The end of May is upon us, summer is coming, and with it the opportunity for beach reading, vacation reading, and campfire-side reading. What better way to celebrate the summer than with your favorite hard-boiled Bay Area Private Eye, Clarke Lantham?

Lantham is the first of several treats I’ve got lined up for you this summer and he comes gift wrapped with three major events hitting between now and the fourth of July.

  1. Silent Victor in Paperback
  2. That’s right. At long last, the fourth and most current Clarke Lantham novel will be coming in paperback next week, with all the car crashes, alien abductions, conspiracy theorists, spies, science museums, gunfights, international incidents, murder, mayhem, nipple jewelry, and hardcore snark you’ve come to expect from a Lantham novel. Four hundred pages long, this breathless thrill ride will keep your ass glued to that beach towel long after the tide comes in to sweep you away.
     

  3. And Then She Was Gone blog serialization
  4. Many of you discovered this blog through the podcasts, which means you may not have had your first taste of Lantham. Well, your wait is just about over. In celebration of item 3 on this list, and to build anticipation, starting next week I will be serializing the very first Clarke Lantham Mystery, And Then She Was Gone on this very blog. Each episode will cover between 1500 and 3000 words, and will post in html and as an epub (which will also go on the podcast feed). The book will stay up until a month after the entire book has finished its serialization, so those of you following along will be able to read it all the way through (even if you come in late). New installments will post every Tuesday and Thursday, ideally positioned to help you get through the middle part of your work week. The entire process should take ten to twelve weeks, so I can keep you on tenterhooks all summer long. [insert evil laugh here]
    I might even do some Dealing In episodes to augment the experience, so sharpen those death threat skills and get your comment-rants ready!
     

  5. He Ain’t Heavy a.k.a. Lantham #5
    This is the biggie, the one I’m really excited about. The fifth Clarke Lantham Mystery, He Ain’t Heavy, is coming at the end of June. In this one, Lantham faces down tech billionaires in his most disturbing adventure yet, one that brings him face-to-face with his own mortality (and lack of cooking ability) and plunges him headlong into a world of venture capitalists, arms dealers, corrupt cops, Evangelical social activists, rambunctious puppies, surly sherrifs, and mexican drug lords. If you thought And Then She Was Gone was fast paced, if you thought Silent Victor was perverse and twisty, if you thought Smoke Rings was emotinoally harrowing, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

    Paperback and ebook releases are scheduled for the same day, and we’ll have the facility to do pre-orders for signed books (both singles of book five and complete sets, all signed), which I’ll update you on as the time draws nearer.

    More news soon. Enjoy your various conventions–and look for me in the bar at Baycon, where I’ll be sneaking in an appearance!