Welcome to:

I've Been Everywhere Man

2011-11-13T09:33:00.000-08:00

Since September I've been traveling. I attended Bouchercon In St.Louis. Hung out with and met many a good people like Daniel Woodrell, Katie Estill, John Rector, Christa Faust, Reed Farrel Coleman, Peter Farris, Benjamin Whitmer, Jed Ayres, Keith Rawson, Cam, Jimmy the Worm, Matt Funk, Matt McBride, Scott Montgomery, Rod and Judy Wiethop, Stacia Decker and her husband Matt, Jonathan Woods, Megan Abbott and many many more. Traveled to Indy for a reading at the Irving Theater and read with Victoria Barrett and shot the shit with her husband/writer Andrew Scott . In October I traveled to Dearborn, Michigan for the Gliba trade show met writers Benjamin Busch & Jason Karlawish and spoke for a few seconds to Daniel Ames author of Feasting at the Table of the Damned. Signed books for 80 or 90 indie bookstores and shook many and spoke with some great bookstore owners. Went to Austin, Texas for the Texas Book Festival met and hung out with Craig Johnson and his lovely wife as well as Ray Wylie Hubbard and his wife Judy and the outstanding Harry Hunsicker. Shared drinks with Daniel Woodrell, Rod Wiethop, Craig Johnson (who by the way is one funny and cool rockin' SOB!!), Scott Montgomery, Michael and Buffy Crutchley (Mike has the stories on the dead and dumb shit that get people killed). But also had a panel with Daniel Woodrell, Donald Ray Pollock and Bruce Machart. Came back to Corydon, Indiana for a reading at the Artisan Center for Larry and Ran (great group of artists, keep kickin' it guys) and this past weekend I traveled to Frankfort, Kentucky for the Kentucky Book Fair. Had a great time. Got to meet Silas House, a great Kentucky author and a good ole country boy. Also met and spoke with Will Lavander and Derek Nikitas (couple more cool SOB's). And I'm damn tired. I'd like to thank everyone thus far that I've met and who've been so damn supportive of me and my work. Most of all thanks to my lovely wife Jenn, you've been very understanding and supportive through every step of this madness. And it looks like there's still more juice in the pipeline.

Some Things I've Been Doing

2011-10-05T02:46:00.000-07:00

A research piece I wrote that got accepted by Granta: http://www.granta.com/Online-Only/The-Heartland

An essay I wrote about some of the wilder people I ran with back in my younger days: http://www.fsgworkinprogress.com/2011/09/we-brought-tomorrow-until-today-was-gone/#more-1086

Here's an interview I haven't posted, more of these are around the corner: http://www.wyso.org/post/book-nook-crimes-southern-indiana-frank-bill

To say the least, I've been busy with some essays for other venues while trying to work on my next book, travel and chip away at the day gig. My last reading/signing took place in Indy at Irving Theater with Victoria Barrett. Had a great time. Here's the interview in the NUVO: www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/frank-bills-crimes-in-southern-indiana/Content?oid=2354542

Next up is Dearborn, Michigan for: http://www.gliba.org/tradeshow_authors_2011.php

And here are a few reviews of Crimes in Southern Indiana: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2016133649_br11indiana.html?prmid=head_more
http://www.curledup.com/crimes_in_southern_indiana.htm
http://www.timeoutchicago.com/arts-culture/books/14956813/crimes-in-southern-indiana-by-frank-bill-book-review
http://www.dangerousminds.net/comments/crimes_in_southern_indiana_dope_and_death_in_americas_heartland
http://www.thenervousbreakdown.com/rthomas/2011/09/cisi_bill/
http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/The-Long-List/Crimes-in-Southern-Indiana-Stories/ba-p/5715
http://lit.newcity.com/2011/09/28/fiction-review-crimes-in-southern-indiana-by-frank-bill/

I'd like to thank everyone for coming to my readings, your support is much appreciated.
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Release Party & First Reading

2011-09-12T02:44:00.000-07:00

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Thanks to EVERYONE for coming to each of these READINGS!!! More pics when I get time ....And I really appreciate the trash talk from the drunk who sat on the patio. Dick move when you're seated with my close friends and family.

John Hornor Jacobs A Southern Gothic Master

2011-09-03T06:27:00.000-07:00

I met John several months back when doing my second Noir At the Bar in St.Louis. Though our words were limited, I drove four and a half hours to read for fifteen minutes and he drove six hours with wife and kids in tow to do the same, I can say it was well worth it. Even with Aaron Morales trying to cop a feel of my back side while John read one of his stories. At the time each of us was counting down the days till our first books hit the shelves. Mine being Crimes in Southern Indiana and John's being Southern Gods. I recently asked John to write something that influenced the writing of Southern Gods, one kick ass piece of literature and he did. Enjoy!

