NoHo Noir

Beat to a Pulp Superhero

2012-08-24T10:18:00.000-07:00

This anthology will be out in mere weeks and features 12 stories by writers like Thomas Pluck, Keith Rawson, Sandra Seamans, Steve Weddle, Court Merrigan, and Kevin Burton Smith. For more details, go to David Cranmer's Education of a Pulp Writer blog.

We love I fucking love science

2012-08-23T00:01:00.002-07:00

We love "I fucking love science." Can't seem to find them on FB any more, but everyone else seems to have access to their particularly smart blend of science and snark.

Suspense Magazine

2012-08-22T15:12:00.001-07:00

You can never read too much suspense. Suspense Magazine is available either online or in print, in full year or single issue options. If you sign up for the blog, there are freebies. They also host a writing contest (open until end of December). Here are the details.

Red 2--we'll be there

2012-08-22T13:23:00.003-07:00

Royal Noir

2012-08-22T13:05:00.001-07:00

Well, they say that "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas," but as Prince Harry has just discovered, that doesn't mean pictures of bare-ass nekkid royals won't get snapped and uploaded. TMZ has the pictures with the naughty bits (sort of) obscured. (Come on, if we can see a guy's junk in HBO's Game of Thrones, couldn't we at least get a glimpse of the princely penis?) Boys will be boys... but honest to God Harry, didn't you learn from the photo of you wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party?

So good we had to tell you twice! Interview with NoHo's Mark Satchwill

2012-08-22T12:58:00.002-07:00

Over at EBSQ (Where Art Meets Blog) there's an excellent interview with artist Mark Satchwill. Mark talks about the transition from trad to digital and there are pictures! Check it out here.http://blog.ebsqart.com/2012/08/21/interview-with-mark-satchwill-going-digital/

Zombie Cat in the Hat

2012-08-22T12:53:00.002-07:00

Somewhere, Dr. Seuss is turning over in his grave. (Maybe there's a zombie Dr. Seuss shambling around out there.) This is from Cthulhu Hand Luke. You can follow them on Tumblr here.

Going Digital Interview with Mark Satchwill

2012-08-21T09:47:00.001-07:00

The lovely and talented Amanda Makepeace has interviewed NoHo's Mark Satchwill about his move from creating art traditionally to digitally over on the EBSQ blog.

http://blog.ebsqart.com/2012/08/21/interview-with-mark-satchwill-going-digital/

John Waters makes it simple....

2012-08-20T22:21:00.003-07:00

What's going on with The Dark Tower?

2012-08-20T19:09:00.002-07:00

Depending on who you talk to, a filmed adaptation of Stephen King's Dark Tower is still happening but in what form and with what filmmakers is unknown.
It's on. It's off. Javier Bardem is playing the gunslinger. Or he's not.
Here's a Deadline Hollywood story with the latest, which seems to be that it's still alive with Ted backer MRC investigating the possibility of financing it.

Interview with Katherine Tomlinson

2012-08-16T09:46:00.000-07:00

NoHo's Katherine Tomlinson is interviewed about her work and upcoming projects over on Jeff Shear's Six Degree Conspiracy blog!
Read it here: http://www.jeffshear.net/2012/08/15/noho-noir/

Frightmare Film Review

2012-08-10T14:04:00.000-07:00

Sheila Keith/Dorothy Yates, Digital, 2012

NoHo's Mark Satchwill has a written a new review of the classic Peter Walker shocker "Frightmare" over on the Classic Horror Campaign website where it's British Horror Month.

He also created this illustration of the wonderful Sheila Keith as she appears in the film playing cannibal Dorothy Yates.

Check it out here: http://www.classichorrorcampaign.com/2012/08/10/frightmare-1974/

NoHo Noir: Perceived Value

2012-08-04T15:00:00.001-07:00

PERCEIVED VALUE

Written by Katherine Tomlinson

Illustrated by Mark Satchwill

Gillis Montgomery didn’t like his wife working at the North Hollywood pawn shop. It was the biggest one they owned, but it was a trouble magnet, especially after a guy got shot trying to pass stolen goods while Orla was there alone.

But Orla knew jewelry inside and out—“All those years of dress up,” she liked to say—and people were coming in every day hoping to exchange their valuables for enough money to pay their electric bill so they could keep the A/C on. Gillis could value most items with a cursory glance but he was clueless about bling.

