Reflections on proofing the Sin and Nicki Box Set

I published Sin Walks Into The Desert, Regret Things and To Guns as a Kindle box set this weekend. Mostly, this is just a marketing thing. (My Owl and Raccoon box set easily outsells the individual books in that series.) But it's also because I want more readers to make it through to To Guns, which is one of my favorite books.

I did the due diligence of proofing the whole series, and it was a frustrating and illuminating experience. Sin Walks Into The Desert is undeniably a niche book. I get that. Sin is sulky and obsessed with guns and the language of the book follows his lead. Still, with all the awards the damn thing has won, I feel like it should be a best-seller. Some of the scenes - like the conversation between Sin and Sandy in the diner after Sin pulls a gun at school - are just fucking great.

Regret Things was a much more frustrating read. Some of my more creative friends say it's the best thing I've ever written. And there are places they're right. The dialogue between Nicki and Ryan before she asks him to help with her heist? Fucking brilliant. But the pages read like a mashup of scenes, not a novel. And too much time is spent with Nicki's illicit lover, Grant. He was the inspiration for the book, and therefore the whole series. But now I look back and worry that he sucks all the oxygen out of Nicki's story. And his nonstop leering feels eye-rollingly adolescent. I wish I'd culled his airtime back.

So I'm not surprised To Guns has been a flop. To enjoy it, you really need to have read both of the prior books. But I can't imagine there are many people out there who'd tolerate both a raw neo-Western and a casserole of bohemian excess. That's a huge regret of mine. To Guns' descriptions of the Colorado mountains, its shootouts, and its scene between Nicki, Sin and their underage bartender are all so, so good.

I hope this box set will finally get To Guns the audience it deserves.

How to get a free print copy of Sin Walks Into The Desert

I have seven copies of Sin Walks Into The Desert left over from its stint on the shelves at Tattered Cover. I figure I'll mail them out to the next seven people who sign up for my email list, which you can do in the righthand sidebar of this blog.

Sin is my most popular book. It's been well-reviewed and highly awarded. But it is desert noir. Sort of a moody vigilante story mixed with a dose of teenage melancholy. And as many reviewers note, Sin's uncomfortable fascination with guns colors almost every page. If that doesn't sound like your cup of tea, please skip it.

But if it does, well, I already have the books stuffed into envelopes. I'm just looking for a few good addresses to write on the front. Thanks for your interest.

Manhattan Book Review on To Guns

The Manhattan Book Review takes on To Guns:

...All this escalates into a classic Western gun battle that is at times hilarious, and at times high-throttle, but always memorable... Ingwalson once again uses his trademark smooth, noir style to draw the reader into the novella while not distracting from the action at hand. To Guns is written in a novella style as it follows the action of this single chase to Colorado, so it is great for thriller fans looking for a quick read to pick up and breeze through.

Sound good? Get it on Amazon.

How To Guns is different than any of my other books

About a year ago, I wrote a post for Omnimystery about the difference between plotting mysteries and writing noir. You can read the whole thing if you want. But the upshot is that the former genre is about architecting the ending, while the latter is about losing yourself in atmosphere.

Both of the Owl and Raccoon books were outlined from the solution backwards before I started writing. While both the Sin and Nicki books chase a scene or sentence I found compelling.

To Guns is the first book I've written that's both. It has all the lush detail and moody atmosphere, but I finished chapter-by-chapter notes for the four main characters (Sin, Nicki, Mathieu and Meb) before I started writing.

Presenting a story about stories. And guns.

I finally pulled the trigger on the third novella in the Sin and Nicki series. And until July 1, it's priced as low as Amazon will allow. You can order a print copy now for $4.99. Or pre-order the Kindle version for $0.99.

It's a couple years after Regret Things. Nicki's hunting for a safe place to raise her family. And Sin's searching for a life without violence. But they're on a collision course with a lone Italian mercenary and a team of trashy Colorado meth dealers. Their separate storylines converge deep in the southern Rockies.

To Guns is more than just a neo-Western shootout. It's a story about stories, full of metaphors for the way people construct their personal mythologies. I hope you love it. Thank you, thank you, thank you.