Somewhere Down South, A Foot is Stomping in a Tenement Shack

There’s music to writing. Sentences have cadences, characters have rhythms to their dialogue, plots have tempo. A writer’s style and tone can sometimes have a minor lilt or major lift. Authorial voices sometimes have bright timbres or bass rumbles.

It makes sense that music influences writers. Seeps into plots. Informs characters.

I grew up on the rhythms of the South. Blues, soul, gospel and country were the constant accompaniment to the long car rides with my father, crisscrossing Arkansas, towing a flatbottom, a full cooler, and rods and reels and shotguns. In every country store dotting the landscape of the delta there was music; you open the door with a creak and the customer bell rings, a voice thick with tobacco and molasses and bacon-fat greets you. The air-conditioner hums and the strains of a gospel choir, tinny and indistinct, sound from the radio above the counter, tuned to the AM band. The hiss of a Coca-Cola being opened and the bright clatter of the cap falling to the floor. The snick of a Zippo. The husky laugh of a woman hefting a child on her hip. Barefoot feet slapping on a poured-concrete floor.

Many places in the south, we ain’t got shit but music and the music of the bottle or the pipe to get us through.

When I grew older, I became a musician – a fair one, in all honesty, not great but competent enough to tour, play shows all over the south. At some point I fell in love with the blues.

I don’t know what there was about it that really attracted me, the blues. Its deep rhythms, maybe. The sadness, the pain all balled up tight with joy and sex and love and loss. The human heart in conflict with itself. The best blues tunes have the makings of a great novel. The legends of the blues, Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Albert King, John Lee Hooker, they were generous with their legacy, and it spread beyond race, class. It spread into other forms of music and eventually infected my writing.

Music is an infection. Music is a voice.

When I sat down to write Southern Gods, the amalgam of music from a lifetime of living in the Delta welled up and came out, in one way or another. It spilled into my plot, into my style. Maybe into my voice. I don’t know. But I know what I wanted it to sound like. It needed pain and horror and the suck of gravity. It needed the grit and gravel of car wheels crunching on a backroad. It needed the static and buzz of an untuned radio. It needed to sound like this:

http://www.atomictomato.com/blog_music/rosie.mp3

Call and response. And that’s the relationship between the writer and reader, each one brings something to the song. The writer sings his line, and the reader rises to join him in chorus. It’s give and take. It’s tension and release. It’s the rise and fall of breathing. It’s the barrel and roll of sex.

http://www.atomictomato.com/blog_music/sometimes.mp3

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Ray Wylie Hubbard

2011-08-25T02:33:00.000-07:00

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Lord have mercy! Crimes in Southern Indiana is like hearing sticky fingers or shooting a .50AE Desert Eagle the first time.I need to go to confession and ask for God's mercy and forgiveness just for reading this book. Sordid, brilliant, great, and rude. Frank Bill is one cool book writing son of a bitch -Ray Wylie Hubbard-legendary singer/songwriter

Those are the kind words Ray passed onto me after reading Crimes in Southern Indiana. If you haven't heard of Ray why the hell are you still reading this? The man is a legend. He's influenced the likes of Todd Snider and Hayes Carll. He runs with the troubadour of Texas musicians like James McMurtry, Scott H. Biram and Guthrie Kennard. He's one of the greatest singer/songwriters ever. And I'm happy to call him a friend. He's working on a new album as I write this and I'm betting your mother's retirement and decaying dental that he'll raise the bar once again in the music world by bringing the pain and the grit. So quit huffing exhaust fumes, go buy a seven dollar and sixty-five cent bottle of whiskey and check out Ray Wylie's website.

Updates coming real soon if I can ever catch up on interviews and essays. And as always I appreciate everyone's support and kindness. Keep kicking ass people!

More Happenings!

2011-08-06T08:11:00.000-07:00

Scott Montgomery of The Book People (http://bookpeopleblog.wordpress.com/2011/08/04/mysterypeople-pick-of-the-month-crimes-in-southern-indiana/) down in Austin, Texas passed along a very kind review of my first book, Crimes in Southern Indiana. He also picked it as his book of the month. I have to tell you, this is all a bit overwhelming. The feedback from everyone thus far has been very positive.

Here is a bookstore only anthology I was asked to contribute to as well: http://store.subbooks.com/product/noir-bar contact Subterranean Books in St.Louis to get a copy. It's a limited run. The book is being sold to help the store out in these rather unfortunate times.

And Ron Earl Phillips has been pimping the shit out of my book as he got an ARC. Checkout his blog and some kind words about me and his contest: http://ronearl.com/

Coming soon: http://www.fsgoriginals.com/

Indie Book Stores Are Behind Frank BIll's Crimes in Southern Indiana!!

