fragged (RC) link | Flashshot, June 27, 2006 |
| An officer decides to get his revenge on a lieutenant at the firing range. | |
| This piece of flash fiction will appear for one day only as part of Flashshot's free email subscription service. | |
| A Soldier's Valentine | Writers Post Journal, May 2006 |
| A soldier writes his wife from Afghanistan. | |
| This was my entry in the Savage Press Valentine's Day 2006 love letter contest. It won second place. I wrote the letter to Therese from Patrick, so the original writing credit is attributed to Patrick Z. This magazine is no longer active. | |
| Lead Time (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| A man gets overpaid on his paycheck. What will he do to keep that money? | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Greed.' | |
| Oprah's Smile (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| A woman, her TV show and a Ding Dong. | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Sloth.' | |
| Where He Shouldn't Be (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| A man succumbs to his desires, forbidden as they are. | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Lust.' | |
| Wish (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| A messed up man is jealous of a lot of different people for a lot of different reasons, and he handles it in a potentially deadly manner. | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Envy.' | |
| Pride Goeth (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Pride.' The sequel to this story is "And A Fall Cometh." | |
| Strength Of A Dancer (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| Why is Sarah so huge? | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Gluttony.' | |
| Beaten By Anger (RC) link | Seven By Seven, April 2006 |
| Phillipe Richard, the hockey player from "Five For Fighting And A Murder Misconduct," plots revenge. | |
| This story is part of the SEVEN BY SEVEN Anthology. The theme for this one is 'Wrath.' | |
| The Meat-cutter's Wife (RC) link | Mysterical-E, Spring 2006 (Issue #6) |
| Dominic Bracco, a transplanted New Jersey wise-guy, makes arrangements for a hit. Takes place in 2003 in River City. | |
| I thought it would be fun to write about organized crime in River City. This story touches on the Mafia presence and on the Russian premise. There is a distinct tie-in to events later referenced in "If Only," "Pride Goeth" and "And a Fall Cometh." This story also reaches back to what occurs in "And Every Man Has To Die," set in 1998, and which won't be published until 2011. And, of course, "Rescuing Isaac" and "Dead Even" both occur sometime after this story. Lastly, "Running into Darkness" tells the flip side of this tale. | |
| Round Trip (RC) | espresso Fiction, March 27, 2006 |
| Sometimes it's funny when you think about doing something (or someone), but you don't...but it looks like you did... | |
| This story is set in River City, though it is not a crime or mystery story. | |
| The Worst Door (RC) | Dispatch Literary Journal, Winter 2006 (Issue One) |
| Detective Joe Finch is going on a raid. He would rather be anywhere else, but he knows he has to be there. | |
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Finch and his partner Elias are mentioned briefly in "No Good Deed." They star in "Finch and Elias," "Core Issue," and "The Bastard Mummy." Aside from John Tower and Ray Browning, they are Major Crimes detectives, working homicides, robberies and serious assaults. I wrote this story because I have something in common with Finch. *2006 Derringer Award Finalist |
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| Party Dress (RC) link | SaucyVox(Dot)Com, January/February 2006 Reprint: Flashquake, September 2006 |
| This piece of flash fiction focuses on a woman trapped in a small town and how she vicariously escapes. | |
| This was one of my first two attempts at flash fiction (The Worst Door being the other). It is set in Deer Park, a small town about twenty minutes north of River City. I have a feeling that Maggie, the main character, will show up again. Not sure where yet, but she will. | |
| Trails of Red (RC) link | Crime and Suspense, January 2006 |
| A killer finishes with his victim and then encounters a problem. | |
| The main character of this story isn't really the killer or the victim, but the cold itself. I wrote this specifically for this issue, which had a theme of ICY FINGERS. | |
| Be My Santa Baby (RC) link | Mysterical-E, December 2005 |
| "Ho-ho-ho, motherfucker." Two guys and a girl pull a robbery on Christmas Eve. This won't be mistaken for Miracle on 34th Street, that's for sure. | |
