He threaded his way through the small round tables scattered across a dark, cavernous room. Small floodlights in the ceiling cut through a fog of blue cigarette smoke. Somewhere, someone was torturing an acoustic guitar. Nevada Southern University was just across the desert—maybe half a mile away—and college kids with fake IDs crowded the tables, sitting on short stools and mismatched chairs. Smoking. Drinking jug wine from chipped coffee cups. Acting cool. Acting beat. Snapping their fingers instead of clapping their hands. Pretending they were something they weren’t. He saw some older faces among the students. Hip professors. It was perfect. It was the last place anyone would look for Ben Berlin.

When the Red Barn opened just off old Bond Road, a couple miles east of the Strip, it was an antique store with an Old West angle. The antique store didn’t last. A new owner came along and it reopened as a cowboy bar. That didn’t last either. The county fathers renamed the two lane road Tropicana Avenue and it still looked like a big red barn and the decor inside … (more) →

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Please join me on June 24 at The Writer’s Block in Las Vegas for its local author showcase, 5 to 7 p.m. 

“Joey’s Place” will be one of the featured books at this gathering and you’ll find a unique and eclectic mix of styles and subject matter in the other offerings. I look forward to meeting old friends and new ones.

The Writer’s Block is located in the heart of vintage Las Vegas, Nevada, at 1020 Fremont Street. I hope to see you there.

Use the form below to contact me for more information. Or email me at John@JWNelson.net.  Thank you.

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Recently, I was flattered to learn that John had commented on “Joey’s Place” on his website (John updates this page regularly, so I’ve copied his comments below):

“Another big thumbs up for John Nelson’s detective novel, Joey’s Place. Nelson took the Anatomy of Story Masterclass so many years ago it was just called the Story Structure Class. He really knows his stuff. The story takes place in Las Vegas, 1970, the turning point when the city’s casinos went from mob control to corporate control. This allows Nelson to make the rare and difficult combination of detective story and historical drama. We not only get a terrific plot, we see the machinations play out within the making of a modern American city. … (more) →

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Fortuna reached over the front seat, turned off the ignition, and said to Ben, “He still gets excited.”

[from LANDMARK KILL]

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“… Joey’s Place was unique for another reason. It was a private club with only one member, its co-owner, Joey Ross. “Cool Joey.” Everyone who walked through the front door was his personal guest. If you didn’t know Joey Ross, you didn’t get in. You didn’t get in to enjoy those private bungalows in back. You didn’t get in to relax by the spring-fed swimming pool surrounded by cool green lawns, palms and olive trees. You didn’t get in to gamble at its intimate, no-limit casino.

Movie stars, politicians, entertainers, millionaires, star athletes. Make a scene and you’d be shown the door and your card would be pulled, even if your name was Rockefeller, Garbo or Rainier. A slow night was when there was only an archduke or an Oscar winner in the house.

Ben walked past on the hot Strip sidewalk. Valet parking was full. And not because there was no self-parking. It was full because there was no off-season at Joey’s Place. The back entrance … (more) →

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I have recently enjoyed receiving daily emails from Delanceyplace.com containing interesting excerpts from a variety of books. Today’s email had an excerpt from Joseph J. Ellis’s “American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson,” and described how our third president rarely spoke in public, preferring to use the written word.

Here is Jefferson requesting that James Madison carefully review the president’s first annual address to Congress: ‘Will you give this enclosed a revisal, not only as to matter, but diction. Where strictness of grammar does not weaken expression, it should be attended to in complaisance to the purists of New England. But where by small grammatical negligences the energy of an idea is condensed, or a word stands for a sentence, I hold grammatical rigor in contempt.’ …

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“I have learned to spare no labor upon the process of writing a page four or five times over if nothing less will bring the words which express all that I mean, and nothing more than I mean.” Thomas Henry Huxley, 1927

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I turned 22 in 1970. I grew up in Las Vegas but at that time I was two years into my thirty year career as a broadcaster. I bought my first house on Scenic Way that was near Lorenzi Park. I also got married that year. I read “Joey’s Place” this past (Labor Day) weekend. It was fun to be 22 again. I was able to go back to a home that no longer exists. The Vegas I used to know. Even now, as I write this, I can still see myself turning off the Strip to Convention Center Drive. The rotunda in front of me… the Landmark to the left, Channel 8 Drive to the right. Yes, I enjoyed the book. It was fun to be 22 again. … Most of my reading is non fiction. In fact the last fiction I read was a re-read of “Moby Dick.” I also have every Sherlock Holmes … (more) →

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