So I'm in Wal-Mart today, browsing the book section, and I see a hardback copy of Michael Connelly's new novel THE NARROWS. Having just read and enjoyed THE BLACK ECHO, I thought I'd take a look at this one. I open the book . . . and the first line of dust jacket copy -- the very first line! -- gives away the identity of the killer in a previous Connelly novel. Well, there's a book I won't ever need to read, I guess. What's really frustrating is that the line of jacket copy could have been edited so that it would be equally effective and still not give anything away. I guess in these days of movie previews that detail the entire plot of the film, such things just don't matter anymore.

After running errands all morning and part of the afternoon, I came home and wrote 12 pages, plus finished up my zine for the next PEAPS mailing.

Currently reading the novelette "No Man's Guns" by T.T. Flynn in the November 1953 issue of BIG-BOOK WESTERN. Flynn is one of my favorite Western authors. This is actually a reprint of a story originally published in 1935 as "King of the Rio Gunmen", but I don't know where it appeared under that title.