Showing results by author "Michael A. Black" in All Categories

The Department of Institutional Memory talks Black Rock Ranger

Join your hosts Stephanie and Michael as they explore the spookiest and most disturbing cases of true crime, unexplained deaths, macabre history, serial killers, conspiracies, weird mysteries and the occult. Stories of morbid fascination and the human condition. Let us take you on a journey into darkness, and maybe have a laugh or two.

Suburban husband and wife team, Michael and Rebecca Black, chat about marriage, family, and anything else that comes to mind after they put their kids to bed at night.

Veteran of sketch, television, and film, comedian Michael Ian Black has mastered a delivery that's equal parts dapper and deadpan, whether he's discussing the pro-choice debate or the Tilt-A-Whirl. Taped at John Jay College in New York City, Black's special includes his wry take on the human experience, from parenting and gender roles to guilty pleasures of all shapes and sizes.

Pulp Heroes Reborn Airship 27 Productions is thrilled to present volume five of Mystery Men (& Women ), their showcase anthology for debuting new pulp heroes created by today’s best action-adventure writers.

In the years after the Civil War, the greatest lawman to operate in the untamed wilderness frontiers was US Deputy Marshal Bass Reeves. Here, in this second volume of an ongoing series, the Deputy Marshal finds himself teaming up with a spitfire of a she-devil known as Quickshot Katy, chasing down desperate train robbers, protecting an army gold shipment and defending a vicious killer against an entire town demanding blood.

Detective Roger Colby thought he ended serial killer Morgan Laird's murderous spree 28 years ago when Laird was sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison. But Colby soon finds out that nothing is certain in today's ever-changing society. The wheelchair-bound criminal has been released from prison and granted parole. But is it coincidence that a new series of homicides has suddenly begun, identically mirroring Laird's brutal series of murders from the past?

It started as a simple missing person case. Maria Castro came to private detective Ron Shade because her friend, Juanita, was desperate to find her fiancé. It all seemed pretty standard...until the missing fiancé was found floating in a canal. From there the search for something resembling the truth led Shade deeper and deeper into the darkness, in a world of murder, conspiracy, and cover-ups. But Shade won't be satisfied with the truth. He's looking for justice.

Things couldn’t be worse for Sergeant Frank Leal. He’s assigned a homicide at a seedy motel that suddenly develops into a "heater". Leal’s regular partner‚ Olivia Hart‚ is reassigned to the SWAT team. He’s also saddled with a college intern tweeting his every move‚ and Hart’s replacement is a rubber-gun-squad candidate who has conversations with a hand-puppet named Oscar. Hart’s secretly assigned to an internal affairs investigation to determine which members of the SWAT team are stealing the money during drug raids.

Something's happening in the underworld of Cook County. Tensions are rising between two rival drug lords, and the streets are their battleground. Sergeant Frank Leal and his former partner, Olivia “Ollie” Hart, get involved when one of their informants turns up dead with his ear cut off. When one drug lord decides it’s time to eliminate the competition completely, the takeover becomes very hostile indeed. As blood flows in the gutter and retaliation rules the day, Leal and Hart have to stop two criminal armies....

The case wasn't just cold - it was ice-cold. But the murder of Miriam Walker had a pretty high profile in the middle of a tough re-election campaign, so the Cook County sheriff assembled a task force to get results... and put Sergeant Frank Leal on it.

How much do you owe a past love? Ever wonder about it? Private Detective Ron Shade does when he bumps into his former lover, Paula Kittermann, late one lonely December night in a hotel bar. Paula had once been a major factor in Shade’s life, but that was a very long time ago. Against his better judgement, he lets her back in, but when she’s gone, without so much as a goodbye kiss, leaving him once with only bittersweet memories of what might have been. Then Paula turns up dead, the apparent victim of a hit-and-run accident. Though shocked, Shade moves on with his life until Paula’s young cousin, Laurie, shows up in Chicago, asking him to look into the matter. Shade’s investigation takes a walk on the seedy side, and begins to attract the attention of some very powerful enemies. But whenever Shade gets close to the truth, somebody seems to end up dead, and he suddenly finds himself the prime suspect in a homicide investigation. Working to clear himself and find out who killed Paula, Shade goes up against some redoubtable foes who will stop at nothing to ensure his search for the truth won’t be completed.

Ten years ago the hillbilly king of rock-and-roll, Colton Purcell, was cryogenically frozen after his premature death. Or was he? Chicago-based magazine reporter Harry Bauer intends to find out as he becomes involved in a convoluted murder plot stretching from good-old Memphis to glitzy Las Vegas, where the 10th anniversary celebration of Colton's death is in full swing. When Harry's mentor and friend, a Vegas reporter specializing in conspiracy theories, turns up murdered, Harry is intent on finding out why. But in a city where illusion often transcends reality, the truth proves more elusive than a gambler's lucky streak.

Linc Jackson and his buddy Rick Weaver thought they'd seen it all on the brutal battlefields of Desert Storm, but found themselves displaced and forgotten men when they came back to the States. Now, a year later, the opportunity of a lifetime suddenly drops in their laps.... That is, if they don't mind tiptoeing on the dark side to make the score. During a freak flood that causes havoc in the downtown business hub of Chicago, Linc and Rick put everything on the line as they execute a heist that they hope will put them on Easy Street for the rest of their lives.

The Red Caesar Code: A Guidebook for the Installation of the American Dictator is a timely short-form work that investigates the political and social dynamics that have led to a precipice in the political landscape of the United States, and indeed the world.

Private eye Ron Shade and news reporter Alex St. James nearly ran into each other in the final chapters of their respective adventures, A Final Judgment and Deadly Interest. Little did they know that their chance encounter would place them on a future collision course. Now, in Dead Ringer, their first adventure together, Shade is looking for Bob Bayless, a dead-and-buried executive who was recently spotted playing blackjack in Vegas, while Alex fights off the attentions of a creepy mortician who’s a little too eager to show Alex his backroom moves.

Ex-army ranger Steve Wolf is hoping to clear his name for a war crime he didn’t commit. But when a mysterious fixture in his life resurfaces with a dire warning for him and his mentor, Big Jim McNamara, he discovers that his past has once again come back to haunt him. Wolf is being stalked by powerfully corrupt foes—plural.

From the very beginning, the Lord's Supper has stood at the heart of Christian worship. If Jesus lives in us, and the Holy Spirit is poured out on us, why do we need to eat bread and drink grape juice or wine? Does it really matter? It does matter—and it's life-changing, says leading Pentecostal theologian Jonathan Black. With warmth and depth, he explores not only how the table is still a powerful place of transformation and encounter with Jesus, but also how we can experience Christ's promise of presence, glory, healing, forgiveness, victory, and intimacy.

That’s what Steve Wolf is starting to believe after a carefully planned appeal to clear his name—an appeal his high-priced lawyer assured him was a slam-dunk—mysteriously disappears from the Military Court of Appeals docket.

Ex-Army Ranger Steve Wolf is wondering just that after receiving a desperate call home from his mother. His younger brother, Jimmy, is in trouble. As Wolf heads back to North Carolina to set things straight, he realizes that things have changed—and not for the better.