bill crider Archives - Tachyon Publications

January 30, 2017

HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE showcases Lansdale’s most personal and reflective writing to date

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized best of 2016, bill crider, blood and lemonade, elizabeth story, enrique murciano, hap and leonard, hap and leonard: blood and lemonade, hap and leonard: mucho mojo, ian rogers, james purefoy, Joe R. Lansdale, michael k. williams, Publishers Weekly, review, sundanceTV', swamp noir, texas noir, tiffany mack, wayne dehart

Photo: Karen Lansdale

With a *starred* review, PUBLISHERS WEEKLY praises Joe R. Lansdale’s forthcoming HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE.

Fans of Lansdale’s Hap and Leonard novels (RUSTY PUPPY, etc.) will welcome this wonderful compilation of vignettes and episodes from Hap Collins’s early life in East Texas, most of which deal with issues of racism and injustice. “Tire Fire” relates the full story of teenager Hap’s memorable first meeting with Leonard Pine at a nighttime “money fight” in the country.

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Another highlight is “Apollo Red,” in which Hap tells girlfriend Brett and daughter Chance a few stories about his father, a larger-than-life character, whose kindness and charitable actions often seemed to contradict his racist talk. This loose collection of tales showcases some of Lansdale’s most personal and reflective writing to date.

BILL CRIDER’S POP CULTURE MAGAZINE likes the new book.

You might notice that I said “short pieces” instead of short stories. Some of the pieces are stories, and all of them have a story to tell, but not all of them are stories. One of them is even called “The Parable of the Stick,” so you know what that one is. And while they’re mostly about Hap (and occasionally Leonard) all of them have something to impart beyond the simple history of a character. They’re about a time and a place and people and attitudes and growing up in an era different from the one we live in now. I suspect that some of them are drawn from Lansdale’s own life, but that’s just, like, my opinion, man.

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.

Ian Rogers named, without comment, HAP AND LEONARD as one of his favorite collections of 2016 and “The Oak and The Pond” one of the favorite short stories.

SUNDANCETV shared more images from the forthcoming Series HAP AND LEONARD: MUCHO MOJO.

Hap Collins (James Purefoy), Leonard Pine (Michael K. Williams) Raul
(Enrique Murciano) and Florida Grange (Tiffany Mack) in Episode 2.

Raul (Enrique Murciano) and Leonard Pine (Michael K. Williams) in Episode 1.

Leonard Pine (Michael K. Williams), Hap Collins (James Purefoy) and Illium Moon (Wayne Dehart) in Episode 2.

For more info about HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

For more info on HAP AND LEONARD, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story

March 18, 2016

HAP AND LEONARD won’t steer you wrong

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized Alan Cranis, bh shepherd, bill crider, bookgasms, bookshots, collection, crime, hap and leonard, hap and leonard ride again, joe lansdale, Joe R. Lansdale, killer nashville, Lit Reactor, mystery scene, review, swamp noir, texas noir, the dallas morning news, w. k. stratton

A quintet of reviews for Joe R. Lansdale’s wrought and fun HAP AND LEONARD.

Photo: Karen Lansdale

At LIT REACTOR, BH Shepherd gives the collection the “Bookshots” treatment.

Joe R. Lansdale is one of the all-time heavyweight Texas storytellers, and Hap and Leonard are obviously his most prized creations. You can tell he is having too much fun putting them in strange situations and seeing what happens, a joy the reader shares as they watch the title characters stumble and struggle through nasty situations that are somehow always worse than what they seem. Hap Collins’ narration is the pinnacle of the Lansdale voice, equal parts vulgar and academic. Many of the characters they meet are jokes personified and the situations they find themselves in are frequently absurd, but the story always pivots before it becomes too unbelievable. Hap and Leonard are capable combatants, but they are not action heroes. While they are clever, they are not master detectives that need only a shred of evidence to solve a mystery. 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.

W. K. Stratton for the THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS writes about the book.

This is turning out to be the year of Hap and Leonard. This month Hap and Leonard debuted on the Sundance TV. Moreover, HAP AND LEONARD, the retrospective book, debuts this month from Tachyon Publications. In it are the collected short stories about the pair, including a new one, “Not Our Kind,” in which we learn how the two collaborators against evil met when they were in high school. The stories are well wrought and fun, even if they don’t quite carry the weight of the novels in the series.

