During the past month, Betimes Books has released three
Hector Lassiter novels ONE TRUE SENTENCE, (its first time in paperback),
FOREVER’S JUST PRETEND (its first time anywhere)
and TOROS & TORSOS.
Two more, brand new Lassiters are headed your way in just a
few days: THE GREAT PRETENDER (Orson Welles, The War of the Worlds Panic
Broadcast of ’38, religious relics and occult-obsessed Nazis) and ROLL THE
CREDITS (World War II, the birth of film noir and Hector as narrator for the first
time since HEAD GAMES).
By year’s end, or thereabouts, you should have the whole of
the Lassiter saga before you via Betimes—a number of other novels and the
Lassiter short story collection/miscellanea, WRITE FROM WRONG.
All of this has led to some questions from readers and book
folk about Betimes.
In a word, Betimes Books is all about offering quality
fiction, in-and-out of genre, running the range from dark literary thrillers such
as Betimes stablemate Hadley Colt’s erotic and twisty PERMANENT FATAL ERROR,
about a mysterious, long-believed dead author (there is mystery attached to
Colt herself, BTW), to edgy literary works—most recently including the
republication of Richard Kalich’s CENTRAL PARK WEST TRILOGY.
A couple of months back, I had the good fortune to be
afforded an early read of Betimes’ REACH THE SHINING RIVER by Kevin Stevens, a
historical crime novel that transports you back to 20th Century
Kansas City.
It evocatively tracks racial tensions circa 1935 against a vividly
rendered backdrop of corruption and class friction, all of it unfolding to a
soundtrack of classic jazz and blues.
Betimes also reunites me with Sam Hawken, who’s written some
very fine Borderland noirs including LA FRONTERA and the recently released
MISSING (now available from Serpent Tail.)
Apart from sharing some of the same Borderland
preoccupations (mine play out in 2011’s EL GAVILAN) Sam and I go way back,
having become acquainted moons ago when I was guest editing a Cinco de Mayo edition of HARDLUCK
STORIES I dubbed “Borderland Noir.”
(That label’s since become a catchphrase or
even title for others and their borderline-tension focused anthologies).
Sam’s
short story contribution for that edition later became a chapbook for which I
supplied an introduction.
In sum, Betimes is publishing some extremely interesting
stuff and, my own works apart, I highly recommend you sample their other wares
at Betimes’ official site here.
You'll find plenty of sample chapters, excerpts and essays
by Betimes authors.
I’ll leave you with Hadley Colt’s very powerful and moody book trailer for PERMANENT FATAL ERROR (you can read more about the book trailer's production here) to
further entice your palate for all things Betimes:
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