Ronald Rabbit Is a Dirty Old Man (17 page)

When God gives you all that to work with, it shouldn’t be all that hard to produce a novel.

Nor was it. I wrote
Ronald Rabbit
in four days. They were, it must be said, long days—not because I was in a great rush to get done, but because I couldn’t seem to stop. One letter kept leading to another. I was completely caught up in the realization of the havoc that could be wreaked by a single manipulative maniac with a typewriter, and I just kept hammering away at it, and in hardly any time at all I was done.

Then I got various friends to read it because I had the feeling it ought not waste its fragrance upon the desert air of pseudonymous paperbackery. Everybody chose to confirm me in this folly, and my agent pledged the book with Bernard Geis, and I thought I was going to get rich. For years I’d scratched out a meager living by writing dirty books under pen names. Now I had broken through. I had written a dirty book under my own name, and the world was sure to be my oyster.

Except, of course, it didn’t turn out that way. Geis, who’d written several great chapters in the history of contemporary publishing, picked that moment to write Chapter Eleven. It didn’t take an astrologer to see it was not the best time to be published by him. He tried, and there was actually an ad, and he had a ton of promotional campaign buttons printed, but the book essentially sank without a trace.

Rumors of lucrative reprint deals came and went, too, and finally my agent called to tell me that Manor Books wanted to do the book in paperback. They would pay a hot fifteen hundred dollars, all of which would go to Geis to offset some of the unearned balance of the five thousand dollar advance he’d given me.

Some oyster.

There was a catch, though. Manor wanted to change the title. I told them no.

Geis called my agent. “Talk some sense into Larry,” he said. “If he won’t let them change the title, it might queer the deal.”

“God,” I said, “I hope so.” But it didn’t. Manor published the book in paperback, with the original title, and their edition is probably harder to find than Geis’s hardcover edition. The only other edition the book has ever had is a Japanese one, and that may be the hardest of all to find, because how would I even know if I found it?

So there you have it, Jim. That’s how the book came about. And you know what else it is? It’s the intro. Just copy this letter directly as the introduction to your sumptuous edition. What better intro to a book of letters than another letter? In fact you might want to photograph this letter rather than bother setting type. Don’t worry about the letterhead. I’ve already changed the phone number to one of those generic 555 nonexistent numbers, and I don’t care if the rest is public information. If people want to write me letters or send me faxes, I say God bless ’em.

Hang in there, Jim. And be nice, or I’ll get Laurence Clarke after you.

And let me add, Dear E-Reader, how pleased I am to have
Ronald Rabbit
available as an ebook. I can only hope you had a fraction of the fun reading it that I had writing it.

—Lawrence (with a W) Block (with a K)

Greenwich Village

Lawrence Block ([email protected]) welcomes your email responses; he reads them all, and replies when he can.

A Biography of Lawrence Block

Lawrence Block (b. 1938) is the recipient of a Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America and an internationally renowned bestselling author. His prolific career spans over one hundred books, including four bestselling series as well as dozens of short stories, articles, and books on writing. He has won four Edgar and Shamus Awards, two Falcon Awards from the Maltese Falcon Society of Japan, the Nero and Philip Marlowe Awards, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Private Eye Writers of America, and the Cartier Diamond Dagger from the Crime Writers Association of the United Kingdom. In France, he has been awarded the title Grand Maitre du Roman Noir and has twice received the Societe 813 trophy.

Born in Buffalo, New York, Block attended Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio. Leaving school before graduation, he moved to New York City, a locale that features prominently in most of his works. His earliest published writing appeared in the 1950s, frequently under pseudonyms, and many of these novels are now considered classics of the pulp fiction genre. During his early writing years, Block also worked in the mailroom of a publishing house and reviewed the submission slush pile for a literary agency. He has cited the latter experience as a valuable lesson for a beginning writer.

Block’s first short story, “You Can’t Lose,” was published in 1957 in
Manhunt
, the first of dozens of short stories and articles that he would publish over the years in publications including
American Heritage
,
Redbook
,
Playboy
,
Cosmopolitan
,
GQ
, and the
New York Times
. His short fiction has been featured and reprinted in over eleven collections including
Enough Rope
(2002), which is comprised of eighty-four of his short stories.

In 1966, Block introduced the insomniac protagonist Evan Tanner in the novel
The Thief Who Couldn’t Sleep
. Block’s diverse heroes also include the urbane and witty bookseller—and thief-on-the-side—Bernie Rhodenbarr; the gritty recovering alcoholic and private investigator Matthew Scudder; and Chip Harrison, the comical assistant to a private investigator with a Nero Wolfe fixation who appears in
No Score
,
Chip Harrison Scores Again
,
Make Out with Murder
, and
The Topless Tulip Caper
. Block has also written several short stories and novels featuring Keller, a professional hit man. Block’s work is praised for his richly imagined and varied characters and frequent use of humor.

A father of three daughters, Block lives in New York City with his second wife, Lynne. When he isn’t touring or attending mystery conventions, he and Lynne are frequent travelers, as members of the Travelers’ Century Club for nearly a decade now, and have visited about 150 countries.

A four-year-old Block in 1942.

Block during the summer of 1944, with his baby sister, Betsy.

Block’s 1955 yearbook picture from Bennett High School in Buffalo, New York.

Block in 1983, in a cap and leather jacket. Block says that he “later lost the cap, and some son of a bitch stole the jacket. Don’t even ask about the hair.”

Block with his eldest daughter, Amy, at her wedding in October 1984.

Seen here around 1990, Block works in his office on New York’s West 13th Street with, he says, “a bad haircut, an ugly shirt, and a few extra pounds.”

Block at a bookstore appearance in support of
A Walk Among the Tombstones
, his tenth Matthew Scudder novel, on Veterans Day, 1992.