2011-07-23T06:20:00.000-07:00

When I began writing I wanted to write stories that took the air from your lungs. Regardless of violence I wanted my work to be about language and place. About people that others didn't write about. I cared not for heroes because in the real world, more times than not, there are no heroes. I write about men and women getting by the best way they know how, using what they know, good or bad. I'm not a sentimental writer. You want hugs and kisses get on the Care Bear bus. You want action. Bad deeds and people pushed to the edge? Read my work. And the indie book sellers, they get that. And I thank them. Below are what a few had to say about my first book, Crime in Southern Indiana!
*
Like a wild, non-stop ride in a bullet-ridden Ford pickup careening through the author's hometown of Corydon, Indiana. Most of the characters in these short stories are bad to the core, and the ones that aren't are usually victims. Meth heads, bare-knuckle fighters, weed runners and random evildoers populate this collection from Frank Bill, a rising star from the heartland. Don't think for a minute though that everything's black & white in these stories; they're hard-edged tales with a literate punch. This book is in a category all by itself. Wow!
Carl Hoffman, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin"
http://www.boswell.indiebound.com/
*
As a way of introducing you to his stunning debut, Crimes in Southern Indiana, Frank Bill grabs your hand & leads you into the pitch-dark, flooded basement of America where he proceeds to force your head down into the dark, pungent depths. The resultant interlaced stories are gritty, mean, awful, & flat-out brilliant. The characters of Bill’s Indiana are deplorable, miserable wretches – brawlers, drunks, meth-heads, & scumbags - yet this is what lends them such an air of vitality that makes them all the more real. I couldn't tear my eyes away from them, as much as I thought I wanted to. I kept thinking, "Just one more story & I'll stop this madness," but I never did. Ah, let’s admit it: I never wanted to. A power-punch of a debut that left me reeling, arms pinwheeling in space as I tried to return to the sunlit world outside its pages."

http://warwicks.indiebound.com/book/9780374532888

*
Carl & Matt, thanks again. You guys kick ass. Oh, I've a new friend on twitter. Ray Wylie Hubbard http://raywylie.com/ His music and other Texas Musicians have been a great influence over the years. Check this cat out, he's one of the great influences for singer/song writers like Hayes Carll http://www.hayescarll.com/ and Todd Snider http://www.toddsnider.net/fr_home.cfmand maybe even Ryan Bingham http://www.binghammusic.com/. Regardless, you can bet they all dig Ray. I sure as shit do.

Up Coming Readings!!

2011-07-10T09:25:00.000-07:00

Another month down and another on the horizon. Publisher's Weekly was kind enough to feature me among ten first authors in this month's print issue. http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/profiles/article/47872-first-fiction-2011-frank-bill-great-writing-is-no-crime.html

The web version should go up at the end of the month. Last month I was interviewed by them and it's up right here:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/20110606/47516-methtown-u-s-a--pw-talks-with-frank-bill.html

And next month, the first three stories from Crimes in Southern Indiana, The Hill Clan Trilogy, will be in PLAYBOY!! Let me say this, the art work is top notch. And the editor was great to work with. For me, I've said this before and I'll say it again, working with editors is a blast. I dig their input.

My first reading will be here: http://carmichaelsbookstore.com/event/2011/09/10/month September 7th, at 7pm. The release party will be September 10th in Corydon, Indiana at Beef O'Brady's. Good friends Donald Ray Pollock, Scott Phillips, Kyle Minor, Jed Ayres, Matthew McBride and Aaron Morales, to name a few who will be in attendance. The following week I'll be in St. Louis for Bouchercon.

Don's new book will be out next week: http://www.amazon.com/Devil-All-Time-Donald-Pollock/dp/038553504X/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310314776&sr=1-2
And from the reviews he's gotten in ELLE Magazine and ESQUIRE, it's gonna kick ass!

Scott Phillips will have new book out in August: http://www.amazon.com/Adjustment-Scott-Phillips/dp/1582437300/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1310314884&sr=1-1

And the review he got over at the Publisher's Weekly website is nothing short of great and brutal.

On September 29th, I'll be in Indy reading at the Irving Theater. Reading starts at 7:30 pm. http://www.attheirving.com/ It hasn't been posted on their site yet, but when it goes live, I'll be sure to re-post it here along with any other readings I'll be doing.

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First Review

2011-06-04T07:45:00.000-07:00

There will be an interview in the June 6th issue of Publisher's Weekly. Nothing new to report other than I'm working on final edits for Playboy. Gearing up for St.Louis next weekend. Doing Noir at the Bar with Aaron Morales, John Hornor Jacobs and Fred Venturini. Check out Jed's site for more about that.