Or so he claimed.

In truth, he hated dealing with jewelry. The misery was just too intimate when a woman came in to pawn her engagement ring, or a man brought in his father’s turquoise-inlaid cufflinks as collateral for a loan. The baubles were rarely worth much and the shame and despair of the people offering them up was like a wave of body odor—you couldn’t see it but the smell was so strong it could knock you off your feet.

Orla was better at dealing with the emotional stuff than he was.

Or so he liked to think.

When Martin Prentice walked through the door, Gillis heard Orla sigh.

Prentice was one of their regulars, a veteran who came in a couple times a month to pawn bits and pieces he’d scrounged from different places. Orla had asked him once where he came by all the things and he’d told her he kept an eye out for moving vans because people who were moving would often leave things behind because they didn’t have room for them or they wanted to buy new stuff. Orla thought that was a disgrace—throwing away perfectly good items that weren’t worn out seemed like a sin to her—but she was happy Prentice could get some profit out of them himself. He brought them lots of ugly lamps.

In the beginning, Prentice had parked his clapped-out Toyota in front of the shop, and it had been clear he was living in it. Back then, the stuff he brought to the shop were household things he’d apparently taken with him when he moved out—picture frames and flower vases and some fancy wine glasses.

Both Orla and Gillis knew there was a story there, and over the months they’d pieced together a picture of PTSD, marital infidelity and an apartment lease that was in the faithless woman’s name.

At first, Prentice had lived in a series of rented rooms but after a few weeks dealing with Prentice’s night terrors and argumentative ways, the landlords had usually tossed him out. Prentice had eventually gone mobile, living out of the trunk of his car, parking it at night near the Hollywood Bowl.

The Toyota had died around the new year and since then Prentice had been living on the street, preferring to sleep in the parks and alleys rather than the crowded shelters where he felt closed in and vulnerable.

These days when he came into the shop he was often grubby, his hair unwashed, his clothes stained. Orla worried about him. He was a reader and when he saw her with the Walter Isaacson biography of Steve Jobs, he’d suggested she might enjoy Isaacson’s biographies of Einstein and Benjamin Franklin. He’d told her Benjamin Franklin was his favorite of the founding fathers.

Despite his protests that he was “just fine,” Orla had contacted the Veteran’s Administration on his behalf and been frustrated and angry that all they could offer seemed to be group therapy. After seeing homeless advocate Gene Burkhart on television, she’d contacted him and he’d assured her that he would reach out to Prentice, see if he could get into housing.

Prentice hadn’t liked Burkhart and told Orla that although he appreciated what she was doing he preferred she mind her own business.

Orla had been embarrassed and she’d backed off, but that didn’t stop her from worrying about him.

Gillis had heard Orla sigh when Martin Prentice came through the door, so he’d stepped up to help him.

“Afternoon, Mr. Prentice,” he’d said and Prentice had nodded his head in return. Then he’d reached into his pocket and pulled out a small blue box. Inside was a pin-backed scrap of ribbon with a star-shaped gold and silver medal dangling from it.

Gillis knew what it was instantly.

His grandfather had earned a Silver Star in France during “the Good War.”

“That’s a Silver Star,” he said.

“Yes sir, it is,” Prentice agreed.

They don’t give those out for hangnails, Gillis thought.

Orla came over to the counter to look at the medal.

All three of them stared down at it for a moment, then she picked the medal up, turned it over, and read the inscription. “For gallantry in action.”

She looked up at Prentice a question in her eyes.

“I’ve got no use for jewelry,” he said to her flatly.

Gillis picked the medal up and put it back in its flat box.

“Mr. Prentice, I can’t give you very much for this.” He tried to hand it back. “Not near what it’s worth.”

Prentice refused to take it.

“I don’t need but a few dollars,” he said.

Gillis nodded. “Okay then,” he said and pulled out his receipt book.

“Twenty dollars do you?” he asked, knowing that really he should only offer ten.

“Appreciate it,” Prentice said.

He took the money with a hand that had black grime embedded in its wrinkles but clean fingernails.

As the door closed behind him, Orla picked up the blue box and headed after Prentice.

“What are you doing?” Gillis asked her.

“We can’t take his medal,” she said.

“We can’t take his pride,” Gillis said.

Orla nodded her head like she understood but kept moving toward the door.

