Monday, April 2, 2012

Why I decided to publish Cuffs by Matthew C Funk

Cuffs by Matthew C Funk is the third story in the Speedloader anthology, the first release of Snubnose Press. Last year when I interviewed him as part of the Conversations with the Bookless series I said the following:

Matthew Funk is one of my favorite writers out there on the short fiction scene. There is a select group of writers that I will drop everything to go read something new of and his name is among them. More broadly he is one of the premier stylists working in crime short fiction right now.


A year later I still stand by all of that. I count myself among the many who are eagerly awaiting Funk to be published.

So when it came time to invite writers to send me a story for Speedloader Funk was a no-brainer, of course I was going to ask him.

Cuffs is probably one of the tensest stories that I've read in a long time. The reader stays in Darrell's, the protagonist, shoes the whole time and feels every inch of his fear, confusion and frustration.

He lowered the phone. The car behind him was close. It was wide and low and so dark Darrell could only make its shape out of the night as a nervous field of ricochet rain.


Even at a word level I appreciate his writing. How the softer sounds of "nervous field" get hammered by the harsh sound of "ricochet rain" which foreshadows the doom about to come.

One of things that I really like with this story is that it succeeds on a microcosmic and a macro-cosmic level. On a micro level it has a clear beginning and a clear end, so the story itself feel complete. But, on a macro level, there is still a broader world and actions that are only hinted at. The effect that this creates is simultaneously satisfaction and wanting more.

Cuffs is filled with great characters, subtle characterization, a suspenseful air of doom and top notch writing. That's why I decided to publish Cuffs.

Currently Reading: Submissions for Snubnose; A Death in Mexico by Jonathan Woods; The Hunger Games trilogy.

Currently Listening: One of my favorite songs being played on the radio right now is Low Fuel Drug Run by 7Horse.