Other than that I'm busy with a new novel. Reading through manuscripts by Big Daddy Thug, which is pretty fucking brilliant. And new work by Jason Duke, whose work is always bad ass!

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Hanging Out With Literary Hereos!!!

2011-03-22T16:03:00.000-07:00

As you sit at the best dern laundramat in Milltown, names of some of the greatset literary/satirist writers glance off the spin cycle. Hunter S. Thompson, Chuck Palahniuk, Denis Johnson, Norman Mailer, Jack Kerouac, Kurt Vonnegut, Joseph Heller, and a whole lot more. Breathing in the mold and mildew of damp crete, seeing navel lint decorating the floor you ask yourself, what do you have in common with these fine writers?

On February 28th your editor, Sean, wrote you with some great news and a question. You answered. Hell yes!

On March 1st Sean introduced you to another editor named Amy. You told Sean and Amy they were fuckin' geniuses. Amy felt this was much better than being called a genius.

Why is that?

And what do you have in common with these writers?

And why are you writing this in the second person?

You're writing in the second person because that's how you taught yourself long ago when you first read a Chuck Palahniuk book. And now you get to hang out in the same pages you read him in many times over the years. That's right, you're going to be in PLAYBOY!! Your Hill Clan stories will be published in PLAYBOY MAGAZINE later this year. And you couldn't have done it without the support of your freinds, family, Agent and Editors (whom have become part of your northeastern kin).

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Aaron Michael Morales

2011-03-21T07:49:00.000-07:00

He phoned after passing Main St., he was turning around. I ran down the alley in front of Backwoods Brewery in Nashville, Indiana. Saw the gray black mini coupe. Aaron Morales parked. Got out we shook hands. He’s about 5’5 or 5’6. Clean cut. Hair the shade of an oil slick. Thin. Inked forearms. And he cusses like a motherfucker. I knew we’d hit it off.

He wrote a deep, dark tome titled, Drowning Tucson (http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Drowning-Tucson/Aaron-Michael-Morales/e/9781566892407/?itm=1&USRI=drowning+tucson). A book of inner connected stories. It’ll break your heart and bust the cartilage in your nose. His phrasing, masculine fiction. My words, bad ass. If you’ve read Bukowski or Selby, prepare for the next generation. He’s the real deal.

My favorite story, Rainbow, tells of a girl who lost her virginity to her grandfather at age 13. And after he dies she’s abandoned by her mother. I won’t spoil anything else. Buy the damn thing. Man up, as Aaron would say.

We walked back to the brewery. I introduced him to my wife. We ordered drinks. Like his prose, he’s a straight shooter. He holds no remorse for the words he speaks. We talked about how he ended up in Indiana. He moved when he was a senior in high school from Tucson to Terre Haute. He was raised catholic. Graduated. Applied to college. Wrote an essay and got into Purdue. His parents split after 20 some years of matrimony. He’s brother in prison. Sister in the military another gives tattoos. He’s a brother in Bloomington. Aaron teaches writing at Indiana State up in Terre Haute.

Explaining his life and where he came from, the characters in Drowning Tucson took shape for me. The gang bangers, prostitutes, military men and their wives. A gay man seeking revenge on his lost love. He’s a real person. A writer with depth.

One of the big things we discussed was writing being published today. Most of what is read is boring. There are enough novels on bad marriages and relationships in general to stock a shopping mall. We spoke on violence and the breaking points of the human soul. Getting into the head of a character and discovering the why’s? and how’s? of people. What makes them tick and suddenly explode with rage.

We talked about writers we dig, Donald Ray Pollock. Kyle Minor and Neil Smith. Chuck Palahniuk, Irvine Welsh and Bret Easton Ellis. Larry Brown, William Gay, Tom Franklin, Elmore Leonard and Scott Phillips. Unfortunately he dropped a lot of names I didn't write down and the drink made them disappear.

I asked him about Hubert Selby Jr., cause his book really reminded me of his writing. He smiled. Told me he’d spent time with Selby before he passed. Had wanted to do a textbook on him but someone had beat him to the punch. He’s taught Selby in one of his classes. Used the film Requiem For a Dream. Talk about powerful.

We touched on the meth epidemic and immigration and Tucson. Talked a bit about his next book, Eat Your Children. It’s about meth. I won’t leave any spoilers.

We drank up a $103 beer bill and felt better for it. He wanted to grab a shot of whiskey but I had to motor back to the cabin and check on the dog. I plan on hooking up with Aaron again, soon. Very soon.

