How I Got the Gun: Ryan Sayles
Back in August, a longtime friend Ryan Sayles reached out about his new book Like Whitewashed Tombs which released August 29th from Down & Out Books. Ryan’s work first appeared on Shotgun Honey in 2011, and he returned several times since. In fact we had the pleasure of publishing his novel Goldfinches in 2016. Before […]
My Los Angeles by Nolan Knight
Los Angeles—the siren, the beast—is at the heart of my short story collection, Beneath the Black Palms, out now by Down & Out Books. The collection was written over the course of fourteen years, many of the stories previously published in places like Thuglit, Plots with Guns, Needle, TOUGH and Crimespree Magazine. As a native […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: Severance Package (2003)
Back in 2001, a yesterday that is suddenly over twenty years in the past and an entire lifetime ago, Marvel Comics readers were treated to a surprisingly special title featuring — yet decidedly not featuring — Spider-Man. The cool concept here was that they would tell stories about people in Spider-Man’s orbit, or more specifically […]
How I Got the Gun: Paul J. Garth
Most of our Gauntlet members over the years have been past contributors to our online flash offering. Having been here since day one, it gives me a unique opportunity to watch these writers grow in their craft. Though I admit, Paul’s contributions have shown exceptional skill from his first story. Two weeks ago, THE LOW […]
Finding My Voice by Scott Blackburn
It dies with him. In the winter of 2018, a friend of mine said those words during a conversation we were having about family legacies, and almost immediately, the vague idea of a story (and title) formed in my brain. As a writer, having new ideas has never been my strength, so I let my […]
How I Got the Gun: Bobby Mathews
Kicking off a new iteration of our original interview series HOW I GOT THE GUN we sat down with Bobby Mathews whose debut book, LIVING THE GIMMICK, releases May 27, 2022 (tomorrow). Instead of an elaborate introduction, we’ll let Bobby’s words speak for themselves. How’d you get the gun? Or rather, what drew you to […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: Barbarian with a Gun (1994)
I grew up in the 1980s, in the lengthening shadow of the Vietnam War and well before the days of mobile phones and the Internet. I was deeply into action movies and adventure fiction at a time when a booming entertainment sub-genre had been established around the mythology of The ‘Nam. Not specifically war storytelling, […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: Mumbai Confidential (2012)
Have you ever noticed that in Korean crime movies, there’s a shit ton of street fighting with blades and blunt objects, but a distinct lack of gunplay? When guns actually do come into action, it’s a shocking moment and generally game-changing. This is markedly different from their Chinese brethren, which have made a signature of […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: LIAR’S KISS (2011)
Some of the first crime stories I experienced were from the venerable private eye genre; in fact the acknowledged granddaddy to the mystery story, Edgar Allan Poe’s Murders In The Rue Morgue is as much a P.I. story as anything. Oh, and Consulting Detective is just super British-y for Licensed Dick, I shit you not, […]
Author POV: NO BULL by Benjamin Drevlow
I never set out to run a lit mag, same way I never set out to be a writer. Growing up, the only thing I read was the thing the teacher made me read. The only thing I wrote was the thing the teacher made me write. Reading and writing were for exploring your emotions […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: BREAKNECK (2019)
There are more sub-genres in crime fiction that you can quantify, and there’s one wonderfully ADHD little crime-action love child that when done right, is sublime. It’s a ridiculously over the top premise, usually crime-related and played half-straight/half-surreal, with insane action, absurd humor and runaway pacing. There’s usually a race against the clock element that […]
Comics’ll Break Your Heart: Cage #1-5
“I heard you help people that need it.” Wow, that line got me. Lines like that get me in general, I mean I’m a softie and I accept that but this time it was a real gut punch. It wasn’t even the line, or the entirety of the panel, but the moment and all those […]