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Two Pens on Notebook

Joseph S. Walker

As of November 2022, I have shifted to a new website.  Please join me at jswalkerauthor.com

I'm an Edgar-nominated author of short stories, primarily in the crime/mystery field.

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About Me

I was born and raised in Peoria, Illinois.  In 1998 I earned my PhD in contemporary American literature from Purdue University.   While still writing occasional academic essays, I've returned to my longtime ambition to write fiction, especially in the mystery genre I've always loved.  I've now published more than fifty short stories, been nominated for the Edgar and Derringer Awards, and won the Bill Crider Prize for Short Fiction and the Al Blanchard Award (twice).

My Fiction

OFF THE SHELF

Mickey Finn IV: 21st Century Noir.  Ed. Michael Bracken.  Down & Out Books, 2023.

WE ARE THE STONEWALL GIRLS

More Groovy Gumshoes.  Ed. Michael Bracken.  Down & Out Books, 2023.

The Book of Extraordinary Femme Fatale Stories.  Ed. Maxim Jakubowski.  Mango Publishing, 2022.  31-42.

JOURN-E: The Journal of Imaginative Literature 1.2 (Fall 2022).  35-39.

CLEANING DAY

Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.  September/October 2022.  121-122.

Malice in Dallas: Metroplex Mysteries, Volume One.  Ed. Barb Goffman.  Sisters in Crime North Dallas, 2022.  184-198.

The Dark City Crime & Mystery Magazine, 7.2 (January 2022).

Kings River Life.  March 19, 2022.

A DEATH AT PRINCE'S LANDING

Blues City Clues.  Malice in Memphis, 2022.

THE DOMINION OF ALL THE EARTH

Extraordinary Visions: Stories Inspired by Jules Verne.  The North American Jules Verne Society, 2021.

Mickey Finn III: 21st Century Noir.  Ed. Michael Bracken.  Down & Out Books, 2022.

Mystery Magazine, May 2022.  74-83.

GOT THEM SHOES ON YOUR FEET

Mystery Tribune, forthcoming.

Black Cat Weekly #25 (February 2022).  11-24.

The Clockwork Chronicles.  Ed. Jade Cinders.  Madhouse Books, 2022.

Black Cat Weekly #39 (May 2022).  11-25.

The Big Fang.  Ed. Melissa Haveman & Allison Deters.  2022.  191-197.

MORE THAN SUSPICION

A Hint of Hitchcock.  Ed. Cameron Trost.  Black Beacon Books, 2022.

Mystery Weekly, January 2022.  18-28.

N is for Nautical.  Ed. P. J. Blakey-Norris.  Red Cape Publishing, 2022.

Black is the Night: A Cornell Woolrich Tribute.  Ed. Maxim Jakubowski.  Titan Books, 2022.

Guilty Crime Story Magazine #6 (Fall 2022).

Uncharted Magazine, August 2022.

Second place, Uncharted 2022 Crime/Mystery short story contest.

Guns & Tacos, Season 4, Episode 20.  Ed. Michael Bracken and Trey Barker.  Down & Out Books, 2022.

Summer Bludgeon: A Crime, Mystery, Noir, Suspense & Thriller Anthology.  Eds. H Dair Brown & Robin Knabel.  Unsettling Reads, 2022.  99-105.

Die Laughing: An Anthology of Humorous Mysteries.  Ed. Kerry Carter.  Mystery Weekly, 2021.  329-335.

Moonlight & Misadventure: 20 Stories of Mystery and Suspense.  Ed. Judy Penz Sheluk.  Superior Shores Press, 2021.  3-18.

Monkey Business: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Films of the Marx Brothers.  Ed. Josh Pachter.  Untreed Reads, 2021.

Under the Thumb: Stories of Police Oppression.  Ed. S. A. Cosby.  Rock and a Hard Place Press.  47-56. 

The First Line 23.1 (Spring 2021).  17-23.

Mickey Finn II: 21st Century Noir.  Ed. Michael Bracken.  Down & Out Books, 2021.

Tough.  July 5, 2021.

Reprinted in The Mysterious Bookshop Presents the Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2022.  Ed. Otto Penzler and Sara Paretsky.  2022.

