Midnight Haul (22 page)

He wondered how this one would come out.

The events in this novel are not true, but they of course have parallels in reality—from Love Canal to the disaster in April 1980 at Chemical Control Corporation in New Jersey. Nonetheless, this novel should be viewed as an entertainment and not as nonfiction, and those seriously interested in the toxic-waste problem should seek out the numerous magazine and newspaper articles available, as well as Michael Brown’s definitive
Laying Waste
(Pantheon, 1980).

I was particularly aided by two television documentaries, the transcripts of which were kindly provided to me by their producers:
NOVA
, “A Plague on Our Children,” 1979, WGBH, written, produced and directed by Robert Richter; and ABC N
EWS
C
LOSEUP:
“The Killing Ground,” 1979 (and a later 1980 update), written by Brit Hume, Michael Connor and Steve Singer, directed by Tom Priestly, produced by Priestly and Singer. Also, various representatives of both federal and local environmental agencies provided much appreciated help.

I would like also to thank my agent, Dominick Abel; and my editor at Foul Play Press, Lou Kannenstine.

Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Barbara Collins, for convincing me to write this one and for staying at my side for what proved a long midnight haul.

Photo by Bamford Studio

Max Allan Collins is the
New York Times
best-selling author of
Road to Perdition
and multiple award-winning novels, screenplays, comic books, comic strips, trading cards, short stories, movie novelizations, and historical fiction. He has scripted the
Dick Tracy
comic strip,
Batman
comic books, and written tie-in novels based on the
CSI, Bones,
and
Dark Angel
TV series; collaborated with legendary mystery author Mickey Spillane; and authored numerous mystery novels including the Quarry, Nolan, Mallory, and Nathan Heller series. In 2012, Thomas & Mercer will revive two of Collins’s series: The
Disaster
series, including
The Lusitania Murders, The Titanic Murders, The Hindenburg Murders, The Pearl Harbor Murders, The London Blitz Murders,
and
The War of the Worlds Murder
and the Mallory novels
Kill Your Darlings, The Baby Blue Rip-Off, No Cure for Death, A Shroud for Aquarius
, and
Nice Weekend for a Murder
.