News & Blog

The non-profit, online literary magazine Upcoming4.me has a regular guest feature called the Story Behind the Story, in which authors and editors write about what inspired their latest books. The folks at the site collect those essays every year or so and turn them into a book, with all proceeds going to the UK charity Epilepsy Action.

The latest volume is out now, and includes an essay by yours truly about the story behind my novel Dying Is My Business. It also features essays by Charlaine Harris, Sarah Pinborough, Paul Witcover, Phil Rickman, Steven Brust, and many more, over forty essays in all.

It’s an excellent collection of essays that benefits an excellent cause, so if you’d like a copy you can pick it up from Amazon in both trade paperback and e-book. (I’m told they’ll be making it available from other retailers and for other e-readers shortly, so keep an eye out for that.)

In the “better late than never” department, The Urban Politico has published a glowing new review of Die and Stay Dead. Here’s a snippet:

This story is just crying out to be translated into the visual medium. I’m imagining something that draws on Big Trouble in Little China, Angel Heart and National Treasure….What’s really the juicy sweet spot of this story [is] the author’s envisioning of New York City as a special, magical and very old place….Kaufmann weaves a pretty compelling mystery story. This is a book you ought to be reading.

I’ve mentioned before that sales of Dying Is My Business and Die and Stay Dead were disappointing, and that St. Martin’s will only publish the third and final book in the trilogy if sales improve drastically. So if you’re a fan of the series, please tell all your friends. And if you haven’t tried it yet, now’s the perfect time to start!

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There’s some sad news to report today, too. World Fantasy Award-winning author Tanith Lee has passed away at the much too young age of 67. I interacted with her briefly back in the early 1990s. I worked for The Overlook Press at the time and we were publishing her Secret Books of Paradys series. She was such a good a writer, and she left us with a lifetime’s worth of amazing fiction. Rest in peace, Tanith Lee.

“Meeting writers is usually disappointing, at best. Writers who write sexy thrillers aren’t necessarily sexy or thrilling in person. Children’s book writers might look more like accountants, or axe murderers for that matter. Horror writers are very rarely scary looking, although they are frequently good cooks.”

— Kelly Link, “Magic for Beginners”

There are ONLY FOUR SEATS LEFT for this amazing LitReactor online class, which benefits the Shirley Jackson Awards! Join me and my fellow instructors for a four-week journey into what makes good, substantive horror fiction. You’ll learn about structure and pace, building suspense, the intersection of character and plot, and the art of subtlety.

Once again, there are ONLY FOUR SEATS LEFT, so sign up today!