“That’s right.”
“What happens if I don’t?”
The big man shrugged. “Find out.”
I thought about it. Decided not to.
“No,” I said. “I’ll come.”
The big man nodded once. If I had to guess, I’d say I disappointed him.
He opened the Bentley’s rear door. “One condition,” I said to him.
“What’s that?”
“You got any change?”
The big man cocked his head at me quizzically, and then rummaged through his pockets. I held out my palm, and he dropped three pound coins into my hand. I took two, and handed one back. “Thanks,” I said. “I’ll only be a second.”
I trotted back to Danny’s grave and placed the coins atop his headstone.
Then I climbed into the waiting Bentley, and, doors locking, it pulled out of the graveyard, headed toward God knows where.
Acknowledgments
It takes a great deal of work to turn a humble manuscript into a finished, polished novel, and though I’d love nothing more to bask in all the credit, it’s hardly mine alone in which to bask. To that end, I extend my deepest gratitude to my agent, Jennifer Jackson, and to the crack Angry Robot team of Marc Gascoigne, Lee Harris, and Darren Turpin, as well as honorary Robot John Tintera. And though I’ll never turn away a compliment for my lovely, lovely covers, it’s worth noting said compliments should rightly be directed to Marco once more, and to the fine folks at Amazing 15 Design.
Thanks to my parents for their love and support, and to my sister Anna, for occasionally distracting them so I can get some writing done. Thanks also to my in-laws (father, mother, sisters, and brothers), for putting the lie to the stereotype and championing me at every turn. My extended family deserves thanks, too, both for their great generosity of spirit and because I suspect they may well comprise the majority of my readership.
I’ve been fortunate in my writing career to cross paths with more wonderful people than I could possibly list here. However, I would like to single out a few of them for providing me support along the way (with sincere apologies to anyone I’ve missed): John Anealio, Jedidiah Ayres, Patrick Shawn Bagley, Eric Beetner, Frank Bill, Nigel Bird, Stephen Blackmoore, Judy Bobalik, Chris Bowe and the fine folks at Longfellow Books, Paul D. Brazill, Maurice Broaddus, R. Thomas Brown, Bill Cameron, Rodney Carlstrom, Kristin Centorcelli, Joelle Charbonneau, Sean Chercover, David Cranmer and cohorts at Beat to a Pulp, the Cressey family, my fellow Criminal Minds bloggers, Laura K. Curtis, Hilary Davidson, Tony DiMarco, Barna Donovan, Neliza Drew, Jacques Filippi, the whole Founding Fields crew, Renee Fountain, Kent Gowran, Janet Hutchings, Sally Janin, Naomi Johnson, Suzanne Johnson, Jon and Ruth Jordan, John Kenyon, Chris La Tray, Jennifer Lawrence, Brian Lindenmuth and the fantastic folks at Spinetingler, Sophie Littlefield, Jennifer MacRostie, Dan Malmon, Matthew McBride, Erin Mitchell, Scott Montgomery, Joe Myers, Stuart Neville, Lauren O’Brien, Sabrina Ogden, Dan O’Shea, Miranda Parker, Lou Pendergrast, Ron Earl Phillips, Kathleen Pigeon, James W. Powell, Keith Rawson, Kieran Shea, Julia Spencer-Fleming (and her husband Ross), Julie Summerell, Brian Vander Ark, Jeff VanderMeer, Meineke van der Salm, Steve Weddle, Chuck Wendig, Elizabeth A. White, and Shaun Young.
And, as ever, thanks to my lovely wife Katrina: my copilot, my ideal reader, my best friend. A good spouse will pretend not to notice their partner is making it up as they go; only the best of them encourage it.
About the Author
Chris F. Holm was born in Syracuse, New York, the grandson of a cop with a penchant for crime fiction. He wrote his first story at the age of six. It got him sent to the principal’s office. Since then, his work has fared better, appearing in such publications as Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Needle Magazine, Beat to a Pulp, and Thuglit.
