This episode of the Crime Cafe podcast features my interview with crime writer Nicholas Chiarkas.

Check out our discussion of his Weepers series! Before I bring on my guest, I’ll just remind you that the Crime Cafe has two eBooks for sale: the nine book box set and the short story anthology. You can find the buy inks for both on my website, debbimack.com under the Crime Cafe link. You can also get a free copy of either book if you become a Patreon supporter. You’ll get that and much more if you support the podcast on Patreon, along with our eternal gratitude for doing so. Check us out on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/crimecafe Debbi (00:54): But first, let me put in a good word for Blubrry podcasting. I’m a Blubrry affiliate, but that’s not the only reason I’m telling you this. I’ve been using Blubrry Podcasting as my hosting service for my podcast for years and it’s one of the best decisions I ever made. They give great customer service, you’re in complete control of your own podcast, you can run it from your own website, and it just takes a lot of the work out of podcasting for me. I find for that reason that it’s a company that I can get behind 100% and say, “You should try this.” Try Blubrry. It doesn’t require a long-term contract, and it’s just a great company, period. It also has free technical support by email, video, and phone, so you can get a human being there. Isn’t that nice? If you want to podcast, try out Blubrry. No long-term contract, excellent distribution, and great technical support, too, by email, video, and on the phone. I’ve included an affiliate link on this blog. I’ve included an affiliate link on this blog. Download a copy of the PDF transcript of this episode here.

Debbi: Hi everyone. Our scheduled guest for today was unfortunately unable to be here. However, fortunately we have another author filling in for him. He was the director of Wisconsin State Public Defender Agency for 22 years, and has also received several awards for excellence. He founded The Justice Without Borders organization, a transnational group that provides legal aid to victims of labor exploitation and human trafficking. Interesting! He has also written two novels - Weepers and Nunzio's Way. It's my pleasure to have with me as my guest, Nicholas Chiarkas. Hi, Nick. How are you doing today? Nick: I am fine. Thank you so much for having me, Debbi. I appreciate it. Debbi: Well, it's my pleasure. Very much so. It's great to meet you. Tell us about your books. They're part of a series. Is that correct? Nick: They are. They're part of what we call the Weepers series. The first novel was Weepers. The second one, which came out this past October - wow, almost a year ago - is Nunzio's Way. Can I hold them up and show you what they look like? Debbi: Absolutely. For anybody who is watching on YouTube. Nick: I just happen to have a couple. Debbi: Oh, yeah. They just happen to be sitting there. Nick: This is Weepers and this is Nunzio's Way. Debbi: Very good. Very good. Hold Weepers up a little bit more. Good. Get a nice, good view. There we go. Weepers. Okay. Look at all those people in the background. Very evocative. Let's see, so they have different protagonists though, correct? Nick: There are some of the same ones, but they do have different characters. Weepers focuses more on Angelo, who is a 13-year-old kid growing up in the Al Smith projects on Manhattan's Lower East Side, where I actually grew up. In many ways, Weepers, if you were talking to my wife instead of me, she would say it's a memoir or a Roman à clef, you know, a story that is based on fact that has a façade of fiction over it. And it's kind of fun to guess who the characters are and what the real events really were. So it's based on a lot of real events and my experience growing up in a housing project like you did, Debbi, in New York City.

Weepers focuses more on Angelo, who is a 13-year-old kid growing up in the Al Smith projects on Man...