Created by Christa Faust
“In pulp novels, the private dick always keeps a gat in his desk drawer. I keep my iron in a gunsafe keyed to my fingerprint, but I do keep a strap-on in my desk drawer. You know, for emergencies…”
— Butch clues us in…
Okay, folks: let’s just assume a few tongues are firmly in cheek–or at least somewhere–with this one. If you combine the raunchy innuendo of Shell Scott and the frank-for-its-time sexuality of Ann Bannon with the back-of-the-counter smut of the era, you might just come up with something like Christa Faust’s BUTCH FATALE, DYKE DETECTIVE.
But you probably won’t, because you’re not Christa.
She just owns Double-D Double Cross (2012), from its first no-holds-barred, “how do you do?” pages to the teeth-clenching, eye-rolling climax. The first in a proposed series, it’s a clever, horny and affectionate send-up, as well as a straight-up pure pulp tale of one of the most kickass and randy gumshoes–gay, straight, make or female–to steam up the place in a long, long time–and it’s hard to imagine anyone else getting so delightfully in your face about it.
And I when I say steam, I mean it. There’s more steam in just the opening chapter than the old Cunard line ever had. Make a Beeline for this one, folks…
Butch isn’t some airbrushed, Oprah-friendly lipstick lesbian, either. Butch is unapologetically two-fisted and mouthy with–as La Christa puts it–“an insatiable appetite for two things: women and trouble.” She’s got an Echo Park office and a Tony Curtis-style do, and clocks in at 5’10” and 150 pounds of “don’t push me around.” As her creator puts it, “The attractive villainess who uses her sexuality to control and manipulate men has been done to death a thousand times.”
The acclaimed author of several novels, including Choke Hold and Money Shot, Faust has been nominated for the Edgar, Anthony, and Barry awards, and was the first woman published by HardCaseCrime — and has the tat to prove it. She has worked in the Times Square peep booths as a professional dominatrix, and in the adult film industry, both behind and in front of the cameras, for over a decade (an experience she detailed in Peepland, the Hard Case Crime Comics mini-series she co-wrote with Gary Phillips), and is an unabashed fan of film noir, hard-boiled pulp and MMA fights. She lives and writes in Los Angeles.
UNDER OATH
- “(Christa Faust is) a Veronica in a world of Betties.”
— Quentin Tarantino
NOVELS
- Double-D Double Cross (2012) | Kindle it!
RELATED LINKS
- What Were Once Vices…
Some other ntable Gay and Lesbian eyes… - Mistress Christa’s Ten Rules to Write Noir
DO NOT DISOBEY!
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
