Party Favors

Reasons to be cheerful 1,2,3.
Well how about these? It's Friday, the UK is heading into a holiday weekend with the sun still shining (for now anyway) and my story 'Party Favors' is up at one of the coolest of the cool, Spinetingler Magazine.

I guess a lot of you hard-boiled types who follow the crime writing scene around the web will have seen my stuff popping up at places like Shotgun Honey and All Due Respect and wondered where the hell this hack, Chris Leek has sprung from.

Well, the fact is I've been at the writing gig for a while, but it's only in the past year that I've managed to settle myself into a genre where I finally feel at home. Having said that 'Party Favors' is a difficult story to categorize, it has a dash of crime and a good helping of horror too. I'm pretty sure it would need more spaceships to qualify as science fiction, but beyond that I'll leave it up to you to decide. I hope you like it. Click here for those Party Favors

 

Hey while you're there why not leave me a comment and let me know what you think.

Happy Birthday Joe

If Joe Strummer had survived the heart problems that took him from this world nearly 10 years ago, he would have been celebrating his 60^th Birthday today. Okay so that makes me feel pretty old. But when the guitar rips at the start of 'Tommy Gun' I still feel it the same damn way I felt it 30 odd years ago. That's got to count for something right?

Here's to ya Joe!

Review – Beautiful, Naked & Dead

I told you I had a few things I thought you'd like, well I think I saved the best until last. Anyone who has the good sense to know 'Give 'Em Enough Rope' is the finest Clash album automatically gets my vote, but this piece of bad-ass rocked harder than Joe Strummer ever did. 

“There is nothing quite like the cold taste of gun oil on a stainless steel barrel.”

The first line of Josh Stallings debut novel 'Beautiful, Naked & Dead' tells you most of what you need to know about this hard boiled wonderland.

Moses McGuire is damaged goods, a casualty of war and so are those he leaves bleeding and broken in his wake. His revenge fuelled ride through the strip clubs of LA and the brothels of Nevada gives Mo just enough of a reason to keep from eating a bullet, besides there are plenty of others who are trying to save him the trouble.

'Beautiful, Naked & Dead' is fast paced, well honed and purrs like a V-8 with the hammer down. There are no punches pulled here, only some damn fine writing. I know I'm late to this party, but like Josh told me “ It's an all night stale beer on the floor strip-club party, nobodies ever late to it.” So if you haven't seen the show, slip a couple of dollars in the G-string and get yourself a lap dance you'll never forget: Beautiful, Naked & Dead

The Ties That Bind

I'm delighted to tell you that I have a story up at Chris Rhatigan's excellent site
'All Due Respect' today.

I have long been an admirer of the quality crime stories over there and it's a real buzz to have one of mine selected. 

'The Ties That Bind' is a story about family. Don't get the wrong idea, I've not gone all Waltons on you. That probably doesn't mean anything to you if you're under the age of 30, but blood is thicker than water or whiskey for that matter and you'll find plenty of both here: The Ties That Bind

I hope you'll stop in and give it the once over, why not post a comment while you're there and let me know what you think. I still have the Prozac  somewhere so have at it, I can take it!

Review - Dirty Words

I've got some 'Dirty Words' for ya. I know what you're thinking, I should quit running the potty mouth 'cause it's not big and it's not clever. But these words aren't mine, they belong to Todd Robinson and they're damn good.

I read a lot of short stories both on the kindle and in the flesh, it's where I live. Mainly I do it for the hit, but I'd be lying if I told you I didn't like to see how the other guys cook their stew. I can tell you now the 11 tales in 'Dirty Words' are the best I have come across in a very long time. I dug every one of them and that's something I've never been able to say about a collection before.

These are my kind of stories; rammed full of mobbed up bad guys, dive bars and wise cracking low-lifes. Todd Robinson writes what he knows and the mean streets of his New York bleed through the pages like an open wound. 'Dirty Words' is brutal, clever and at times laugh out loud funny, but above all that it's brilliantly crafted. This really is hard boiled bad ass at it's best.

My only complaint? Where the hell is the second volume!

Buy it now, you can thank me later: Dirty Words

Roadkill and other animals

With the Olympics in full swing and sucking writing time from my universe like a frekkin black hole, I thought I'd better drop by and let you know that Elvis ain't dead and neither is my particular possum, he's just resting.*
(Unlike this dude who, let's face it, is pretty damn wasted).

First up, I'm really surprised at the response 'Easy Money' got. I didn't expect anyone to actually read the thing, let alone like it, but I got some great feedback from folks both here and on Twitter (thanks guys!) I'll look at posting some more stuff in the future.

In other news I'm pretty stoked to tell you I have a flash fiction piece coming up at Spinetingler later this month. It was reading the flash stories hosted by Spinetingler and those at Shotgun Honey and The Flash Fiction Offensive that convinced me to try some quick and deadly scribbling of my own. Now by using a patented mix of violence, cohesion and blackmail, I have been fortunate enough to get my ass accepted at all three.

You can still read my sweat stained efforts at those other two kings of cool.

Here: TFFO - A Redheaded Woman and here: SGH - Drinks At Romero's

Hey, while your over at Shotgun Honey you really should make a point of checking out 'Red Spanish Night' by my buddy Gareth Spark.

The pen jockeying continues and normal service will be resumed shortly, but now if you'll excuse me it's time for the semi- final of the Mixed Doubles Tantric Table Tennis. C'mon Kirkplaistan that gold is there for the taking!

*Insert rest of Monty Python sketch here.