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Latest news and gossip from the world of crime fiction |
Thursday, June 25 |
India Knight’s criminally good reads
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I am extremely interested in underground London and in Hampstead there is a building I used to walk past every day for decades – odd shape, and with no discernible entrance or exit. We knew it was something to do with the Second World War, but nothing else. It was, it turns out, a fully fitted (and very deep) shelter, one of several in London. Oliver Harris takes it as the starting point for Deep Shelter (Vintage: read the opening pages here, and buy the book here) an absolutely gripping novel – the second to feature his bad-penny, borderline-depraved detective, Nick. His research is impeccable, his writing is unusually elegant for this genre, and it’s one of those books you gulp down in two sittings.
I’ve also been reading the Commissaire Adamsberg series by Fred Vargas, the nom de plume of a French historian and archaeologist called Frederique Audoin-Rouzeau. Adamsberg is, unlike most fictional detectives, a chipper sort, preoccupied by affairs of the heart and sexual rivalry. He goes off into vague, Zen-like daydreams. He draws a lot. These books are brilliantly mad and sometimes very funny. Start with her first, translated by Sian Reynolds (Vintage: buy here) for a taste of highly original French police procedural.
In non-fiction, I loved Blood Will Out by Walter Kirn (Corsair: read the first chapter here, and buy the book here), a successful, sharp-as-a-tack American writer who is nevertheless completely taken in by a conman calling himself Clark Rockefeller. Clark is far from being the blue-blooded son of privilege that his name deliberately suggests. In fact, he’s a murderer and a psychopath. The author’s failure to fathom this out – he and Rockefeller are friends for 15 years – speaks volumes about the blinding effects of class and privilege.
■ The Times/Sunday Times Crime Club newsletter is published on the last Thursday of every month.
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looking ahead: our july picks
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A Song for Drowned Souls by Bernard Minier, translated by Alison Anderson
Mulholland
Intense and intellectual, Commandant Servaz revisits his past amours in a Pyrenees university town in this clever atmospheric thriller from the bestselling French author.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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In Bitter Chill by Sarah Ward
Faber & Faber
Powerful debut novel from crime blogger Ward: genealogist Rachel Jones teams up with local police to probe small-town secrets that link a long-ago child abduction to a hotel-room suicide.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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What Remains by Tim Weaver
Penguin
Missing persons investigator David Raker has to risk everything for another man’s grim obsession as he helps broken ex-copper Colm Healey find the elusive child killer who ruined his career and his life.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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No Cure for Love by Peter Robinson
Hodder & Stoughton
Written 20 years ago by the creator of DCI Banks, and set in 1980s California where LAPD detective Arvo Hughes has to find the author of threatening letters to a transplanted Brit actress.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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Speaking in Bones by Kathy Reichs
Heinemann
American forensic anthropologist Tempe Brennan is back for her 18th fossick among the remains of the horribly murdered, with plenty of high-tension ‘woman-in-jeopardy’ moments along the way.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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Friday on My Mind by Nicci French
Penguin
Another jeopardy-filled outing for psychotherapist Frieda Klein, creation of the husband-and-wife writing team Nicci French, as she becomes chief suspect in a baffling murder.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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Vanishing Games by Roger Hobbs
Doubleday
High-octane thriller sequel to Ghostman pairs international criminal Jack with equally ruthless Angela in the criminal underworld of Macau on the trail of stolen diamonds as bullets fly and speedboats crash.
Buy >
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The 3rd Woman by Jonathan Freedland
HarperCollins
In a southern Californian dystopia where the Chinese run everything, sparky journalist Madison Webb uncovers dangerous truths as she investigates her sister’s death. First thriller under his own name from the Guardian journalist aka Sam Bourne.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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Freedom's Child by Jax Miller
HarperCollins
Stunning debut from the American author with a life story almost as dramatic as her fiction. Her troubled narrator, Freedom, is drinking and drugging away the pain of losing her children — until her past catches up with her and she embarks on a dangerous mission into the heart of a disturbing religious cult.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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NEW IN PAPERBACK Prayer for the Dead by James Oswald
Penguin
Fife sheep farmer turned crime-writer sends his Edinburgh DI Tony McLean into the city’s darkest corners to be taunted by a twisted serial killer.
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
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NEW IN PAPERBACK The Girl in the Ice by Lotte and Soren Hammer, translated by Paul Norlen
Bloomsbury
Danish sister-and-brother writing team present DCS Konrad Simonsen with a murdered girl long frozen in Greenland ice, and he realises she’s not the killer’s only victim.
Buy >
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NEW IN PAPERBACK Gun Street Girl by Adrian McKinty
Profile
Moody Irish noir enmeshes detective Duffy – troubled, cynical, with plenty of bad habits but a good man at heart – in a tangled web of political corruption and international intelligence agencies in 1980s Belfast.