He’s been a Derringer Award finalist and a Spinetingler Award winner, and he’s also written a novel or two. He lives on the coast of Maine with his lovely wife and a noisy, noisy cat.
Why the Hell?
Portions of this essay first appeared on Do Some Damage, L.A. Noir, and The SciFi Guys, and are reprinted with permission.
The Collector series, it seems, is a tough one to pin down. I’ve seen it referred to as gonzo pulp. Urban fantasy. Paranormal mystery. Even, to my great surprise, as science fiction, despite the fact there ain’t much science to be found within its pages.
Truth is, I don’t really mind what people call it, so long as they’re enjoying it. If you ask me, though, the Collector series is fantastical noir. But since there’s a teeny tiny chance I made that phrase up, I should probably explain just what the heck I think it means.
“Noir” is perhaps the slipperiest term in all of literature. That’s in large part due to its muddy origins; our modern use of the term derives from the film noir of the ’40s and ’50s, which in turn borrowed heavily from the bleak crime tales that began cropping up in the U.S. during the Depression. James Cain, author of The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity, is widely credited as the creator of the modern roman noir. Before Cain, the term was used to refer to what we’d now call Gothic novels, but afterward, the term took on a life of its own.
Thing is, Cain wasn’t wild about the label, and those classic film noir flicks? Yeah, they weren’t called that then. The title was bestowed upon them by a French critic years after they began popping up in theaters, and the so-called noir canon wasn’t really well-defined until the ’70s, when critics and cinema historians adopted the label en masse; before then, most of what we consider film noir were simply melodramas. So really, noir fiction is the result of a decades-long game of telephone that bounced from books to movies and back again, with stops on two continents along the way. Now, there’s not a lot of agreement as to what it means; like pornography, it seems, most folks just know it when they see it.
The definition that’s gotten the most traction of late is noir preservationist Eddie Muller’s take on noir as “working class tragedy,” due in large part to the fact that it’s been championed by no less than Dennis Lehane. “In Greek tragedy, they fall from great heights,” sayeth Lehane. “In noir, they fall from the curb.”
Now, that doesn’t strike me as half bad, but it’s more descriptive than prescriptive; a shorthand for where noir’s been, as opposed to an instruction manual for where it’s going. For my money, noir boils down to bleak humanism —or, to put it more plainly: shit options, bad decisions, and dire consequences. The difference between Greek tragedy and noir ain’t the height of the fall, but the reason: those who fall in Greek tragedy do so because they’re destined to; those who fall in noir choose to their damn selves.
In short, free will’s a bitch.
But regardless of whose definition you go with, you’ll notice something’s lacking: namely, any mention of genre. That’s because for as much as noir’s assumed to be a subset of crime fiction, it’s more vibe than subgenre. And, as many an enterprising modern writer seems intent on proving, that vibe is one that plays just as well with fantasy and science fiction as it does with crime.
When I sat down to write Dead Harvest, it was the darker aspects of free will I was most interested in exploring. I was raised in a Catholic family, and I’ve long been fascinated with the Church’s teachings on the matter of free will. On the one hand, we’re told God gave to humankind, his most beloved creation, the gift of free will, and on the other, that said gift resulted in the humankind’s expulsion from paradise, and a taint that’s passed to every one of us at birth. We’re taught that three-quarters of everything we do —or even think —is sinful, and we should beg forgiveness at every turn lest we wind up burning for all eternity. We’re taught that even good people can go to hell if they don’t play by God’s rules. And we’re taught that if they do wind up in hell, it’s all their fault.
I’m not trying to knock my family’s faith. But being raised in such a faith can scare the ever-loving shit out of you. It puts no small amoun
t of pressure on you to make good decisions, and no doubt has filled the pews for damn near two thousand years of Sundays with folks trying desperately to reconcile their decisions and their beliefs with a rulebook that’s both dense and difficult to comprehend. Because by God, if they don’t, they’re gonna take a fall.