BOOKGASM’s Alan Cranis reviews HAP AND LEONARD.

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. New readers will soon find themselves seeking out the previous Hap and Leonard novels, which fortunately are all currently available in paperback reprints.

Lansdale fans need only know the title of this new collection to have them immediately adding it to their bookshelves, and either revisiting or finally experiencing these wonderful but slightly shorter adventures of Hap and Leonard.

HAP AND LEONARD was the Killer Nashville Book of the Day.

In stories like “Dead Aim”, the meat and potatoes of the book, we see well-developed, polished characters trying to protect a woman from a disgruntled future husband—or so it seems, at first glance. As the story continues, the two men find themselves in a predicament, which includes a dodgy lawyer and a mountain of debt owed to thugs.

Now a SundanceTV original series, the book draws the reader in by creating comedy and crime-related tension in every nook and cranny of each story. With all the mystery, humor, and sharp-shootin’ mixed in, you meet characters so easy to connect with, you forget you’re reading a book and feel like you’re simply just getting to know someone.

Bill Crider mentions the collection at MYSTERY SCENE.

Joe Lansdale’s HAP AND LEONARD is a collection of tales about two of the most entertaining characters in crime fiction. In the opening novella, Hyenas, there’s a young man in trouble. He’s mixed up with some really bad folks, and his brother asks Hap and Leonard for help in extracting his brother from the mess. Hilarity and violence ensue—as they do in the other stories here. One story, “Veil’s Visit,” is a collaboration between Lansdale and Andrew Vachss. The character of Veil might remind you of one of the authors. Besides the stories, there’s an introduction by Michael Koryta, an interview with Hap and Leonard conducted by Lansdale, and a short essay on how the series came to be. Rumor has it that the e-book version of this collection will have a somewhat different table of contents, as well as a short memoir about a certain Bill Crider and his long friendship with Joe Lansdale.

For more info on HAP AND LEONARD, visit the Tachyon page.

For more info about HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN, visit the Tachyon page.

Covers by Elizabeth Story

October 22, 2015

There’s further trouble in HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN

Alec Checkerfield Uncategorized andrew vachss, bill crider, crime, ebook, elizabeth story, hap and leonard, hap and leonard ride again, hap collins, james purefoy, joe lansdale, Joe R. Lansdale, leonard pine, michael k. williams, michael kortya, novella, Rick Klaw, short stories, short story, sundanceTV', texas, texas noir

James Purefoy and Michael K. Williams as the titular characters in SundanceTV’s forthcoming series HAP AND LEONARD.

Coming out in March, 2016 concurrently with the print only HAP AND LEONARD, the ebook HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN delivers more adventures of the not-so-dynamic duo, including an original vignette only available in this edition.

Complete with an introduction by New York Times bestselling author Michael Koryta, a history/memoir by noted mystery writer and historian Bill Crider, and an original afterword by Joe R. Lansdale, his ownself, HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN delivers six tales of mayhem, violence, and adventure told in the uniquely Lansdale manner.

Introduction: An Appreciation of Joe R. Lansdale by Michael Koryta
Joe R. Lansdale, Hap and Leonard, and Me by Bill Crider*
Veil’s Visit (with Andrew Vachss)
Death by Chili
A Bone Dead Sadness*
Not Our Kind
The Oak and the Pond*
The Boy Who Became Invisible comic book script*
Joe R. Lansdale Interviews Hap Collins and Leonard Pine
Interview with Joe R. Lansdale (Rick Klaw)*
The Care and Feeding and Raising Up of Hap and Leonard

*Only in this edition

For more information about HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN, visit the Tachyon page.

Cover by Elizabeth Story.

bill crider

HAP AND LEONARD: BLOOD AND LEMONADE showcases Lansdale’s most personal and reflective writing to date

HAP AND LEONARD won’t steer you wrong

There’s further trouble in HAP AND LEONARD RIDE AGAIN

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