Euro Crime

Harry Hole's Days are Numbered?

2012-03-02T19:03:00.001Z

In an interview with Jo Nesbo in The Bookseller (9 December 2011), he responds to the question of how much longer has Harry got?:

"...I've had the end in sight since the third novel (The Redbreast). I know how it's going to end. But I'm not going to say when and how. All I can promise is that he will not resurrect."

I've just started Phantom, the ninth in the series and I'll report back on it soon. Already published down under, it's released in the UK on 15 March.

Visit Jo Nesbo's bibliography with reviews over on the Euro Crime website

New UK paperbacks for March 2012

2012-03-01T08:30:00.002Z

From The Bookseller's March Paperback Preview (in the 25th November edition), crime titles published in paperback this month include:

"Euro-Crime" Authors

1st March

Geraint Anderson's Just Business
Simon Brett's Bones Under the Beach Hut
Frances Brody's Murder in the Afternoon
Chris Carter's The Night Stalker
Tarquin Hall's The Case of the Man who Died Laughing
John Lawton's A Lily of the Field
Donna Leon's Drawing Conclusions
Andrew Pepper's Bloody Winter
Craig Russell's A Fear of Dark Water
Alexander McCall Smith's The Saturday Big Tent Wedding
Cath Staincliffe's Scott and Bailey: Dead to Me
Christopher Wakling's The Devil's Mask
Jason Webster's Or The Bull Kills You

7th March

Evonne Wareham's Never Coming Home

15th March

Quentin Bates's Cold Comfort
Mark Billingham's Good as Dead
Alan Bradley's A Red Herring Without Mustard
Neil Cross's Luther: The Calling
Mo Hayder's The Hanging Hill
Camilla Lackberg's The Stranger (apa The Gallows Bird)
Karen Maitland's The Gallows Curse
William Ryan's The Bloody Meadow
Jack Steel's The Titanic Secret

23rd March

William Seil's The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: The Titanic Tragedy

26th March

Jacqueline Winspear's The Mapping of Love and Death

29th March

Kimberley Chambers's The Schemer
Colin Cotterill's Slash and Burn
Conor Fitzgerald's The Fatal Touch
Christopher Fowler's Bryant and May and the Memory of Blood
Dan James's Unsinkable
Imogen Robertson's Island of Bones
Jacqui Rose's Taken

US Authors

Mary Burton's Merciless (15th)
Marcia Clark's Guilt by Association (15th)
Robert Crais's The Sentry (15th)
Charlaine Harri's Real Murders (8th)
James Hayman's The Chill of the Night (29th)
Laura Kasischke's The Raising (1st)
Alex Kava's Hotwire (29th)
John Lutz's Mister X (1st)
James Patterson & Maxine Paetro's 10th Anniversary (1st)
J D Robb's New York to Dallas (15th)
Erica Spindler's Watch Me Die (1st)

A list of "Euro-Crime" books that are being published for the first time in March can be found on the New Releases page on the website. This is a first publication anywhere in the world, rather than UK specific.

For titles that are published in the UK during 2012, there is a separate list here. This is also available for the following sub-categories: Translated, Historical, First Novel (Debut) and Anthology.

Scott & Bailey - on tv & in print

2012-02-28T19:24:00.002Z

The successful ITV series Scott & Bailey starring Suranne Jones and Lesley Sharp, returns with a new series of eight episodes, starting (I believe) on Monday 12th March on ITV1.

A month later, on 12 April, Cath Staincliffe's prequel to series one, Dead to Me, is published by Corgi.

Official blurb:

A prequel to the hit TV series Scott and Bailey, and a chillingly authentic story of murder and hunting killers on the mean streets of Manchester

A daughter's death

A teenage girl is found, brutally murdered in her squalid flat.

A mother's love

Her mother is devastated. She gave her child up to the care system, only to lose her again, and is convinced that the drug-pusher boyfriend is to blame.

Two ordinary women, one extraordinary job

DC Rachel Bailey has dragged herself up from a deprived childhood and joined the Manchester Police. Rachel's boss thinks her new recruit has bags of raw talent but straight-laced DC Janet Scott, her reluctant partner, has doubts.

Together Scott and Bailey must hunt a killer, but a life fighting crime can be no life at all...

Cath Staincliffe is no stranger to tv work as she is the creator of the hugely successful Blue Murder series and also novelised two of the episodes.

Inspector Montalbano's fourth is his second

2012-02-27T16:53:00.001Z

The next Inspector Montalbano episode, at 9pm on 3 March, is another new to BBC4 one: The Terracotta Dog and is based on the second book in Camilleri's series. The previous three episodes were based on the third, fourth and first books respectively

A criminal turned state witness informs Montalbano of an arms stash in a cave just outside Vigata. Also uncovered in the cave is a secret chamber where the bodies of two lovers, killed sometime in the 1940s, were buried in a bizarre ritual. An intrigued Montalbano must challenge the Mafia and deal with the arms cache before he can investigate this second find.

Review: Precious and the Monkeys by Alexander McCall Smith

2012-02-27T13:11:00.001Z

Precious and the Monkeys by Alexander McCall Smith and illustrated by Iain McIntosh (Hardback, 73 pages, July 2011, Polygon, An Imprint of Birlinn Limited, ISBN: 1846972043)

Precious and the Monkeys was first published in the Scottish language as Precious and the Puggies
and I have to confess that, even though it's a children's book, I couldn't make head nor tale of it so I was very pleased when this English language version came out.

Precious and the Monkeys reveals how Precious (later Mma) Ramotse was inspired to become a detective and how the name of her business was devised, but it mainly details her first case as a young girl.

Still unsure how to pronounce Ramotswe? From Chapter One:

"That is an African name, and is not as hard to say as it looks. You just say RAM and then you say OTS (like lots without the l) and the you finish it off by saying WE. That's it."

The crime Precious has to investigate is who is stealing food from her classmates at school? Fingers are pointed at one of her fellow pupils but Precious insists that's there's no proof and that you really mustn't accuse someone without hard facts. Showing the kindly ways, readers of the No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency series are familiar with, she befriends the suspect and the solution is revealed and the culprit caught (though the cover and title do rather give it away).

The story, however, isn't a whodunnit but a morality tale, told by an avuncular narrator, with the hope of encouraging its young readers to behave considerately and thoughtfully. It is utterly charming and the illustrations are beautiful. A delightful book which is over all too soon.

This will be published in the US as The Great Cake Mystery: Precious Ramotswe's Very First Case, on 3 April.

New Reviews: Akunin, Brophy, Craig, Ellis, Forshaw, Hannah, Harper, Mallo, Robinson

2012-02-26T12:17:00.001Z

Win 3 Richard Nottingham mysteries by Chris Nickson (UK only) closes 29 February.

Here are this week's 9 new reviews:

Laura Root reviews the tenth (and final?) Erast Fandorin adventure from Boris Akunin, and translated by Andrew Bromfield: The Diamond Chariot;

Lynn Harvey reviews Kevin Brophy's The Berlin Crossing which is heavier on the love story than the spy story apparently;

Terry Halligan reviews the second in the John Carlyle series from James Craig: Never Apologise, Never Explain;

Lizzie Hayes reviews the newest Wesley Peterson/Neil Watson mystery from Kate Ellis: The Cadaver Game;

Maxine Clarke reviews Barry Forshaw's guide to Scandinavian crime fiction: Death in a Cold Climate;

Susan White reviews Sophie Hannah's Kind of Cruel the seventh to feature her detectives Waterhouse and Zailer;

Amanda Gillies reviews Tom Harper's Secrets of the Dead, calling it "another excellent book";

I review Ernesto Mallo's follow-up to the CWA International Dagger Shortlisted Needle in a Haystack: Sweet Money, tr. Katherine Silver set in 1980s Buenos Aires

and Mark Bailey wants more standalones from Peter Robinson after reading Before the Poison.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Kate Ellis, Claire McGowan, Peter Robinson and Robert Wilson have been added to these pages this week.

Red-Headed League

2012-02-25T22:51:00.003Z

Is the cover-designer of the Young Adult mystery, Perception a fan of Spiral's Audrey Fleurot?

TV News: The Fall

2012-02-25T17:15:00.002Z

This one passed me by earlier this month, a new crime drama, to be filmed in Belfast, called The Fall and starring Gillian Anderson, has been announced by the BBC. Filming starts in March and it will be shown on BBC2

From the BBC's Press Office:

The Fall is a gripping psychological thriller that forensically examines the lives of two hunters. One is a serial killer who stalks his victims at random in and around Belfast and the other is a talented female Detective Superintendent on secondment from the MET who is brought in to catch him.
Produced by Artists Studio and written by Allan Cubitt (The Runaway, Murphy’s Law, Prime Suspect), the five episodes will follow the police investigation uncovering the intricate story of the lives entangled by a series of murders – both the killer's and the victims’ families.
Gillian Anderson stars as DSI Gibson, who arrives to conduct a 28 day review at a Belfast station where the police are getting nowhere on a high profile murder case.

Detective Inspector Huss - reissued

2012-02-24T13:42:00.001Z

To coincide (sort of) with the release of the next Inspector Huss book by Helene Tursten in English: Night Rounds (the second in the series which is released in the UK next month), the first book has just been reissued.

Simply titled Detective Inspector Huss, when Maxine reviewed the original publication she wrote of it: "this book is as near to perfection as you can get in this genre". Read her whole review here.

I feel the cover has improved enormously!

Headhunters - Trailer

2012-02-23T12:10:00.001Z

Jo Nesbo's standalone novel, Headhunters, translated by Don Bartlett has been made into a film which will be released in the UK on 6 April.

Included below is the official UK trailer.

The paperback release (featured left) has a film-tie in cover and is published on 29 March.

A review of the book should soon be up on Euro Crime but here is Euro Crime reviewer Maxine's excellent review at Petrona.

The Silence - DVD Release

2012-02-21T10:00:00.002Z

The Silence, based on Jan Costin Wagner's book Silence, was released on DVD yesterday in the UK. I am very intrigued to watch this to compare it to the book. The action has been switched to Germany from Finland and from the reviews the crime that opens the book is shown in a more explicit manner.

Euro Crime reviews of the book are here (me) and here (Mark).

Official blurb: 2 missing girls. Same place. Same time. 23 years apart. History repeats itself in this knife-edged thriller, which has been described as the natural successor to The Killing.

An ageing detective comes out of retirement in the hope of solving a missing girl case, which is believed to be connected to an unsolved mystery that happened 23 years ago. Over the long hot summer days, tensions start to reach breaking point as our troubled detective closes in on the deeply methodical serial killer.

A striking debut, The Silence follows on from European crime thrillers such as The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and Wallander as it delves into the psyche of detectives and criminals to deliver a chilling story of murder and betrayal.

Inspector Montalbano's First Case?

2012-02-20T16:45:00.001Z

The next Inspector Montalbano episode, at 9pm on 25 February, is another new to BBC4 one: The Shape of Water and is based on the first book in the series, in which Salvo meets Ingrid. The previous two episodes were based on the third and fourth books respectively

Mr Luparello, a renowned local engineer and leading political figure, is found dead in a car at a notorious prostitution spot on the outskirts of Vigata. The coroner rules that he died of a heart attack following an amorous encounter. Fending off pressure from prominent ecclesiastical figures who wish to keep the case under wraps and navigating the intricacies of local party politics, Montalbano goes about making sense of the available evidence, including the incongruous discovery of an expensive necklace found at the site of the murder.

New Reviews: Baker, Bateman, Kelly, McDermid, Mercier, Watson

2012-02-19T14:11:00.001Z

Win 3 Richard Nottingham mysteries by Chris Nickson (UK only).

Here are this week's 6 new reviews:

Terry Halligan reviews Adam Baker's Juggernaut which has two female mercenaries as leads (for a change);

Dan Starkey is back in (Colin) Bateman's Nine Inches, reviewed here by Geoff Jones;

Maxine Clarke reviews the American edition of Erin Kelly's The Sick Rose which has been retitled to: The Dark Rose;

Michelle Peckham reviews Val McDermid's latest Tony Hill/Carol Jordan novel, The Retribution which is now out in paperback;

Lynn Harvey reviews Pascal Mercier's Perlmann's Silence, tr. Shaun Whiteside which though not a traditional crime novel, does involve some crime(s);

and Susan White reviews the paperback release of S J Watson's Before I Go To Sleep.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Colin Bateman, Gerald Jay, Pascal Mercier, Stuart Neville and Evonne Wareham have been added to these pages this week.

Film News: ID: A & The Woman in the Fifth

2012-02-17T10:00:00.001Z

Two films of an Euro-Crime interest are released today in the UK. ID: A a Danish film and The Woman in the Fifth, set in Paris and starring Kristin Scott Thomas.

ID: A, the synopsis is from The Danish Cultural Institute:

From the producers of Melancholia and directed by Christian E. Christiansen, the Danish film ID:A will be screened in the London cinema Curzon Soho from 17 to 19 February.

The film ID:A is about Aliena, who wakes up in a river in France with a bag with 2 million euros, a scar across her abdomen and no memory. Slowly traces begin to appear about the past and Aliena learns that her past life was more complicated than she first thought.

The cast: Tuva Novotny, Carsten Bjørnlund and Flemming Enevold. You may know the latter two from the Danish drama The Killing 2, where they play Major Christian Søgaard and Colonel Torsten Jarnvig, respectively.

Trailer

The Woman in The Fifth: American writer Tom Ricks comes to Paris desperate to put his life together again and win back the love of his estranged wife and daughter.

When things don't go according to plan, he ends up in a shady hotel in the suburbs, having to work as a night guard to make ends meet.

Then Margit, a beautiful, mysterious stranger walks into his life and things start looking up. Their passionate and intense relationship triggers a string of inexplicable events... as if an obscure power was taking control of his life.

Based on the novel by Douglas Kennedy.

Trailer

Publishing Deal - Stuart Neville

2012-02-16T09:54:00.002Z

I received a press release last night from Harvill Secker regarding Stuart Neville, who has received glowing reviews from Euro Crime's reviewers:

Harvill Secker has acquired UK and Commonwealth rights for two new Jack Lennon novels by the Belfast crime writer Stuart Neville, in a deal with Caspian Dennis of Abner Stein. The two new novels are to be published January 2014 and January 2015 and will be a great asset to Harvill Secker’s prestigious crime list which features authors such as Jo Nesbo and Henning Mankell.

Stuart Neville’s debut The Twelve was published to critical acclaim in 2009 and went on to win the LA Times Book Prize in its category. Collusion and Stolen Souls have followed closely in its tracks, each garnering increasingly widespread praise.

In 2013 Harvill Secker will publish Ratlines, an exciting standalone thriller following the trail of Nazis in Ireland in the wake of World War II.

This will be followed by two newly acquired novels featuring Detective Inspector Jack Lennon, the protagonist of Stolen Souls, which has just been published to great acclaim. In the first of these new novels, Jack is struggling to keep his own life together but is dragged into a case of two brothers who, as children, committed a horrific murder and are now back on the streets. The second will feature a highly dangerous character from Jack’s past.

Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries

2012-02-16T09:06:00.002Z

Many years ago, in preparation for a holiday in Australia I managed to get hold of Kerry Greenwood's Cocaine Blues (apa Murder by Misadventure) which is the first in a long running series featuring 1920s flapper and private detective Phryne Fisher set in Melbourne. I picked up a few more of the series whilst in Australia and subsequently bought a few more online, when the pound:Australian dollar ratio was more favourable! ThouAgh Orion have published some of the later books, I wish that a UK publisher such as ~~Allison & Busby~~ Robinson would take the whole series on - as they have with Carola Dunn's, also 1920s set, Daisy Dalrymple series. Both series incidentally have the most beautiful covers.

A TV series has been made of the Phryne Fisher books, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries which begins in Australia on Friday, February 24, at 8.30pm on ABC1. We in the UK can only hope it gets picked up here.

TV tie-in Kindle editions are available on UK Kindle with Cocaine Blues being a bargain £1.32 at the moment and other in the series are around a fiver. (I haven't been able to check for epub availability as the Kobo site was down).

Phyrne is played by Essie Davies (and the series also stars Miriam Margolyes):

The opulent 13-part series, produced by Fiona Eagger and Deb Cox, is based on Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher crime novels, set in and around Melbourne during the late 1920s. Davis read most of Greenwood's 18 Phryne adventures not long after she was approached to audition. She immediately clicked with a heroine who is more Mata Hari than Miss Marple.

...read more about the series, listen to a review and watch a clip from the show at The Age.

Film News: Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

2012-02-15T13:37:00.001Z

The Turkish film, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia has its UK release on 16 March according to UK Film dates. There appears to be the odd showing in the UK before then. I can't find a very detailed synopsis (other than: "A group of men set out in search of a dead body in the Anatolian steppes") so here is a sample from the TimeOut review:

Once Upon A Time In Anatolia is a crime movie, but not as you know it, and as well as asking us to puzzle together fragments of a murder case, it also offers rich, and sometimes comic, ruminations on city, small-town and village attitudes, on cynical versus more feeling attitudes to life, on our ability to separate the personal and the professional and on the banalities that arises even in extreme, unusual situations. It might be about a murder, but it’s also about the passing of time (and, in a subtly different way, passing the time), and to stress both, Ceylan asks that we share nearly three hours with him and his film.

We follow a group of 12 men in three vehicles – policemen, soldiers, two suspects, a doctor, a prosecutor and two men with shovels – as they trawl the countryside at night looking for a buried body, trying and failing several times before they make some progress. One minute they’re looking for freshly dug earth, the next they’re discussing the merits of cheese or the tell-tale signs of prostate cancer. With two prisoners in tow, they make a pit-stop at a village where we get a naturalistic portrait of everyday relations and where small, endearing differences emerge between the town folk of the investigation and their rural hosts. Back on the road, Ceylan moves around characters, and sometimes leaves them behind altogether for some staggering landscape shots. Night becomes dawn, and only when it’s morning do they return to town and the final chapter of the film unfolds in a police station and doctor’s surgery.

Possible UK posters:

OT: Happy Birthday Foxy

2012-02-14T19:00:00.001Z

The kitten that we found in May 2007, which would turn into the beautiful bruiser that is Foxy, was roughly 3 months old so we allocated a nominal birthday of 14 February, making him 5 today. Appropriately he is a sweetheart and possibly the most characterful cat we've had (so far?). Here he is in the snow a few days ago...

Getting Access to Audiobooks

2012-02-14T12:53:00.002Z

As well as my print reading, I nearly always have an audiobook on the go. I have a longish commute to work and sometimes it's too busy/noisy or I'm too tired to read with my eyes. Plus I walk a lot and love to listen as I exercise. I often try authors that I might not get round to reading conventionally. I often stick to audiobooks for a series if the narrator is exceptional and I am in a dilemma regarding the latest Stella Rimington, Rip Tide, which is not narrated by Maggie Mash, unlike the previous five. What to do? Try the new narrator or switch to reading the book and "hear" Maggie Mash's narration as I read?

I love audiobooks and so if you want to try them for yourselves, here's how to get one...

The cheapest way is to join your local library. I'll use my local libraries as examples - I work for Birmingham Libraries (B) but live in Worcestershire (W) so I have two cards.

Did you know that you can join any library in England, Wales and Northern Ireland for free without being a local resident? Back in 2009, the policy changed:

The Society of Chief Librarians (SCL) said members of the public simply need to show their existing library card or proof of address to join or use a library they are visiting.
The scheme applies to public libraries in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Scotland is not part of the UK Society of Chief Librarians, although some Scottish authorities are considering joining the scheme.
According to the society, customers will be able to borrow books from any library and, in some cases, use other services such as DVD rental and online resources.

You can normally apply online for a library card (as well as at the library itself) but depending on the library service, you may have to either collect it or pop in to activate it. Birmingham posts the card to the address given by the online joiner.

Having got your library card, you then have access to the libraries audiobook collection. To hire an audiobook, there's usually a fee (90p B, £1 W). If you want a specific title, then if it's available in that library service, then there will usually be a reservation fee (free B, 60p W). If the item can't be sourced locally then you have the option of an Inter Library Loan which is £3, plus the hire charge.

As well as the physical audiobook collection, many libraries are supplying an e-audiobook option. This means you can download audiobooks for free from home. Birmingham has 700 titles available. Worcestershire doesn't offer this service yet.

However be aware that if you are not a local resident, there may be restrictions on what you can do with your card eg, this from Surrey County Council's website:

Do I have to live in Surrey to sign up for this service?
Overdrive, the US based company who supplies our eBook and eAudio service, has requested that access is limited to Surrey residents only. This decision has been made as a result of UK and US publishers concerns surrounding rights and access issues. However, there are several other UK library authorities offering eBooks access, so if you live outside Surrey we suggest you check with your local council to see if they offer this service.

If you cannot access a library, prefer a more permanent copy of the book or cannot get the books you want easily then audible.co.uk (or equivalent), is probably the next cheapest option. You buy the download, and packages start from £3.99 a month. I haven't used them myself and there may be alternative companies that I don't know about, equally good/bad.

Lastly, audiobooks can be bought from retailers such as Amazon and often these are not too expensive - comparable with a hardback price eg Camilla Lackberg's The Hidden Child is rrp £19.99. Audiobooks can also be bought direct from the providers, including AudioGo and Whole Story Audiobooks usually as a box of cds, though AudioGo offer MP3 downloads as well.

There are free audiobooks available, in my limited experience, these are usually read by non-professional narrators, of older books and the mp3 quality is not as good as it could be.

If you've not tried an audiobook before then I urge you to do so. My favourite combinations include Christopher Fowler's Bryant and May series narrated by Tim Goodman and Alexander McCall Smith's No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Adjoa Andoh.

New UK paperbacks for February 2012

2012-02-13T12:15:00.001Z

From The Bookseller's February Paperback Preview (in the 28th October edition), crime titles published in paperback this month include:

"Euro-Crime" Authors

1st February

Michael Ridpath's 66 Degrees North (1st)

2nd February

Simon Beckett's The Calling of the Grave
Gyles Brandreth's Oscar Wilde and the Vatican Murders
Andrew Martin's The Somme Stations
Leif G W Persson's Between Summer's Longing and Winter's End
Peter Robinson's Before the Poison
Tom Rob Smith's Agent 6

16th February

M C Beaton's Death of a Sweep
Carola Dunn's Gone West
David Jackson's Pariah
Quintin Jardine's Grievous Angel
Val McDermid's The Retribution
M J McGrath's White Heat
Henning Mankell 's The Troubled Man
Liza Marklund's Vanished (apa Paradise)
Denise Mina's The End of the Wasp Season
Craig Robertson's Snapshot

US Authors

Beverly Barton's Don't Cry (2nd)
Greg Iles' The Bone Tree (16th)
Katya Lief's Five Days to Die (2nd)
Peter Spiegelman's Thick as Thieves (2nd)
John Verdon's Shut Your Eyes Tight (16th)

Next Time on Montalbano

2012-02-13T11:16:00.001Z

I'm somewhat behind with my euro-tv, I have all of Borgen still to watch plus Saturday's Montalbano (and ages old Wallander episodes - both Swedish versions) and crimeficreader reports that Those Who Kill will be on from 23 February...

The next Inspector Montalbano episode, at 9pm on 18 February, is another new to BBC4 one, The Voice of the Violin:

When the naked dead body of a young woman is found in a villa outside Vigata, Montalbano discovers that she had recently bought the villa and was in the process of restoring it using her wealthy husband's money. When the case is taken from Montalbano and given to rival inspector Panzacchi from nearby Montelusa, Panzacchi draws some easy conclusions and the investigation risks going badly off course. Will a proud Montalbano stick his neck out to regain control of the case or will he allow his incompetent colleagues to pin the murder on the wrong suspect?

The Potter's Field, the thirteenth in Andrea Camilleri's Inspector Montalbano series will be published in the UK in April (it is already out in the US). The previous twelve novels are listed in order and all reviewed on Euro Crime.

New Reviews: Adams, Beckett, Cleeves, Eastland, Higashino, Kaaberbol & Friis, Leather, Rickman, Russell

2012-02-12T12:08:00.002Z

As is vaguely customary, a 6 review week is followed by a 9 review week...making roughly a review a day.

Win 3 Richard Nottingham mysteries by Chris Nickson (UK only).

Here are this week's 9 new reviews:

Lizzie Hayes reviews Jane A Adams's sixth Naomi Blake outing, Blood Ties;

Geoff Jones reviews Simon Beckett's fourth David Hunter novel, The Calling of the Grave, now out in paperback;

Maxine Clarke reviews the fifth in Ann Cleeves's "Vera" series, The Glass Room;

Lynn Harvey reviews the third in Sam Eastland's Inspector Pekkala series, Siberian Red;

Michelle Peckham reviews the paperback release of The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino, translated by Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander;

I review The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbol and Agnete Friis, tr. Lene Kaaberbol set in Copenhagen and which is the first in the Nina Borg series;

Terry Halligan reviews the third in the supernatural PI Jack Nightingale series from Stephen Leather Nightmare;

Rich Westwood reviews Phil Rickman's The Lamp of the Wicked which touches on some true-life crimes, and is the fifth in the Merrily Watkins series which is being issued in paperback by Atlantic Books;

and Amanda Gillies reviews Craig Russell's third book in the Lennox series, The Deep Dark Sleep, set in 1950s Glasgow.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Jane Adams, John Connolly, Sebastian Fitzek, Tony/Anthony Hays, Anne Holt, Fabrice Humbert, Susan Elia MacNeal, Danielle Ramsay and Simon Urban have been added to these pages this week.

Lakeside Tree - Copycat Cover

2012-02-11T20:15:00.001Z

Becoming a bit of a habit this, spotting a duplicate cover as I prepare the new reviews. The tree was on the trade paperback version of The Calling of the Grave but was obscured more by the writing. Why We Die is from 2006 and is OOP but cheap on Kindle and I'm not sure where it's set. Whereas, from the review(s), The Calling of the Grave seems set mostly near Dartmoor. I'm sure that tree has graced more covers than these two...

Awards News: Barry Nominations (2012)

2012-02-11T09:28:00.003Z

The 2012 Barry Award nominees have been announced. The winners will be revealed at Bouchercon in Cleveland (4-7 October). Here are those shortlists which include British/European/Translated titles with links to available Euro Crime reviews:

Best Novel
THE KEEPER OF LOST CAUSES (aka MERCY), Jussi Adler-Olsen tr. Tiina Nunnally
THE ACCIDENT, Linwood Barclay
THE HURT MACHINE, Reed Farrel Coleman
IRON HOUSE, John Hart
HELL IS EMPTY, Craig Johnson
THE TROUBLED MAN, Henning Mankell tr. Laurie Thompson

Best First Novel
LEARNING TO SWIM, Sara Henry
THE DEVOTION OF SUSPECT X, Keigo Higashino tr. Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander
THE BOY IN THE SUITCASE, Lene Kaaberbol and Agnette Friis tr. Lene Kaaberbol
TURN OF MIND, Alice LaPlante
THE INFORMATIONIST, Taylor Stevens
BEFORE I GO TO SLEEP, S J Watson

Best British (Published in the UK in 2011)
NOW YOU SEE ME, S J Bolton
HELL'S BELLS (aka THE INFERNALS), John Connolly
BAD SIGNS, R J Ellory
THE HOUSE AT SEA'S END, Elly Griffiths
OUTRAGE, Arnaldur Indridason tr. Anna Yates
DEAD MAN’S GRIP, Peter James

Best Paperback Original
THE SILENCED, Brett Battles
THE HANGMAN'S DAUGHTER, Oliver Pötzsch
A DOUBLE DEATH ON THE BLACK ISLE, A. D. Scott
DEATH OF THE MANTIS, Michael Stanley
FUN AND GAMES, Duane Swierczynski
TWO FOR SORROW, Nicola Upson

Best Thriller
CARVER, Tom Cain
COUP D’ETAT, Ben Coes
SPYCATCHER (aka SPARTAN), Matthew Dunn
BALLISTIC, Mark Greaney
HOUSE DIVIDED, Mike Lawson
THE INFORMANT, Thomas Perry

Review: The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbol & Agnete Friis

2012-02-10T09:20:00.001Z

The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbol & Agnete Friis, translated by Lene Kaaberbol (paperback, 300p, Jan. 2012, Soho Press, ISBN: 1616950994)

THE BOY IN THE SUITCASE is the first in the Nina Borg series and is set in a less than salubrious Copenhagen (one familiar to viewers of The Killing). Nina, a nurse working in a Danish Red Cross Centre, is phoned by fellow nurse and slightly estranged friend Karin, who asks Nina for a favour and that they must meet immediately. A very panicked Karin gives Nina a key to a locker at the train station but Nina could not have expected to collect a suitcase containing a drugged young boy... Trying to avoid a sinister man she has spotted at the station, her efforts to track down Karin are at first in vain and when she does find her, Karin is not in a position to help. Not trusting the police to look after the boy and wanting to get to the bottom of things – Nina and the boy's uncomfortable night on the streets begins.

There are several points-of-view in this book but the other main narrative is told from the point of view of Sigita, a young mother in Lithuania whose child has vanished. A non-drinker, she had been found drunk at the bottom of the stairs, her son absent. She puts the pieces together slowly and the reader is given her history and how she has become a single mother with a well furnished apartment.

All the narratives eventually collide in a dramatic show-down in Denmark.

I quite enjoyed THE BOY IN THE SUITCASE, in particular the segments from Sigita as she persists with the police and finally gets their attention. This part of the story is more like a detective story whereas Nina's part is more that of a thriller as she avoids the police and her own family and tracks down someone to help with translation (from a rather unorthodox source). Sigita's story also gives the reader a peek into Lithuanian life and culture and Nina's touches on problems in Danish society.

