THIS JUST IN . . .

In its new 2010 Arts issue, Big Sky Journal, a lifestyle and culture magazine of the Northern Rockies, has run an excerpt from my book, Cowboys, Mountain Men & Grizzly Bears. The excerpt appears as the issue’s “Images of the West” column. The chapter chosen is “The Great Die-Up,” about the horrific winter of 1886-1887 in Montana, and all over the nation, in fact.

And the nifty bit is that the article includes a handful of historic works of art–with extended captions–that don’t appear in my book. I think the piece looks grand and I hope readers do, too. (But most of all, I hope readers will be so overwhelmed with emotion that they will buy two dozen copies (each) of my book to give as Christmas gifts! After all, it’s never too early to think of others…. )

Click here for an online preview of the article.

SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME
My short, short story found a home at the fine e-zine Beat to a PULP.

Gary Dobbs, mastermind of The Tainted Archive—and one heck of a writer—talked with me over his virtual campfire one night recently and he’s posted the transcript here (you’ll have to add your own crackling-log sounds). We talk writin’, Westerns, the gripping future of the genre, and more. Pull up a stump and set a spell. The coffee’s still hot….

And my Missoula, Montana chum, fellow writer Chris La Tray, kindly snapped a new pic of The Manliest Book Ever Written (aka Cowboys, Mountain Men & Grizzly Bears), dominating a spinner rack at the Lochsa Lodge in Idaho. Cool place for my book to prowl its way into people’s shopping bags. Thanks, Chris!

Here’s a sneak preview of the semi-final cover art for my next non-fiction book, Bootleggers, Lobstermen, and Lumberjacks: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments in the History of Hardscrabble New England, due out October 5, 2010 (but available for pre-order now!):

(Click cover for larger image.)

In Bootleggers, Lobstermen, and Lumberjacks: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments in the History of Hardscrabble New England, author Matthew P. Mayo presents 50 narrative-driven tales covering hundreds of years of incredible, true accounts of Indian abductions and all-out wars; of timber-tough men in the golden age of New England logging; of suspected witches being hung and crushed by stones; of savage storms, fantastic shipwrecks, ruthless pirates, and half-starved castaways; of train wrecks, blizzards, and nor’easters; of the hair-raising exploits of rumrunners, smugglers, and bootleggers; of hardworking lobstermen driven to settle their differences any way they can; of hill farmers with fast cars during Prohibition doing their best to survive in the challenging and unique locale that is New England—as much a place as a state of mind.

(Globe Pequot Press; October, 2010)
(Softcover; 6 x 9; 320 pages; 28 historic photos; $16.95; ISBN: 978-0-7627-5968-2)

Here’s a taste of what’s inside:

• The Pilgrims’ first winter is a time of disease, starvation, and death

• Giles Corey is pressed to death with stones during the Salem Witch Trials

• Hannah Duston’s scalping spree leaves 14 Indians dead

• Every month in 1816 saw a killing frost, and famine swept through New England

• Big Jim Cullen gets his neck stretched in New England’s only lynching

• A R.I. girl’s corpse is mutilated, then her family inhales the fumes of her burning organs

• The mother of all logjams rips apart a Vermont town

• Two-million gallons of molasses in a 40-foot wall roars through Boston

• A high-speed Vermont booze-run ends in a shooting, a car wreck, and a dead boy

• FBI’s most-wanted, the Al Brady Gang, are outwitted by savvy Mainers

• Nazis from a submarine use a small Maine town as their entry to sabotage the US

• Lobstermen cut trap lines, burn docks, sink boats, and then the shooting starts

Available for pre-order: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Borders | Indiebound | Powell’s

I received word this week from my agent that she struck a deal with Dorchester Publishing to reprint my three Black Horse Westerns as mass-market paperbacks available all over the US (and beyond!) as part of the Leisure Books line. This is grand news for me, as it will significantly broaden the reach and exposure of my books.

The first, Winters’ War, is due for release in May, 2011, followed in roughly six-month intervals by Hot Lead, Cold Heart, and Wrong Town. The books will appear in print, audio versions, various e-book formats, and possibly foreign-language versions.

Hopefully all of this plus new covers (maybe sporting the words “Spur Award Finalist”!) and major distribution will add up to stellar sales. Keep ’em crossed!

