Angry Moon

Earlier today I finished reading Terrill Lee Lankford's first novel ANGRY MOON. (First written, second published, if I remember right from the interview on Al Guthrie's excellent Noir Originals website.) Having read Lankford's EARTHQUAKE WEATHER earlier this year, I was expecting a good book. I got it. A very fine book, in fact.

ANGRY MOON starts out seeming to be a well-written but fairly standard crime novel -- mob hitman wants out of the business, but first he has to do one last job: killing his own mentor who taught him everything he knows. But then . . . things get weird. And weirder. This novel has a furious pace and well-drawn characters and is very entertaining. It's probably not as good as EARTHQUAKE WEATHER. It's more of a straight-ahead story and lacks that later book's scope and wonderful use of Hollywood and the movie business. But ANGRY MOON is still about as much pure fun as any book I've read this year.

That leaves me with only SHOOTERS to read. Write more, Lee.

On my own writing front, I got started on my next book today and enjoyed it, as I usually do when I start a new one. Livia and I also discussed that outline I worked on yesterday, kicked around an idea or two to add to it, and tried to come up with a good title. No real luck yet on that front, though.

With ANGRY MOON finished I'll be going back to the Mountie anthology for a day or two and reading a few stories there.