The problem I had with THE BOY IN THE SUITCASE is Nina's behaviour in that she doesn't get help from the normal channels, and leaves her family in the dark and I didn't find her reasoning believable. She has a track-record of running away from her family, seemingly to them at the drop of a hat, to war-zones to offer her professional services; very commendable but it doesn't make her very likeable. However I will give her the benefit of the doubt and I look forward to the next book. I had a similar problem with Anne Holt's Johanne Vik at first and now that's one of my favourite series.

Publishing Deal - Simon Urban

2012-02-09T10:03:00.002Z

A publishing deal has been announced today for German author, Simon Urban's Plan D which will be published in English in Spring 2013. From Booktrade:

Plan D is a brilliant thriller in the vein of Robert Harris's Fatherland and John le Carre's The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, which imagines a world in which the Berlin Wall never fell.

While modern day West Berlin enjoys all the trappings of capitalism, on the crowded, polluted, Eastern side of the city, the GDR is facing bankruptcy. The ailing government's only hope lies in economic talks with the West, but then an ally of the GDR's chairman is found murdered – and all the clues point to the Stasi being involved. East German detective Martin Wegener, still haunted by the recent end of his relationship and the mysterious disappearances of a trusted friend and colleague, is forced to work with a counterpart in the West German police force to solve the murder.

New Books in German describes it thus: A modern-day Raymond Chandler, Urban’s remarkable genre-busting detective novel is set in Berlin in October 2011 – but with a difference. In Plan D, the East German republic still exists (full review here).

(German cover on the left.)

Simon Urban joins the growing list of German crime writers available in English

Paying Homage: Brat Farrar

2012-02-08T12:56:00.002Z

A few posts ago I mentioned a new series by Diane Capri which pays homage to a character from Lee Child's very successful thriller series, in her Hunt for Jack Reacher series.

I recently listened to an audio book which payed homage to the plot of the classic mystery by Josephine Tey: Brat Farrar.

Jenny Valentine's The Double Life of Cassiel Roadnight is a teenage/young adult novel which is set in Hay-on-Wye.

I haven't read Brat Farrar, though I have a copy - not this one with the stunning Mark Greenstreet on the cover - but I did watch the BBC TV series when it was shown many many moons ago and loved it. It's not available to buy but you can watch a patchy version on You Tube.

The Year of Translated TV Dramas

2012-02-06T10:33:00.002Z

The announcements have been coming thick and fast over the last few days regarding new to the UK dramas from mainland Europe. Borgen has finished but is due to return at the end of the year and a third series is in production.

Borgen's immediate replacement on BBC4 is Montalbano, with the first of ten episodes, The Snack Thief, beginning next Saturday. The second episode is the previously shown Montalbano's Croquettes.

According to IMDB there are 22 episodes (up to 2011).

Borrowing this convenient summary from the Radio Times, here's some of what's in store for 2012 :

Those Who Kill - ITV3, in the coming weeks

It’s set in Copenhagen, co-stars Lars Mikkelsen, who played mayoral candidate Troels Hartmann in The Killing, and features another dedicated female detective, Inspector Katrina Ries Jensen, played by Laura Bach.

But where The Killing follows a single murder investigation throughout a series, Those Who Kill (or Den som Draeber as they say in Denmark) focuses on the psychology of multiple serial killers, and has been compared to shows such as Criminal Minds and Wire in the Blood.

Based on the books by bestselling crime author Elsebeth Egholm*, the first series of Those Who Kill drew a record audience share when it aired on Danish channel TV2.

*Hopefully this will see a UK release of the original novels...

The Bridge - BBC4, spring

Danish and Swedish cops Martin Rohde (Kim Bodnia) and Saga Norén (Sofia Helin) must work together after a grizzly discovery on the Oresund Bridge, which links the two countries.

What's at first thought to be a single body turns out to consist of two different victims, one a Swedish politician, the other a Danish prostitute.

Sebastian Bergman - BBC4, 2012

Rolf Lassgård – known to many as the original, Swedish Wallander – stars as another troubled detective, Sebastian Bergman, politically incorrect, abrasive and still battling grief over the loss of both his wife and daughter in the Thailand tsunami.

Two 90 minute dramas focus on the murder of a 15-year-old boy, and a copycat serial perpetrator who appears to be basing his crimes on those of a killer Bergman himself put behind bars."

And today, it's been announced in the Guardian that the Norwegian series, Lilyhammer is on its way to BBC4.

Lilyhammer, a Norwegian comic drama starring The Sopranos' Steven Van Zandt, is the latest Scandinavian import to be bought by BBC4, currently on a high after critical acclaim and healthy audiences for a string of Danish and Swedish series.

Van Zandt, who played Silvio Dante in the US drama, stars as a New York mobster who enters the witness protection programme and starts up a new life in Lillehammer, the sleepy Norwegian town he fell in love with while watching the 1994 Olympic Games.

"Lilyhammer mixes sharp wit and American big city ways with the beauty of the Norwegian mountains and folksy nature of a small town – a perfect combination for a razor-sharp drama about cultural mores," said Richard Klein, controller of BBC4.

And hopefully The Killing 3 will be on our screens at the end of the year.

Gloomy Shed - Copycat Cover

2012-02-06T09:45:00.001Z

When I was checking the details yesterday for Ewart Hutton's Good People, a familiar cover popped up on this German edition. Good People is set in Wales, The Quarry on the island of Oland, Sweden.

New Reviews: Anderson, Hutton, Lapidus, Leonard, Nickson, Voss & Edwards & a New Competition

2012-02-05T16:10:00.005Z

It's February, so here's a new competition and reviews of 6 more books...

Win 3 Richard Nottingham mysteries by Chris Nickson (UK only).

Here are this week's reviews:

Amanda Gillies reviews Lin Anderson's most recent Rhona MacLeod outing, Picture Her Dead;

Maxine Clarke reviews Ewart Hutton's debut, set in Wales: Good People;

Laura Root reviews the best-selling Swedish novel, Easy Money by Jens Lapidus, tr. Astri von Arbin Ahlander;

Terry Halligan reviews Peter Leonard's Voices of the Dead set in Germany and the US;

Michelle Peckham reviews the February competition prize, The Constant Lovers by Chris Nickson

and Susan White reviews the kindle best-seller, Catch Your Death by Louise Voss and Mark Edwards.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Jefferson Bass, Tony Black, Kevin Brooks, Ed Chatterton, Arne Dahl, Jurgen Fauth, Jasper Fforde, Andrea Gillies, Annie Hauxwell, Hazel Holt, David Jackson, Dan James, Alanna Knight, Jeffrey Siger and June Thomson have been added to these pages this week.

Win: 3 books by Chris Nickson

2012-02-05T15:44:00.002Z

Thanks to the generosity of Chris Nickson, Euro Crime has a set of the first three books in the Richard Nottingham series: The Broken Token (Paperback), Cold Cruel Winter (Trade paperback) and The Constant Lovers (Hardback) to giveaway.

(Euro Crime reviews of the prizes: The Broken Token, Cold Cruel Winter and The Constant Lovers.)

To enter the draw, just answer the question and include your details in the form below.

This competition is open to residents of the UK only and will close on 29 February 2012.
Only 1 entry per person/per household please.
(All entries will be deleted once the winner has been notified.)

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Alternative Poster for TGWTDT

2012-02-04T13:40:00.003Z

Today's Guardian supplement has a feature on alternative film posters, ones that tell the truth that have been created by The Shiznit, including Iron Lady, The Help and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo:

Matti Joensuu RIP

2012-02-03T14:22:00.001Z

I'm sorry to say this a bit after the event but I've only just discovered that Finnish crime writer Matti Joensuu died in December 2011.

From Helsingin Sanomat

Matti Yrjänä Joensuu (October 31st 1948 - December 4th 2011), who died suddenly at his home in Valkeakoski on Sunday, was one of Finland’s most respected and widely-read writers of crime fiction.

In addition to his literary career, Joensuu worked as a police officer and a detective in Helsinki. He retired from the Helsinki Police Department’s Criminal Investigation Division in 2006, despite having been a successful novelist for some twenty years before this.

The best known of Joensuu’s works are his 12 Harjunpää novels, most of which were published between 1976 and 1993. They depict the life and work of Detective Sergeant Timo Juhani Harjunpää of the Helsinki Police Department’s CID unit.

Joensuu’s last novel was Harjunpää ja rautahuone (”Harjunpää and the Iron Room”), published in 2010, after a break of seven years. A new novel was in the works at the time of his death.

Joensuu was awarded the State’s Literature Prize in 1982, and the Vuoden johtolanka (”The Clue of the Year”) prize for the best Finnish crime novel in 1985, 1994, and 2004, granted by the Finnish Whodunnit Society, the Finnish crime fiction society. In 1987, Joensuu received the Martin Beck Award.

Paying Homage: Jack Reacher

2012-02-03T08:41:00.003Z

American author, M Diane Vogt has released some of her early books as e-books (under the name Diane Capri) along with the e-book release of the first in "The Hunt for Reacher" series. Don't Know Jack is an e-book exclusive and can be bought in the UK as well as the US.

Diane explains how this new series came about on her blog.

Follow her on twitter: @DianeCapri

Blurb: It’s been a while since we first met Lee Child’s Jack Reacher in Killing Floor. Fifteen years and sixteen novels later, Reacher still lives off the grid, until trouble finds him, and then he does whatever it takes, much to the delight of readers and the dismay of villains. Now someone big is looking for him. Who? And why? Hunting Jack Reacher is a dangerous business, as FBI Special Agents Kim Otto and Carlos Gaspar are about to find out. Otto and Gaspar are by-the-book hunters who know when to break the rules, but they Don’t Know Jack. Reacher is a stone cold killer. Is he their friend or their enemy? Only the secrets hidden in Margrave, Georgia will tell them

Publishing Deal - Ed Chatterton

2012-02-02T13:33:00.002Z

A publishing deal for a new series set in Liverpool, written by Ed Chatterton has been announced today. From The Bookseller:

Century has acquired two novels in a new procedural crime series by author Ed Chatterton, billing it as "gritty, dark, visceral and utterly gripping".

...the first novel, A Dark Place to Die, [is] to be published in summer 2012. It will feature detective inspector Frank Keane and be set in Liverpool, with the next novel to follow in summer 2013. Random House Australia will publish simultaneously.

Monumentally Similar

2012-02-02T09:32:00.001Z

Gordon Ferris's The Hanging Shed out now and Craig Russell's next Lennox book, Dead Men and Broken Hearts will be out in June. Both books are set around 50 years ago, one in London, one in Glasgow.

Also Published As...

2012-01-31T13:20:00.004Z

After yesterday's post which announced the retitling of Arne Dahl's Misterioso (a title suitable for everywhere else it seems from the covers on his website) as The Blinded Man, I thought I'd have a look at what else has been retitled in the last couple of years or so. Usually the UK title is first with the US title in brackets, but not always.

Published in 2010, 2011 and 2012 (so far)

Jussi Adler-Olsen - Mercy (apa The Keeper of Lost Causes) 2011
Sam Barone - Quest for Honour (apa Conflict of Empires) 2010
Quentin Bates - Frozen Out (apa Frozen Assets) 2011
M C Beaton - Death of a Chimney Sweep (apa Death of a Sweep) 2011
Mark Billingham - Good as Dead (apa The Demands) 2011
Gyles Brandreth - Oscar Wilde and the Nest of Vipers (apa Oscar Wilde and the Vampire Murders) 2010
Howard Cunnell - The Sea on Fire (apa Marine Boy) 2012
Arne Dahl - Misterioso (apa The Blinded Man) 2011
Ruth/R S Downie - Ruso and the River of Darkness (apa Caveat Emptor) 2010
Jeremy Duns - Free Country (apa Song of Treason) 2010 (both UK titles)
Sam Eastland - The Red Coffin (apa Shadow Pass) 2011
Ariana Franklin - A Murderous Procession (apa The Assassin's Prayer (UK)) 2010
Nicci French - Complicit (apa The Other Side of the Door) 2010
Sophie Hannah - Lasting Damage (apa The Other Woman's House) 2011
Diane Janes - Why Don't You Come for Me? (apa Why Didn't You Come For Me?) 2011
Mons Kallentoft - Midwinter Sacrifice (apa Midwinter Blood) 2011
Erin Kelly -The Sick Rose (apa The Dark Rose) 2011
Christobel Kent - A Fine and Private Place (apa Murder in Tuscany) 2010
Tom Knox - Bible of the Dead (apa The Lost Goddess) 2011
Camilla Lackberg - The Gallows Bird (apa The Stranger) 2011 (both UK titles)
Simon Lelic - Rupture (apa A Thousand Cuts) 2010
Liza Marklund - Last Will (apa Nobel's Last Will (UK)) 2012
Mark Mills - House of the Hanged (apa House of the Hunted) 2011
Graham Moore - The Sherlockian (apa The Holmes Affair) 2010
Anne Perry - Betrayal at Lisson Grove (apa Treason at Lisson Grove) 2010
William Ryan The Bloody Meadow (apa The Darkening Field) 2011
Lynn Shepherd - Tom-All-Alone's (apa The Solitary House) 2012
Jeffrey Siger - Prey on Patmos (apa An Aegean Prophecy (UK)) 2011
Frank Tallis - Deadly Communion (apa Vienna Twilight) 2010
Felicity Young A Dissection of Murder (apa The Anatomy of Death) 2012
Juli Zeh - Dark Matter (apa In Free Fall) 2010

Sometimes the changes are minor, and you wonder why bother, and other times the title's very different.

Publishing Deal - Arne Dahl

2012-01-30T11:13:00.001Z

In the "how did I miss this!" category, belated news of a UK publishing deal for Swedish author Arne Dahl. From The Bookseller:

Harvill Secker has acquired two books by Swedish crime writer Arne Dahl, with senior crime editor Alison Hennessey making her first signing in her new role.
Hennessey bought UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, in the titles, both from Dahl's Intercrime series. Harvill Secker plans to publish the first book, The Blinded Man, as a Vintage paperback in July 2012, and the second, Bad Blood, in summer 2013.

The Blinded Man kicks off the series which follows an elite team of detectives assembled to investigate international violent crime, with Bad Blood revolving around an American serial killer on the loose in Sweden.
Hennessey said: "I am delighted to be bringing Arne Dahl's critically acclaimed Intercrime series to Harvill Secker as my first acquisition; with clever plotting and brilliant characterisation that will appeal to readers of Henning Mankell and fans of 'The Wire' alike..."

Dahl is already published in the US, with Misterioso, translated by Tiina Nunnally published last July. I am assuming that either The Blinded Man or Bad Blood is the same book as Misterioso. My notes say that "Misterioso was the second published in Swedish, but chronologically the first, the one in which a team of misfit police officers are pulled together to form a new investigative unit" which makes me none the wiser, so if anyone can shed any light I'd appreciate it.

Arne Dahl is on twitter: @arne_dahl

New Reviews: Cato, Cordy, Enger, Hochgatterer, Learner, Nickson, Smith, van der Vlugt, Wallace

2012-01-29T15:02:00.002Z

As well as reading the 9 new reviews, if you haven't already, do enter the competition which closes on 31st: win Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (no geographical restrictions).

