So the new fitness habit has taken hold and I think that getting up and knowing I am going to work out first thing (after coffee) is the biggest help. No thinking. No scheduling. Just do it first thing.

I might need to take a similar tact with writing. I’m finding the last month that it’s more hit and miss and takes a lot of mental effort to get going. I need to set it and forget it.

Here are 3 crime fiction links, 2 quotes, and 1 question for this week:

3 LINKS

• CrimeReads digs into ultra dark noir. I do tend to like darker books but sometimes it’s too much. Personally, I’d nominate Flynn’s DARK PLACES one of the few books I couldn’t finish b/c it was so dark.
  
  
• The Guardian finds King’s BILLY SUMMERS meandering, stereotypical, and indulgent, and also his best book in years. .
  
  
• The NYTs takes the recent (or pending) ends to BOSCH, MR INBETWEEN and JACK IRISH to examine if the TV landscape has become less hospitable to hard-boiled crime dramas with middle-aged white male heroes.

2 QUOTES

Two quotes from some classic noir this week:

• “In this world you turn the other cheek and you get hit with a lug wrench.”
  
  
• “That’s life. Whichever way you turn, fate sticks out a foot to trip you.”

1 QUESTION

• What is your favorite classic noir movie?

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Until next Thursday, happy reading,

Mike

Author the Max Strong thriller series