Check Aaron out at: www.aaronmichaelmorales.com

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It's Been a Long Road

2011-03-05T08:22:00.000-08:00

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I started writing back in 1999 or 2000. Filling notebooks up with words on the night shift. I'd read a book called Invisible Monsters. Thought, I can do this. Then I read Fight Club. Survivor. I was a huge Chuck Palahniuk fan. He turned me onto Irvine Welsh. AM Homes. Dennis Johnson. Bret Easton Ellis. Junot Diaz. Jason Starr. Jim Thompson. But the wake up call was Larry Brown. I never thought I could write like Larry. I kept filling notebooks and typing up a novel that never amounted to shit. Then I read Craig Clevenger. Will Christopher Baer. Eddie Little. Andrew Vachss. And I read and re-read Lullaby, Fight Club and Twisted City. Really studied the openings, the middles and the endings. The word choices and the settings. I wrote my first novel, Acting Out. It was based on research I did about self-mutilation and a lot of stories I'd heard from other people. It was dark. Disturbing. Disgusting, but funny. I sent it out to about 50 or 100 agents. This was 2003. No one wanted it.

Writing that novel gave me something. A belief in myself and my ability as a writer. I went back to Larry Brown. Discovered Poachers by Tom Franklin and Pinckney Benedict's Town Smokes, Wrecking Yard and Dogs of God. I read John Ridley and Hubert Selby Jr., Dorothy Allison and Jerry Stahl. I read and re-read Joe, Big Bad Love, Facing the Music, Father and Son, Fay and Dirty Work. I write a lot of short stories.
They fall between crime and literary fiction. I write A Coon Hunter's Noir. My grandfather's voice was ringing in my head. I sent it to the Missouri Review, Georgia Review, North American Review and the entire list of literary review magazines. No one wanted it. I sent it to Hardboiled, a print crime journal in New York. I got a letter from the editor. He really liked it but some thing was off. He couldn't place his finger on it. I stuck with mellow drama. Cut back on the crime. But somehow I couldn't shake the act of crime from my work. I wrote a story called The Old Mechanic. The Missouri Review liked it but wouldn't publish it. The North West Review likes a story I wrote called The Penance of Scoot McCutchen but won't publish it. A story I wrote after losing my grandfather to brain cancer. The Talking River Review sends me a two page letter about The Old Mechanic. They liked it a lot. But won't publish it. I send them The Penance of Scoot.
I write another novel called The Cruel and the Unkind. The setting is 9-11 in a small town. Send it around to a few agents. Get a few good responses that tell me my work holds merit but no one wants it. I send an excerpt to the Missouri Review. Get a nice letter that tells me they like the excerpt. But its too long and they won't publish it.
I get an acceptance from The Talking River Review for my story The Penance of Scoot McCutchen.
I find a hardback copy of Dirty Work by Larry Brown in a used bookstore in Louisville, Kentucky. The owner of the bookstore tells me, "You like Brown you'll like Offutt. He's been in here a few times on his book tours."
I buy everything Offutt wrote. I devour all of it. But especially The Good Brother. I read all of Larry Brown's non-fiction and am reminded of where I grew up, where I came from.
I'm pissed off. Night shift is getting to me. I'm writing stories that no one wants. Except for one story, The Penance of Scoot. What did I do on that story? Editing. I wrote and re-wrote it. I dig out A Coon Hunter's Noir. See the error of my ways. I edit the shit out of it. Proof it over and over. Send it back to Harboiled. Six weeks later I get a letter from the editor, he still likes it. And he pays me twenty bucks. It'll be in one of the future issues.
A girl is abducted up in northern Indiana. I follow the story and get pissed off. She's found face down in a creek bed. She'd been molested. She's dead. The story haunts me. I dig through alot of anger. Contemplate loss and what I know. Contact my cop buddy, ask him a lot of police procedure questions. I write Trespassing Between Heaven and Hell. I get a lot of rejections. A letter from the editor of EQ Mystery Magazine. I don't care. I'm writing what I like. Nearly four months pass. I write Old Testament Wisdom. Send it to my first online e-zine, Thuglit. I get a letter from Lunch Hour Stories telling me Trespassing Between Heaven and Hell placed third in their writing contest. I'll get paid fifty bucks. Five contributor copies. I've found my nitch. I start work on A Rabbit in the Lettuce Patch, which is an excerpt from The Cruel and the Unkind. Then one weekend I check my email at twelve a.m. on night shift. I have a letter from Allison "Lady-D" Robinson. She read my story Old Testament Wisdom. She's read it for the third time. She believes its as powerful a story as any she's read. The cadence in the narrative, is lyrical and at times point-perfect. She's surprised I'm a struggling writer. But it needs a good edit. And that's what we do. And it gets published in Thuglit.

I get a rejection from Plots With Guns. A.N. Smith tells me he likes Rabbit in the Lettuce Patch, but it's not a fit for his zine. I get pissed off. I write Rough Company. Send it to him. He believes the story is a hoot. Gives me some pointers on editing. Accepts the story. And pretty much everything I send him after that. We become great friends. I read Knock'em Stiff by Donald Ray Pollock. In the Devil's Territory by Kyle Minor.