Prentice was in the parking lot, talking to a neatly dressed balding man who was holding out a greasy bag from Jack in the Box. He was talking low and smiling and offering the bag to Prentice, who eventually took it and walked away. The man called after him, “See you around,” and got back in his car.

Orla came back into the shop with the medal, which she put on a shelf below the counter.

“We’ll just keep it for him,” she said to Gillis, who knew when not to argue with her.

That night as they were eating dinner in front of the TV, Gillis nearly choked on a forkful of trout meuniere he’d prepared using Emeril's recipe.

“Oh my God,” Orla said a second later as Martin Prentice’s photograph flashed up on the screen, followed by a live shot of an attractive Hispanic detective from the LAPD serial killer task force giving a statement at the scene where his body had been found.

At the bottom of the screen, a crawl offered a tip line phone number.

Orla turned to Gillis, tears in her eyes.

“That son of a bitch,” she said.

“Prentice?” Gillis asked, confused.

“The guy with the fast food bag.”

She put down her plate, wiped her eyes and picked up her cell phone.

“Read me that number,” she said to Gillis because she was too vain to wear glasses.

Frighten Brighton Art and Interview

2012-07-18T10:19:00.000-07:00

Noho Noir's Mark Satchwill has created a poster image for the Frighten Brighton Classic Horror Film Festival happening in the UK next month.
You can read an interview with Mark about his love of horror movies, the inspiration for the poster and why he supports the Classic Horror Campaign over on their website:

http://www.classichorrorcampaign.com/2012/07/18/exclusive-new-frighten-brighton-artwork-and-interview/

NoHo Noir: Smother Mother

2012-07-15T13:20:00.003-07:00

SMOTHER MOTHER

Written by Katherine Tomlinson

Illustrated by Mark Satchwill

Shannon could hear her son sobbing all the way from the parking lot. When she entered the office of the little motel they owned, she was upset to see her mother Maeve holding down the counter instead of Nori, the guest who usually covered for her when she had to run out on an errand.

She was torn between confronting her mother and tending to her son, who had hurled himself into her arms the moment he saw her. “What’s wrong Liam?” she asked as he burrowed his head into her leg.

“Nothing’s wrong,” her mother said. “He’s just a little cry-baby.”

“I am not a cry-baby,” Liam wailed.

Shannon stroked his back. “I know sweetie,” she said, giving her mother a lethal look. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

She took Liam's hand and led him into the little apartment behind the office.

“You’re doing him no favors by coddling him like that,” Maeve said, loudly enough that she could be heard through the locked door.

It had taken Shannon 15 minutes to calm Liam down and get the story out of him. He kept apologizing for “making Grandma mad,” and every time he did, the red haze clouding Shannon’s vision got a little redder.

She remembered apologizing for making her mother mad, even when she’d had no idea what she’d done.

Liam had set Maeve off by asking her where Nori was when he saw his grandmother behind the front desk in the motel’s office. Maeve had flown into a rage, ranting that he was dissing her and that she wasn’t going to stand for it.

And then she’d whacked him with a rolled-up copy of the L.A. Times that was delivered every morning because the former owner of the motel had a three-year subscription and Shannon had never cancelled it, figuring some of the guests might enjoy reading it.

Shannon kissed Liam on the top of his head and told him he could watch a movie. As he happily settled down in front of the TV, clicking through the channels to find Animal Planet, Shannon’s eye caught the recycling bin by the door, full of junk mail and flyers and outdated newspapers.

The newspaper.

Maeve had whacked him with a newspaper like he was a puppy who’d just piddled on the rug.

With her, Maeve had started with a fly-swatter, hitting her with stinging slaps that didn’t hurt so much as they humiliated. She’d moved on to wooden spoons. And then to belts.

The wooden spoons had hurt more, so the belts were an improvement, but there had been other household items Maeve had repurposed for her sick needs.

Maeve was not going to do to Liam what she’d done to Shannon.

She slipped back into the office. Her mother was casually texting someone, pretending not to notice her daughter standing there.

“You need to leave,” Shannon said.

Maeve sneered, a minimal twitch of an expression that was all her Botox-frozen face would allow. “Seems like I got here just in time.”

“I need the unit,” Shannon said, wondering for the hundred millionth time how exactly her mother had found out there was an empty room at the motel and had managed to move in while Shannon and Liam were at the movies.