Here are this week's reviews:

Lizzie Hayes reviews Joyce Cato's, A Fatal Fall of Snow the second in this culinary series and which is set at Christmas;

Susan White reviews The Colour of Death by Michael Cordy which is set in the US and covers synaesthesia and cults;

Lynn Harvey reviews Thomas Enger's Burned, tr. Charlotte Barslund now out in paperback, and she's keen to read the sequel;

Maxine Clarke reviews the follow-up to The Sweetness of Life by Paulus Hochgatterer, The Mattress House, tr. Jamie Bulloch (do read Maxine's review but please do not read the synopsis on book-selling websites which give far too much away);

Terry Halligan reviews T S Learner's The Map, a historical quest thriller set in Europe;

Michelle Peckham reviews Chris Nickson's Cold Cruel Winter now out in trade paperback (look out for February's competition sponsored by this author);

Laura Root reviews the final part of Tom Rob Smith's USSR trilogy, Agent 6;

Rich Westwood reviews Simone van der Vlugt's Shadow Sister, tr. Michele Hutchinson a Dutch suspense thriller

and Amanda Gillies reviews political thriller Killing the Messenger by Christopher Wallace.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Joyce Cato and Anya Lipska have been added to these pages this week.

New Non-Fiction guides to European Crime Fiction

2012-01-28T10:26:00.001Z

There are not one but two new guides to European crime writing published this month. The first is Barry Forshaw's very readable guide to Scandinavian crime fiction: Death in a Cold Climate. I received a proof copy of this and it's one I keep dipping in to, and I particularly like the insights offered by the translators

The other book, which has just been brought to my attention, and which should be out in a few days is The Dragon Tattoo and Its Long Tail: The New Wave of European Crime Fiction in America by David Geherin.

Here are the covers and official blurbs:

Death in a Cold Climate is a celebration and analysis of Scandinavian crime fiction, one of the most successful literary genres. Barry Forshaw, the UK's principal expert on crime fiction, discusses books, films and TV adaptations, from Sjowall and Wahloo's influential Martin Beck series through Henning Mankell's Wallander to Stieg Larsson's demolition of the Swedish Social Democratic ideal in the publishing phenomenon The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. In intelligent but accessible fashion, the book examines the massive commercial appeal of the field along with Nordic cultural differences from Iceland to Denmark. Including unique interview material with writers, publishers and translators, this is the perfect reader's guide to the hottest strand of crime fiction today, examined both as a literary form and as an index to the societies it reflects. Includes Stieg Larsson, Henning Mankell, Jo Nesbo, Hakan Nesser, Karin Fossum, Camilla Lackberg, Liza Marklund, Jussi Adler-Olsen, Arnaldur Indridason, Roslund & Hellstrom and many others.

The enormous popularity of Stieg Larsson's Millenium trilogy has raised awareness of other contemporary European authors of crime fiction. As a result, several of these novelists now reach a receptive American audience, eager for fresh perspectives in the genre. This critical text offers an introduction to current European crime writing by exploring ten of the best new crime and mystery authors from Sweden (Stieg Larsson and Henning Mankell), Norway (Karin Fossum and Jo Nesbo), Iceland (Arnaldur Indridason), Italy (Andrea Camilleri), France (Fred Vargas), Scotland (Denise Mina and Philip Kerr), and Ireland (Ken Bruen) who are reshaping the landscape of the modern crime novel.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (10)

2012-01-27T07:50:00.012Z

The final instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Maxine Clarke who has chosen a tv series and a book.

Maxine Clarke's Favourite Discoveries of 2011

I think my two crime fiction discoveries of the year have been The Killing (though I prefer the straight translation of Forbrydelsen, The Crime) Danish TV series and the Norwegian novel Dregs by Jorn Lier Horst.

The Killing (series 1) was compelling and tense viewing. For me, the best thing about it was the character of Sarah Lund because at last here is a female TV detective who is a real person, not forced into any of the usual gender cliches that the medium seems to insist upon (and why I rarely watch TV drama). The obsessed personality of Sarah Lund as portrayed by Sofie Gråbøl reminded me of the last time I saw a filmed crime drama that had that same "something special" about the protagonist -- that was William Peterson's portrayal of Will Graham in the 1986 film Manhunter, from Thomas Harris's novel Red Dragon. That film did not do well at the box office but who could forget the portrayal of the man who was prepared to give up everything in order to solve the crime? Sarah Lund as portrayed by Gråbøl has that same kind of focused, intense seriousness, indeed, the script takes her further than the Graham character in failing to provide a "happy ending", even better (as we can look forward to more stories about this amazing woman). There were aspects to the series that I did not like so much, but Sarah Lund and her jumper are, for me, as close to perfection as crime fiction can get.

The book discovery of the year for me was Dregs by Jorn Lier Horst translated by Anne Bruce. It may not be my favourite book of the year or the best crime novel ever written, but these days when it is so hard to find a straight-down-the-line, engaging, reliable police-procedural series - tough-minded but with a social conscience - this book was like a gift from heaven.

From the publisher's blurb:

Meet Chief Inspector William Wisting, an experienced policeman who is familiar with the dark side of human nature. He lives in challenging times for the Norwegian police force, meeting them with integrity and humanity, and a fragile belief that he can play a part in creating a better world.

Dregs is the sixth novel in a planned series of ten. The author is a retired Norwegian policeman whose role model (crime fiction-wise) is Henning Mankell and his Wallander series. The author says: "I would like to be a police officer like Wallander, an upright and good detective who led the work on major cases. A policeman with a conscience, integrity and humanity and an involvement in his community beyond the individual, a true commitment to my fellow human beings.

In Dregs I think he has succeeded in this and, vitally, has created a very readable story and interesting characters. More about this author and his books can be found in this wonderful interview at the Cyprus Well website.

Publishing Deal - Hilary Bonner

2012-01-27T07:50:00.004Z

A new publishing deal for Hilary Bonner has been announced. From The Bookseller:

Pan Macmillan has acquired two psychological thrillers by Hilary Bonner.

Publishing director Wayne Brookes bought world rights for The Cruellest Game and an as-yet-untitled novel. Pan Macmillan plans to publish the first title in 2013.

The Cruellest Game follows an apparently perfect family, tracing the "calamitous sequence of events" which follow "unexpected revelations of lies and duplicity".

Sarah Death on Book Cafe

2012-01-26T10:38:00.001Z

If you're a visitor to the FriendFeed Crime and Mystery Room (and if not do come along) then you'll have heard about this a few days ago.

I downloaded the podcast after Maxine at Petrona had mentioned it but only got round to listening to it last night.

16 January 2012
Jo Nesbø says that Per Wahlöö was the 'godfather of Scandinavian crime writing', creating the archetypical disillusioned, troubled but somehow dedicated detective now familiar to us from the work of Steig Larsson, Henning Mankell and Nesbø himself. Sarah Death, the translator of two new editions of Wahlöö's classic crime novels, explains why now's the time to discover him for ourselves.

Sarah Death, editor of Swedish Book Review, who as well as retranslating Per Wahlöö's Murder on the Thirty-first Floor and The Steel Spring is also working on Kristina Ohlsson's series, the first of which Unwanted was published in English last September.

In the 10 minute interview which begins the podcast, as well as discussing the Wahlöö books, Sarah suggests a refresh in translation of the Martin Beck series might not go amiss and also recommends Hakan Nesser and Lars Kepler. If you want further reading suggestions, have a look through the Euro Crime list of Swedish authors, many of whose books are reviewed on the site.

There is a little more information on the Per Wahlöö retranslations here.

To get the podcast - as well as subscribing through iTunes you can download the podcast here or you can listen again (for 3 more days only) here.

Riverside Lady - Cover Theme

2012-01-25T12:37:00.002Z

Yes, the mysterious lady walking along the Thames (presumably) gets another outing. This time she's on the upcoming Waiting for Sunrise by William Boyd.

Other covers that she's appeared on and similar ones (that I know about) are shown below.

Whitechapel III - Start Date

2012-01-24T20:35:00.002Z

The third series of ITV's excellent Whitechapel begins next Monday at 9pm. There are six episodes comprising three two-part investigations which are inspired by three real-life crimes/criminals: The Ratcliffe Highway Murders, The Whitehall Mystery and The Zodiac Killer.

As far as I know, the Ratcliffe Highway Murders, unlike Jack the Ripper, haven't featured in much crime fiction. There is of course the non-fiction account, The Maul and The Pear Tree by P D James and T A Critchley which was reissued in 2010 and there will be Lloyd Shepherd's debut novel, The English Murder which is to be published 1 March.

Blurb: London, 1811. The twisting streets of riverside Wapping hold many an untold sin. Bounded by the Ratcliffe Highway to the north and the modern wonders of the Dock to the south, shameful secrets are largely hidden by the noise and glory of Trade. But two families have fallen victim to foul murder, and a terrified populace calls for justice. John Harriott, magistrate of the new Thames River Police Office, must deliver revenge up to them and his only hope of doing so is Charles Horton, Harriot's senior officer. Harriott only recently came up with a word to describe what it is that Horton does. It is detection.

Plymouth, 1564. Young Billy Ablass arrives from Oxford armed only with a Letter of Introduction to Captain John Hawkyns, and the burning desire of all young men; the getting and keeping of money. For Hawkyns is about to set sail in a ship owned by Queen Elizabeth herself, and Billy sees the promise of a better life with a crew intent on gain and glory. The kidnap and sale of hundreds of human beings is not the only cursed event to occur on England's first officially-sanctioned slaving voyage. On a sun-blasted islet in the Florida Cays, Billy too is to be enslaved for the rest of his accursed days.

Based on the real-life story of the gruesome Ratcliffe Highway murders, The English Monster takes us on a voyage across centuries, through the Age of Discovery, and throws us up, part of the human jetsam, onto the streets of Regency Wapping, policed only by Officer Horton.

Lady in Red - Cover Theme

2012-01-24T19:48:00.002Z

In one of those weird coincidences, today at work I placed copies of both of these books on the 'recently returned & popular reads' stand. The cover for the more recent Season Light is very striking and then I noticed they both had the same lady in them, albeit with a modified bodice.

NB. The actual cover of Season of Light comes with a sticker (of course) saying:
"We think if you like PHILIPPA GREGORY you'll love KATHARINE McMAHON"

Cited on To Tell The Truth

2012-01-23T20:13:00.001Z

I've had sight of an early copy of Anna Smith's To Tell The Truth which is published by Quercus on 2 February and on the reverse is a quote from Amanda Gillies' review of The Dead Won't Sleep, the first in the Rosie Gilmour series.

New Reviews: Anderson, Ferris, McDermid, Moffat, Stanley, Templeton & Website Updates

2012-01-22T15:12:00.001Z

Earlier today I discovered that Scotland will have its first dedicated crime festival in September: Bloody Scotland so I have gone with a Scottish theme today (with the exception of a review of the current (African) competition prize!)

...and the competition prize: Win Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (no geographical restrictions).

Here are this week's reviews:

Amanda Gillies reviews Lin Anderson's sixth Rhona Macleod instalment, Final Cut (look out for Amanda's review of Picture Her Dead which I have in the queue to post, plus the first few books in this series are extremely cheap in Kindle and epub format at the moment);

Rich Westwood reviews Gordon Ferris's The Unquiet Heart the second in the post-WW2 Danny McRae PI series (also available at a good price on Kindle);

Laura Root reviews Val McDermid's non-series book, Trick of the Dark;

Amanda also reviews Blindside the third in this series by G J Moffat;

Michelle Peckham reviews the current competition prize, Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley calling it "a very entertaining read"

and Michelle also reviews Aline Templeton's Cradle to Grave the latest in the "Big Marge" series.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive and forthcoming titles can be found by author or date, here.

Website Update

State of play at 22.01.12:

The Author Websites page now lists 917 sites.

The New & Upcoming Releases pages have been updated (added since last weekend - Richard Crompton, R J Ellory, Mari Hannah, James McGee and Karen Maitland).

In Bibliographies there are now bibliographies for 1735 authors (8893 titles with links to 2174 reviews):

I've added new bibliographies for: George Arion, M K Bates, David Belbin, Nancy Bilyeau, Laurent Binet, Kevin Brophy, Peter James, Cottrell, Richard Crompton, Howard Cunnell, Maurizio De Giovanni, Hannah Dennison, Mark Douglas-Home, Zoran Drvenkar, Ruth Dugdall, Caryl Ferey, Camilla Grebe & Asa Traff, Alex Grecian, Tom Grieves, Paul Grossman, Penny Hancock, Mari Hannah, Antonio Hill, Hjorth-Rosenfeldt, Bogdan Hrib, Ewart Hutton, Victor Arnar Ingolfsson, Laurie R King, Peter Leonard, David Mark, Alex Marwood, Matt McGuire, Hakan Ostlundh, Chris Pavone, Oliver Potzsch, Jutta Progijt, Kate Rhodes, Jacqui Rose, Alexander Soderberg, Dag Solstad, Jason Steel, Oana Stoica-Mujea, Ferdinand von Schirach, Kate Williams, Tom Winship.

I've updated the bibliographies (ie added new titles) for: Geraint Anderson, Patti Battison, M C Beaton, James Becker, Mark Billingham Benjamin Black, Helen Black, Sara Blaedel, Richard Blake, Xavier-Marie Bonnot, Stephen Booth, Rhys Bowen, Gyles Brandreth, William Brodrick, Ken Bruen, Andrea Camilleri, C S Challinor, Sam Christer, Cassandra Clark, Rory Clements, Alex Connor, Julie Corbin, James Craig, Adam Creed, Julia Crouch, Judith Cutler, Diego De Silva, P C/Paul Doherty, Carola Dunn, Steven Dunne, Patrick Easter, R J Ellory, Giorgio Faletti, Conor Fitzgerald, James Forrester, Karin Fossum, Christopher Fowler, Nicci French, Robert Goddard, Ann Granger, Barry Grant, Alex Gray, J M Gregson, M R Hall, Patricia Hall, Oliver Harris, C S Harris, John Harvey, Elizabeth Haynes, James Henry, Paulus Hochgatterer, Arnaldur Indridason, Quintin Jardine, Michael Jecks, Roderic Jeffries, Paul Johnston, Susanna Jones, Alan Judd, Jim Kelly, Graeme/G W Kent, Bill Kitson, Bernard Knight, Tom Knox, Marek Krajewski, Roberta Kray, Lynda La Plante, Camilla Lackberg, T S Learner, Donna Leon, Peter Lovesey, Matt Lynn, Karen Maitland, Edward Marston, Andrew Martin, Faith Martin, Peter May, Kathleen McCaul, Andy McDermott, James McGee, M J McGrath, The Medieval Murderers, Danny Miller, G J Moffat, Susan Moody, R N Morris, Ian Morson, Colin Murray, Amy Myers, Hakan Nesser, Chris Nickson, Felix Palma, Caro Peacock, Anne Perry, Leif GW Persson, Sarah Pinborough, R T Raichev, Mary Reed and Eric Mayer, Linda Regan, Ruth Rendell, Craig Robertson, Imogen Robertson, Eileen Robertson, Rosemary Rowe, Pauline Rowson, Craig Russell, Giorgio Scerbanenco, Kate Sedley, Bob Shepherd, Frank Smith, Alexander McCall Smith, Roz Southey, Simon Spurrier, Gunnar Staalesen, Lyndon Stacey, Cath Staincliffe, Veronica Stallwood, Jon Stock, D J Taylor, James Thompson, Rebecca Tope, M J Trow, Nicola Upson, Roland Vernon, Jason Webster, Louise Welsh, Andrew Williams, Elizabeth Wilson, Laura Wilson, Jacqueline Winspear, Tom Wood, Simon Wood and Juli Zeh.

