Martin J. Smith
Martin J. Smith is a veteran journalist and magazine editor who has won more than fifty newspaper and magazine writing awards, and whose crime novels have been nominated for three of the publishing industry’s most prestigious honors, including the Edgar Award, the Anthony Award, and the Barry Award. His 2012 nonfiction book, “The Wild Duck Chase,” about the Federal Duck Stamp Contest and the strange and wonderful world of competitive duck painting, inspired Brian Golden Davis’ documentary film “The Million Dollar Duck,” which won both the Jury and Audience awards at the 2016 Slamdance Film Festival. He also is a former senior editor of the Los Angeles Times Magazine, and was editor-in-chief of Orange Coast magazine in Orange County, Calif., between 2007 and 2016, during which time the Western Publishing Association five times named Orange Coast the best city/metropolitan magazine in the western U.S., including four consecutive wins between 2013 and 2016.
Works

Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee
“Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee” is a collection of Smith’s essays about the people, places, and peculiarities of the American Southwest, where he lived and worked between 1985 and 2016. The Los Angeles Review of Books called the collection “compelling and readable,” and called Smith “a master of the essay and human interest profile form” and “one of the best nonfiction writers today.”
Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee
Combustion
The Disappeared Girl
The Wild Duck Chase
Oops: 20 Life Lessons from the Fiascoes That Shaped America
Poplorica: A Popular History of the Fads, Mavericks, Inventions, and Lore That Shaped Modern America
Straw Men
Shadow Image
Time Release
Awards and Recognition
- Finalist, Anthony Award (1998) Finalist, Edgar Award (2002) Finalist, Barry Award (2002)
Press and Media Mentions
- Review of "Mr. Las Vegas Has a Bad Knee" from the Los Angeles Review of Books
- Review of "The Wild Duck Chase" from Publishers Weekly
- Review of "Combustion" from Publishers Weekly
- Feature story about female characters (including Smith's alpha female Brenna Kennedy) from Publishers Weekly
- Interview with crime novelist Martin J. Smith from January Magazine
- Interview with crime novelist Martin J. Smith in The Internet Writing Journal
- Archive of Martin J. Smith's culture essays from Denver's 5280 Magazine