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The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
Joe R. Lansdale
The boys are back, and just in time for Season 3 of the Hap and Leonard TV series, starring Michael K. Williams (The Wire) and James Purefoy (Altered Carbon). Everyone’s favorite ass-kicking Texan duo are immortalized in this expanded collection of tall tales, slick nonfiction, and two full-length novellas.
The boys are back, and just in time for Season 3 of the Hap and Leonard TV series, starring Michael K. Williams (The Wire) and James Purefoy (Altered Carbon).
Hap Collins looks like a good ’ol boy, but his lefty politics don’t match. His buddy, Vietnam veteran Leonard Pine, is even more complicated: black, conservative, gay . . . and an occasional arsonist. With Hap and Leonard on the job, small-time crooks all on the way on up to the Dixie Mafia are extremely nervous.
Everyone’s favorite ass-kicking Texan duo are further immortalized in this expanded collection of tall tales, slick nonfiction, and four full-length novellas.
Foreword for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
Joe R. Lansdale can be a pain in the ass. That’s why this book exists.
Hap and Leonard collected all of the not-so-dynamic duo’s previously published shorter adventures (circa 2016) plus the original story “Not Our Kind,” basically everything that’s not a novel, in one handsome volume. This being the 21st century and all, an ebook edition was required. And therein lies the problem.
Seems Joe had promised the digital rights to the novellas “Hyenas,” “Dead Aim,” and the short story “The Boy Who Became Invisible” to another publisher than Tachyon. So we could wait until 2018 for the ebook, when the rights reverted, or figure out something else. We opted for the latter.
The ebook Hap and Leonard Ride Again contained all of the material present in Hap and Leonard except for the trio of stories mentioned above. Since the remaining material scarcely made for a book, we added the original short story “The Oak and the Pond,” the Marvin Hanson novella “A Bone Dead Sadness,” Joe’s comic script adaptation of “The Boy Who Became Invisible,” my interview with Joe, and an original remembrance about the creation of Hap and Leonard by Bill Crider, who sadly died while we were putting together The Big Book of Hap and Leonard.
When Joe offered us the rights to “Hyenas,” “Dead Aim,” and “The Boy Who Became Invisible,” we decided it was best to combine the two editions into this one super—dare I say big—book you hold in your virtual hands.
Sometimes a pain in the ass leads to gold. Not sure if this qualifies as such but if not, it’s damn close.
Rick Klaw, editor
Austin, Texas
February 23, 2018
Praise for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
“I recommend it for all Hap and Leonard fans. As you read, you might hate yourself for laughing, you might wish you had not laughed, but you are going to laugh.” —Looks at Books
“Compulsory if you’re a fan of the characters.”
—Pulp Consumption
Biography
Joe R. Lansdale is the internationally-bestselling author of over forty novels, including twelve books featuring the popular Hap and Leonard. Many of his cult classics have been adapted for television and film, most famously Bubba Ho-Tep, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. Lansdale has written numerous screenplays and teleplays, including for the iconic Batman the Animated Series. He has won an Edgar Award for The Bottoms, ten Stoker Awards, and has been designated a World Horror Grandmaster. Lansdale, like many of his characters, lives in East Texas.
Praise for Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade
[STARRED REVIEW] “Showcases some of Lansdale’s most personal and reflective writing to date.”
—Publishers Weekly
“If Frank Dobie is the Lone Star State’s Homer, if Larry McMurtry is the Texas equivalent of Henry James, then Joe R. Lansdale has to be the Mark Twain behind the pine curtain. No other writer—in Texas or any other state in the union—can switch between gut-bursting humor and nail-biting suspense with as much heart and grace as Lansdale . . . Blood and Lemonade is a must-have for just about everyone.”
—Texas Book in Review
“Joe R. Lansdale’s Blood and Lemonade is a masterpiece of addictive and stylistic storytelling.”
—Risingshadow
“Everything here is written in Lansdale’s inimitable style of down-home East Texas storytelling, and everything is eminently readable and enjoyable. There’s humor, there’s sadness, there’s blood, and there’s lemonade. And some cussing, too. Great stuff, irresistible reading.”
—Bill Crider, Pop Culture Magazine
“Joe Lansdale is our East Texas Hemingway, and here’s another example of what makes him great. In Hap & Leonard: Blood and Lemonade, he carves out beauty with plain words and direct sentences. Some of the stories in this mosaic novel are horrifying, others gritty, sad, thrilling, and funny, but all of them are beautiful. I ate it up.”