If you spot any errors or omissions do let me know.

Seeing Double

2012-01-22T12:10:00.005Z

Yvonne has just posted the new reviews up at Reviewing the Evidence, a site which kindly lets me link to their reviews to supplement those written by the Euro Crime review team. Yvonne is also able to access those books published over the pond.

Reading through the reviews, you'll see a remarkable similarity in two Minotaur Books' covers:

Event News: Bloody Scotland

2012-01-22T09:00:00.001Z

Scotland will have its own crime festival this year. Bloody Scotland will take place in Stirling, 14-16th September 2012. Peering at the photo on the website, joining Ian Rankin will be Lin Anderson, Tony Black, Alex Gray, Allan Guthrie, Alanna Knight, Stuart MacBride, The Mulgray Twins, Craig Russell and many others from this list of Scottish authors.

Follow the progress on twitter: @bloodyscotland
Website: Bloody Scotland

Scottish crime fiction is amongst the best in the world

It is the most popular genre amongst Scottish readers both in bookshops and in libraries, it generates countless screen adaptations, and yet at present none of our 40 plus literature festivals celebrates it.

Bloody Scotland is an innovative festival which will showcase Scottish crime writing and place it in an international context. We will shortly be announcing a stellar cast of leading crime writers.

Stirling is the natural location for a major new festival, with easy access from the cities and also nearby Falkirk, Linlithgow, and Perth. Bloody Scotland seeks to build on the existing strengths of Stirling’s own successful Off the Page festival… and forge something new.

Update on The International Dagger Eligibles

2012-01-20T14:12:00.002Z

I have been keeping the master list of 2012 International Dagger Eligibles list up to date, adding in new titles and linking in the reviews from the Euro Crime website. There have been one or two changes from when I first posted it.

One of the most significant is the change in publication date for Disgrace, the sequel to Jussi-Adler Olsen's Mercy (voted Euro Crime Reviewers' Favourite Read of 2011) from March to June which puts it into next year's list.

The cover has a Sarah Lund vibe - or is it just me?

Other movers are: Petros Markaris's Basic Shareholder which will now be published in 2013 (month unknown at the moment) and the eagerly awaited Last Will by Liza Marklund, whose English translator Neil Smith has informed me that the US edition will be April but a slightly different edition for UK and Australia will come out in September.

Now eight months into the Dagger year, what are the likely contenders so far? Lots of good titles/authors still to come of course...

Edgar Awards 2012 - Nominees

2012-01-20T12:08:00.003Z

The shortlists for the 2012 Edgar Awards have been announced. In the Best Novel category, there is much to please fans of translated and/or European crime fiction with four of the five nominees falling into one of those categories and all four have been reviewed on Euro Crime:

The Ranger by Ace Atkins (Penguin Group USA - G.P. Putnam's Sons)
Gone by Mo Hayder (Grove/Atlantic - Atlantic Monthly Press)
The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino (Minotaur Books) tr. translated by Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander
1222 by Anne Holt (Simon & Schuster - Scribner) tr. Marlaine Delargy
Field Gray by Philip Kerr (Penguin Group USA - G.P. Putnam's Sons - Marion Wood Books)

Included in the Best Paperback Original category are Lucretia Grindle's The Faces of Angels (published in the UK in 2006), Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (which will be reviewed soon and is currently the competition prize (no geographical restrictions)), as well as Frank Tallis's Vienna Twilight (UK: Deadly Communion).

The whole list of nominees and categories is listed on the The Edgars website.

Whitechapel III - Imminent

2012-01-17T19:36:00.002Z

My tv guide is featuring Whitechapel III in its next edition which means it should start sometime in the w/c 28 January. Here's the teaser trailer released on Christmas Day:

Luther wins Golden Globe

2012-01-16T08:48:00.004Z

More accurately Idris Elba has won a 2012 Golden Globe in the category Best Actor - Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for TV, for his portrayal of the character Luther in the series of the same name.

So far there have been two series of Luther, both are available on DVD and have been followed up by an original novel from the series creator, Neil Cross: Luther: the Calling which is reviewed here by Sarah Hilary for Euro Crime.

New Reviews: Goodwin, Harvey, James, Johnston, Kitson, Koppel, Marklund, Pastor, Price

2012-01-15T16:17:00.004Z

As well as the 9 new reviews, don't forget to see which title, author and translator made the top spot for the Euro Crime reviewers' favourite book of 2011.

The competition's still open: win Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (no geographical restrictions).

Here are this week's reviews:

Susan White reviews the latest in the Yashim the Eunuch series by Jason Goodwin, An Evil Eye (and Susan has even tried some of the recipes featured in this series);

John Harvey's Good Bait features a new protagonist plus a couple of characters from earlier books including DCI Karen Shields from the heart-breaking Cold in Hand and is reviewed here by Maxine Clarke;

Michelle Peckham thinks Peter James's Dead Man's Grip signals that the series could be running out of steam;

The Silver Stain is a belated but welcome return for Paul Johnston's PI Alex Mavros, set in Greece, reviewed here by Geoff Jones;

Terry Halligan found Bill Kitson's latest DI Mike Nash, Back-Slash hard to put down;

I review Hans Koppel's She's Never Coming Back tr. Kari Dickson which I didn't enjoy very much;

Fortunately Lynn Harvey had a better experience with Liza Marklund's The Bomber which has been retranslated by Neil Smith;

Norman calls Ben Pastor's Liar Moon "grown-up crime fiction"

and Lizzie Hayes reviews Joanna Price's debut A Means of Escape set in the Glastonbury area (and incidentally is very cheap on Kindle at the moment).

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Mark Billingham, Kevin Brophy and Hakan Ostlundh have been added to these pages this week.

Photos of Nimes (the cat)

2012-01-12T20:58:00.001Z

I'd like to thank everyone for their kind words on the blog and in emails about our sad loss last week. Now the shock has passed, we've been able to reflect back on the life Nimes shared with us. Remembering how he used to follow us on walks round the housing estate we used to live on in Ipswich, how he seemed to find one of our other cats (when he followed Nimes back) and how he would lurk in the hedges of the cycle path and surprise us. When we moved to the Midlands we had several rented houses until we settled in out current house 14 years ago. When we moved in, we thought the house was secure and let him out of the cat box. A few minutes later we noticed a tabby setting off up the grassy knoll and off into the trees....he'd jumped out of the first-floor bathroom window! He came back a bit later no problem and was very much at home here. I mentioned he was partial to chicken, well the local squirrel population reduced when he was in his prime. Just the tails were left...

When we got him, he was 3 months old and had been rescued by the Cats Protection League who had got him from a vets where they didn't put down healthy cats. He was so nervous and would hide under the video recorder/tv stand. He eventually warmed up and was fairly sociable with people but was absolutely terrified at first of the new cats we got a few years later and would never pick a fight with another cat (unlike a certain Mr Fox). It was so pleasing to see Nimes just sleeping in the front garden, completely relaxed - so different from when we first got him.

I've been browsing through the digital photos and found a few nice ones from 2004 when he was 13. You'll see he was a bit of an omnivore. He also loved Skips and any other crisps.

Sleeping...

After some chicken:

"Arthuring" it with Pippa Jones for soup:

These two are a couple of years later when he was 15:

I know everyone thinks their cats are beautiful but he really was and good-natured too. Didn't mind being picked up and put up with the younger cats - and if he did get fed up a mighty paw would descend on the offender and that would be that!

When Two Cover Themes Meet

2012-01-12T10:25:00.002Z

What do you get when the Twilight-esque hands clasped theme meets an old favourite, butterflies in a glass jar?:

Diane Chamberlain's books are marketed as for fans of Jodi Picoult, and you can see a slight resemblance in cover style (ahem):

The Caller - Cover Opinions

2012-01-10T20:37:00.001Z

This week's selection for "cover opinions" is the US and UK covers for Karin Fossum's The Caller, tr. K E Semmel. The US release is not until August 2012. You can read an extract here. The UK mass-market paperback (with a new series look, I understand) will be out in July.

So what are your thoughts on the US (LHS) and UK (RHS) covers? Which would entice you to pick the book up if you were not familiar with the books of Karin Fossum? Both have the same quote from Jo Nesbo.

If you have read it, how well do the covers match the story? (I actually thought that was a grave-stone on the US cover (which would sort of fit in) but I think it's just a gap in the trees.)

Read the Euro Crime review (by me) of The Caller.

Euro Crime reviewers favourite reads of 2011

2012-01-09T10:15:00.003Z

I've asked the recent contributors to Euro Crime to choose their five favourite European reads of 2011 and a total of 73 titles have been submitted. The following favourites come from the lists submitted by: Pat Austin, Mark Bailey, Maxine Clarke, Amanda Gillies, Terry Halligan, Lynn Harvey, Sarah Hilary, Geoff Jones, Michelle Peckham, Norman Price, Laura Root, Rich Westwood, Susan White and myself (there is some overlap with the 2010 favourites):

The most mentioned titles are:

4 votes:
Jussi-Adler Olsen - Mercy, tr. Lisa Hartford

3 votes
Asa Larsson - Until Thy Wrath Be Past, tr. Laurie Thompson
Jo Nesbo - The Leopard, tr. Don Bartlett

2 votes:
Thomas Enger - Burned, tr. Charlotte Barslund
Arnaldur Indridason - Outrage, tr. Anna Yates
Hakan Nesser - The Inspector and Silence, tr. Laurie Thompson
Johan Theorin - The Quarry, tr. Marlaine Delargy
Fred Vargas - An Uncertain Place, tr. Sian Reynolds

The most mentioned authors (irrespective of title) are:

4 votes:
Jussi Adler-Olsen
Jo Nesbo
Fred Vargas

3 votes
Asa Larsson
Hakan Nesser

2 votes:
Alison Bruce
Thomas Enger
Arnaldur Indridason
Laurie R King
Roslund-Hellstrom
Johan Theorin

The most mentioned translators are:

6 votes:
Laurie Thompson

5 votes:
Lisa Hartford/Tiina Nunnally

4 votes:
Don Bartlett
Sian Reynolds

3 votes:
Marlaine Delargy

2 votes:
Charlotte Barslund
Neil Smith
Anna Yates

The breakdown by reviewer, with additional recommendations and any additional comments they have made, can be found on the website.

New Reviews: Becker, Bruce, Dahl, Ferris, Griffiths, Tallis & Reviewers' Top 5s

2012-01-08T20:34:00.003Z

As well as 6 new reviews, I have uploaded the Euro Crime reviewers' favourite reads of 2011, by reviewer. Tomorrow I will announce the favourite book, favourite author and favourite translator of 2011 (based on the aforementioned submissions!).

The competition's still open: win Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (no geographical restrictions).

Here are this week's reviews:

Amanda Gillies reviews the latest from James Becker, The Nosferatu Scroll (or The Vampires of Venice for Dr Who fans...?) which continues the high standard of the earlier books;

Alison Bruce's, third DC Goodhew book, The Calling is listed in Susan White's 5 favourite reads of 2011;

Laura Root reviews K O Dahl's Lethal Investments, tr. Don Bartlett which is the first in the Oslo-based Gunnarstranda and Frohlich series;

Terry Halligan reviews Gordon Ferris's post World War II set Truth Dare Kill the first in the Danny McRae series;

Maxine Clarke reviews the fourth and latest in the increasingly popular Ruth Galloway series by Elly Griffiths: A Room Full of Bones set in North Norfolk

and Lynn Harvey reviews Frank Tallis's Death and the Maiden the sixth in this historical series set in Vienna, which is now available in paperback.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Patti Battison, Rhys Bowen, Gyles Brandreth, C S Challinor, Cassandra Clark, Rory Clements, Julie Corbin, Peter James, Cottrell Howard Cunnell, Maurizio De Giovanni, Diego De Silva, Mark Douglas-Home, Nicci French, Alex Grecian, J M Gregson, Patricia Hall, C S Harris, Elizabeth Haynes, Viktor Arnar Ingolfsson, Roderic Jeffries, Laurie R King, Bernard Knight, Peter Lovesey, Faith Martin, Susan Moody, Amy Myers, Chris Nickson, Chris Pavone, Caro Peacock, Anne Perry, Oliver Potzsch, Jutta Profijt, Mary Reed and Eric Mayer, Linda Regan, Eileen Robertson, Rosemary Rowe, Pauline Rowson, Kate Sedley, Frank Smith, James Thompson, Rebecca Tope, Louise Welsh, Andrew Williams and Simon Wood have been added to these pages this week.

Nimes RIP

2012-01-06T19:54:00.002Z

Our eldest cat Nimes had to be put down today aged 20 1/2. He'd been deteriorating quickly so we took the sad decision to go to the vets. He was a quiet cat, nothing flashy about him but he was much loved by the humans and other cats in the household. We gave him a good life (and lots of chicken) and he has left us with some happy memories.

Is This a Red Kite I See Before Me?

2012-01-06T09:25:00.001Z

Pedant mode on...

Just spotted this cover for Charles Todd's newest Inspector Ian Rutledge, The Confession, which is set in the 1920s. On the cover of this book, set in London and Essex, there appears to be a red kite; a once common bird in London in Shakespeare's time but by the 20th century only found in Wales. The first sighting in London for 150 years was reported in 2006. They are much more common now due to an RSPB reintroduction programme - easiest way to see them is to go on the Chiltern railway line which goes through their English heartland of the Chilterns (eg Princes Risborough).

The Darkest Room on Radio 4 Extra

2012-01-05T19:09:00.002Z

I had a tip-off about this from a friend at reading group. The CWA International Dagger Award winning, The Darkest Room by Johan Theorin is being serialised on Radio 4 Extra. The first of five thirty-minute parts begins on Saturday at 23.30.

If you can't stay up then I imagine it will be on iPlayer very shortly afterwards!

Radio 4 Extra page.

Euro Crime review of The Darkest Room.

Johan Theorin's bibliography with reviews of all three books available in English.

New Richard & Judy and TV Book Club lists

2012-01-05T09:39:00.001Z

Amazingly the same book has been selected for both new seasons of the well-known UK book groups: Richard & Judy and the TV Book Club.