Bloodroot: The Best New England Crime Stories 2021.  Ed. Susan Oleksiw, Ang Pompano and Leslie Wheeler.  Crime Spree Books, 2021.  1-13.

Winner, 2021 Al Blanchard Award

Now There Was A Story!.  Ed. Tia Ja'Nae and Stephen J. Golds.  Uncle B Publications, 2021.  13-23.

KILLER'S CRUISE

The Fish That Got Away: The Sixth Guppy Anthology.  Ed. Linda M. Rodriguez.  Wildside Press, 2021. 

THE LAST MAN IN LAFARGE

Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, July/August 2021.  151-158.

Winner, 2019 Bill Crider Prize for Short Fiction

Gabba Gabba Hey: An Anthology of Fiction Inspired by the Music of the Ramones.  Ed. Chris McVeigh.  Fahrenheit Press, 2021.  152-155.

Coming Through In Waves: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of Pink Floyd.  Ed. T. Fox Dunham.  Gutter Books, 2021.  153-160.

Dramatized on the Mysteryrat's Maze podcast.  July 4, 2022.

Cemetery Plots of Northern California: The Capitol Crimes 2021 Anthology.  Ed. Terry Shepherd, Sarah Bresniker, Kathleen Asay, and Stacie Giles.  Capitol Crimes, 2021.  95-106.

Trouble No More.  Ed. Mark Westmoreland.  Down & Out Books, 2021.  115-125.

WEDNESDAYS AT TEN

Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, May/June 2021.  40-54.

After The East Wind Blows Part III: When the Storm has Cleared (1921-1928).  Ed. David Marcum.  Belanger Books, 2021.  102-121. 

CHASING DIAMONDS

Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine.  September/October 2020.  27-34.

Finalist, 2021 Derringer Award for Best Long Story

The Killer Wore Cranberry: A Sixth Scandalous Serving.  Ed. J. Alan Hartman.  Untreed Reads, 2020.  35-47.

ETTA AT THE END OF THE WORLD

Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine.  May/June 2020.  4-13.

Finalist, 2021 Edgar Award for Best Short Story

Finalist, 2021 Derringer Award for Best Long Story


Reprinted in The Mysterious Bookshop Presents The Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2021.  Ed. Otto Penzler and Lee Child.  401-416.

Read by the author for the Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine podcast.

Mystery Weekly.  September 2020.  22-34.

Tough.  March 16, 2020.

Peace, Love and Crime: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of the Sixties.  Ed. Sandra Murphy.  Untreed Reads, 2020.  129-140.

Featured on the podcast Desideratum, May 28, 2021.

Heartbreaks & Half-truths: 22 Stories of Mystery & Suspense.  Ed. Judy Penz Sheluk.  Superior Shores Press, 2020.  211-221.

Mickey Finn: 21st Century Noir.  Ed. Michael Bracken.  Down & Out Books, 2020.  123-143.

Cozy Villages of Death.  Ed. Lyn Worthen.  Camden Park Press, 2020.  27-43.

Hoosier Noir Two.  First City Books.  2020.  89-97.

BONUS ROUND

Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine.  May/June 2019.  6-15.

Named a Distinguished Story of the Year, Best American Mystery Stories, 2020.

Life is Short and Then You Die.  Ed. Kelley Armstrong.  New York: Imprint, 2019.  175-190.

Sherlock Holmes: Adventures in the Realms of Edgar Allan Poe.  Ed. Brian and Derrick Belanger.  Belanger Books, 2019.  175-206.

Seascape: The Best New England Crime Stories 2019.  Ed. Verena Rose, Harriette Sacker & Shawn Reilly Simmons.  Level Best Books, 2019.  376-388.

Winner, 2019 Al Blanchard Award

Reprinted in epub/Kindle form in the series Barb Goffman Presents

The Blood Tomes, Volume 2: Creatures.  Ed. Andrea Dawn.  TellTale Press, 2019.  61-65.

Mystery Weekly.  August 2018.  2-15.

Scream and Scream Again!  Ed. R. L. Stine.  New York: HarperCollins, 2018.  282-298.

Day of the Dark: Stories of Eclipse.  Ed. Kaye George.  Rockville, Maryland: Wildside Press, 2017.  131-141.

