{"id":9511,"date":"2022-02-23T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-02-23T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=9511"},"modified":"2022-02-22T18:52:03","modified_gmt":"2022-02-22T23:52:03","slug":"guns-tacos-at-the-midnight-hour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=9511","title":{"rendered":"Guns + Tacos at the Midnight Hour"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Gosh, I\u2019ve read a lot of good books lately, as well as some notable short story collections!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I received Volumes 5 and 6 of the Guns + Tacos series<\/a>, edited by Michael Bracken and Trey R. Barker. These were the \u201csubscriber editions,\u201d and each contained three novella-length stories. (some of the editions are sold for parts on Amazon; since they\u2019re short, order the compilations). The stories in Volume 5 were by Dave Zeltserman, Stacy Woodson, and David H. Hendrickson and in Volume 6 by Hugh Lessig, Neil S. Plakcy, and Andrew Welsh-Huggins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The underlying conceit is that somewhere in Chicago you can find a taco truck after midnight, where, if you order \u201cthe special,\u201d you get a handgun with it. Thus the stories have names like \u201cRefried Beans and a Snub-Nosed .44\u201d or \u201cChimichangas and a couple of Glocks\u201d or \u201cTwo Tamales, One Tokarev, and a Lifetime of Broken Promises.\u201d In Volume 6, editor Bracken provides dessert with the three entrees, \u201cChristmas Enchiladas and a Gold-Plated Derringer.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, if all the folks in these stories know about the taco truck, the cops must too, but set that aside. The stories are highly and consistently entertaining, long enough to develop a strong premise, but not so long as to wear it out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Midnight Hour<\/em><\/a>, edited by Abby L. Vandiver, is a compilation of twenty remarkable stories by authors of color. In a foreword, Stephen Mack Jones says their writing \u201cwithout preaching or proselytizing, uncovers and reveals the distortions and delusions, fallacies and myths of an American society that has often pushed such voices to the back of the literary bus.\u201d Or, as it may feel to the authors, under the bus. You don\u2019t have to have a political agenda to enjoy these stories, many of which would stand up against many other recent compilations. There\u2019s a lot of great stuff here, and if The Best American Mystery and Suspense<\/em> series intends to diversify its selection of authors, I\u2019d say, start right here. Highly recommended.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gosh, I\u2019ve read a lot of good books lately, as well as some notable short story collections! I received Volumes 5 and 6 of the Guns + Tacos series, edited by Michael Bracken and Trey R. Barker. These were the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Like crime & mystery, but pressed for time. Start here. Short but (not) sweet crime tales.\n","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[440,52,54,632,126,120],"tags":[1958,1959,1960],"class_list":["post-9511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure","category-crime","category-detective","category-police","category-reading-2","category-short-story","tag-guns-tacos","tag-michael-bracken","tag-midnight-hour"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2tp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9511"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9511\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9517,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9511\/revisions\/9517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}