Richard and Judy's Spring 2012 Collection is listed in full here but the crime titles are:

Before I Go To Sleep by S J Watson

Midwinter Sacrifice by Mons Kallentoft, tr. Neil Smith

TV Book Club - the whole list is here but the crime titles are:

29 January - Before I Go To Sleep by S J Watson

19 February - Into The Darkest Corner by Elizabeth Haynes

You can currently pick up a free copy of Before I Go to Sleep at your local Birmingham library as it is Birmingham's Big City Read.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (9)

2012-01-04T10:00:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Sarah Hilary who has chosen a French crime tv series.

Sarah Hilary's Favourite Discovery of 2011

My new discovery (new to me) was Spiral, the French TV series with the best hero/heroine combination I've seen on television and, of course, Paris. A great hard-edged contrast to my favourite euro crime author of the moment, Fred Vargas.

There have been 3 series of Spiral shown on BBC4 and they can be bought on R2 DVD as individual box sets or as a combination of series 1 & 2 or series 1-3; at an average of £8 per series they are an absolute steal.

Fred Vargas's books (in English translation) are listed and reviewed here.

You can read Sarah's Euro Crime reviews here (by searching for her name).

Event News: UK Launch of The Boy in the Suitcase

2012-01-03T12:45:00.001Z

The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbol and Agnette Friis is being launched at Foyles on 17th January.

DATE: 17th January 2012
LOCATION: The Gallery, Foyles, Charing Cross Road, London, WC2H 0EB
TIME: 6.30pm to 8.00pm

Celebrate with us the English language release of the award-winning Danish thriller The Boy in the Suitcase. The evening will feature a lively discussion with the authors chaired by crimefiction expert Barry Forshaw, author of Death in a Cold Climate: A Guide to Scandinavian Crime Fiction and will include compelling insights from Scandinavian Crime enthusiast and founder of the legendary Nordic Noir Book Club Dr. Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen (UCL).

Lene Kaaberbøl has sold more than two million books worldwide as a fantasy writer. Her collaborator, Agnete Friis, is a children’s writer. The bestselling Nina Borg series has been translated into nine languages and was a finalist for the coveted Scandinavian Glass Key Crime Fiction Award.

Blurb: Nina Borg, a Red Cross nurse, wife, and mother of two, is a compulsive do-gooder who can't say no when someone asks for help—even when she knows better. When her estranged friend Karin leaves her a key to a public locker in the Copenhagen train station, Nina gets suckered into her most dangerous project yet. Inside the locker is a suitcase, and inside the suitcase is a three-year-old boy: naked and drugged, but alive.

Is the boy a victim of child trafficking? Can he be turned over to authorities, or will they only return him to whoever sold him? When Karin is discovered brutally murdered, Nina realizes that her life and the boy's are in jeopardy, too. In an increasingly desperate trek across Denmark, Nina tries to figure out who the boy is, where he belongs, and who exactly is trying to hunt him down.

My Top 5 favourite reads of 2011

2012-01-02T10:50:00.002Z

Crime-wise I still read about 98% translated so it's no surprise my top five favourite crime novels that I read this year, are all translated crime novels though I'm more surprised that they are all Scandinavian. The pie charts I posted recently show that the translated crime scene is dominated by Swedish authors at the moment.

Top 5

Jussi Adler-Olsen - Mercy (apa The Keeper of Lost Causes) tr. Lisa Hartford (2011)
Anne Holt - Fear Not tr. Marlaine Delargy (2011)
Asa Larsson - Until Thy Wrath be Past tr. Laurie Thompson (2011)
Jo Nesbo - The Leopard tr. Don Bartlett (2011)
Roslund-Hellstrom - Three Seconds tr. Kari Dickson (2010)

Runner-up

Sergios Gakas - Ashes tr. Anne-Marie Stanton-Ife (2011)

There were some other books that I enjoyed very much and for which I have devised new awards:

The "mad as a box of frogs" award goes to...

Donato Carrisi for The Whisperer tr. Shaun Whiteside (2010)
A compulsive read, quite gory with a great twisty ending but goes deep into woo-woo territory near the end.

The "Keyser Soze" award - for an ending you'll never guess goes to the non-Euro Crime...

The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino tr. Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander (2011)

and lastly,

The "David Attenborough" award for the most scientific information you can shoehorn into a crime novel goes to...

Sissel-Jo Gazan for The Dinosaur Feather, tr. Charlotte Barslund

Despite my flippant categories, I enjoyed and do recommend these last 3 books for something a bit different!

New Reviews: Bauer, Benn, Hunt, Kallentoft, May, Neville & a New Competition

2012-01-01T10:39:00.001Z

To introduce the New Year, a new competition and reviews of 6 books (5 of which are published on 5 January). There's a bit of a snowy-woods theme in terms of covers this week (see the Euro Crime homepage...)

Win Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley (no geographical restrictions).

Here are this week's reviews:

Maxine Clarke reviews Belinda Bauer's Finders Keepers which continues the Exmoor setting of the previous two books;

Laura Root reviews Tom Benn's promising debut set in Manchester, The Doll Princess the first in the hero/anti-hero Bane series;

Irish author Arlene Hunt's latest book The Chosen is set in the US, and Terry Halligan describes it as an exciting read;

Michelle Peckham reviews the mass-market paperback release of Mons Kallentoft's Midwinter Sacrifice, tr. Neil Smith and Michelle thinks lead character Malin is a close relation to The Killing's Sarah Lund;

Amanda Gillies reviews Peter May's second part of his 'Lewis trilogy' The Lewis Man which stand equally well in its own right

and Lynn Harvey calls Stuart Neville's third book, Stolen Souls "a seriously good crime novel".

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Sara Blaedel, Andrea Camilleri, Conor Fitzgerald, Barry Grant, Colin Murray and Ruth Rendell have been added to these pages this week.

Win: Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley

2012-01-01T09:37:00.002Z

Euro Crime has 5 copies of Death of the Mantis by Michael Stanley to giveaway.

(Euro Crime reviews of the previous two books: A Carrion Death and A Deadly Trade.)

To enter the draw, just answer the question and include your details in the form below.

This competition is open to residents of the world and will close on 31 January 2012.
Only 1 entry per person/per household please.
(All entries will be deleted once the winner has been notified.)

The third novel in the fantastic Detective 'Kubu' Bengu crime series is set in the southern Kalahari area of Botswana - a place full of buried lost cities, incredible hidden wealth, ancient gods and, for thousands of years, home to the nomadic Bushmen.

When a fractious ranger named Monzo is found dead, fallen into a donga - a dry ravine - surrounded by three Bushmen, the local police arrest the nomads. Detective 'Kubu' Bengu is on the case, which reunites him with his old school friend Khumanego, a Bushman and now an advocate for his people. Khumanego believes the arrests are motivated by racist antagonism from the police, as the Bushmen are claiming that they were at the murder scene because they were trying to help. Soon after Monzo's death, Detective 'Kubu' learns of another case involving two botany students on their way back from a specimen-collecting trip but who were later found dead, seemingly poisoned, at a campground. Could the deaths be connected?

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For the Camilleri fan in your life...

2011-12-30T14:44:00.001Z

I've just been trawling amazon to see what Montalbano delights are in store. As well as the UK edition of The Potter's Field in May 2012, also listed are the US editions of The Age of Doubt (May 2012) and Hunting Season (Jan 2013).

In addition McFarland are publishing a companion guide, Andrea Camilleri: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction by Lucia Rinaldi, in July 2012:

Publisher's Blurb: This is the first comprehensive reference work in English dedicated to the writing of world-famous Italian mystery writer Andrea Camilleri. It includes entries on plots, characters, dates, literary motifs, and themes from the bestselling author’s detective stories and television crime dramas, with special attention to the serialized policeman Inspector Salvo Montalbano, Camilleri’s most famous character. It also equips the reader with background information on Camilleri’s life and career and provides a guide into the writings of reviewers and critics.

Happy Christmas & a Big Thank You

2011-12-24T16:16:00.003Z

Happy Christmas to the much appreciated readers of this blog and its sister Euro Crime website. Plus a big thank you to the Euro Crime review team, which has increased this year, and the publishers who send out the review books. As ever, I'm very grateful to those who've commented on the blog and sent comments, information and Christmas cards directly to me. I wish you all the best for 2012.

Is it Christmas yet?

Coming soon: more favourite discoveries of 2011; an article by Leigh Russell on her new book, Death Bed, which is available on Kindle now - 6 months ahead of its print release; the Euro Crime reviewers favourite reads of 2011; a new competition or two, and included in the next set of reviews, reviews of the latest books by Elly Griffiths and Stuart Neville.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (8)

2011-12-22T11:41:00.004Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Michelle Peckham who has chosen a Scandinavian crime tv series, though not The Killing. The series is based on the books by Gunnar Staalesen - and I wrote up a recent interview between him and his translator Don Bartlett: from Norway to Norfolk.

Michelle Peckham's Favourite Discovery of 2011

Missing both the dramatisations of Wallander and The Killing on BBC4, and feeling rather bereft, I ordered a 3 DVD set featuring Varg Veum from Amazon (Bitter Flowers / Sleeping Beauty / Yours Until Death). The series is based on the books by Gunnar Staalesen, of which I'd read Yours Until Death, and enjoyed. Unfortunately, not all the books are available in English, so the DVDs were actually a chance to discover more.

Varg Veum is a private investigator, based in Bergen, a 30ish rakish character, divorced, and attractive. He seems to have a knack for taking on cases that prove difficult, and always seem to bring him into contact with the police. The Norway setting adds to the interest, and these DVDs certainly made up for the lack of Scandinavian crime fiction on BBC4. Thoroughly recommended!

(This set is available in R1 and R2 - the R1 cover is on the right.)

Read Michelle's Euro Crime reviews here.

The titles by Gunnar Staalesen which have been translated into English - not many yet alas - are listed and reviewed here.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (7)

2011-12-21T10:00:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Terry Halligan who chooses his favourite book of 2011.

Terry Halligan's Favourite Discovery of 2011

The Warsaw Anagrams by Richard Zimler (Paperback: 336 pages (Feb. 2011) Publisher: Corsair ISBN: 1849013697)

It is the bitterly cold Autumn of 1940 and Erik Cohen, an elderly retired psychiatrist, is forced to move into an area within Warsaw that the Germans have created, to locate all the 400,000 Jews of that city. Erik is obliged to live with his niece and his beloved nine year old nephew, Adam, in a tiny flat. One, extremely cold day, Adam goes missing and after searching all over the place and questioning all their contacts, finally, the next day his body is found naked and entangled in the barbed wire fence that surrounds the ghetto. The boy's leg has been hacked off and a tiny piece of string has been left in his mouth.

Erik and niece are obviously, very upset about all of this and even more so, when a young girl's body is located also with one of her hands missing. Erik and his close friend Izzy start to look into all the possible clues associated with this, as both men feel that as Jews their lives are very limited and they need to ensure that all the children living in the ghetto are as safe from death as possible. It was a truly depressing time, the Germans having made an island where they control who goes in and out and what food and everything else goes in and out. This island is encircled with barbed wire and the only access points are guarded night and day by their armed soldiers. The inhabitants of the ghetto have to sell off all their possessions gradually, to buy food to live, as they get no income otherwise and as they do not know individually how long they will live, they have to go without and suffer the resulting hunger. As they cannot get any coal, even if they could afford it, as all possible supplies are cornered by the Germans to help the war effort, in this bleak Winter it is bitterly cold and they are having to burn furniture, or anything flammable in their fires to keep out the cold. But of course there is only a finite amount of furniture.

Erik discovers that the two dead children were members of a choir, he suspects that adult members of the same group could be involved in the deaths and then it becomes apparent that the girl who was killed was expecting a baby, the father of whom, was a gentile (a non Jew) living outside the ghetto. Erik wants to check that out more and needs to leave the ghetto to do so, which is very difficult and the preparations he makes are explained in detail. He needs to get fake papers forged by a criminal he knows, as he will have to go through a German check point. He decides to take Izzy along with him, which presents other difficulties. So as it goes on the two main characters have many adventures until at last the murderer is discovered and dealt with, but it doesn't end in a nice way.

I found this a deeply moving book. It deals with the Second World War but with an aspect of it that is not discussed too often, and the author has researched his subject extremely thoroughly and his characters live with much deprivation in the ghetto. I consider this book the best and most moving one that I've read for some time and I was deeply affected by it. This is the seventh book written by this author who indicates in a dedication at the beginning that many of his grand-uncles, aunts and cousins perished in the ghettos and camps of Poland during the War. A truly wonderful book, which I will not forget.

Read more of Terry's reviews here.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (6)

2011-12-20T10:00:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Amanda Gillies who chooses a film from a few years ago and which stars Rufus "Zen" Sewell.

Amanda Gillies's Favourite Discovery of 2011

My best discovery this year is definitely the movie Dark City, a futuristic fantasy about, unsurprisingly, a city that is kept in perpetual darkness and the people living there who don’t seem to release they never see the sun. It focuses on John Murdoch (played by Rufus Sewell) who wakes up in the bath to discover that he has no memory and can’t understand why the police are after him. To make matters worse, his beloved wife Emma (Jennifer Connelly) no longer recognizes him.

John sets out to get to the bottom of the strange goings-on and his discoveries will make your blood run cold. He is horrified when the clock strikes midnight and everyone, except him, falls asleep exactly where they are. Things get even worse when he meets the terrifying, black-clad, white-faced "strangers" and their weird side-kick, Dr. Schreber.

The film was written and directed by Alex Proyas, also known for I, Robot and The Crow, and came out in 1998. It is a clever mix of crime fiction, science fiction and fantasy. I absolutely loved the movie and was delightfully creeped out and fascinated for its entire 2.5 hours. The idea of a city being controlled, directed, and changed round the way this one is, really caught my imagination. It also has an amazing ending and left me exhausted. Loads of "Tingle Factor" and, essentially, the right level of "Yuk" to keep the viewer happy.

I can’t believe it took me so long to find Dark City and must have been one of the very few who hadn’t seen it!

Read more of Amanda's reviews, both crime and teenage/YA fiction.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (5)

2011-12-19T10:00:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Geoff Jones who chooses an American/Irish author who made quite a splash with her debut in 2007 and it went on to win the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Award for Best First Novel.

Geoff Jones's Favourite Discovery of 2011

In 2011 I discovered this exciting writer. Her first novel In the Woods made its debut in 2007 to apparently much acclaim (I must have been preoccupied with something else!). She followed this up a year later with the equally well received The Likeness. Her third book, published in 2010, is the one that made me notice this great talent – Faithful Place.

Born in the USA but of Irish parentage, she has lived in Ireland and Italy as well as America. She now lives in Dublin and is married with a daughter. She writes very well about Ireland which is a place I don't know but she describes it so well I feel as if I’ve been there. Her characters are very believable and she has a unique method that a minor character in one book becomes the lead in a subsequent one – very clever.

If I had been asked several years ago who my favourite authors were, very few women would have figured in the top 10. Not sure why – I suppose I felt that only men could write grisly murder mysteries? How wrong could I be!! Today Lynda La Plante, Karen Campbell, Denise Mina and Val McDermid feature prominently. I can now add Tana French to the growing list.

Her fourth book, Broken Harbour, is out in June 2012.

You can read reviews of Tana French's first three books here.