By the time they got home, Maeve was covering the bed with a spread she’d bought on sale at Target and lighting scented candles to give the unit “ambience.” There was a locksmith installing a new lock to replace the one that had been jimmied open.

“You can’t live here,” Shannon had said to her.

“I’ll pay rent,” Maeve had countered.

“It’s $90 a day,” Shannon had said, doubling the rate.

Maeve had laughed.

“But the family rate is only $15, am I right?”

And that had been it. Her mother’s will was Hurricane Katrina and she was New Orleans.

“Your mother’s a skank,” Nori had said to Shannon three days after Maeve had moved in. “She’s been hitting on my clients, trying to cut in on my action.”

Shannon couldn’t help herself. She had to ask. “How’s that working out?”

Nori had laughed. “I’m 16, your mother’s what? Sixty?”

Forty-seven, actually.

“But for reals, Shannon, I can’t be having that. It’s creeping them out.”

“Your mother treats you like shit,” Kevin Eastman had observed to Shannon a week after Maeve had moved in. “It’s not good for you to have her here,” he added. “You’re getting sucked back into her orbit, you’re falling back into old patterns.”

Shannon had been surprised Kevin had said something. The Gulf War vet pretty much kept to himself, but she knew he kept an eye on her and Liam. He had taught Liam to play chess. He’d bring his travel board into the office and they’d play for hours.

It bothered Shannon that the closest male role model her son had was a near-homeless recovering addict with PTSD but Kevin had been a rock for them both during the trial of the gang-banger who’d killed the motel’s owner while Liam watched.

“I appreciate what you’re saying Kevin,” she’d said, hoping to steer the conversation in another direction.

“I know,” he said, “it’s none of my business.” He studied her for a moment. “But I don’t like what I’m seeing.”

That had been months ago and Maeve was still in the motel, hovering like a skeletal bird of prey, just waiting to swoop down on Shannon and Liam.

“It’s Sunday,” Shannon said. “I want you out by Friday.”

“I don’t want to leave,” Maeve said. “I like it in Los Angeles.”

“There are other motels in Los Angeles,” Shannon said.

“None this cheap,” Maeve said, and smiled as if that settled the question.

“By Friday,” Shannon said.

“And if I’m not out by Friday?”

This is not a negotiation, Shannon thought to herself, don’t fall into the trap.

“Friday,” Shannon repeated.

“I don’t think so,” Maeve said, picking up her stuff from the counter and sauntering toward the door just as Kevin Eastman entered the office.

Never one to pass up a chance to play the martyr, Maeve fluttered her false eyelashes like an inebriated butterfly and asked Kevin, “Can you believe my own daughter wants to throw me out?” she asked.

Without waiting for an answer, she pushed through the door into the humidity of the July afternoon.

“Want some help?” he asked.

Feeding Kate--A Charity Anthology

2012-07-10T10:28:00.001-07:00

We all get by with a little help from our friends and sometimes our friends need more help than others. Feeding Kate is an anthology friends are putting together to raise money for Sabrina (of the blog "My Friends Call Me Kate"). She needs surgery and her insurance won't pay for it. You can read the details here on Thomas Pluck's blog and then you can head over to the Indiegogo page to see what a donation as little as $5 will get you.
I don't know Sabrina/Kate but for $5, I can help a sister out AND get an e-copy of the anthology, which will contain stories by Thomas Pluck, Hilary Davidson, Chad Eagleton, Chad Rohrbacher, Johnny Shaw, Anthony Shaw, Steve Weddle, Chuck Wendig, and Holly West. (Plus a lot more.)
Feel free to give more, but know that every little bit helps!

NoHo Noir: The Heat is On!

2012-07-07T17:26:00.002-07:00

The Heat Is On

Written by Katherine Tomlinson

Illustrated by Mark Satchwill

Vera Polk was bored. It was such an unusual sensation for her that she almost didn’t recognize it at first and thought it was just another variety of depression. It had been a tough school year and now that it was summer, she should have felt the usual vacation uptick in her mood, but instead she’d been plagued with sleeplessness and a vague sense of ennui.

“Just be glad you’re not teaching summer school,” her friend Moira had said when they met for lunch at City Wok one weekend.