—Daryl Gregory, author of Spoonbenders and We Are All Completely Fine
“A brilliant ‘mosaic’ novel. An amazingly vivid style that feels like Hemingway. Themes that are especially important for our time. With these early adventures of his compelling Hap and Leonard characters, Joe. R. Lansdale hits a new high.”
—David Morrell, New York Times bestselling author of Murder As a Fine Art
“Blood and Lemonade is the best of Lansdale and the best of Hap and Leonard. As urgent as it is timeless. As fun as it is thoughtful. It haunts you while it kicks your ass. Joe never lets you down, just shows you over and over why he’s the best.”
—Jim Mickle, director of Cold in July
“Magnificent storytelling.”
—Char’s Horror Corner
“Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade is something truly special. You are going to love it”
—Horror Drive-In
“The dialogue is pitch perfect . . . thoughtful, rather clever, and with enough bullets and banter to satisfy the most demanding reader.”
—Sci-Fi and Fantasy Reviews
“When you come right down to it, this may be my favorite Hap and Leonard book ever, and that’s saying a lot.”
—Chet Williamson, author of Psycho Sanitarium
“Exceptional . . . Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade is a wonderful piece of storytelling, and a worthy addition to a great series.”
—October Country
Praise for Hap and Leonard
“Seven laid-back adventures, one of them brand new, for “freelance troubleshooter” and good old boy Hap Collins and his gay black Republican partner Leonard Pine. . . . No one currently working the field demonstrates more convincingly and joyously the deep affinity between pulp fiction and the American tall tale.”
—Kirkus
[STAR] “Last seen in the novel Honky Tonk Samurai, Lansdale’s incomparable East Texas crime fighting duo show their chops in this remarkable story collection. Hap Collins, a straight, white liberal, and Leonard Pine, a black, gay conservative, have long challenged genre conventions, and the friendship and camaraderie between these two hard cases as they suit up against injustice and hypocrisy is at the heart of these seven tales. In the novella “Hyenas,” the boys help save a client’s impressionable younger brother from the clutches of a group of psychotic robbers. “Dead Aim” finds the pair taking on the Dixie Mafia after a seemingly straightforward cheating spouse case gets a tad more complicated. “Not Our Kind” is set against the backdrop of the late 1960s, when a teenage Hap first befriends Leonard and faces the racism and intolerance of his peers up close. Readers can also look forward to the debut of the TV show Hap and Leonard on the Sundance Channel in March.
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“An essential Hap and Leonard addition”
—The Novel Pursuit
“As Mr. Lansdale might say, “This was more fun than rolling down a hill with a bunch of armadillos.”
—Horror Novel Reviews
“. . . it’s great to have all of these wonderful stories together in one nifty volume”
—Horror Drive-In
“Highly entertaining”
—Sons of Spade
“a perfect introduction”
—Booklist
“East Texas charm, profane wit, and strong characterization, with enough snappy dialogue to keep a smile on your face . . . excellent entertainment, edge-of-your-seat action one minute, gut-busting humor”
—Adventures in Genre Fiction
“This collection is crime/pulp fiction at its best and most captivating.”
—Risingshadow
“short, concentrated bursts of everything that makes the series so good.”
—October Country
“If you find yourself on the wrong side of Hap and Leonard, be cautious, because they are quicker than a rattlesnake, and their bite is just as bad. If you find yourself an innocent bystander looking for a great book to read, you’ve come to the right place.”
—Killer Nashville
“If you are a fan of the genre and looking for a new character to get into, Hap and Leonard won’t steer you wrong.”
—LitReactor
“For those new to either Lansdale or the series, this latest collection is an excellent introduction to the kind of trouble these two often find themselves in; all the while exchanging some of the funniest, lovingly antagonistic, and memorial dialogue of any crime series.”
—Bookgasm
“If you haven’t read any of the dozen or so Hap and Leonard novels, start here.”
—Lone Star Literary
Praise for Joe R. Lansdale
“A folklorist’s eye for telling detail and a front-porch raconteur’s sense of pace.”
—New York Times Book Review
“An American original”
-Joe Hill, author of Heart-Shaped Box
“A terrifically gifted storyteller.”
—Washington Post Book Review
“Like gold standard writers Elmore Leonard and the late Donald Westlake, Joe R. Lansdale is one of the more versatile writers in America.
