Hey all you fags and cunts and faggy cunts, the mad man is back! Where have I been? Fuck off! If I wanted to answer that I wouldn’t have disappeared in the first place.
Did I come up with the above brilliant title on my own? No! It’s from a Leonard Cohen song. I’m not as talented as he is. So I plagiarized.
Seriously, when Neil asked me to write “Another Earful,” I had to confess that I’d been out of touch with crime fiction since I fell off the map 4-5 years back. Read the last column I wrote before PWG’s hiatus. You’ll sense me getting over it.

After sleeping on his offer, I then figured I could write an earful called “Quitters Never Win.” A self-effacing yet affirming piece about how I gave up and now all the other crimedogs have multiple publications while I’ve got my thumb in my ass.

Butt fuck that!

Why? Because that column wouldn’t have been the truth. Fact is I’m happy as hell for all the old crew, especially Neil because I know him the best. I know how much work it takes to write a manuscript. Know how much more it takes to re-write a manuscript. Know how hard you’ve got to bite your tongue to keep from telling all the faggy parasitic agents and publishers what you really think of them. And finally, I know that getting published takes a whole lot of a quality that I don’t have. Faith.

I’m a faithless fuck. Always have been. So let me tell you about how I lost what little faith I ever had in being a crime fiction novelist. Not to bum you out, though I don’t give a shit if that’s what I do, but to offer some straight honest ugly talk for any and all hopefuls out there.

Why? Because back when I started with PWG, I was you. I spent years of hard work writing, networking, etc. Was it all a waste of time? A giant jerkoff? Hmmmm…

Well, I wouldn’t say hard work is ever a waste. And though deep down in my darkest places, I’d rather be machine gunning crowds than being nice to people I don’t give a shit about, still the social/political aspects of writing is how I learned sales. Which made me good money over the years. Yet and still, at the end of the day I was chasing a grand delusion.

It’s this that I want to lay bare for you. All you hopefuls, listen close now. Real fuckin’ close. Nobody, I repeat NOBODY is making a living at this. Okay, that’s not true. A few are. But if you want to get into statistical type reality, the kind we’re all stuck in whether we like it or not, you might as well resolve to the fact that you’re never going to write for a living.

See, much as I loved writing and much as I loved crime fiction, what I was really after was a way to do something artistic for a living. And that’s why I said – fuck this in the ass! That’s why I can’t offer you some affirming cuddly piece about how if I’d only stuck with it, blah blah fuckin’ blah!

That’s why I’m smashing you in the face with the column I wish somebody had broken my nose with when I first found PWG.

Why? Because then I could’ve done some real soul searching and examined the hell out of why I was writing in the first place. This is something I suggest you do now. Because you better be doing it out of pure love. I mean that giggly Junior High, I pop a boner just thinking of your beesting titties kind of love. And you better be doing it as an end in and of itself. If you’re not, the reality is going to depress the living shit out of you. Trust me. I been there.

Go ahead. Tell yourself I’m just a bitter asshole. You’re right! But make sure you send me a copy of that first million dollar advance. I’ll say congrats for blowing me off and send you a jpeg of my giant cock if you’re willing to share some of the money with me.

Let’s neither one of us hold our breath, deal?

So where does that leave us? Well, I dunno. Maybe that’s what’s exciting? If I’m going to write another one of these, then I need to brush up on what’s changed in crime fiction.

Of course, all agents are still condescending cum guzzlers. And most of these people with their names on books probably haven’t made a dime that hasn’t gone back into self-promotion. And so many of the chosen few who are living the dream are the shits and always will be.

But what has really changed within the writing?

Now let me confess something else, seeing as I’ve been holding back on you thus far. I told Neil that I’d write another column and attempt to get back into the genre after I checked out some stories on the new Plots with Guns.

On the old issues, there’d be a few stories that I was into and a few more that I thought were boring genre rehash and a lot of pussy bullshit, even if they were trying like hell to be the blackest of noir.

I don’t feel this way about these new batches. What I read recently is the kind of stuff I wanted to read and more correctly, the kind of stuff I wanted to be written. Less cliché. Less fear of God. More let me shit in your face…or the top of your toilet as the case may be.

So you sick little fuckers, keep writing and do your homework! I’m still gonna be a prick about that. And I’ll keep reading and we’ll see where it goes from here. Who knows? Maybe you’ll so inspire me that I consider attending another Bouchercon?

But let’s not hold our breath waiting for that one either…

OOXXXOOXXX

Hugs & Black Kisses,
Maviano

Trev is fatter, hairier and cruder than he was before.