Some of them might be renaissance men, others would like to think they are, but when celebrities pick up the pen the results are mixed. For every literary luminary there’s a dabbler who should have kept their manuscript in a drawer. And then, of course, there are the works of fiction so awful that they become cult favorites.
The latest famous face on a book jacket: Gene Hackman. On June 7, the two-time Oscar winner hits the trail with "Payback at Morning Peak," a Western about Jubal Young, a guy with a dark past, a yearning for revenge and a loaded .22.
Promising? Maybe. Hackman lives in New Mexico, and he's done enough time in the Old West onscreen — remember "The Quick and the Dead"? — to earn his spurs. Plus, while "Payback" is the first book he's written solo, he has authored three adventures with Daniel Lenihan, a fellow Santa Fe resident. In the library of celebs-turned-novelists, he stands to earn high marks. And we can’t say that for everyone.