I pull another story from the Cruel and the Unkind manuscript. Call it Tweakers. Send it to Beat to a Pulp. I get a letter from David Cranmer. Then a phone call from Elaine Ash. They want Tweakers. I send them a story called The Need. They accept The Need. Do a double publication. The first ever.
Lunch Hour Stories goes out of business. I get paid but Trespassing doesn't get published.
I make more friends online. Keith Rawson, Jed Ayres, Greg Bardsley, Kyle Minor, Scott Phillips, Kieran Shea, David Cranmer and Elaine Ash become my biggest supporters and best friends. I write more shorts till I've enough for a book. Put it all together. Call it Crimes in Southern Indiana. Neil Smith gives me a few agents names. I send it out. Kyle Minor gives me an agents name. I send Crimes to that agent. That agent reads the manuscript and gets back to me within twenty four hours. But wants a novel as well as the stories. Tells me to email when the novel is finished. It never gets that far.

I get invited to the first Noir at the Bar in St. Louis. Read with Neil Smith. Meet Scott Phillips and Jed Ayres. I read with all of them. Scott asks if I have an agent. No. But I've sent my stories out to a few. He mentions an agent that Neil recommended. I tell him she has my manuscript. He says I'll put in a good word for you.
Few days later she contacts me. Loves the stories. Wants to know, do I have a novel? I'm twenty five thousand words in, but it's not finished. I agree to not query any other agents. She wants to see the novel but only when I'm comfortable with it. I edit the shit out of those pages. Send them her way. She's between agencies. She reads the pages. We have another phone call and I sign with her. I'm an agented writer. I finish the novel. Attend the B-Con in Indianapolis with my cop buddy Don Ross. I meet Neil. I meet my agent, Stacia Decker. I meet Victor 'Fucking' Gischler. I have drinks with him, Neil, Greg Bardsley, Kieran Shea. Neil and Stacia introduce me to a few other writers and publishers. I meet Derek Nikitas. Jason Starr. John Rector. Dan O'Shea. Joelle Charbonnean. Christa Faust. Sean Doolittle. Rod Wiethop.

My first novel, Acting Out gets a revision and is accepted to be published in Beat to a Pulp's first ever anthology, ROUND 1.

Stacia and I work on the edits to Donnybrook. She sends it out. I'm anticipating months and months. Two weeks later I get an email. Editors from Farrar, Straus & Giroux are fans of Donnybrook and Crimes in Southern Indiana. They wanna have a phone conversation. What do you think?

I think hell yeah!

There were an awful lot of ups and downs in-between all of this. I gave up my studies in Chinese martial arts to write. I lost two grandparents. My dog died. My wife lost both of her grandparents within six months. My mother was diagnosed with an incurable cancer. She went through a second divorce. I went from 14 years on night shift to day work. The economy went to shit. And there were other things as well. But being able to write, I taught myself to never pull punches. Never quit believing in yourself when others do not.
OK, enough of the sappy talk.
In the coming months you'll be getting irritated by me and the emails. Everything I've done this far has come to fruition. Below are links to my first book. I have the cover art. It's top notch. It's not posted yet. But will be added soon. I also so have some really big news but I cannot announce it yet. Wish I could.
I also posted my hometown's bookstore, Arlstons. Contact them. Buy Crimes in Southern Indiana from them. Support the indie bookstores. Most of all thanks to all of my family and friends who've been there over the years.

http://arlstons.com/arlstons/Home.html

http://www.borders.com/online/store/TitleDetail?sku=0374532885

http://www.amazon.com/Crimes-Southern-Indiana-Frank-Bill/dp/0374532885/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1299332426&sr=1-1

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Crimes-in-Southern-Indiana/Frank-Bill/e/9780374532888/?itm=1&USRI=crimes+in+southern+indiana

London & Germany are calling!!

2011-01-29T08:30:00.000-08:00

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The photo above has big hair, a little man with a big attitude and me with a mullet. Times have changed. The little man is all grown up with a child on the way. The cherry headed country chic is now married with kids and could tell a few stories about me and angels. Me, I no longer sport a mullet. We've all grown up and come a long way since this photo was snapped in the 90's.

NEWS:

This week I got word from my editors that we'd sold foreign rights in the UK (London) to an imprint of Random House UK. They've published DH Lawrence, Graham Greene, Anthony Burgess, W. Somerset Maugham and Harper Lee and James Ellroy, Donna Leon, Douglas Coupland, Don Winslow, Paul Harding (last years Pulitzer winner) and many others.

