I’ve got a new book out! ASK HAGAN is a collection of six short stories that originally appeared in such diverse places as Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, the Los Angeles Review, Pulphouse, and Fiction River. It’s a short read, but it also won’t set you back much, so if you’re looking for some twisty tales that pack an emotional wallop (my usual fare), please consider buying it. Sooner rather than later. I have a daughter in college, you know.
Just kidding. Kind of.
Oh, and one last thing you might find interesting. The lead story (about a struggling writer who hits it big when he invents an obnoxious Ann Landers-like advice columnist named Hagan T. Stone, hence the title Ask Hagan) actually did start out as column idea. I pitched it to an editor of an edgy, genre-crossing magazine, basically saying “What if someone like Hunter S. Thompson wrote a Dear Abby column?” Hagan T. Stone would be completely made up, of course, but nobody but me and the editor would know it was me. And while the editor liked the idea, he decided it wasn’t quite the right fit. Undaunted, I even toyed with the idea of starting a website myself, going so far as obtaining a domain name before sanity (or maybe it was my wife?) thankfully prevailed.
But the idea stayed with me. Then one day I wondered what would happen if the column not only became a huge hit, but one day an imposter showed up on the scene to reap all the rewards, and before you knew it I was writing. As usual, the story went in a completely unexpected direction, with a whiz bang ending readers will hopefully enjoy as much as I did. Janet Hutchings certainly thought so when I sent it to her, buying it for Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, where it appeared last year. I hope you enjoy it too.
More info below, including where you can buy it. And thanks for reading!
Ask Hagan anything. Anything at all. Even how to outwit a madman …
Once a promising young novelist with big literary dreams, John Winsley wakes up on the other side of forty as a third-rate hack with a perpetual hangover. Fueled by bitterness, he creates an obnoxious online persona as something of a lark—a funhouse version of Ann Landers named Hagan T. Stone with mad eyes, a black beard shaped like a spade, and an irreverent wit. The Ask Hagan advice column becomes a surprising worldwide hit. And it makes Winsley a very rich man.
Wracked with guilt about the wife and daughter he abandoned, Winsley feels conflicted about his anonymous success … until an imposter claiming to be Hagan T. Stone shows up to reap all the rewards. Now Winsley only has to answer one question: How far will he go to get what he deserves?
This taut, suspenseful tale kicks off Carter’s latest collection. From a mysterious elevator in an Iowa cornfield to a crowded superstore where android spouses are bought like toasters, these six provocative forays into Carter’s wide-ranging imagination never fail to surprise.
Ebook:
Amazon | B&N | Kobo | iBooks | Google Play
Paperback:
Amazon
