Things are chugging away slowly but surely here at Hard-Boiled. We picked up some nice press in the Hamilton area recently. A few weeks go I spoke with Hammer D20 about the new book: “When The Luck Runs Dry” for Cable 14. If you missed the show live, this link will take you to a podcast of the show w host Stevan Sobot: https://cable14now.com/video-on-demand/video/?videoId=5760

This week we have a nice feature in the Hamilton Community News/Dundas Star courtesy of Cara Nickerson: https://www.hamiltonnews.com/community-story/10389549-former-dundas-filmmaker-stephen-hayes-debuts-gritty-first-novel/?fbclid=IwAR2VEd9xgq5ShB1QPZASF-FHT6DHFeJuiYSCnGdyaY3f87kMDs4W_7J4I1Y

We picked up another outlet as well for the books: Cafe Domestique in Dundas, On has signed copies ready to go. Just ask the ever friendly Krys Hines and he will fill you in: https://cafedomestiique.com

Books are still available at The James Street Bookseller: https://www.jamesstreetbooks.ca and Paisley Cafe: https://paisleycoffeehouse.com so happy reading! E-book and film links for I Tunes are in the menu above. Oh and here is the article courtesy of Cara Nickerson & The Dundas Star:

Former Dundas filmmaker Stephen Hayes debuts gritty first novel
Cara Nickerson
Dundas Star News
Monday, May 10, 2021
Author Stephen Hayes’ debut novel, ‘When the Luck Runs Dry’, begins with a literal bang. A mobster has been shot dead on one of the piers near Hamilton’s Stelco plant, and the main character has been framed for his murder.

The gritty, self-published neo-noir novel is an adaption of Hayes’ 2012 film ‘Lucky 7’. The film, like the novel, is set entirely in Hamilton, which the former Dundas resident said was the perfect place to tell his tale.

“I thought Hamilton made a great setting, and had a great background visually,” he said. “The crime setting is also quite rich; maybe not in a good way, but there’s a lot of material there.”

In 2012, Hayes took ‘Lucky 7’ to several international festivals and was working on a sequel script, ‘Fallen Angels’, when he was in a severe accident and lost his left leg.

“It knocked me out of doing much for over a year or two,” Hayes said. “After my accident, I didn’t go back to work in film. I retired from being a technician, when I had those life-altering injuries.”

Hayes turned his focus to writing. He began working on several different scripts before he decided to adapt ‘Lucky 7’ into a novel. Hayes found that moving the story from a film to a novel gave him more creative freedom.

“We did a two-hour crime movie, but there was actually only one gunshot on screen,” Hayes said. “It costs money to do even one gunshot, with insurance and police you have to have on duty and special effects …”

Those barriers don’t exist when you tell a story through a novel, he said. However, Hayes discovered that getting his book into print has its own challenges when he submitted his manuscript to publishing houses.

“Some will never get back to you,” Hayes said. “Some might take two years get back to you.”

Hayes didn’t wait to hear back from any of the publishing houses and pushed forward on his own.
“Overall, it was a pretty good experience, but it was a total learning curve from doing a movie,” Hayes said.

Other than commissioning an artist from Hamilton’s Dundurn Press to design the cover, Hayes has done all the work for his first book himself, taking it to the presses and has been doing all the promotional and distribution work.

With his first novel on the shelf, Hayes is looking toward his next project: converting three of his scripts into novels, including ‘Fallen Angels’, the sequel to ‘When the Luck Runs Dry’.

“I want to move on,” Hayes said. “I got all the work done. Now it’s time to get it out there, work on promoting it and then move on to the next one.”

Hayes’ first novel is currently available in Hamilton at Paisley Café and James Street Bookseller.