Then a few days later, my editor's emailed with more good news. We sold rights to Germany. The Publisher is Suhrkamp, they've published Beckett, Joyce, Neruda, Proust and Hemingway.

And to reflect back on last year when this all started, we sold to a publisher in Norway and France.

Big THANKS to my editors, the FSG Team and my superwoman agent Stacia for all of the hard work and support. And also to my wife, friends and family on and off of facebook and twitter.

Also, a lot of the older posts have been lost. Me and the blog had it out this morning.

Now back to the writing.

The Triple Threat

2009-05-10T08:02:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day to (from left to right) Aunt Trudy, Aunt Becky and my mother Alice. This photo comes from one of the many christmas's on the farm. Long before I was planned or unplanned. These women are big hearted. Good spirited and tough as leather.

Black & White

2009-05-09T18:29:00.000-07:00

Some say a picture tells a thousand words.

Something about this picture brings a smile to my face. A tear to my eye. The female's time appears happy. Care free. Though her history during this time was filled with knuckles. Palms. Belligerence. Tongue to a swelled lip. Tasting blood. Hurt.

The female brought two daughters into the world during her first six years of marriage. My aunt and mother. They, like the female, my grandmother, would be scarred by these times. But strenghtened by the world in which they survived.

They don't produce women like my grandmother, aunt or mother anymore.

Each took on years of abuse from a man I never knew. My real grandfather. A man I knew only through cards on select holidays. Birthdays. Stories told during car rides for christmas shopping. Dinners with family. A man I was forbidden to acknowledge.

The man my grandmother remarried was the man I grew up calling grandpa. He owned a 100 acre farm. They sired another child. Another aunt. He raised my mother. And aunt. Along with his newborn. Raised them as his own. They lived a simple life. Gathered eggs from the barn. Fed the ducks. Chickens. Rabbits. Watched hounds being born. Triained. Hunted. Sold.

The farm was my world. Just as it was my aunt's. My mothers. A world I miss. It's taken nearly seventeen years to use all that I saw. Lived. Felt and remember. My stories are as black and white as the smile on my grandmother's face. But violent and real like the memories they shared with me.

Corporal Frank Bill Sr.

2009-04-18T16:28:00.000-07:00

He entered The Marines in July of 1967 after graduating high school. Boot Camp at Paris Island. Entered the Vietnam War December 18th of 1967. Returned home on January the 2nd or 3rd of 1969.

His name is Frank Merritt Bill Sr.

He phoned me late one night in the a.m., happy with the rattle of ice cubes in his drink. I'd been up late working on a short story about an ex-Vietnam Vet who raised, trained and hunted coon hounds.

Dad was open for conversation. He'd recently been contacted by men he'd served with in the war. Men he'd not spoken with in some time. One had a website, listed and described the battles in which they'd fought. Dad later sent this same man some of his photos and he placed them onto a disk with the ones he had from their time over their.

Dad never talked about the war a lot when I was growing up. I always accompanied him to the local VFW. Where, looking back now, he felt at ease. Among others like himself. Men who'd seen and participated in things others could or would not.

Dad was an engineer. Part of the Tankers Division. I asked why he never applied for a good civilian job as an engineer. He told me he wasn't that type of engineer. He blew things up with C4. I won't offer details. But I will offer what our town Newspaper wrote about my father back in 67:

Marine Lance Corporal Frank M. Bill was recently awarded the Navy Commendation Medal for outstanding performance in operation Allen Brook-a search and destroy mission in Vietnam.

He is also in line for a Purple Heart for wounds he received when a fellow soldier stepped on a land mine during the same operation.

His commendation authorizes Corporal Bill to wear the Combat "V". The citation read in part as follows:

"For heroic achievement while serving as a Combat Engineer....on 15 May 1968...the unit to which Lance Corporal Bill was attached came under intense automatic weapons and mortar fire from a large, well entrenched enemy force and sustained several casualties. Realizing the seriousness of the situation, Lance Corporal Bill unhesitating-exposed himself to the hostile fire and assisted in the evacuation of the seriously wounded Marines.

"On May 16, the Marines came under a heavy volume of enemy fire from a nearby village. Ignoring the enemy rounds impacting near him, Lance Corporal Bill boldly assisted several casualties across the 300 meters of open terrain to a helicopter landing zone and fearlessly remained in the hazardous area, unloading vital ammunition."

"Upon returning to his unit, he calmly assisted in destroying a large cache of enemy ordnance which was dangerously emplaced within several concealed booby traps, despite the accurate sniper fire directed at his position."

"By his courage, bold initiative and unwavering devotion to duty in the face of great personal danger, Lance Corporal Bill inspired all who observed him and upheld the finest traditions of the Marine Corps and of the United States Naval Service."

