The Avain Gospels by Adam Novy
Posted on November 1, 2010 Leave a Comment
My book review for The Avian Gospels by Adam Novy is now LIVE at The Nervous Breakdown. This was a wild ride, a surreal, dystopian book, issued in two beautiful volumes by Short Flight / Long Drive Books. I don’t know if you’d call this a division or an arm of Hobart, but whatever you call it, the people over there (Aaron Burch and Elizabeth Ellen) are doing great things. Big World, by Mary Miller, another of their releases (2009) was just fantastic.
Richard Thomas is interviewed by Simon West-Bulford.
Posted on October 29, 2010 Leave a Comment
Simon‘s a fantastic author himself, with his first book due out soon with Medallion Press, entitled The Soul Consortium. So check out our conversation here as we chat about my novel, Transubstantiate, multiple POVs, plot vs. no plot, staying motivated, and many other things.
Kevin Lucia writes Hiram Grange and the Chosen One, supernatural detective
Posted on October 27, 2010 Leave a Comment
Check out my review at OWC
I thought I posted up about this last June, but guess I didn’t! WHOOPS, my apologies, Kevin. Hiram Grange and the Chosen One by Kevin Lucia is the sixth book in the Hiram Grange series, and it was a real hoot. My review gets into all of the details over at Outsider Writer’s Colletive, but suffice it to say it was a wild ride. So go check it out. Imagine F. Paul Wilson with a little James Bond, Sherlock Holmes and Phineas Poe sprinkled in.
Interview with Amelia Gray at The Nervous Breakdown
Posted on October 16, 2010 Leave a Comment
In addition to doing book reviews at The Nervous Breakdown, I’ll also be doing interviews. My first is with one of my favorite authors, Amelia Gray. I hate to even limit her by calling her a small press darling (in the vein of Parker Posey, indie film darling) as she is a voice to be reckoned with, and I’m sure the small presses will only hold on to her for as long as they can, until the bigger presses come calling. Harper Perennial, are you paying attention?
Instead of doing the standard interview, asking about her latest projects and what her process is, I went over her first two books, AM/PM (Featherproof) and Museum of the Weird (FC2), reminisced about the times I’ve seen her read live at various AWPs and other outings, and generally prompted her with whatever authors, presses, and eccentricities I could think of.
Visit her at her site, or Five Things (her reading series in Austin), or hell, just Google her. She’s everywhere. Be sure to catch her live, it’s always worth it.
So, go check out the review up at The Nervous Breakdown, pick up copies of AM/PM and Museum of the Weird, and track her at Twitter and her blog. She’s one of the most compelling voices out there right now – hilarious, disturbing, emotional, surreal, heartbreaking, grounded, alluring and smart.
Pela Via interviews Richard Thomas at Word Riot
Posted on October 15, 2010 Leave a Comment
Not your typical interview, Pela Via and I talk about all kinds of wild things at one of my favorite online fiction sites, Word Riot. They published one of my stories last year, “Three Mistakes”.
"How YOU doing?"
"Living the dream, baby!"
OWP Reading Saturday October 16th at 7 pm at Quimby’s, Chicago
Posted on October 13, 2010 Leave a Comment
I’ll be reading Saturday at my favorite bookstore, Quimby’s in the hip and happening Bucktown / Wicker Park area with several other OWP authors – Laura, Nik, and David at 7pm. COME ON OUT! Blocks from the Damen/North/Milwaukee el stop and right on the North Avenue bus line.
Saw Chuck Palahniuk read here years ago.
The Nervous Breakdown – Book Reviews by Richard Thomas
Posted on October 8, 2010 Leave a Comment
Hey guys!
I’m going to be doing some book reviews for The Nervous Breakdown, and I’m really stoked about that. I’m going to be focusing on small presses and the genre/lit benders. I’m also thrilled to be working with Shya Scanlon, a really talented author I first heard of with his online serial Forecast 42, which will be out by Flatmancrooked as Forecast later this year. We have similar tastes and I know we’ll get some much needed attention to some gifted authors, presses and journals.
My first review is now live for the fantastic dark collection of shorts The Physics of Imaginary Objects by Tina May Hall, winner of the 2010 Drue Heinz Literature Prize. Her novella included in this book “All the Day’s Sad Stories” was the winner of the 2008 Caketrain Chapbook Competition, selected by Brian Evenson.
What’s next after this you ask?
Next will be an interview with Amelia Gray, up soon, 101 Prompts covering her career, books, and various eccentricities. After that: Avian Gospels by Adam Novy (Hobart: Short Flight/Long Drive), then Daddy’s (Featherproof) by Lindsay Hunter, followed by The Wilding (Graywolf) by Benjamin Percy then probably this great new press, Dark Sky Books and Cut Through the Bone by Ethel Rohan. So keep your eyes and ears open.
There’s so much great fiction out there.
Another great review of Transubstantiate, this one at Morpheus Tales
Posted on October 1, 2010 Leave a Comment
The review supplement for Morpheus Tales #10 is now out. Happy to see my pal Jeremy C. Shipp in here too, we’ll also be sharing space in an upcoming issue of Withersin. We got another fantastic review for Transubstantiate, this one from Stanley Riiks. Here’s an excerpt:
Described as a neo-noir thriller, a description I can whole-heartedly agree with, this is a very dark, cynical, and intelligent novel. The way it’s told only adds to both the tension and the mystery. A brilliant tale of a haunting dystopia.
Go to the REVIEWS PAGE or hit this link for a DIRECT DOWNLOAD.
New Velvet Podcast – Sex and Violence in Fiction
Posted on September 22, 2010 Leave a Comment
Velvet Podcast 008
Episode 008: Don’t Pull My Hair Unless You Mean It
I join writers Nik Korpon (Stay God), Pela Via and Nic Young to grind out the topic of sex and violence in fiction and their complex relationship to sadistic bedfellows, love and shock.
This was a lot of fun, some great thoughts, well worth the time to check this out. Let me know what you think.
Interview up at 3:AM Magazine
Posted on September 19, 2010 2 Comments
Interview by Gregory Frye
An interview with me done by the talented Gregory Frye is now up at 3:AM Magazine. Love 3:AM, they published a story of mine “A Bird in the Hand” last year.
Here’s an excerpt:
Richard Thomas is catching a lot of attention with his debut novel Transubstantiate, a neo-noir thriller mostly set on a mysterious island where nothing is as it seems. The place is inhabited by prisoners who are supposedly part of a rehabilitation experiment, meanwhile most of the global population has been wiped out by plague. The survivors, both on the island and off, truly live up to the label of noir, black, nihilistic. Thomas’ book seems to have come to the front at a time when a lot of readers and writers are starting to ask what neo-noir is all about, how is it defined, and where can we take it.
- Richard Thomas - 