Fri 7 Sep 2018
Books Noted, by Lee Goldberg: The RALPH DENNIS Novels.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Books Noted[5] Comments
Lee Goldberg left this bit of good news as a comment following Richard Moore’s previously posted essay on author Ralph Dennis. Thinking the news deserves to be spread as much as possible, I’m reposting it here:
I’m excited to announce that I’ve acquired the rights to all of Ralph Dennis’s work — his published and unpublished novels. Brash Books will be re-releasing his 12 Hardman novels, starting with the first four in December, and the rest through 2019. The Hardman books include a terrific introduction by Joe R. Lansdale … and subsequent books include afterwords by Richard A. Moore, Ben Jones and Paul Bishop. The first two titles in the series, Atlanta Deathwatch and The Charleston Knife is Back in Town are already available for preorder in paperback and ebook on Amazon, iBook, Barnes & Noble and Kobo.
We’ll also be re-releasing in 2019 a substantially revised version Ralph’s WWII thriller MacTaggart’s War, which we’ve retitled The War Heist. It was his last published title and didn’t do as well as he, or the publisher hoped. I believe i know why… I’ve gone back to his original manuscript, rearranged chapters, deleted chapters, and made other revisions to heighten suspense, sharpen characters, etc… cutting the book by about 35,000 words along the way (it still clocks in at 100K words).
And we’re also going to be releasing many of Ralph’s unpublished novels … which, if they need revision, I will be doing myself. One of the manuscripts is going to be slightly reworked as a sequel to his previous published novel Atlanta (which we are likely to retitle before re-publishing).
This has been a passion project for me ever since Bill Crider and Paul Bishop introduced me to the Hardman novels five years ago. I immediately decided I had to get them back into print, so I sought out the advice of my good friend Joel Goldman … and as a result of those discussions, a partnership and a publishing company were born. Now, after the publishing nearly 100 titles together, we are finally putting out the novels that we’d hoped would be our first releases.
I can’t thank Richard Moore enough for all of his help making this deal finally happen.
I can’t wait to hear what you think of the books as they roll out… and I hope you will spread the word. We want Ralph Dennis to get the recognition and readership he’s long deserved.
September 8th, 2018 at 1:06 am
Good to hear that this series will be reprinted. It was incorrectly marketed as men’s adventure when first published in the 1970’s. An attempt to cash in on THE EXECUTIONER type series.
I read the first two novels in 1989 and enjoyed them. I see 1001 MIDNIGHTS reviews the first novel in the series, ATLANTA DEATHWATCH. Randisi likes it a lot and recommends several other of the Hardman novels.
September 8th, 2018 at 7:25 am
Great news! I remember Richard meeting Dennis and writing about the books, and I know Bill was a fan. I read a couple of them and I think I have a couple of them still unread at home.
I”ll look forward to their release.
September 8th, 2018 at 11:07 am
So DEADMAN’S GAME and KANE as a double won’t be part of this? Too bad.
September 8th, 2018 at 1:50 pm
We will be releasing a book that combines Dead Man’s Game and the unpublished Kane 2 into one. I’ll write any necessary bridging material
September 8th, 2018 at 8:27 pm
Good news. The Hardman novels were a breath of fresh air in the men’s action genre, more Gold Medal than the Executioner. Good writing, interesting plots, and great action.