Behind The Black Mask: Mystery Writers Revealed

DEADLY BELOVED, released in December 2007 by Hard Case Crime, is the culmination of Max Allan Collins's eclectic and prolific career. Its tight pacing and razor-sharp scene cuts recall Max's talent as a filmmaker. Its visual prose speaks to his experience writing the Dick Tracy comic strip, the Ms. Tree comic book series, and the justly famous graphic novel THE ROAD TO PERDITION. The vivid evocation of the city of Chicago, and the subtle references to its mob past, remind us of Max's uncanny ability to build fiction on fact--as he has done so successfully with his Nate Heller historical thriller series. In short, DEADLY BELOVED could only have been written by Max Allan Collins. These are the topics addressed in the first half of this double-length holiday-bonus episode, while the second half allows Max to detail his current projects--as the inheritor of Mickey Spillane's unfinished manuscripts, the creative genius behind a series of graphic novels that investigate real-life crimes in the world of comics, and