Duane Swierczynski is the author of several crime thrillers, most recently Expiration Date, published March 30 by St. Martin's Minotaur. He also writes for Marvel Comics and has collaborated with CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker on a series of "digi-novels" called Level 26. You can visit him at duaneswierczynski.com and twitter.com/swierczy.
On your nightstand now:
David Peace's Occupied City. So far it's fascinating, dense, compelling and more than a little insane.
Favorite book when you were a child:
The Movie Treasury of Horror Movies by Alan G. Frank, though I didn't know the title or author when I was a kid. It's a survey of horror flicks, with a special emphasis on the Hammer films from the 1960s/early 1970s that my dad had bought and foolishly left in the family bookcase. My God, did this book scare the living crap out of me. Page after page of stabbings, tongue-gouging, claw hammer-fu, frozen Nazis, crazy vampire women... you name it. The damned thing gave me endless nightmares, but I couldn't put it down. My younger brother and I read it so much, it eventually started to fall apart. I found a mint copy at a used bookstore just a few weeks ago, which is the only reason I know the title and author.
Your top five authors:
There are too many favorite living authors to narrow it down to five, so here are my top dead ones: James M. Cain, Fredric Brown, David Goodis, Philip K. Dick, Joseph Moncure March. I should also include Donald Westlake, but I'm still very much in denial about him being gone.
Book you've faked reading:
James Joyce's Dubliners, back in high school. (Sorry, Mr. Oliver.) At the time (1988) I was into the whole splatterpunk school of horror novels--guys like Clive Barker, David J. Schow, John Skipp & Craig Spector, Rex Miller. So, put one of those books down in favor of a bunch of stories about moody Irish people? Uh, yeah... get right on that.
Book you're an evangelist for:
On the nonfiction side: Geoffrey O'Brien's Hardboiled America, a brilliant look at hardboiled and noir writers from the mid-20th century. O'Brien's suggested reading list is alone worth the cover price; I've been ticking off titles for over a decade now.
On the fiction side: Jean-Patrick Manchette's The Prone Gunman. It's the book I recommend whenever people ask me for a crime novel beyond the usual suspects.
Book you've bought for the cover:
Way too many to name. I'm a vintage paperback junkie, so I've literally purchased pounds of meh titles that happen to have amazing covers. If only the stories inside lived up to the stories on the outside....
My favorite blog is Rex Parker's Pop Sensation, where Mr. Parker brilliantly and savagely critiques the covers of the paperbacks from his collection.
Book that changed your life:
This is so hard to narrow down, but two stand-outs are Joe Lansdale's Cold in July and Robert Ferrigno's The Horse Latitudes. These paperbacks were the gateway drugs that took me from horror to crime--and made me realize that they're just two sides of the same coin.
Favorite line from a book:
"Ray, old buddy, one of the things I'll never be able to forget is the look on your face when you strolled into your bedroom and discovered me there with your wife."--From George Garrett's "A Record As Long As Your Arm," from his collection An Evening Performance.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Charles Willeford's Pick-Up. Don't let anybody tell you anything about it. Just read it.