Truth is, the old pulps from which my series draws its tone aren’t so far afield from the Church in that regard. I suppose it shouldn’t surprise: after all, what were the early pulps if not lurid updates of classic morality plays? James Cain’s tales of forbidden romance leading to violence, misery, and regret may as well have taken place in Eden. Chandler’s cops and criminals were often cut from the same cloth, while Revelations and the Book of Enoch talk of angels and their fallen brethren. Genesis tells the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah; in Red Harvest (whose title I not-sosubtly twisted to suit my own nefarious purposes), Hammett writes of Poisonville. And speaking of Poisonville, while nearly every culture on the planet has their own flood myth of rising waters sent to wash away the wickedness from the world, Hammett’s violent cleansing of that corrupt burg came courtesy of his nameless, unflagging Continental Op —but it was no less awesome for it. And what would any pulp tale be without a decent femme fatale? The Babylonian Talmud first introduced the world to a redheaded, acid-tongued temptress by the name of Lilith, who, in one form or another, has since wreaked havoc in darn near every religious or occult text penned. I’m pretty sure she popped up in The Maltese Falcon, too, only then she was known as Brigid O’Shaughnessy. Lord knows she shows up in my series. And believe me when I tell you, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
To my mind, the Collector series affords me the opportunity to revisit the roots of these classic archetypes, in what I hope is both a fresh and exciting way. And to drop into their midst a man in Sam Thornton who’s not so different from you or I —trying desperately to make his way through the moral minefield that is free will. Sam’s neither a bad man nor a perfect one, but even in the direst of situations, his intentions, at least, are pure.
Of course, you know what they say about good intentions…
Praise for CHRIS F. HOLM
“With a candid style that exhibits solid confidence and finesse, Chris Holm pulls readers in and pins us to the edge of our seats”
NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS
“The breakneck pace of the narrative, and the world Holm creates, make for a thrillingly brutal ride.”
SFX MAGAZINE
“Jim Thompson meets John Milton in this thrilling supernatural riff on the old collections racket. This gripping supernatural adventure gives a whole new meaning to ‘possession is nine-tenths of the law.’”
EDGAR AND SHAMUS AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR CHARLES ARDAI
“The Collector series gets off to a strong start with this noir urban fantasy, a very promising first novel.”
LOCUS MAGAZINE
“Chris F. Holm clearly had both angels and devils watching over him as he wrote Dead Harvest. Thrilling, riveting and hardboiled as hell, this stunning debut still manages to be incredibly soulful. If I could recommend one book to everyone this year, this would be it.”
ANTHONY, ELLIS & MACAVITY AWARD-NOMINATED AUTHOR HILARY DAVIDSON
“Get a nicotine patch cause you’ll be smokin’ by the end of Dead Harvest. A surreal page-turner where crime meets goth meets fantasy meets horror, strips the elements of everything you knew about storytelling, and creates a new genre called Chris F. Holm!”
FRANK BILL, AUTHOR OF CRIMES IN SOUTHERN INDIANA
Also by Chris F. Holm
Dead Harvest
Copyright
ANGRY ROBOT
Osprey Publishing Inc.
44-02 23rd Street,
Suite 219,
Long Island City,
New York,
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USA.
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He’s a soul man.
An Angry Robot paperback original 2012.
Copyright © 2012 by Chris F. Holm
Cover art by Amazing 15
Distributed in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York.
All rights reserved.
Angry Robot is a registered trademark and the Angry Robot icon a trademark of Angry Robot Ltd.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Sales of this book without a front cover may be unauthorized. If this book is coverless, it may have been reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed” and neither the author nor the publisher may have received payment for it.
ISBN 978-0-85766-221-7
eBook ISBN: 978-0-85766-222-4
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The Wrong Goodbye tc-2 Page 28