—Los Angeles Times
“A zest for storytelling and gimlet eye for detail.”
—Entertainment Weekly
“Lansdale is an immense talent.”
—Booklist
“Lansdale is a storyteller in the Texas tradition of outrageousness…but amped up to about 100,000 watts.”
—Houston Chronicle
“Lansdale’s been hailed, at varying points in his career, as the new Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner-gone-madder, and the last surviving splatterpunk…sanctified in the blood of the walking Western dead and righteously readable.”
—Austin Chronicle
Praise for Cold in July
“…impressive Realism-meets-Road House-circa ’89 fight-scenes, tailings, and gunfights…. You’re sure to finish this book fast, but you’re also sure to think on it slowly.”
—Lit Reactor
“One of the benefits of Cold in July being made into an independent movie (adapted by screenwriter/actor Nick Damici and directed by Jim Mickle) is this new, movie tie-in edition from Tachyon, Joe R. Landsdale’s publisher….a finely told crime story.”
—Bookgasm
“…a crime fiction classic.”
—The Novel Pursuit
“It’s a major novel, full of darkness, humor, passion, and truth.”
—Lewis Shiner, author of Glimpses and Mozart in Mirroshades (with Bruce Sterling)
“I can’t think of a more remarkable suspense novel in the last few years. Cold in July has it all….”
—Ed Gorman, author of The Poker Club
Foreword for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard by Rick Klaw
An Appreciation of Joe R. Lansdale by Michael Koryta
Joe R. Lansdale, Hap and Leonard, and Me by Bill Crider
Hyenas
Veil’s Visit
Death by Chili
Dead Aim
A Bone Dead Sadness
The Boy Who Became Invisible (story)
The Boy Who Became Invisible (comic book script)
Not Our Kind (original e-book publication)
The Oak and the Pond (original e-book publication)
Bent Twig
Joe R. Lansdale Interviews Hap Collins and Leonard Pine
Interview with Joe R. Lansdale
The Care and Feeding and Raising Up of Hap and Leonard
The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
Joe R. Lansdale
The boys are back, and just in time for Season 3 of the Hap and Leonard TV series, starring Michael K. Williams (The Wire) and James Purefoy (Altered Carbon). Everyone’s favorite ass-kicking Texan duo are immortalized in this expanded collection of tall tales, slick nonfiction, and two full-length novellas.
The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
by Joe R. Lansdale
ISBN: Digital ISBN: 978-1-61696-309-5
Published: March 2018
Available Format(s): Digital Formats
Description
The boys are back, and just in time for Season 3 of the Hap and Leonard TV series, starring Michael K. Williams (The Wire) and James Purefoy (Altered Carbon).
Hap Collins looks like a good ’ol boy, but his lefty politics don’t match. His buddy, Vietnam veteran Leonard Pine, is even more complicated: black, conservative, gay . . . and an occasional arsonist. With Hap and Leonard on the job, small-time crooks all on the way on up to the Dixie Mafia are extremely nervous.
Everyone’s favorite ass-kicking Texan duo are further immortalized in this expanded collection of tall tales, slick nonfiction, and four full-length novellas.
Foreword for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
Joe R. Lansdale can be a pain in the ass. That’s why this book exists.
Hap and Leonard collected all of the not-so-dynamic duo’s previously published shorter adventures (circa 2016) plus the original story “Not Our Kind,” basically everything that’s not a novel, in one handsome volume. This being the 21st century and all, an ebook edition was required. And therein lies the problem.
Seems Joe had promised the digital rights to the novellas “Hyenas,” “Dead Aim,” and the short story “The Boy Who Became Invisible” to another publisher than Tachyon. So we could wait until 2018 for the ebook, when the rights reverted, or figure out something else. We opted for the latter.
The ebook Hap and Leonard Ride Again contained all of the material present in Hap and Leonard except for the trio of stories mentioned above. Since the remaining material scarcely made for a book, we added the original short story “The Oak and the Pond,” the Marvin Hanson novella “A Bone Dead Sadness,” Joe’s comic script adaptation of “The Boy Who Became Invisible,” my interview with Joe, and an original remembrance about the creation of Hap and Leonard by Bill Crider, who sadly died while we were putting together The Big Book of Hap and Leonard.
When Joe offered us the rights to “Hyenas,” “Dead Aim,” and “The Boy Who Became Invisible,” we decided it was best to combine the two editions into this one super—dare I say big—book you hold in your virtual hands.