As I mentioned previously, this year’s Western Writers of America convention (June 22-26) took place in Knoxville, Tennessee, the first time in the organization’s 57-year history that it was held east of the Mississippi River. To help us learn all about the region, there were various bus tours and panels, including visits to Cumberland Gap and Wilderness Road State Park, an impressive park in Virginia that is home to Historic Martin’s Station, an “outdoor living history museum featuring the most authentically reconstructed frontier fort in America.” It was built more than a decade ago by men who lived there for seven months, using only period (1775) tools, clothes, techniques, etc. Truly impressive. Here’s a link: www.historicmartinsstation.com.

I was also fortunate enough to meet a variety of authors whose work I’ve read for years. During the mass book signing at the East Tennessee Historical Society Museum in downtown Knoxville, my neighbor happened to be Gary McCarthy, whose Derby Man novels I’ve long enjoyed. And I finally got to meet Marcus Pelegrimas–who writes his superb Westerns under the name Marcus Galloway (and urban horror—the “Skinners” series—under his own name). We’ve corresponded for a couple of years via email, and this convention provided us with the opportunity to sit and yammer for hours–about movies, writing, books, video games, movies, books, writing, and more. Like old hens clucking away. It was great fun.

And guess who else I was fortunate enough to meet…. Yep, Robert J. Randisi, creator and writer of the long-running and perpetually enjoyable “Gunsmith” series, the “Rat Pack Mysteries” series, and so many more. It was a genuine treat for me to meet this man, whose work I’ve long admired.

Matthew and Jennifer with John D. Nesbitt at the 2010 Spur Awards Banquet.

Another high point of the week, for me, was receiving my Spur Finalist award in the Short Fiction category at the Spur Finalist Luncheon on Friday. The story, “Half a Pig,” appears in the Express Westerns anthology, A Fistful of Legends. That I came in a (close?!) second to my good friend, writer John D. Nesbitt, made the achievement much more special. The certificate’s now framed on my office wall, and makes me type faster and with more emphasis. Look out, world!

Next year … Bismarck, North Dakota!

Yep, pards, for the first time since its founding in 1953, the Western Writers of America (WWA) will hold its annual convention east of the Mississippi River. Knoxville, Tennessee will play host this June 22-26 to a few hundred folks sporting cowboy hats and toting typewriters, me among them—though I’ll be wearing my trusty Red Sox cap.

The 2010 convention looks to be a corker, and events will include, due to proximity to Nashville, WWA’s official vote on the greatest Western songs of all time, plus panels on Indian writers, the Trail of Tears, Davy Crockett, and more. Planned side trips include a visit to Cumberland Gap National Historical Park and a visit to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians. Also planned is the annual mass book signing and Spur Awards banquets. And Pulitzer Prize winner, N. Scott Momaday, will be presented with this year’s Owen Wister Award for lifetime contributions to the literature of the American West.

The convention is open to members and non-members, and as always, promises to be jam-packed with activities, business, and perhaps a bit of time left over for bellying up to the bar. Visit www.WesternWriters.org for the full feedbag. See you there, pards!

Blogmeister David Cranmer (of Beat to a Pulp fame) is handling blog duties over at Gutter Books‘ great new site and he flattered me by interviewing me for the inaugural post! He popped me on the jaw with his famous “7 Questions” and I did my best to be entertaining: Gutterbooksnewsandevents.blogspot.com

At Goodreads, Chris La Tray gave my book four out of five stars and offered up this review:

“This is a great collection of short little pieces roughly lumped into three different categories, as Mayo outlines in the introduction: Mountain Men and Indians; Man vs. Nature; and Cowboys and Gunfighters; running chronologically from the early 19th century to the early 20th century. It touches on many great stories — 50 of ’em — all of which are potentially worthy of full books devoted to each one. It is an exciting, and harrowing, review of the hardships faced in the Old West, as well as many of the larger-than-life characters to come out of that era. A great book to keep on the bedside table for those moments when you only have 10 or 15 minutes to read at a time. Recommended!”

Thanks, Chris!

My chum, Chris La Tray (www.chrislatray.com), had occasion to pass through the airport at Missoula, Montana, a few days back and he snapped these pics. Lookin’ good! (I’ve read many of the other books on the rack and it’s an honor to have my book in their company. Just wait ’til they get a load of the next one….) Thanks for the pics, Chris!