Not mine, by the way. This time. No, I’ve just finished reading a rough manuscript by a private investigator who’s turned a real-life case into a fictionalized account, and it had a very good story. I mean, something of a tragedy, but that’s life, innit? I think I gave some good feedback. I hope I did, at least.
I don’t want to say the author’s name or the name of the manuscript, not until it’s more tightened up, I guess? On the other hand, since I’m working on a crime thing of my own, I wanted to state that I had read the work, so everybody knows there’s nothing shady going on here. I already promised I wouldn’t steal from him, and I won’t, ha.
(If I’m going to steal from a crime author, it’s going to be Robert B. Parker and his forebears, Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Just so’s you knows.)
The second installment of the World of Trouble series (Cult of Personality) is going to be heavily led by a private investigator, so maybe I’ll get to have a real-life PI read that (whenever it’s done) and get some feedback? That would be neat. And while that certainly is one reason I did the reading, I also want to pay forward all the help I got when I was a wee budding author, myself.
People like David Moody, Jonathan Maberry, Tim Curran, and Joe McKinney all took time out of their schedule to help me out, be it in the form of advice or reading a finished manuscript for a cover blurb. And who the hell was I? Nobody, with no real prospects, and they helped anyway.
So now that I’m still nobody with few prospects, I still like to help when I can. It’s not much, but it’s honest work. Heh. -TB