Geoff's reviews can be read here.

New Reviews: Ellis, Eriksson, Fowler, Higashino, Lambert, Williams

2011-12-18T19:45:00.001Z

As promised, a final set of reviews for 2011. More reviews will appear early in the New Year. Do please read the Euro Crime reviewers Favourite Discoveries of 2011 which I'll continue to post next week.

Here are this week's reviews:

Michelle Peckham reviews Joy Ellis's follow-up to Mask Wars, Shadowbreaker (which is set in my beloved Fens) and Michelle praises it highly;

Lynn Harvey reviews the recent UK release of Kjell Eriksson's The Princess of Burundi, tr. Ebba Segerberg the earliest of the "Ann Lindell" series available in English from an author Lynn likens to Henning Mankell (and for once the snowy cover is warranted);

Mark Bailey reviews the most recent of Christopher Fowler's Bryant and May series: Bryant & May and the Memory of Blood;

I review the much talked-about The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino, tr. Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander;

Maxine Clarke begins her review of Charles Lambert's Any Human Face (set in a Rome) by saying that it is "an excellent, well-written novel of suspense"

and Terry Halligan is impressed with Andrew Williams's To Kill a Tsar.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Geraint Anderson, Richard Blake, Julia Crouch, Steven Dunne, James Forrester, Ann Granger, Grebe & Traff, Quintin Jardine, Michael Jecks, Alan Judd, Tom Knox, Lynda La Plante, Matt Lynn, The Medieval Murderers, G J Moffat, Kate Rhodes, Craig Robertson, Imogen Robertson, Jacqui Rose, Bob Shepherd, Simon Spurrier, Jason Steel and Jon Stock have been added to these pages this week.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (4)

2011-12-16T13:05:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Rich Westwood who chooses a French author, probably not as well known as Fred Vargas but who shares some of her writing DNA.

Rich Westwood's Favourite Discovery of 2011

My discovery of 2011 is the Provençal crime fiction of Pierre Magnan.

I'm a sucker for an illustrated cover, and the breezy artwork by Nadine James is what first brought Pierre Magnan to my attention in my local library. However, the comedy of the books is darker than the covers might suggest.

The investigator Commissaire Laviolette is an interesting figure, but for me it is the secondary characters who make these books sing. Magnan offers up crusty collection of eccentrics, thoroughly doused in red wine, reeking of Gitaines and strange local cheeses, all closeted in cramped little Provençal communities and dealing with boredom and poverty any way they can: gossip, superstition, ancient feuds, modern rivalries, mushroom-hunting, obsession and, of course, murder.

A truffle-hunting pig proves a useful ally for the Commissaire in Death in the Truffle Wood, ultimately a story of culture clash between hippies and locals (it was written in the 70s). The book has some great snow-bound scenes which really rack up the tension and show an (for me) unexpectedly harsh side of Provence.

The Messengers of Death has a strong flavour of John Dickson Carr, opening with a retired village postman digging his own grave and features a fancy-dress murderer wielding an antique bayonet.

I’ve only managed to find these two titles in the Laviolette series in English, but if you like Fred Vargas (in particular if you enjoyed the cryptic scenes with the Normandy hunters in This Night's Foul Work), I'd definitely recommend seeking them out.

You can read Rich's Euro Crime reviews here (by searching for his name).

Discover which of Pierre Magnan's books are available in English (with reviews), here. (Death in the Truffle Wood and The Messengers of Death were both translated by Patrica Clancy and are still in print having been published 2006/7.)

Pierre Magnan's website is here (in French).

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (3)

2011-12-15T13:08:00.001Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Lynn Harvey who blogs at Little Grey Doll as well as reviewing for Euro Crime. She has chosen a tv series and an author.

Lynn Harvey's Favourite Discoveries of 2011

It goes without saying that a Scandi-Noir fan like I thinks first of The Killing (original Danish version), because I was indeed hooked and transfixed by it, as was almost everybody. If I could, I would mention the other Scandi-series that had me glued to my telly chair this year: BBC4's showing of that most excellent Icelandic comedy of dysfunction, The Night Shift. But it has to be said that apart from petty pilfering and the violent onslaughts that the increasingly unhinged shift manager inflicts upon staff and customers alike, The Night Shift isn't really a crime story.

So it is with some surprise that I find that my most joyous crime-reading discovery of 2011 is set all the way over in South East Asia with the slightly off the wall crime novels of Colin Cotterill.

I reviewed Killed at the Whim of a Hat for Euro Crime. This is Cotterill's first outing with a new heroine, the woman journalist Jimm Juree, and is set in Thailand. But never having read any of Colin Cotterill's books before and in order to do my homework, I read one of his books set in Laos and featuring pathologist and reluctant shaman, Dr Siri Paiboun. The book that I chose was Curse of the Pogo Stick; foreign setting, social observation, a sense of the absurd, dark reality, black humour, and a helping of the paranormal - just my cup of tea. Although the title does make me wince a little, I love an imagination that can provide the visions of long-suffering shaman Dr Siri Paiboun's regular bruisings at the hands of a pair of tough guy skeletons in the Other Realm. Perhaps it is because I am also a fan of comics and graphic novels that this kind of visual imagination - Colin Cotterill is also a cartoonist - appeals to me. The book also describes the darker reality of life for a minority cultural group amidst the state and politics of 1970s Laos - so not all laughs then. Cotterill's writing is a truly happy discovery for me. So thank you, Euro Crime.

The Killing Series 1 & 2 will be available as a combined box-set from 19 December on R2 DVD, just in time for Christmas, or as individual series box-sets.

You can read Lynn's Euro Crime reviews here by searching for her name.

Colin Cotterill's books with reviews are listed here on the Euro Crime website.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (2)

2011-12-14T10:00:00.002Z

Today's instalment of favourite discoveries of 2011 comes from Norman Price who blogs and reviews at Crime Scraps as well as at Euro Crime. Norman's choice is a tv series which I have been faithfully recording but have not yet watched.

Norman Price's Favourite Discovery of 2011

Braquo is a French crime series, showing on FX the channel that introduced The Wire to British TV. It is very exciting while raising the moral question of how far should the police go to solve crimes. Should they use the violent methods of the crooks they are attempting to catch, and should their loyalties be to their fellow cops or the law?

The four person squad at the centre of the series is a disparate group lead by Eddy, a grizzled veteran living on a houseboat on the Seine. Then there is Walter, a bald gambling addict whose wife is a chronic alcoholic unable to look after their children. Theo, a young violent coke addict who has a way with women. And Roxanne, who manages to look extremely sexy while alternating between a bad hair day, and a very bad hair day.

The squad are supported by their ex-boss and his crew, and opposed by nasty Internal Affairs cops, who are trying to catch them at the various crimes they are forced to commit to solve their numerous problems. When the cops are trying their hand at murder, robbery, drug dealing, kidnapping and blackmail you know that you are probably watching something French.

Perhaps not everyone's cup of tea but I am enjoying every episode.

Braquo will be available on R2 DVD just in time for Valentine's Day (6 February) at around £30.

You can read Norman's Euro Crime reviews here.

Discover French crime writers available in English, here.

Favourite Discoveries 2011 (I)

2011-12-13T12:55:00.005Z

As is customary here at Euro Crime towers I have asked my fellow reviewers to come up with their top 5 reads of 2011 - these will be collated and announced in January. As a bonus question, I asked them what their favourite crime fiction discovery of 2011 - be it book, film or tv series - has been. Mark Bailey kicks us off with his choice, one which I have also read thanks to Europa Editions which published these 2006-2008.

Mark Bailey's Favourite Discovery of 2011

Absolutely the best thing that I have read this year is Carlo Lucarelli's De Luca trilogy (Carte Blanche (Carta Bianca), The Damned Season (L'estate Torbida) and Via delle Oche ) – small delicately shaped morsels (the longest is 160 pages and all three together are shorter than your typical doorstop novel).

In the last days and aftermath of World War II Italy, the world of Commissario de Luca, a fundamentally good man driven by a desire for justice who is (and has been) forced by circumstance to work for people with evil in the hearts is, to my mind, one of the great creations of modern crime fiction. I have the award winning TV movie adaptions on my to-be-watched list for Christmas and can’t wait.

Reviews of the first two parts of the trilogy can be found on the Euro Crime website's bibliography page.

You can read Mark's reviews for Euro Crime here by searching for his name.

A link to the DVD on amazon for more information.

Another First (Fossum)

2011-12-12T09:30:00.001Z

It's rumoured that Jo Nesbo's first Harry Hole book, The Bat Man will be out in 2012 but there's no official confirmation yet. But, Karin Fossum's first Inspector Sejer is finally getting an English translation. In the Darkness, translated by James Anderson will be published on 19 July 2012, ten years after book two, Don't Look Back, was first published in English to much acclaim. The tenth in the Sejer series (and currently the last entry) was published this year in English, but English readers can hope that the missing seventh book also gets translated in due course (and we can find out where the psychiatrist girlfriend went perhaps?).
(Euro Crime bibliography is here)

The blurb from amazon:

Eva is walking by the river one afternoon when a body floats to the surface of the icy water. She tells her daughter to wait patiently while she calls the police, but when she reaches the phone box Eva dials another number altogether.
The dead man, Egil, has been missing for months, and it doesn't take long for Inspector Sejer and his team to establish that he was the victim of very violent killer. But the trail has gone cold. It's as puzzling as another unsolved case on Sejer's desk: the murder of a prostitute who was found dead just before Egil went missing.
While Sejer is trying to piece together the fragments of a seemingly impossible case, Eva gets a phone call late one night. A stranger speaks and then swiftly hangs up. Eva looks out into the darkness and listens. All is quiet.
Gripping and thought-provoking, In the Darkness is Karin Fossum's first novel featuring the iconic Inspector Sejer.

New Reviews: Cain, Cleeves, Cregan, Eriksson, Lewis, Morris, Pearson, Roslund-Hellstrom, Zouroudi

2011-12-11T12:28:00.001Z

The final set of reviews for 2011 will be uploaded next weekend. There are 9 new reviews this week (to make up for missing last week). Look out for some forthcoming blog posts from the Euro Crime review team on their new discoveries this year.

Here are this week's new reviews:

Terry Halligan reviews the fifth (and best so far he thinks) in Tom Cain's Carver series - Carver;

Lynn Harvey reviews her first but the fourth "Vera" book in Ann Cleeves's (now televised) series - Silent Voices which is now out in paperback;

Laura Root reviews the second of Sean Cregan's Newport set series, The Razor Gate which is an example of "futurist noir writing";

I review the latest title that has been made available in English in Kjell Eriksson's Ann Lindell series, The Hand That Trembles, tr. Ebba Segerberg;

Susan White reviews the second in Jonathan Lewis's DCI Bale and dog-handler Kate Baker series, Into Dust;

Geoff Jones reviews the fourth (and last I believe) of R N Morris's Porfiry Petrovich series, The Cleansing Flames;

Lynn Harvey also reviews the fourth in another series, Murder Club by Mark Pearson which features DI Jack Delaney and is set in London;

Maxine Clarke reviews Roslund-Hellstrom's Cell 8, tr. Kari Dickson

and Amanda Gillies reviews Anne Zouroudi's The Whispers of Nemesis, the fifth in the Hermes Diaktoros series.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by George Arion, James Becker, Nancy Bilyeau, Ken Bruen, Paul Grossman, Oliver Harris, James Henry, Antonio Hill, Hjorth-Rosenfeldt, Bogdan Hrib, Camilla Lackberg, Andy McDermott, Roger/R N Morris, Leif GW Persson, Sarah Pinborough, Oana Stoica-Mujea, Roland Vernon, Jason Webster, Kate Williams and Juli Zeh have been added to these pages this week.

OT: It's Blurry Cat-urday

2011-12-10T21:30:00.001Z

Not the best pictures in the world - Foxy is just too fast for the camera (!). He's sussed how to get out but hasn't got the leverage to move the handle.

I took the second and third photos after I'd walked into the lounge to see him on his back, motionless, legs pointing out. He'd moved a bit before I got back with my camera/phone...

Metro's Crime Fiction Gift Ideas

2011-12-08T14:33:00.001Z

In yesterday's Metro there was a books two-page spread and it included some gift ideas for "crime enthusiasts". It's quite a good list - though if you are already an enthusiast you perhaps may have read several of them - and very euro-centric. I can't find it on their website so here are their choices with links to Euro Crime reviews (with the exception of the last one):

Henning Mankell - The Troubled Man (tr. Laurie Thompson)

Jo Nesbo - The Leopard (tr. Don Bartlett)

Thomas Enger - Burned (tr. Charlotte Barslund)

Jason Webster - Or the Bull Kills You

Fred Vargas - An Uncertain Place (tr. Sian Reynolds)

S J Watson - Before I Go to Sleep

Tom Franklin - Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter (reviewed by Maxine at Petrona)

Birmingham's Big City Read

2011-12-08T09:38:00.001Z

Birmingham's Big City Read was launched last night:

"The idea of the Big City Read is to celebrate libraries, books and reading. Through the Big City Read Birmingham Libraries would like to encourage readers to try something new, to read and share their reading experience with other readers. We would like as many people as possible in Birmingham to read the same book, post reviews and pass it on. Our Big City Read book is Before I Go To Sleep by S.J. Watson."

The book in question won the CWA John Creasey/New Blood Dagger 2011 and is reviewed on Euro Crime by Lizzie Hayes.

Pop along to your local Birmingham library and pick up a copy. It can be reviewed via email (details on the website listed below) or on the review sheet included with the book. (NB. limited stocks of the book are available.)

More details are on the Big City Read website.

Before I Go to Sleep is released in paperback on 5 January 2012.

Stranger Beware: Title Change Alert

2011-12-07T10:00:00.001Z

It seems that the mass market paperback release of Camilla Lackberg's The Gallows Bird on 15 March 2012 will be titled The Stranger. NB This title precedes The Hidden Child in the series (listed and reviewed here). Published on the same day will be The Drowning.

A New Sam Ryan (Silent Witness) ebook

2011-12-06T20:34:00.001Z

I've been catching up with the library's collection of Bookseller magazines and I'd missed hearing about this. BOX Fiction are providing ebooks in ten instalments. The first part is free then subsequent parts, released weekly, are 69p each or you can buy the whole lot for £5.99.

This new venture kicks off with Nigel McCrery reprising his Sam Ryan creation in Titan. The first 5 parts are now available to buy and a second series is planned for 2012. Pilots have been commissioned from other authors.

Find out more at BOX Fiction.

Crime Writers contribute to Imagined Lives

2011-12-05T12:35:00.002Z

A new exhibition opens at the National Portrait Gallery this week called Imagined Lives, the accompanying book has been available for a couple of weeks. The authors involved in this imagining of lives for unknown portrait subjects include crime writers John Banville (aka Benjamin Black), Alexander McCall Smith and Minette Walters as well as non-crime writers Tracy Chevalier, Julian "Downton Abbey" Fellowes, Terry Pratchett, Sarah Singleton and Joanna Trollope.