Sometimes a pain in the ass leads to gold. Not sure if this qualifies as such but if not, it’s damn close.
Rick Klaw, editor
Austin, Texas
February 23, 2018
Praise for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard
“I recommend it for all Hap and Leonard fans. As you read, you might hate yourself for laughing, you might wish you had not laughed, but you are going to laugh.”
—Looks at Books
“Compulsory if you’re a fan of the characters.”
—Pulp Consumption
Biography
Joe R. Lansdale is the internationally-bestselling author of over forty novels, including twelve books featuring the popular Hap and Leonard. Many of his cult classics have been adapted for television and film, most famously Bubba Ho-Tep, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. Lansdale has written numerous screenplays and teleplays, including for the iconic Batman the Animated Series. He has won an Edgar Award for The Bottoms, ten Stoker Awards, and has been designated a World Horror Grandmaster. Lansdale, like many of his characters, lives in East Texas.
Praise for Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade
[STARRED REVIEW] “Showcases some of Lansdale’s most personal and reflective writing to date.”
—Publishers Weekly
“If Frank Dobie is the Lone Star State’s Homer, if Larry McMurtry is the Texas equivalent of Henry James, then Joe R. Lansdale has to be the Mark Twain behind the pine curtain. No other writer—in Texas or any other state in the union—can switch between gut-bursting humor and nail-biting suspense with as much heart and grace as Lansdale . . . Blood and Lemonade is a must-have for just about everyone.”
—Texas Book in Review
“Joe R. Lansdale’s Blood and Lemonade is a masterpiece of addictive and stylistic storytelling.”
—Risingshadow
“Everything here is written in Lansdale’s inimitable style of down-home East Texas storytelling, and everything is eminently readable and enjoyable. There’s humor, there’s sadness, there’s blood, and there’s lemonade. And some cussing, too. Great stuff, irresistible reading.”
—Bill Crider, Pop Culture Magazine
“Joe Lansdale is our East Texas Hemingway, and here’s another example of what makes him great. In Hap & Leonard: Blood and Lemonade, he carves out beauty with plain words and direct sentences. Some of the stories in this mosaic novel are horrifying, others gritty, sad, thrilling, and funny, but all of them are beautiful. I ate it up.”
—Daryl Gregory, author of Spoonbenders and We Are All Completely Fine
“A brilliant ‘mosaic’ novel. An amazingly vivid style that feels like Hemingway. Themes that are especially important for our time. With these early adventures of his compelling Hap and Leonard characters, Joe. R. Lansdale hits a new high.”
—David Morrell, New York Times bestselling author of Murder As a Fine Art
“Blood and Lemonade is the best of Lansdale and the best of Hap and Leonard. As urgent as it is timeless. As fun as it is thoughtful. It haunts you while it kicks your ass. Joe never lets you down, just shows you over and over why he’s the best.”
—Jim Mickle, director of Cold in July
“Magnificent storytelling.”
—Char’s Horror Corner
“Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade is something truly special. You are going to love it”
—Horror Drive-In
“The dialogue is pitch perfect . . . thoughtful, rather clever, and with enough bullets and banter to satisfy the most demanding reader.”
—Sci-Fi and Fantasy Reviews
“When you come right down to it, this may be my favorite Hap and Leonard book ever, and that’s saying a lot.”
—Chet Williamson, author of Psycho Sanitarium
“Exceptional . . . Hap and Leonard: Blood and Lemonade is a wonderful piece of storytelling, and a worthy addition to a great series.”
—October Country
Praise for Hap and Leonard
“Seven laid-back adventures, one of them brand new, for “freelance troubleshooter” and good old boy Hap Collins and his gay black Republican partner Leonard Pine. . . . No one currently working the field demonstrates more convincingly and joyously the deep affinity between pulp fiction and the American tall tale.”
—Kirkus
[STAR] “Last seen in the novel Honky Tonk Samurai, Lansdale’s incomparable East Texas crime fighting duo show their chops in this remarkable story collection. Hap Collins, a straight, white liberal, and Leonard Pine, a black, gay conservative, have long challenged genre conventions, and the friendship and camaraderie between these two hard cases as they suit up against injustice and hypocrisy is at the heart of these seven tales. In the novella “Hyenas,” the boys help save a client’s impressionable younger brother from the clutches of a group of psychotic robbers. “Dead Aim” finds the pair taking on the Dixie Mafia after a seemingly straightforward cheating spouse case gets a tad more complicated. “Not Our Kind” is set against the backdrop of the late 1960s, when a teenage Hap first befriends Leonard and faces the racism and intolerance of his peers up close. Readers can also look forward to the debut of the TV show Hap and Leonard on the Sundance Channel in March.