| I wrote this story specifically for this issue of this magazine. The theme is 'Bad Santa.' I had an image of a robbery by a couple of guys in Santa suits, and one of them getting the white Santa beard caught up in his gun. The rest of the story just spilled from there. | |
| Baker-124 (RC) | The GenderiZne of Massachusetts, November 2005 |
| Baker-124 is the callsign of River City police officer Matt Westboard. In this story, he responds on a welfare check to a run-down apartment building and encounters a little girl named Zoey. | |
| Westboard shows up as a supporting character in "Under A Raging Moon" and is mentioned in "Good Shepherd." This story, at least the welfare check part, is probably a familiar one to most cops. | |
| Good Shepherd (RC) link | Ascent Aspirations Magazine, November 2005 |
| The story of Lieutenant Alan Hart and a problem he encounters with a very sexy woman down the hall. | |
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This is the first time Lt. Hart has been the protagonist in any of my River City stories. He appears in several of the stories and the novels, but always in a supporting role...if you can call his behavior "supporting." He watches the officers of the River City PD, always looking for them to screw up. I always wondered what might happen to him if he got a little jammed up himself. This is my answer. *2005 Derringer Award Finalist |
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| Saving Grace (RC) | Crime Scene Scotland, September/October 2005 |
| The story of a young man who is an emotional mess and the prostitute he imagines is his destiny. | |
| This is a radical re-working of a story I wrote in high school called "Watching Her. And She Waits." As you can imagine, I revised and rewrote a ton, but the basic premise survived. The story also became part of the River City canon when the prostitute Grace, the biker/pimp and the Asian prostitute all appeared in "Some Degree of Murder." Crime Scene Scotland, unfortunately, is no longer an active mag, but it is still a review blog. | |
| Vancouver Dreams link link2 | SNReview (Starry Night Review), Summer 2005 SpokeWrite, January 2010 |
| A hockey goaltender in his late twenties snatches an opportunity to try out for the NHL when there is a labor dispute. | |
| Okay, I know this is a little bit of alternative history here, but when I wrote it, the 2004-05 season was still locked out and no one knew where it would go. With this story, I was just trying to point out that we should shoot for our dreams, whether we make it there or not. | |
| Burning My Masterpiece (RC) | A Cruel World, March/April 2005 |
| Brian Rooney's wife leaves him. He doesn't take it well. | |
| This story came to me in images. First I saw the scene at lunch in the diner. Then I had an image of how jealous Brian was (burning the sheets he thought were on the bed when she cheated on him). I just sorta worked backward from there. | |
| If Only (RC) link | Ascent Aspirations Magazine, February 2005 |
| Every thing is bad in this cop's life, except for one thing. Too bad that one thing is a prostitute. | |
| Paul, the "hero" of this story, and Toni, the prostitute, get pretty large supporting roles in "Some Degree of Murder." One of the "bad things" in Paul's life is explored more deeply in "Running into Darkness" and "The Meat-cutter's Wife." | |
| No Good Deed (RC) | A Cruel World, January/February 2005 (debut issue) |
| When Connor O'Sullivan encounters someone he once arrested while off-duty, the results aren't pretty...and the worst seem to come after the encounter ends. | |
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Every cop wonders. Some find out. What happens when I run into someone I arrested while I'm off-duty? What if I'm with my family? In a city as small as River City (about 200,000), it is a very distinct possibility. The story popped into my mind, mostly whole, when I pedaled by a McDonald's on my bicycle one afternoon after work in 2004. |
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| A Ride Home | Starsong, October 1991 |
| A young man feels guilty over driving drunk after a high school party and causing the death of a classmate. | |
| It might be possible to classify this one as horror... | |
| Bill's Son | Wide Open Magazine, October 1989 |
| A co-worker lives vicariously through the exploits of Bill's son. | |
| This was the first piece of fiction I was ever paid for ($15, never cashed). It was published in April 2006 as a reprint in Short Tales For Your Enjoyment I, a charitable chapbook from Wolfmont. | |
| Backroads | Unknowns, May 1989 |
| A young man drives home one night along the back roads, testing limits and wondering about his own future. | |
| First accepted piece of fiction. It is a little pretentious, even after the revisions the editor asked for. But everyone's got to start somewhere, right? | |