You can read an extract from False Mary (which is the cover on the book below) written by Alexander McCall Smith on the NPG website.

Eight internationally acclaimed authors have invented imaginary biographies and character sketches based on fourteen unidentified portraits. Who are these men and women, why were they painted, and why do they now find themselves in the Collection of the National Portrait Gallery? With fictional letters, diaries, mini-biographies and memoirs, Imagined Lives creates vivid stories about these unknown sitters from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

OT: Spell it as you Say it?

2011-12-04T16:22:00.001Z

Taking the usual walk to town I spotted another offending window display:

However if you say Accessories in the local accent it does approximate to Accessroies. Super Hero's what though, I wonder?

I wonder if the sign writer is also responsible for Chloe's Consessions as the shops are only two doors apart:

8 Minute trailer for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

2011-12-02T21:46:00.002Z

An extended trailer has been released for the US remake of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo which is to be released in the UK on 26 December.

The Return of Harry Hole

2011-12-02T19:54:00.001Z

The Vintage podcast, for Day 1 of Advent has a short extract from Jo Nesbo's Phantom, read by the author, and which is to be published in March. It describes the return of someone who has been away for 3 years in a warmer climate and who sees how how Oslo is different and yet the same. From the publisher's blurb below I assume the man is Harry Hole...

Oslo Opera House=>

Listen here or download via iTunes.

Summer. A boy, Gusto, is lying on the floor of an Oslo apartment. He is bleeding and will soon die. He is trying to make sense of what has happened. In order to place his life and death in some kind of context he begins to tell his story. Outside, the church bells chime.
Autumn. Former Police Detective Harry Hole returns to Oslo after three years abroad. He seeks out his former boss at Police Headquarters to request permission to investigate a homicide. But the case is already closed; a young junkie, Gusto, was in all likelihood shot by a pal in a conflict over drugs. Harry is granted permission to visit the accused boy in prison. There, he meets himself and his own history. It’s the start of a solitary investigation of the most impossible case in Harry Hole’s life. And while Harry is searching, Gusto continues his story.

A man walks the dark streets of night-time Oslo. The streets are his and he has always been there. He is a phantom.

Romanian Crime Fiction

2011-12-01T18:56:00.003Z

Profusion International Creative Consultancy is introducing some Romanian crime fiction titles to an English-speaking audience:

In 2011 Profusion initiates a brand new publishing venture featuring a series of Romanian crime fiction, along with a shocking true crime story. These books are different. They are thrilling, and they also illuminate the reality of a secret Romania, once behind the Iron Curtain, now a vital European partner.

Behind the tumult of the new, lies a past of intrigue, terror and pitch black comedy. The Profusion Crime Series outlines the map and blazes a trail through this hidden history.

1. Kill the General by Bogdan Hrib, tr. Ramona Mitrica, Mike Phillips, and Mihai Risnoveanu was published last week in paperback and on Kindle (quite cheaply for 1 month):

Bogdan Hrib's KILL THE GENERAL is an explosive thriller - and not just because it talks about Chernobyl and a bloody revolution.

“Stelian Munteanu, lover, killer and Bucharest boy, is a hero who tells us more than we ever imagined about our times. Stelian, a book editor with a sideline in international police work, has to kill a man, a general whose book he’s just published. Will he pull the trigger? Kill the General is an exciting and suspenseful thriller. It is also a complex and detailed character study of an individual - a roller coaster ride through the transitions which have taken place over the last decades in Romanian history.” (Mike Phillips)

“It’s early. The city is sleeping. I cannot pull the trigger. The time is flying. If I don’t make a decision now... I have no guarantee that the general will still be here the following night. I should get this job done and get the hell out of here!”

2. Attack in the Library by George Arion, tr. Ramona Mitrica, Mike Phillips, and Mihai Risnoveanu was published on 15 November and is also currently available at a reduced price on Kindle.

“GEORGE ARION's Attack in the Library is one of the classic narratives of Romanian popular fiction. Written during the dictatorship of the 1980s, it weaves a gripping narrative out of the bars, the housing estates and restaurants of Bucharest. Arion's characters queue for food, cope with power blackouts, sweat in the heat and struggle with the privileges and influence of the elites.“ (Mike Phillips)

“Andrei Mladin, living Romanian journalist! Still living, I should say.”

“Exactly in the chapter indicated by the voice, there were fifty 100-lei banknotes. I felt the embrace of sheer panic. Right then the telephone rang again: ‘Mladin! Have you found the money?’ All I heard after that was the sound of the phone hanging up.”

3. Anatomical Clues by Oana Stoica-Mujea, tr. Ramona Mitrica, Mike Phillips, and Mihai Risnoveanu will be published on 20 December.

“Iolanda Stireanu is a brilliant criminal investigator. She is also crippled by mental instability and the fact that she can’t leave her flat.

Anatomical Clues is a gripping, grotesque exploration of damaged psychologies - a tale, which, like Iolanda, will creep into your head and stay there.” (Mike Phillips)

“The eyes had been plucked and laid carefully on the living room table, in between two withered roses. Everything was in perfect order, and it was just these eyes which didn’t fit with the rest of the picture. On the other hand, they were not strikingly out of place. There was, however, no sign of the body to which they must have belonged.”

Ellis Peters Historical Award - Winner

2011-11-30T20:41:00.002Z

Thanks again to to Crime Scraps, I hear that the Ellis Peters Historical Award has been won by Andrew Martin for The Somme Stations. Also shortlisted were (with links to reviews on Euro Crime):

Rory Clements Prince (John Murray)
Sam Eastland The Red Coffin (Faber & Faber)
Gordon Ferris The Hanging Shed (Corvus)
RN Morris The Cleansing Flames (Faber & Faber)
Imogen Robertson Island of Bones (Headline)

The judging panel said of The Somme Stations: “Martin’s novels featuring railway detective Jim Stringer reveal their treasures in subtle fashion with a winning synthesis of period atmosphere, intriguing plotting and a passion for steam railways.”

Read more about each book on the CWA website.

From next year this award will again be a CWA Dagger award:

"The CWA has also announced some changes to the award, effective from 2012. The Ellis Peters award will once again become a CWA Dagger and submission dates will gradually move to correspond with the other CWA awards. Already entries are being accepted from UK publishers via the specialised Daggers website for publishers.

The changes are in line with the CWA’s commitment to increase the profile of their non-TV Dagger awards. It’s planned that the Ellis Peters and the other Dagger awards will be presented as part of a new awards ceremony in summer 2012. The new rules are being finalised and will be published shortly on the Daggers website.

OT: New York in the Snow (Cover Theme)

2011-11-30T20:32:00.004Z

I saw a big advert for Carmen Reid's new book at the Tube station last week and I thought the cover looked awfully similar (from memory) to an older book by Tricia Ashley. What do you think?

NB. It appears that there is a slight crime aspect to The Jewels of Manhattan.

Maj Sjowall wins the Big Caliber Prize of Honour

2011-11-29T14:54:00.000Z

I've received the news via an email that Maj Sjowall has won the Big Caliber Prize of Honour at the International Festival of Crime Fiction, in Wroclaw (Poland).

The previous winners of this award are: Joanna Chmielewska, Boris Akunin, Aleksandra Marinina, Jeffery Deaver, Leonid Jozefowicz, Tatiana Poles, Marek Krajewski and Jo Nesbo.

Maj Sjowall together with Per Wahloo wrote the classic Martin Beck series which is reviewed here.

From Norway to Norfolk: Staalesen & Bartlett

2011-11-28T10:14:00.001Z

On the 18th, Petrona and I trundled off to the British Library for the Crime Across the Continent study day. The last session of the day, included:

Gunnar Staalesen and Don Bartlett (courtesy of the Royal Norwegian Embassy), From Norway to Norfolk; author and translator in conversation.

Here're my notes from the session. They are a bit illegible at times so I apologise for any errors in transcription.

GS writes PI novels in the classic style. When he was 11/12 he read his first grown-up book, The Hound of the Baskervilles. Sjowall and Wahloo were a watershed between the old and new crime writing. Reading US authors made it possible for a young, left-wing, Norwegian writer to write detective stories. Two great plotters were Agatha Christie and Ross MacDonald. Ibsen was a good Norwegian writer.

[GS's lead character is called Varg Veum] Varg = wolf, Veum = Sanctuary/holy place, outlaw in norse. Veum is an ordinary family name, Varg not so much in use!

He wrote two police-procedurals (like Sjowall and Wahloo) before starting the Varg Veum series (which are hugely successful in Norway; his birthday is celebrated and there is a statue in Bergen where they are set). He's currently writing no. 16.

He didn't choose a social worker profession for VV so he could write social criticism but rather he wanted a character who would want to get to the bottom of something and would protect the "losers", the "weak".

Modern Scandinavian crime writers are on the left side of politics.

He doesn't feel there is a Norwegian crime style but there is a Scandinavian. However nature is more apparent in Norwegian crime novels as the cities are very small eg Bergen is surrounded by mountains. Norway is the most egalitarian county in Scandinavia as there is no nobility; oil has changed society.

He knows exactly when VV's birthday is - 15/10/42 - which is celebrated every year in Bergen. The current book is set in Spring 2002. He wants to get to 20 books in the series. Takes a year to write but three to six years for the ideas to become useable. He mostly knows the end of the book before beginning it.

DB says that GS's books are a translator's heaven: short, linear, a wonderful central character and full of humour.

The point was raised about the fact that DB is the third translator to work on GS's books and how did he tackle that? He looked at the earlier books for technical things like names and ranks to keep a consistency over the series.

DB was asked how he coped with dialect used by the minor characters. The high risk approach of translating dialect is using a recognisable English or American dialect eg Brooklyn in the Camilleri books. DB favours the low risk approach by just thinking how they might speak in English.

DB visited Bergen before translating The Consorts of Death and walked around street by street so he knew exactly where certain events took place.

DB limits himself to 4 translations a year. This year he did 2 Jo Nesbos and will be doing another 2 in 2012.

GS said he had no influence on the Varg Veum tv series. Big changes were made to his stories eg in one episode all that was left of the original was half of the title, however it was good pay for half a title!

Cold Hearts, number 15 in the series is to be published next February by Arcadia and follows on from The Consorts of Death, both translated by Don Bartlett. I'm really looking forward to it.

Reviews and Gunnar Staalesen's bibliography (of titles in English) can be found on the Euro Crime website.

New Reviews: Black, Campbell, Krajewski, Neville, Sjowall & Wahloo, Thomas

2011-11-27T16:46:00.003Z

Here are this week's new reviews:

Mark Bailey reviews Truth Lies Bleeding the first in a new series by Scottish author, Tony Black;

Staying in Scotland, Amanda Gillies reviews Karen Campbell's Shadowplay and summarises her many words of praises in the phrase: "it rocks!";

Marek Krajewski's Mock series is a bit like Marmite, several of the Euro Crime review team have enjoyed it a lot, but Michelle Peckham had the opposite response when she read the latest, Phantoms of Breslau, tr. Danusia Stok, now out in paperback with a new look (though the older cover style may give the potential reader a better idea of the content! eg The End of the World in Breslau);

Lynn Harvey reviews Stuart Neville's Collusion now out in paperback and is the sequel to 'The Twelve';

Maxine Clarke reviews the tenth and final entry in the Martin Beck series by Sjowall and Wahloo The Terrorists, tr. Joan Tate which is as fresh as it was 36 years ago

and Terry Halligan reviews David Thomas's (aka Tom Cain) Blood Relative.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here and new titles by Benjamin Black, Susanna Jones, M J McGrath, Hakan Nesser and Felix Palma have been added to these pages this week.

Marilyn & Watching the Detectives

2011-11-25T20:25:00.003Z

What connects, Brother Cadfael, Foyle ('s War), (my dear) Inspector Japp and Wallander?

I've mentioned before that the UK has an apparently tiny pool of actors and you will spot four familiar faces who have played detectives on the tv, in My Week With Marilyn.

My Week With Marilyn covers the time when Marilyn was filming The Prince and the Showgirl with Laurence Olivier at Pinewood studios and is based on the diary/memoir of Colin Clark, a young man who became friendly with Marilyn for a short while.

Of the four "detectives", Kenneth Branagh (Wallander) has the largest role as Laurence Olivier, Philip Jackson (Japp) is playing an ex-policeman, Michael Kitchen (Foyle) is something to do with showbiz and Derek Jacobi (Cadfael) works at Windsor Castle.

Lots of other familiar British actors abound including: Judi Dench, Dominic Cooper, Dougray Scott (unrecognisable as Arthur Miller) and Emma Watson.

I enjoyed the film and it makes me want to watch The Prince and the Showgirl which I've never seen and read the original books that this film was based on.

A Death in Summer - Cover Opinions

2011-11-25T08:55:00.001Z

This week's selection for "cover opinions" is the US and UK covers for Benjamin Black's A Death in Summer, the fourth in his Quirke series, which is set in 1950s Dublin.

The US editions are on the left, the hardback edition is out now, and the trade paperback (below) will be out in March; the UK edition (on the right) is also already available.

So what are your thoughts on the US (LHS, below), and UK (RHS) covers? Which would entice you to pick the book up if you were not familiar with the books of Benjamin Black?

If you have read it, how well do the covers match the story?

NB. Elergy for April was given the same cover opinions treatment last year.

Blurb: When newspaper magnate Richard Jewell is found dead at his country estate, clutching a shotgun in his lifeless hands, few see his demise as cause for sorrow. But before long Doctor Quirke and Inspector Hackett realise that, rather than the suspected suicide, ‘Diamond Dick’ has in fact been murdered.

Jewell had made many enemies over the years and suspicion soon falls on one of his biggest rivals. But as Quirke and his assistant Sinclair get to know Jewell's beautiful, enigmatic wife Françoise d’Aubigny, and his fragile sister Dannie, as well as those who work for the family, it gradually becomes clear that all is not as it seems.

As Quirke’s investigations return him to the notorious orphanage of St Christopher’s, where he once resided, events begin to take a much darker turn. Quirke finds himself reunited with an old enemy and Sinclair receives sinister threats. But what have the shadowy benefactors of St Christopher’s to do with it all?

Against the backdrop of 1950s Dublin, Benjamin Black conjures another atmospheric, beguiling mystery.

DVDs for your Wish-List

2011-11-24T18:56:00.002Z

Despite being top of the charts for a while due to its success in Ireland, The Guard was only on for a week in my area and I was unable to get to a showing. However the DVD is released on 16 January 2012.

Blurb: The Guard is a critically acclaimed Irish black-comedy, where Sergeant Gerry Boyle (Brendan Gleeson, In Bruges) a small-town cop with a rather unorthodox approach to his police work must join forces with straitlaced FBI agent Wendell Everett (Don Cheadle, Ocean's Eleven trilogy) to take on an international cocaine-smuggling ring.

Fed up with watching the same two Inspector Montalbano episodes on BBC4? Then here's some good news. 5 March 2012 sees the release of the first collection (R2) containing:

"The Snack Thief, The Voice of The Violin, The Shape of Water, The Mystery of The Terracota Dog. In Italian with English Subtitles"