Get ready to rumble Crimeziners
Harlan Ellison is perhaps best known for writing SF [Sci-fi] and classic TV shows such as Star Trek, The Man from Uncle and The Alfred Hitchcock half hour. Ellison is certainly no slave to genre, although he has won the Edgar Allan Poe Award twice for his crime fiction he has been widely lauded for horror, mystery and fantasy writing of every description.
he is no slouch in the awards department either, this career pen smith has won a record 10 Hugo Awards, 5 Nebulas (including the lifetime Grand Master Award), 6 Bram Stoker Awards (including their lifetime Grand Master Award), 4 Writers Guild of America Awards, and 2 World Fantasy Awards, as well as multiple other lifetime achievement awards. He has also been a finalist for the Emmy and twice for the Grammy.
It is therefore with great pleasure that Crimezine would like to announce that those nice people at Hard Case Crime are releasing one of Ellison’s classic crime “rumble” stories, Web of the City. The book was first published more than half a century ago and was turned into a famous episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour starring James Caan (The Godfather) and Walter “Chekov” Koenig (Star Trek).
Web of the City is inspired by Ellison’s real-life experiences, and features the trials of Rusty Santoro a neighborhood kid struggling to survive in a world street fighting mayhem. Rusty wants out—but you can’t just walk away from a New York street gang… Hell, no, Jack— you got to pay a price, and your family too.
The Hardcase Crime edition of Web of the City appears with three thematically related short stories Ellison wrote for the pulp magazines of the 1950’s, Web of the City offers both a snapshot of a lost era and a portrait of violence and grief as timely as today’s most brutal headlines.
There are too many classic Ellison anecdotes to relate here, such as the famous clash he had with Frank Sinatra over a game of Billiards, or the time Ellison got sacked from his job at the Disney Corporation, on the first day—by Roy Disney himself; then there is the famous spat Ellison had with directing legend James Cameron, over who really came up with the idea for the movie The Terminator.
Harlan Ellison is a legend, of that there is no question, a man regarded by no lesser talent than Isaac Asimov as “One of the best writers in the world.” So if you are ready to rumble Crimeziners, take a look at Web of the City, you will be glad you did.
http://www.hardcasecrime.com/books_bios.cgi?entry=bk111&type=excerpt
Web of the City by Harlan Ellison is released April 2013
ISBN: 978-1-78116-420-4
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