Making The Cut

First up; Happy New Year!

I thought it would be best to start 2013 as I mean to go on, so here is the first 'Me' post of the new year. 



When the alcohol haze of midnight celebrations had cleared a little I was delighted to find that two of my short stories had been included in the ‘best of 2012 online’ lists from the inscrutable Paul D Brazill and the enigmatic Mike Monson.

Paul picked my story ‘Redheaded Woman’, which first appeared at The Flash Fiction Offensive and subsequently in the new anthology Out Of The Gutter 8.
Five you Can't Miss from 2012 - Paul D Brazill

Mike plumped for ‘Party Favors’, which was published at Spintingler Magazine, back in the summer. Special Short Stories I read This Year - Mike Monson

Thanks guys I’m honored to have made the cut.

A word on some words

Well I guess it must be December because all the blogs are filling up with their owner's choice for the best read of 2012. And I don’t see why the hell mine should be any different.

I’ve read a lot this year, though nowhere near as much as I would have liked. Time is the fire in which we all burn and I still have a mountain of books, both paper and ‘e’ waiting patiently for my attention. Earlier this year I stared doing some book reviews for Out of the Gutter, I may have mentioned that once or twice on here already. Writing those reviews has been a blast, but it has, by necessity streamlined my choice of reading and 2012 saw me consuming a lot more in the Crime / Noir / Hard-boiled arena, than perhaps I might have otherwise. I’ll point out the obvious and say that not all of my picks were first published this year, but as I read them in 2012 they shall reside here regardless. Anyway onwards! In no particular order, here are my favourites. There were plenty of others that were good, but these were better.  



Make of that what you will, but you could do a lot worse than dropping your Dollar, Pound, Euro or Dinar on any of these excellent works.