Mystery Writers of America 2016 Grand Master: Max Allan Collins

As Dave and I reflect on the past year's adventures among mysteries and their authors, we're especially pleased at the announcement that arrived on November 29 from Mystery Writers of America: naming Max Allan Collins and Ellen Hart as the 2017 Grand Masters.

Today's my day to write a bit about Max Allan Collins and his books. With more than 100 titles, Collins has carved out more mystery, detective, and thriller terrain than any five ordinary authors put together. His most noted series may be the Quarry books, which feature a US marine sniper who returns from the Vietnam War and becomes a professional assassin. It began in 1976 with Quarry and continues, as Quarry in the Black was issued this year.

But for noir fans, the top series is the one with Nathan Heller, where this Chicago "pulps style" private investigator tangles with noted personalities of the 1930s and 1940s. This series is also still running -- this year's title was Better Dead.

The moment I knew that the writing by "M.A.C." had permanently marked my own life and thinking was the evening I finally watched the film version of his 1998 graphic novel  Road to Perdition. Tapping into the American experience of the Great Depression, the story reminded me of what's unique about both our history and our choice of narrative in American crime fiction.

I'm a fan of Collins's blog, where his back stories take on fresh life, at http://www.maxallancollins.com/blog. His reflections on life events, like his prolonged climb to survival of several health events in the past years, as well as the Grand Master award, are told clearly and with some power and a lot of thought -- here's a recent snippet:

I’ve been reflecting on the Grand Master this past week, the only troubling aspect of which is that it’s a reminder that a long career preceded it, and that the remainder of that career will be much shorter. Life achievement awards are something people try to give you while you’re not dead. So that part of it is sobering.

Though it takes years to amass a writing career that brings the Grand Master title your way, Collins is only 68, and with luck and care, we'll have many more of his books ahead. In addition to the ones I've mentioned (see the lists at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Allan_Collins), he's written film novelizations, and co-wrote with others, including his wife Barbara; one of his acknowledged mentors, Mickey Spillane; and Matthew Clemens.

Another aspect that I appreciate is his filmmaking side, which leads him to provide intriguing critiques of others' films as he sees them (an entertaining wrap-up of his 2016 viewing can be found here). And then there's his work on Eliot Ness of The Untouchables. Wow!

Dave and I could barely catch our breath when we finally met this writing legend, at a Bouchercon a few years ago. I see we still have a few of the books for sale that he signed for us then (click here), and he was generous enough to keep signing for a long, long time, as Dave brought many titles, some quite scarce. (The photo here shows Collins at foreground, and Matt Clemens at center.)

Last but not least, Collins's writing and warm friendships bring him lifelong fans. For an enthusiastic and knowledgeable sample of what comes from those friendships, enjoy the write-up from Kevin Burton Smith.

Yes, we'll provide material on Ellen Hart later; the Grand Master awards are presented in April, so there's time to keep reading and thinking about what these authors mean to the mysteries field.

Just a reminder: We're still ready to give away a stack of Ed Gorman paperbacks -- Gorman, like Max Allan Collins, was an Iowa resident. Details here.

PS:  Looking for mystery reviews, from cozy to very dark? Browse the Kingdom Books mysteries review blog here.

Complete Collected Mysteries of Grand Master Margaret Millar

About two weeks ago, Syndicate Books -- distributed by crime fiction marvel Soho Press -- released the first of a massive seven-volume set that will offer the complete works of Margaret Millar.

And for many a mystery fan, the most pressing mystery is: Who was Margaret Millar, and why don't we know her books already?

Think back to when you began reading the classic mystery authors. I know who I read: Agatha Christie, Rex Stout, Ellery Queen, and my mother's copies of Earle Stanley Gardiner and John Dickson Carr. Then Mignon Eberhart, John D. MacDonald, Graham Greene, even Ngaio Marsh. These have all been named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America. The award began in 1955 with Agatha Christie; many others named since then have written for so long that I think of them as my own contemporaries instead of my mother's -- John Le Carré, Tony Hillerman, Donald E. Westlake, Ruth Rendell, P. D. James.

But I missed a few, and I think it's no accident that Margaret Millar's work was among them. Deeply disturbing, psychologically intense, probing, and really truly creepy in their pace and suspense, her books -- like Vanish in an Instant and Beast in View -- are books I could not have absorbed well during the anxious and hectic college years and then childrearing. Now, however, their power and finely honed craft make an immediate impression.

