James D.F. Hannah

To be chosen by Steph Cha and Don Winslow and to be among some of my favourite people and writers is an overwhelming honor.

Huge thanks to Starlite Pulp for its first home.

Please get yourself a copy, if not for my dirty little spite story, than for one of the other 19 amazing ones.

#47: This must be the place BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY AND SUSPENSE 2025, edited by Steph Cha and Don Winslow and including my story "Road to Nowhere," is out today.

It’s a wild, wild life at That Noise at 2 AM, where we’re celebrating the release of this year’s Best American Mystery and Suspense. My story “Road to Nowhere” is part of this year’s collection.

open.substack.com/pub/jamesdfh...

Got a hot tip from @andymboyle.bsky.social that copies of BAMS '25 were out in the wild, so I had to check it out. He was right! Get your copy today! #bams2025

No matter what Christopher Cross says, if you get caught between the moon and New York City, falling in love is NOT the best you can do. You are in serious "Sandra Bullock in GRAVITY" jeopardy, and quick thinking and survival skills are in order.

Priorities, people.

‘I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat Thousands of private messages reveal young GOP leaders joking about gas chambers, slavery and rape.

Wow.
Republicans being racist.
I'm fucking shocked.

www.politico.com/news/2025/10...

Come out, come out, wherever you are, because it’s That Noise at 2 AM, talking to @tonywirt.com about his latest thriller, SILENT CREEK.

open.substack.com/pub/jamesdfh...

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When you’re revising your novel but you’re also testing how much “track changes” can handle.

I've been talking to a lot of people the last few days, and, in case there's any doubt, I want to be clear: What Down and Out Books is doing is goddamn shameful, and staining an otherwise really incredible legacy.

Mark your calendars! On Nov 14 @ noon PST, I'm interviewing my friend, the brilliant @sheilakathleen.bsky.social virtually about her new book on @realgdt.bsky.social's FRANKENSTEIN on behalf of Scottsdale's @poisonedpenbooks.bsky.social. You can tune in via FB/YT: calendar.time.ly/9plshfqx/pos...

When the bell tolls, it tolls for thee at That Noise at 2 AM, where we’re talking to @curtisippolito.bsky.social about his climate change anthology, ON FIRE AND UNDER WATER.

open.substack.com/pub/jamesdfh...

Top AfD politician makes surprise visit to White House Vice President JD Vance has spoken out against the far-right AfD’s political exclusion in Germany.

Nothing good comes from hanging out with right-wing Germans. Absolutely nothing.

www.politico.eu/article/top-...

What does it mean to you to be a Southerner?
Someone asked me that today in an interview

To me being a Southerner is the center of my identity as a black man, as a human , as a writer.
This place of blood and toil, of pain and passion, of joy and agony. Of hatred and hope
This place that -

For the morning crowd.

A ★★★★★ review of One Battle After Another (2025) ¡viva la revolución! once in a great while a movie meets its moment and the collision is explosive, exhilarating, incendiary. a film for our times and maybe a better one than we deserve.

Go see it this weekend, the biggest screen you can find. Here's a movie that can express and amplify all your rage, frustration, alarm, fatigue...and most of all your need for hope.

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Listen, if you’re getting raptured this week, we’d appreciate it if you set the contents of your liquor cabinets outside now and left your car unlocked and the keys on the dashboard. This will save time for all of us left behind. Thanks!

This was a cool exercise—writing about which books share DNA with “On Fire and Under Water.” Grateful to the @wirobooks.bsky.social for inviting and hosting me.

With mentions of work from John Woods, Ivy Pochoda, @jordanharper.bsky.social, and Delfina Cuuero.

Literally more shit to deal with.

What movie do you consider perfect?

So mad I didn't get to meet @nicholasmeyer.bsky.social at New Orleans. I had my TIME AFTER TIME Blu-ray ready for him to sign.

When I was wearing dark suits all of the time and talking talking about aliens, I got told I was too far into my X-Files cosplay. These dip shit however, get to completely exist in their fantasy world.

Southern Baptist Church in Eastern Kentucky right here. This stuff broke me. I was 10 years old, looking for signs of the apocalypse.

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I'm off the internet for four hours and suddenly everyone's talking the rapture is Tuesday when we all know it happened on January 12, 1981 as the second single from the "Autoamerican" album.

Quality content.

BAMS '25: Meet James D. F. Hannah Part 2 of the 'Best American' Interview Series

Thanks to Craig Francis Coates at Cold Caller for letting me ramble about writing and my story “Road to Nowhere,” in this year’s Best American Mystery and Suspense.

coldcallermag.substack.com/p/bams-25-me...

DOJ Deletes Study Showing Domestic Terrorists Are Most Often Right Wing Following Charlie Kirk’s assassination and the Trump administration’s promise to go after the “radical left” a study showing most domestic terrosim is far-right was disappeared.

The Department of Justice has removed a study showing that white supremacist and far-right violence “continues to outpace all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism” in the United States.

🔗 www.404media.co/doj-deletes-...

Still time to sign up for my VIRTUAL short story, query writing and beginnings workshops! Classes start this week, so get those registrations in! writerscircleworkshops.jumbula.com/fall-2025-ad...

YouTube video by Josh Ritter Josh Ritter: "Kathleen" Video/Montage

I’m not saying “Kathleen” by Josh Ritter is the greatest love song of all time.

What I am saying is, there haven’t been any better ones.

Must-Read Latine Crime Novels I spotlight some of my favorite mystery/thriller/crime novels written by Latine authors - just in time for Latinx/Hispanic Heritage Month!

For Latinx/Hispanic Heritage Month, I put together a @bookshop.org list of my favorite mystery books by Latine authors, including @cynthiapelayo.bsky.social @gabino.bsky.social @nodarse.bsky.social @latinasleuths.bsky.social @silviamg.bsky.social. bookshop.org/lists/must-r... @crimewoc.bsky.social

Not that anyone asked, but here's my definitive list of the 10 greatest rock songs about heroin*.

*The list was limited to one song by the Velvet Underground, a band whose entire catalog seems like an ode to the drug.

One of the many things I love about Jordan’s intensely powerful and almost violently prophetic crime fiction is that, with each new book, I’m convinced THIS ONE is his masterpiece. Then he goes and outdoes it with the next one.

(That said, A VIOLENT MASTERPIECE is indeed that, and drops April 28).