…even as all of y’all may be wondering why the falling leaves template is here to announce the long-awaited vernal season. I was going to try passing it off as a nod to my readers in Australia and New Zealand, whom I do in fact cherish, but the actual reason is that I just like the way it looks. And, at least metaphorically, it needn’t be autumn for one to be aware of falling leaves.

Hey, thanks for sharing.

Sorry about that. It’s spring, and I’m delighted, and I have plenty to report. And the first item on my agenda is a brand-new book that I had nothing to do with, and yet I’m eager to commend it to your attention. It’s The Truth About Parallel Lines, by Jill D. Block, and the author’s surname is not entirely coincidental. Jill’s my daughter, and this is her first novel.

I assume it’s a mystery.

No, it’s mainstream fiction, a coming-of-age novel that follows three young women over a span of thirty years. Jill sold her first story to Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, and one of her three other published stories is also crime fiction, but this is not.

One writer, not easily impressed, had this to say: “The Group andThe Best of Everything were the two books that made me want to be a writer. And here’s Jill D. Block, clearly the long-lost bastard daughter of Mary McCarthy and Rona Jaffe, with The Truth About Parallel Lines. The story covers something like thirty years, and—just sayin’— I read it in one sitting.”

All right, I’m sold. Where do I get it? What’s it cost?

Well, let’s just see. You can get The Truth About Parallel Linesfrom Amazon, Apple, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, and Tolino.

Publication day is June 4, but if you act now you can lock in the pre-order price of $6.99 for ebook or $14.99 for paperback. (The ebook is already available for pre-order. You’ll be able to pre-order the paperback in a few days. And for those of you who read with your ears, there’ll be an audiobook before too long.)

And what about Lawrence Block? How’s his health? And has he written anything lately?

Oh dear. So many questions.

First of all, I’m very pleased to report that I’m continuing to improve rapidly after a hip replacement and bypass surgery. I traded the walker for a cane a few weeks ago, and sometimes forget to take the cane with me, which either suggests that I’m able to get along without it, or that my memory’s no better than the rest of me. But I’m capable of walking long distances, and—since I can climb stairs now—I’m once again getting around by subway. And for two weeks now I’ve been to the gym every day, raising and lowering heavy objects to no apparent purpose. So it looks as though I have a decent chance of remaining on the right side of the grass, at least for a while.

And, to my surprise, I’ve resumed writing. In my longstanding tradition of biting off more than I can chew, and chewing it anyway, I’ve got two anthologies in the works. One’s a sequel of sorts to In Sunlight or in Shadow and Alive in Shape and Color, the other a collection of noir stories not unlike Dark City Lights). Some superb writers have signed on for each of these projects, and I already have two stories in hand—and they are gems.

And I myself have written almost 20,000 words of a new something-or-other. I don’t know if it wants to be a novella or a full-length novel, and I’m letting it rest until it speaks to me. While I wait, I’ve started a very dark, very nasty short story, and it’s coming along nicely. (Better make that at a brisk pace, as there’s nothing nice about it.) The title is “A Man Walks Into a Bar,” and I’m not sure whether I’ll tuck it into one of the anthologies or find some other home for it. But I like the way it’s shaping up, and I think y’all may like it, except for those of you who hate it. We’ll see, and sooner rather than later.

Crikey, when do you sleep?

In the winter.

Recently I realized that my novella, Keller’s Fedora, while a brisk seller as an ebook, had gone out-pf-print in its Subterranean Press hardcover edition, and was listed at ridiculously high prices in the aftermarket. So I issued it as a paperback, and it’s been my leading seller for the past two months.

Well, I’m not too handy at leaving well enough alone. I looked at another 20,000-word novella, Resume Speed, also published in hardcover by Subterranean Press, and also no longer in print. Would people want to buy it as a paperback? And could I slip in anything to sweeten the mix?

Turns out I could. There’s Gym Rat, a 10,000-word novelette packaged by Crime Fiction Academy with Matt Plass’s fine short story,”The Murder Club.” Gym Rat’s only eVailable, so why not tuck it in with Resume Speed? And what about “I Know How to Pick ‘Em,” a 7000-word story I wrote for an anthology (Dangerous Women); a holdback clause in the contract kept me from incorporating it in Catch & Release, but that was some years ago, so why not add it to the new paperback?

And omigod what about Hard Sell? I ghost-wrote the thing in 1960 for Craig Rice, who’d recently died but whose agent didn’t want to acknowledge the fact; it was written for the inaugural issue of Ed McBain’s Mystery Magazine, only to pop up decades later in Murder, Mystery and Malone, Jeffrey Marks’ great Crippen & Landru collection of Craig’s stories. And it’s listed in various reference books as my work, which means the cat has long since been out of the bag, so why not make it available to my readers? It may be almost sixty years old, but why let that stop it? I think it stands up, and may even be able to get around without a cane.

So you’ve got enough stories for a book.

It does look that way, doesn’t it? Not sure what I’ll call it but I suspect I’ll think of something, and I’ll be sure to tell y’all about it. Is that enough?

More than enough.

Right, and…oh, one more thing.

Huh?

Sorry about that. The incomparable William Link got the MWA Grand Master award Thursday night, so I’ve got Columbo on my mind.

So what’s the one more thing, and what happened to your raincoat?

The one more thing is that the Hindi edition of The Sins of the Fathers (Scudder #1) , translated by Ishan and Alka Shrivedi, has broken through at last to sell a grand total of three copies.

And you’re excited about that?

Indeed I am. For a couple of years it didn’t sell a single copy.

Let me explain. Ishan and Alka are fans of the Scudder books residing in India, and Alka has been a Facebook friend of mine, and when I mentioned self-publishing translations in German and Spanish and Italian, she suggested I tap the huge South Asian market with translations into Hindi. I enlisted Alka and her husband Ishan to do all the heavy lifting, and I don’t think any of us knew what we were getting into.

For one thing, while Amazon offers plenty of books in Hindi, their self-publishing ebook platform doesn’t support books in that alphabet. That was a blow, esp. after my Goddess of Design and Production had managed the Herculean task of formatting a book of which she could not read a word.

Undaunted, we somehow managed to publish a POD paperback through CreateSpace. And, after several years of no sales whatsoever, three people have recently managed to find their way to it and purchase a copy.

Now I’ve thought all along that an audience for the book exists. New York City has a substantial South Asian population, and the opportunity to read in one’s first language a book set in one’s place of residence has to hold some appeal. But how to bring the book to the attention of its potential readers?

I’ve never been able to answer that question, and that’s why we’ve only managed to peddle three copies. But there are other potential buyers for the book. You, for instance.

Me? Why would I buy a book I couldn’t read???

For openers it would add some much-needed class to your To Be Read pile. But do you have a favorite Indian restaurant? And don’t you think such a thoughtful gift to a waiter or owner would win you Favored Customer status?

Gee. I never thought of that.

Alas, neither did anybody else. But it’s not too late. You can order a copy via Amazon or Barnes & Noble. You can order a whole batch of copies, and make friends all over Jackson Heights and Jersey City.

The possibilities are endless, aren’t they?

So it would appear.

While you consider them, could there ever be a better time  to support an exciting first novelist and make a proud father happy by preordering The Truth About Parallel Lines? You’ll be glad you did, and so will I.

Cheers,