Moira’s husband had been unemployed for nearly two years. She was burnt out on the job of teaching English to disinterested teens, but there was no scenario in which she could afford not to teach during the summer. It was starting to get to her, though. Whenever she and Vera got together, all Moira wanted to do was vent.

“We’re doing a section on Romeo & Juliet,” she said. “I promised everyone I’d give them an A if they could prove they’d watched any of the movie versions.”

She forked in another morsel of the crispy, sweet-hot City Wok Chicken they’d both ordered.

“Poo came in with a screen shot from Romeo is Bleeding,” she added.

Vera raised her eyebrow.

“Joel Silver movie,” Moira explained. “Jet Li. Gangs.” Moira slugged down the rest of her diet Coke. “I gave him a C and he was happy with it.”

Vera shuddered. She taught geometry, trigonometry and calculus. There was no chance that the thuggish Poo was going to end up in one of her classes.

She grabbed the check when it came. “My treat,” she said, as she almost always did.

“I’ll get it next time,” Moira said, as she almost always did.

“It’s on Ms. Math Whiz,” Vera assured her.

Vera was bored with Ms. Math Whiz. She’d turned in a draft of her latest “math for idiots” book in May and was waiting for her editor to give her the final edits. She made a nice side living from the books—almost twice what she brought home from her teaching job—but writing them was getting to be a chore. She enjoyed getting email from enthusiastic geeks who wanted to talk about famous math puzzles and she looked forward to interacting with a couple of her Twitter followers who engaged in lively conversations about subjects ranging from the discovery of the “God Particle” to the science of Prometheus. Other than that, though, being Ms. Math Whiz was about as much fun as teaching remedial math in a vocational school.

She was sitting on her balcony, relaxing with a glass of wine and gazing at the empty parking lot behind her condo when she was suddenly struck with the notion of creating a container garden.

She knew it was too late in the season for tomatoes, but she could try some herbs—chives and sage and dill—and chili peppers. The idea made her happy.

She finished off her glass of wine and went into her home office to tweet a few things before bed. The follower who called him/herself @geekusinterruptus was raving about the new Spider Man movie and wondering if she’d seen it yet. She’d lied and said she had, that she thought it was the best one yet.

The last time Vera had attempted any sort of gardening project, she’d bought all her plants from Stevens Nursery in Studio City. She’d loved browsing there, especially on cool days when the tropical humidity of the greenhouse felt like a lush oasis in the middle of the generally arid LA suburbs.

Stevens had been razed years ago, though, to make room for the ugliest mega-condo/apartment complex in the area.

Vera had found a nursery in Burbank that had a resident cat and good prices. She’d filled a basket with little green and white plastic pots filled with three-inch shoots of aromatic green. She’d been captivated by a square-stemmed plant that smelled like a peppermint patty.

“That’s chocolate mint,” said a guy wearing a dark green polo shirt with the Plant One On Us logo. “It’s great mixed with strawberries, but it’s a little late to be planting it.”

He took the pot out of her hands and put it back on the shelf with the other baby plants. “You’ll want to wait until the fall for it, or maybe early next spring.”

Vera was somewhere between bemused and annoyed as he looked over the other choices in her cart.

“Rosemary and sage but no thyme?” he asked. “How will you ever season a roast chicken?”

“I make roast chicken with garlic and lemon,” she said, not sure why she was trading cooking tips with a total stranger.

“Simple and elegant,” the guy said, “like the cook.”

Vera blushed from the tips of her toes even as she deflected the compliment with a bit of a shrug. “It’s hard to mess up a roast chicken,” she said.

“Au contraire,” the guy said, with a pitch-perfect accent. “At the Culinary Institute of America they ask you to make two things to show off your expertise before graduating.”

“A roast chicken,” Vera guessed, “and what?”

“An omelette,” he replied. “The idea being that if you can create something beautifully simple, you can go on to cook something more complex.”

“You’re a cook?” she asked the guy.

Now it was his turn to shrug.

“I eat a lot of pasta,” he said. “I picked up a cookbook in self-defense.”

Vera casually glanced at the guy’s bare left hand while pretending to tidy the plants in her basket.

Divorced? Gay?

“Let me know if you need any help with anything,” the guy said and turned away.

Say something Vera.

“What about chilies?” she blurted, holding out a pot with a couple of the bright red peppers already ripening.

