The Guest Editors

The single best decision Hardluck Stories ever made was refusing to have one editor. Nearly every issue was curated by a different guest editor — a working crime writer or editor who chose the theme's direction, read the submissions, and put their own stamp on the table of contents. The result was a zine that reinvented itself four times a year while holding one standard constant: noir at heart, no compromise.

How the Model Worked

The founding editor ran the machinery — the site, the schedule, the artwork — and handed each issue's editorial judgment to a guest. Guest editors wrote an introduction framing the theme, selected the fiction, and often contributed or commissioned nonfiction. Because every guest was an active professional, the zine doubled as a map of the working crime-fiction community of the 2000s, the same community organized around institutions like the Mystery Writers of America and the Private Eye Writers of America.

The Roster

• Philip Tomasso III (Fall 2002) — edited the inaugural issue, setting the zine's hard, fast tone from the first table of contents.
• Michael A. Black (Winter 2003 and Winter 2005) — the only two-tour guest editor; a Chicago-area police officer turned novelist who also contributed the craft essay Rules For Writing Short Stories and an examination of John D. MacDonald.
• Charlie Shafer (Spring 2003) — paired his issue with the essay Hard-boiled / Soft-boiled, on the genre's competing temperaments.
• Jim Blue (Summer 2003) — framed his issue with the essay These Are the Good Old Days, an argument that the web-zine era was a golden age in progress.
• G. Miki Hayden (Fall 2003) — mystery novelist and writing teacher; her issue ran fiction by Ray Banks, Tim Wohlforth, and David White.
• Thomas Deja (Winter 2004) — brought a pulp-inflected sensibility and an Ed Lynskey essay on Richard S. Prather's PI Shell Scott.
• Charlie Stella (Spring 2004) — the acclaimed mob-fiction novelist; his issue included Sarah Weinman's Keely Sings The Blues and the landmark Ken Bruen interview.
• Allan Guthrie (Fall 2004) — the Scottish noir novelist and editor; his issue featured Ray Banks's Station to Station and his own craft piece, Hunting Down the Pleonasm.
• Dave Zeltserman (Spring 2005 and Fall 2006) — the founder took the chair for the Bank Job issue (complete with a noir comic illustrated by Jean-Pierre Jacquet) and for Psycho Noir, the issue closest to his Jim Thompson heart.
• Neddal Ayad (Summer 2005) — pushed the zine into Weird Noir, where crime fiction shades into the uncanny.
• Iain Rowan (Fall 2005) — the British writer's City at Night issue distilled urban noir into its purest form.
• Harry Shannon (Winter 2006) — engineered the Horror/Crime crossover, drawing Ken Bruen, Ed Gorman, J.A. Konrath, and Adrian McKinty into one dark room.
• Craig McDonald (Spring 2006) — the journalist and soon-to-be Edgar-nominated novelist built Borderland Noir and conducted the James Crumley interview.
• Ed Gorman (Summer 2006 and the final issue) — the revered Iowa novelist and anthologist edited Western Noir, then returned to co-edit the 30s Pulp Noir farewell.
• O'Neil De Noux (Winter 2007) — the New Orleans writer and former homicide detective curated Femme Fatales.
• Trey Barker (Spring 2007) — musician, lawman, and writer; his Noir Blues issue married the genre to its soundtrack.
• John Helfers (Summer 2007) — overseeing the Five Star Mystery line for Tekno Books, he edited the Crime in the City issue celebrating that imprint's first decade.
• Jeremiah Healy — the Shamus-winning PI novelist, honored with a special issue and a guest-editing turn of his own.

What the Model Proved

Rotating editorship is hard to sustain — schedules slip, tastes clash, and guests have day jobs. Hardluck made it work for over five years because the founder treated guest editors like partners rather than contractors, and because the zine's identity was strong enough to survive being reinterpreted every quarter. Read the issue introductions preserved in the Archives side by side and you can hear it: eighteen different voices, one unmistakable zine.