It's not easy to find Millar's books in bookstores; even in the online sources of used books, they're not plentiful. So it's a huge gift to find the first collected volume of COLLECTED MILLAR, subtitled The Master at Her Zenith, as a freshly issued oversized paperback (9 by 6 inches, and 1.5 inches thick, 533 pages). Unlike the "old" softcovers familiar to collectors, this one is sturdy and well bound, to rest comfortably (if heavily) in the hands. And what a source!

Not only has this central volume of five of Millar's novels been released -- the remaining six are scheduled to follow briskly, this month for Legendary Novels of Suspense and the others in 2017: in January, March, May, June, and July (the last volume is her memoir and nature writing).

I found the insistent tightening of suspense in Vanish in an Instant reminiscent of watching a Hitchcock film playing out -- here's a sample of the writing:

Cordwick picked up the wrinkled bloodstained trench coat, quite naturally and casually, as if it was an ordinary piece of clothing. There was no indication, in his movements or expression, of his extreme distaste for the sight of blood, the feelings it gave him, of loss, futility, vulnerability. The blood on this worn and dirty coat had been the end of a man and might be the end of another.

He said calmly, "Do you, for instance, recognize this coat, Mrs. Hearst?"

"I -- don't know.. It's so wrinkled. I can't ... what are those marks?"

"Blood."

She drew in her breath suddenly, gaspingly, like an exhausted swimmer.

Beyond Hitchcock, the rich literary writing also reminds me of Henning Mankell's work, and the pained examination of emotions might well be a response to those who accuse crime fiction of wanton violence. In Millar's writing, every wound, every death, is shockingly real.

Feminist, Grand Master, sustained powerful author, Millar merits more reading today. I'm glad to see this series in print, and recommend it for many a collection of strong crime fiction.

Margaret Maron, THE BUZZARD TABLE: Crafted by a Grand Master

THE BUZZARD TABLE is the 18th of Margaret Maron's Judge Deborah Knott mysteries, and a crackling good one. Series followers will grab and gobble; for me, the book was a reliable treat, waiting for a calm moment when I could just keep on reading . . . I knew I wouldn't want to put this down very often.

And that's what it is for a writer to become a Grand Master. There are a goodly number of these strong, steady authors who know pace and character the way they know breakfast, and who braid unexpected strands and glittering red herrings like extra courses of dinner. But Maron's writing is more than this -- she is a recognized Grand Master, thanks to her 2013 Edgar Award, as well as recognized in her home state of North Carolina, where she sets much of her writing. And she has the patience to work with a story until its layers are satisfying and rich. Without carrying the metaphor too far, I could say Maron knows her workroom and insists on making the dish come out right.

In this case, Deborah Knott, judge in Colleton County and married for a long time to Sheriff's Deputy Dwight Bryant, isn't as young or adventurous as she once was. Her life balance is now heavier on wisdom and experience. But there are still things that take her into new terrain, like the unexpected reactions she's getting from her young stepson, Cal -- whose mother is dead. She's also puzzled by a visitor to the area, a long-lost cousin of the dying Mrs. Lattimore (that scent in the air is money, plus jewels). Cousin Martin Crawford is an ornithologist. Prickly and defensive, he's set up a "feeding table" for buzzards. Just for photographs -- or for other reasons?

And there is the disturbing core of what's going on in Colleton County: Who's waiting to feed off what corpses, and why?

Deborah's interest in the situation is supplemented by that of her husband Dwight, and by Sigrid Harald, an investigative lieutenant from New York and the granddaughter of the soon-to-be-late Mrs. Lattimore. Dwight and Sigrid get their own chances to narrate the action, but most of the insight and control are in Deborah's voice and view. Maron readers will recognize Sigrid from her own series, btu this book is great as a stand-alone -- you don't need to be caught up on any of Maron's long-standing narrative strands to enjoy THE BUZZARD'S TABLE.

Maron writes traditional mysteries -- death happens, but there are no interludes inside the minds of deviants, and the solution, when it comes, is the result of skilled people working hard to uncover the disturbing secrets around them that may have led to violence. I found the conclusion well crafted and appropriate -- then was haunted afterward by a few provocative strands of moral doubt that Maron leaves dangling.

I'm shelving this one on the "read it again" shelf, and look forward to working back through some of the earlier Maron titles, as well as the ones yet to come.