“Good choice for summer gardening,” he said. “Good way to spice things up.”

She smiled at him, charmed.

“I think I’m ready to check out,” she said.

“Right this way,” he said, and without asking, took the handle of her cart and rolled it over to the checkstand.

“Good luck,” he said to her as she walked away with her purchases. “Let me know if you have any problems.”

Vera blushed again as she put her change away. “I will,” she said, and was surprised that she actually meant it.

The owner of the shop looked at her brother as he watched Vera head for her car.

“She’ll be back,” he promised her.

She knew he was right. Business had almost doubled since he’d started working for her.

Seducing the middle-aged customers was like shooting fish in a barrel for him.

She almost felt guilty about it.

Almost.

As for Vera…she wasn’t bored any more.

A different kind of noir

2012-07-07T08:32:00.001-07:00

Pulp Ink 2 mashes up noir and horror. Here's who's in it: Kevin Brown, Mike Miner, Eric Beetner, Heath Lowrance, Matthew C. Funk, Richard Godwin, Cindy Rosmus, Christopher Black, Andrez Bergen, James Everington, W. D. County, Julia Madeleine, Kieran Shea, Joe Clifford, Katherine Tomlinson, R. Thomas Brown, Court Merrigan, BV Lawson, and Patti Abbott. That's 15.7 cents per story.

Go get it now! And while you're at it, pick up Pulp Ink for just 99 cents. And while you're on the page, why not hit the "like" button. That's free.

Matt Damon is a bad ass in Elysium

2012-07-05T13:07:00.000-07:00

First pics are out. Here it is. You're welcome.

NoHo Noir: There is no Contingency Plan

2012-07-01T00:43:00.000-07:00

There is no Contingency Plan for the Zombie Apocalypse

Written by Katherine Tomlinson

Illustration by Mark Satchwill

It was 101 degrees outside but Esme had cracked the car’s window to avoid breathing in the stale alcohol fumes her partner was breathing out. The metabolized bourbon mixed with toxic levels of garlic from the pizza he’d eaten at lunch had formed an almost visible aura around him. The smell was so thick she wondered if it would explode if she flicked her lighter.

Some days she really missed smoking.

“We should all go out sometime,” Edgar said, for at least the fourth time since they’d clocked in. He was newly hooked up with a skanky badge bunny he’d met in a bar and was looking for validation for the relationship. Considering he’d thrown away four years of sobriety to be with his new love, Esme was not a big fan. She already knew more than she wanted to about “Lucinda” from the pictures on Edgar’s cell and the stories he chose to relate.

She didn’t even listen to the stories anymore, just nodded or grunted every once in awhile.

“You’re not listening Esme,” Edgar said.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’ve got a little bit of a headache.”

“Caffeine withdrawal,” Edgar suggested smugly. He drank Maker’s Mark like it was mother’s milk but didn’t like coffee. She had tried to be inconspicuous about her attempts to cut back on coffee in the wake of a scare with some breast cysts, but Edgar had noticed and driven her nuts with questions until she finally admitted what she was doing.

She was about to say something scathing about there not being sobriety chips for caffeine when the call came over the radio.

“Dispatch, say again,” Edgar said.

“You heard me Edgar,” the dispatcher said, in total violation of protocol. “You’d better get over there fast. The uni who called it in sounded pretty freaked out.”

Esme was already turning the car around.

“It was only a matter of time before they showed up in Los Angeles,” Edgar said.

“There is no ‘they,’ Edgar,” Esme said.

“You saw the memo, same as me,” he insisted.

“This is L.A.,” Esme said, “somebody’s shooting a movie.”

Edgar made a noise that sounded like “humph.”

Esme sighed. It was bad enough that everyone on the force had been working overtime on the homeless serial killer case. When the stories started coming in about cannibal attacks and zombies eating dogs, and the shift briefings started including warnings about designer drugs, everything got amped up another notch.

She knew Edgar was just clowning around to annoy her but some of the kids actually believed zombies were real.

But then, Esme guessed she couldn’t blame them when news stories were actually reporting that voters thought President Obama was better suited to leading the country in the face of an alien attack than Mitt Romney.

In the face of an alien attack, God help us, Esme thought.

“I wonder if it’s a fast zombie,” Edgar said.

