“Craig McDonald’s outstanding interview collections provide a steady supply of insight, inspiration, and fascination, and will become cornerstones of this crime writing generation’s history."
—Michael Koryta, author of Envy the Night

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Rogue Males summary

In 2006, Craig McDonald published Art in the Blood, a collection of probing, long-form interviews with 20 major crime writers that was immediately hailed as a definitive text in the study of modern crime and mystery fiction.

Now McDonald — “a genuine expert on the history of crime fiction” (Eddie Mueller, San Francisco Chronicle) — returns with Rogue Males, a collection of no-holds-barred interviews with 16 authors who have shaped and defined narrative fiction and songwriting.

Rogue Males includes conversations with crime fiction legends Elmore Leonard and James Crumley (in one of his last interviews); premier stylists James Sallis and Daniel Woodrell; noir kingpins James Ellroy and Ken Bruen, and top thriller writers Lee Child and Randy Wayne White.

Praise for Rogue Males

“A fascinating follow-up to the 2006 Art in the Blood dialogue with leading crime writers, this collection by journalist and fiction writer McDonald (Head Games) underlines the “rogue male” theme by putting some of the most influential crime fiction wizards under the spotlight. Among the personalities of murder and mayhem interviewed are Elmore Leonard, James Crumley, James Sallis, Daniel Woodrell, James Ellroy, Ken Bruen and Lee Child. There are choice nuggets in the chatter between McDonald and the scribes, Leonard revealing the secret to James Patterson's profitable corporate brand, Andrew Vachss endorsing the merits of print journalism and Ellroy labeling the late poet Anne Sexton “hot but doomed.” Wannabe writers will savor the various tidbits of information about novelization and screenwriting from veterans Max Allan Collins, Stephen J. Cannell and Pete Dexter. The troubadour section of the book has its crowning glory with a howling yuk-fest by singer/ writer Kinky Freedman and an insightful tit-for-tat by literary mavericks James Sallis and Ken Bruen. Informative, compulsively readable and mentally spicy."
—Publishers Weekly

"A must for all fans of the “rogue males” who populate the edgiest crime fiction."
—Booklist

“Craig McDonald’s outstanding interview collections provide a steady supply of insight, inspiration, and fascination, and will become cornerstones of this crime writing generation’s history. These are writers who understand and love their craft, interviewed by a writer who understands and loves his craft. If there’s a better combination than that for a rare level of insight into the minds behind the work, I can’t imagine what it might be. Rogue Males, like its predecessor, Art in the Blood, is a treasure.”
—Michael Koryta, author of Envy the Night

Edgar®—nominee Craig McDonald is an award-winning journalist, editor and fiction writer. His short fiction has appeared in literary magazines, anthologies and several online crime fiction sites.

His debut novel, Head Games, was published by Bleak House Books in September 2007. Head Games was selected as a 2008 Edgar® nominee for Best First Novel by an American Author.

In the fall of 2008, his second novel Toros & Torsos was published to great critical acclaim.

His nonfiction books include Art in the Blood, a collection of interviews with 20 major crime authors which appeared in 2006, and Rogue Males: Conversations and Confrontations About the Writing Life, a second collection of interviews to be published by Bleak House Books.

McDonald was also a contributor to the NYT's nonfiction bestseller, Secrets of the Code. He recently won national awards for his profiles of crime novelists James Crumley, Daniel Woodrell and James Sallis.

He is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, and the International Association of Crime Writers.