Mickey Spillane: Smoke Coming out of the Chimney

When critics complained that his books were garbage, he said, “I see that — but it’s good garbage,” and he described his own work as “the chewing gum of American literature.”

Spillane wrote more than 30 novels, including The Big Kill (1951), Kiss Me, Deadly (1952), The Deep (1961), The Twisted Thing (1966) and The Killing Man (1989).

He said: “I’m not an author, I’m a writer, that’s all I am. Authors want their names down in history; I want to keep the smoke coming out of the chimney.”

-Writers Almanac