When Esme and Edgar got to the park, there was a crowd milling around an officer who was unsuccessfully trying to set a perimeter. Two guys were kneeling on the ground with their hands clasped behind their heads. One was wearing full-on zombie makeup, the other had gory “wound” makeup on his neck and torso.

The zombie was crying.

One of the uniforms saw Esme and Edgar approaching and double-timed it over to them.

“What’s going on?” Esme asked.

“Ah, coupla kids were filming without a permit and …”

“You’re the one who called it in?” Edgar asked.

“Yes sir,” the kid said, blushing.

“Outstanding,” Edgar said and patted the kid on the shoulder as he made his way to the center of the scrum.

“I didn’t see any equipment,” the cop said sheepishly. “They were using lipstick cams. And people had called 911 claiming there was a guy in the park eating someone else’s face.”

His voice trailed off. “I’m sorry,” he said.

Esme wanted to tell him that it could have happened to anyone but she just wasn’t feeling it.

She started toward the two wannabe Tarantinos but then something on the edge of the crowd caught her eye.

A fat girl in a too-small halter top was struggling with a skinny guy who seemed to be trying to pull it off.

People were edging away from them but no one was moving to intervene. The girl was screaming but there didn’t seem to be real fear in it.

Esme read the two as a couple but you never could tell. The girl was slapping at the guy with what looked like real force.

Esme started toward them but Edgar got there first. He grabbed the skinny guy and shook him like pitbull shaking a kitten.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Edgar yelled.

Edgar had a low tolerance for men who abused women. Normally Esme found that one of his best features but she didn’t like the idea that he was breathing alcohol into the face of a citizen who might later want to make a report.

“You like hurting girls?” Edgar demanded.

The skinny guy just gawked at Edgar, flailing his arms and trying to jerk out of his grip.

“Stop it,” the fat girl cried. “You’re hurting him.”

Shit, Esme thought. Just another couple into exhibition-style foreplay.

Esme slowed her roll just as the skinny guy reached into Edgar’s coat and pulled his weapon right out of its holster.

Fuck!

Edgar made a grab for the gun but the skinny guy danced back, balancing the heavy gun in both hands, pointing it directly at Edgar’s face.

Later, Esme would not even remember pulling her own gun, but she would remember spreading her feet into a regulation shooting stance and calling out, “Drop the gun now!”

The skinny guy didn’t react but by now the fat girl had realized that something really bad was about to go down.

“Put it down Cory,” she yelled.

“Listen to your girlfriend Cory,” Esme echoed.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Cory said with a sneer, not moving to comply with Esme’s orders.

Out of the corner of her eye Esme caught the girl’s reaction to his statement.

He’s hurt her feelings, she thought. And now he’s not going to do what she asked because he has to show that she is not the boss of him.

Whoever she is.

Esme was still processing this when she saw Cory’s finger tighten on the trigger. “No,” she yelled and fired at the same moment Edgar lunged for the gun.

Her partner’s shoulder exploded in a mist of tissue, bone and blood.

Cory dropped the gun and staggered back, his face covered with splattered gore.

He looks just like a zombie,” Esme thought.

You have been warned!

2012-06-30T16:37:00.001-07:00

The Best-Tasting Movie Promo Ever

2012-06-29T19:01:00.002-07:00

Nothing says Dark Knight Rising like chocolate and Cadbury's dark chocolate brand Bournville is going all out to promote the Warner Bros. movie. (But wait, wouldn't the brand have been even more appropriate for the upcoming Bourne reboot?) More information here.

Free Noir!

2012-06-26T11:38:00.000-07:00

Who doesn't love Free Noir? It's almost as good as free love. Right now Noiristo Nigel Bird is offering his third collection of short stories, With Love and Squalor free. As a special pre-publication promo for Pulp Ink 2, he's also offering the original collection, Pulp Ink free.

Bloodline from James Rollins--out now

2012-06-26T00:05:00.003-07:00

We're big James Rollins fans here at NoHo Noir and the good news is that he has a new Sigma Force novel available. It's called Bloodline. More about it here.

Dark Fiction: The Dark Monk

2012-06-24T19:32:00.000-07:00

Something for the TBR pile. The Dark Monk by Oliver Pötzsch is the second book in a series called "The Hangman's Daughter." The stories take place in 17th century Bavaria where Magdalena, the daughter of a hangman (whose duties also involve extracting confessions by any means necessary) solves crimes.