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“An essential Hap and Leonard addition”
—The Novel Pursuit
“As Mr. Lansdale might say, “This was more fun than rolling down a hill with a bunch of armadillos.”
—Horror Novel Reviews
“. . . it’s great to have all of these wonderful stories together in one nifty volume”
—Horror Drive-In
“Highly entertaining”
—Sons of Spade
“a perfect introduction”
—Booklist
“East Texas charm, profane wit, and strong characterization, with enough snappy dialogue to keep a smile on your face . . . excellent entertainment, edge-of-your-seat action one minute, gut-busting humor”
—Adventures in Genre Fiction
“This collection is crime/pulp fiction at its best and most captivating.”
—Risingshadow
“short, concentrated bursts of everything that makes the series so good.”
—October Country
“If you find yourself on the wrong side of Hap and Leonard, be cautious, because they are quicker than a rattlesnake, and their bite is just as bad. If you find yourself an innocent bystander looking for a great book to read, you’ve come to the right place.”
—Killer Nashville
“If you are a fan of the genre and looking for a new character to get into, Hap and Leonard won’t steer you wrong.”
—LitReactor
“For those new to either Lansdale or the series, this latest collection is an excellent introduction to the kind of trouble these two often find themselves in; all the while exchanging some of the funniest, lovingly antagonistic, and memorial dialogue of any crime series.”
—Bookgasm
“If you haven’t read any of the dozen or so Hap and Leonard novels, start here.”
—Lone Star Literary
Praise for Joe R. Lansdale
“A folklorist’s eye for telling detail and a front-porch raconteur’s sense of pace.”
—New York Times Book Review
“An American original”
-Joe Hill, author of Heart-Shaped Box
“A terrifically gifted storyteller.”
—Washington Post Book Review
“Like gold standard writers Elmore Leonard and the late Donald Westlake, Joe R. Lansdale is one of the more versatile writers in America.
—Los Angeles Times
“A zest for storytelling and gimlet eye for detail.”
—Entertainment Weekly
“Lansdale is an immense talent.”
—Booklist
“Lansdale is a storyteller in the Texas tradition of outrageousness…but amped up to about 100,000 watts.”
—Houston Chronicle
“Lansdale’s been hailed, at varying points in his career, as the new Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner-gone-madder, and the last surviving splatterpunk…sanctified in the blood of the walking Western dead and righteously readable.”
—Austin Chronicle
Praise for Cold in July
“…impressive Realism-meets-Road House-circa ’89 fight-scenes, tailings, and gunfights…. You’re sure to finish this book fast, but you’re also sure to think on it slowly.”
—Lit Reactor
“One of the benefits of Cold in July being made into an independent movie (adapted by screenwriter/actor Nick Damici and directed by Jim Mickle) is this new, movie tie-in edition from Tachyon, Joe R. Landsdale’s publisher….a finely told crime story.”
—Bookgasm
“…a crime fiction classic.”
—The Novel Pursuit
“It’s a major novel, full of darkness, humor, passion, and truth.”
—Lewis Shiner, author of Glimpses and Mozart in Mirroshades (with Bruce Sterling)
“I can’t think of a more remarkable suspense novel in the last few years. Cold in July has it all….”
—Ed Gorman, author of The Poker Club
Visit the Joe R. Lansdale website.
Contents
Foreword for The Big Book of Hap and Leonard by Rick Klaw
An Appreciation of Joe R. Lansdale by Michael Koryta
Joe R. Lansdale, Hap and Leonard, and Me by Bill Crider
Hyenas
Veil’s Visit
Death by Chili
Dead Aim
A Bone Dead Sadness
The Boy Who Became Invisible (story)
The Boy Who Became Invisible (comic book script)
Not Our Kind (original e-book publication)
The Oak and the Pond (original e-book publication)
Bent Twig
Joe R. Lansdale Interviews Hap Collins and Leonard Pine
Interview with Joe R. Lansdale
The Care and Feeding and Raising Up of Hap and Leonard
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