Named a Distinguished Story of the Year, Best American Mystery Stories, 2018.

The Dark City Crime & Mystery Magazine.  2.3 (April 2017).

PILL BUG

Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine.  March 2016.  4-18.

Named a Distinguished Story of the Year, Best American Mystery Stories, 2017.

Tomorrow: Apocalyptic Short Stories.  Ed. Karen Henderson.  Australia: Kayelle Press, 2013.  15-28.

Pulp Modern III (Spring/Summer 2012).  27-40.

THE PENTHOUSE VIEW

Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine.  January/February 2012.  99-107.

Resistance Front.  Ed. Bernard J. Schaffer,  Kindle All-Stars, 2012. 363-74.

Absolute Visions: Anthology of Speculative Fiction.  Ed. MacAllister Stone.  Written in Stone, 2011.  285-290.

Indiana Science Fiction Anthology 2011.  Ed. James Ward Kirk.  Indiana: Angels & Demons & Ghosts, 2011.  12-15.

The First Line 13.3 (Fall 2011).  28-35.

MOST ALIVE

Flash: The International Short-Short Story Magazine.  October 2011 (4.2).  29.

My Academic Publications

Excavating Indiana Jones: Essays on the Films and Franchise.  Ed. Randy Laist.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2020.  151-163.

Television Finales: From Howdy Doody to Girls.  Ed. Douglas L. Howard and David Bianculli.  Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 2018.  425-432.

The New Western: Critical Essays on the Genre since 9/11.  Ed. Scott Stoddart.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2016.  62-80.

A State of Arrested Development: Critical Essays on the Innovative Television Comedy.  Ed. Kris Barton.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2015.  134-148.

Gender and the Modern Sherlock Holmes.  Ed. Nadine Farghaly.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2015.  118-132.

A Sense of Community: Essays on the Television Series and Its Fandom.  Ed.  Ann-Gee Lee.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2014.  181-196.

100 Entertainers Who Changed America.  Ed. Robert C. Sickels.  Santa Barbara: Greenwood, 2013.  378-385.

In the Peanut Gallery with Mystery Science Theater 3000: Essays on Film, Fandom, Technology and the Culture of Riffing.  Ed. Robert G. Weiner and Shelley E. Barba.  Jefferson: McFarland and Company, 2011.  209-217.

The Essential Sopranos Reader.  Ed. David Lavery, Douglas L. Howard and Paul Levinson.  Lexington: UP of Kentucky, 2011.  289-296.

Phati’tude 3.3 (Fall 2011).  216, 218-220.

On the Verge of Tears: Why Movies, Television, Music, Art, Popular Culture, Literature, and the Real World Make Us Cry.  Ed. Michele Byers and David Lavery.  London: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2010.  152-155.

Introduction: ‘If You Think We’re Alive, You Ought To Speak’

(with Keith Perry).  {Also assistant editor of this special issue on the Coen brothers.]  Post Script: Essays in Film and the Humanities 27.2 (Winter/Spring 2008): 3-7.

Books and Beyond: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of New American Reading.  Ed. Kenneth Womack.  Westport: Greenwood Press, 2008.  995-1012.

Nothing That Is: Millennial Cinema and the Blair Witch Controversies.  Ed. Sarah Higley and Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock.  Detroit: Wayne State UP, 2004.  163-180.

A Kink in the System: Terrorism and the Comic Mystery Novel

Studies in the Novel 36.3 (Fall 2004): 336-351.

Criminality and (Self) Discipline: The Case of Paul Auster

Modern Fiction Studies 48.2 (Summer 2002): 389-421.

This Thing of Ours: Investigating The Sopranos.  Ed. David Lavery.  New York: Columbia UP, 2002.  109-121.

The Catcher in the Rye: New Essays.  Ed. J. P. Steed.  New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2002.  79-99.

Criminality, the Real, and the Story of America: The Case of Don DeLillo

The Centennial Review 43.3 (Fall 1999): 433-466.

Don DeLillo: A Selected Bibliography

Modern Fiction Studies 45.3 (Fall 1999): 837-51.

When Texts Collide: The Re-Visionist Power of the Margin

Colby Quarterly 35.1 (March 1999): 35-48.

"The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity."

Harlan Ellison

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