Coming home from the war my dad lost most of his papers. Never got his Purple Heart nor his disability compensation for losing part of his hearing in one ear from the land mine. The man mentioned above, who stepped on the land mine and lost his life, dad witnessed this. Was within earshot. He carried this with him for over 20 years.

He once told me you tried not to get too close with others, never knew if they'd be there the next day. Everyday that passed and you were still breathing, you said I made it another day. Still he said he questioned his life, why him and not me?

After his time was served and he came home, he tried to get his lost papers sorted out. To get his compensation for hearing damage from Uncle Sam. It became a headache and he decided it wasn't worth the trouble. Still, what he saw over there was carried around for years and years.

In the 80's he re-enlisted. Entered the Army Reserve. Towards the end of his years in the Army he spoke with another enlisted man. Talked about what had happened. The man told him he should pursue getting his compensation. That he deserved it. Dad decided to go through the headache of all the paper work, get compensated.

Dad got compensated over 20 years later for his disability. But he never did get his Purple Heart. He carried the memories of those he watched fall, that didn't make it home. He carried them for years and has only begun to speak about it openly within the past five to ten years.

My dad is a cut up. Has a lot of funny memories about boot camp. Some very graphic and detailed accounts from the war. Being pinned down for hours. Watching men fall. Waiting for back-up. How he and others survived. How the M16 always seemed to jamb up when needed most. The brush he carried in his helmet for when this happened. To this day he still hasn't looked at the disk of pictures his friend sent him from their time in the war. Afraid there'd be images he still wasn't ready to see.

Jug

2009-04-13T17:34:00.000-07:00

On the back of the photo my grandfather scribed:This is Jug. He is past 8 years old now. He is one of the best strike and track dogs I have ever hunted with in my life. All night tree dog. Good coon killer. He is the same every night, never fails to hunt in my company.

In darker ink at a later time he scribed: He is a track dog second to none and always has been. Now he is dead.

Growing up I always heard about Jug. One of my grandfather's top hounds. A beautiful white and tan. I couldn't wait til the day I'd my own hound dog. When that day came I didn't get a Walker hound or a Mountain Cur. No coon hound for me. I got a full blooded Beagle. A rabbit hound. Not knowing what to name him my mother suggested Jug. Said, "He was your grandpa's favorite coon hound." That name stuck. And my first dog became Jug.

Have Terrapin Will Travel

2009-04-12T08:36:00.000-07:00

Growing up on a farm it wasn't odd to find a land terrapin, what my grandfather called them or a turtle making it's passage across the property. The photo above is of John and my first cousin Dennis Wayne. The photo was taken in the late 70's. John is holding a terrapin he'd found as a boy on the same farm. Carved his intials and date on the bottom of the shell with a pocket knife. Found it all those years later. Some may find this odd or cruel. But it's something a lot of folks who lived in the country used to do. There's something unique about the way people once lived. Finding pleasure in the simple ways of life. I miss those times.

2009-04-11T04:44:00.000-07:00

Richard Duncan was a great friend to my grandfather. They hunted all over Southern Indiana. Richard carried a 357 Mag. on his left hip. My grandfather never liked handguns but a rifle or shotgun hung over every entrance way of his old farmhouse. He was very fond of the .22. Now when coon hunting was big around the area, this is what it looked like. These men hunted coon like Bundy hunted women. They had these minature boards to pull and stretch the hides over. Then hung them to dry. There were a few other things they did as well to keep bugs and rot from the hide as well. But I won't detail that.
My first crime story was titled A Coon Hunter's Noir. It came from these two men as well as my father's time as a Marine in Vietnam. Hardboiled published it in issue #39.
Richard is still among the living. Has a farm down in Kentucky. I miss ole Richard.

John Bussaburger

2009-04-10T14:50:00.000-07:00

The caption on the back of the photo reads: Old Pat a coon dog. One of the good ones. John was my grandfather. A coon hunter first and foremost. A story teller of tales I'll never forget. He worked for the town of Corydon for over thirty years. Every evening he came home to his 100 acre farm. My grandmother Ina cooking supper. He'd feed and water his hounds. Sit down to some form of fried meat. Side of vegetables. Andy Griffith on the TV. Talk about his day. Then after supper he'd sit in the dinning room. Call a friend he'd not spoke with in some time. Talk for hours about hunting. About which stud should be bred with which bitch. Who tree'd the best. His favorite opening comment was always, "Now I'm just talkin" and he'd continue you from there.

To say that my grandfather was a good coon hunter would be an understatement. He knew his trade. Made money from coon hides throughout the 70's. Bred and trained many a hound since old enough to hunt. He was well known throughout Kentucky, Tennessee & Southern Indiana.

My upbringing with him has brought about part of the creative edge within my short stories. Stories that help fill the void of losing him several years ago to brain cancer.