Buy >
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Criminal tendencies
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Sara Paretsky, creator of V I Warshawski
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Q.
When did you decide to create a female private detective heroine?
A.
I read Raymond Chandler's books when I was in my early twenties. In every one, a woman who had a sex life was the main villain. I soon saw this was a major aspect of all crime fiction and wanted to create a woman character who would overturn those dreary stereotypes. It took me a good eight years to find a character the courage to tell her story.
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Q.
How autobiographical is the character of V I Warshawski?
A.
She says many of the things that I think and say but she grew up in the slums around the steel mills, muscled her way through a high-end education and has worked both as a lawyer and as an active investigator. I grew up in a family of day-dreaming readers.
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Q.
Are you surprised she's lasted so long [17 books in 33 years]?
A.
I'm glad that she continues to find readers but her voice has remained vibrant for me personally and so I keep enjoying going back and reconnecting with her in each new book.
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Q.
How has she changed over that time?
A.
Like me, she is older and more tired. When I started with her the world was opening for women in exhilarating ways. Thirty years on, at least in the States, women are still too often living in poverty, stuck in the most difficult and poorly paying jobs. The optimism I felt when I began the series is not something I feel any longer — it can be hard to look for a good outcome sometimes.
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Q.
How would you sum up her character and her values?
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V I has an ardent spirit. She has a wicked sense of humour, loves good food and good clothes but she undertakes a dogged quest for justice in an unjust world.
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Q.
How has Chicago, her, and your, home town changed?
A.
When I started the series, Chicago still had a major manufacturing industry in steel and automobiles. It no longer does, and the city is deeply in debt. Nonetheless there have been positive changes, particularly in race relations. And Chicago is one of the most physically beautiful cities in the world — foreign visitors are always taken by surprise.
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Q.
Who are your favourite crime writers?
A.
I have many favourites, from Margery Allingham to Ian Rankin. I always look for polished writing, believable characters, and a good story, in that order. Two very good new writers I've encountered recently are Rebecca Pawel, who has a series set in Spain right after the Civil War, and Zoe Ferraris, who has a series set in Saudi Arabia where she lived for a year.
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Q.
Outside crime, what's your favourite book?
A.
I remain partial to Little Women.
Brush Back by Sara Paretsky is published in hardcover on July 16 by Hodder & Stoughton
Read the first chapter >
Buy >
Photograph: Susannah Ireland/Rex
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Crime wave: the latest book news
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■ Harrogate braced for crime wave: writers Ann Cleeves, Mark Billingham, Val McDermid, Lee Child and Arnaldur Indridason, plus crime fans Eddie Izzard and Rory Bremner, are all booked to appear at this year’s Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, based in the Old Swan Hotel on July 16-19.
OFFER: Join the Creative Thursday Workshop on July 16 from 9am to 5.30pm, for £80 (normal price £99) by quoting 'Crime Club' when calling the box office on 01423 562 303 or book here. Limited spaces are available, so it’s on a first come, first served basis.
■ Historical mystery for TV: production company Lovely Day, who brought James Runcie’s 1950s vicar-detective to ITV’s Sunday evenings with Grantchester, has acquired screen rights to Kate Griffin’s first Kitty Peck Victorian crime novel, Kitty Peck and the Music Hall Murders. Grantchester scriptwriter Daisy Coulam is already at work on the screenplay. The second novel in the series, Kitty Peck and the Child of Ill-Fortune, is out next week from Faber & Faber (read the opening pages here, and buy the book here).
■ Agatha uncovered: organisers promise “fresh insights into the life, literature and legacy of the world’s bestselling author” at the International Agatha Christie Festival in Torquay, Devon, on September 11-20, which will celebrate her 125th anniversary. Expect more Christie-related activity from publishers, broadcasters, marketers and the Torquay tourist board as the big day – she was born on September 15, 1890 – approaches.
■ Daggers will fly: one winner of a Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Dagger award has already been announced: Catherine Aird is getting a Diamond Dagger for her long-lived career. Contenders for the CWA’s other annual awards will have to wait till the dinner on June 30 at the Hotel Russell in Bloomsbury to know their fate. Categories include international, historical and short story, plus the coveted Dagger in the Library, nominated by readers. See the shortlists at thecwa.co.uk
■ British publishers take note: the hot new Italian title The Death of Gods, the debut thriller by Mirko Zilahy, Italian translator of Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch, has been snapped up by publishers in Spain, Greece, Germany, France and Turkey. But there’s so far been no British taker for the tale of police inspector Enrico Mancini’s battle of wits with serial killer ‘the Shadow’.
■ What would you like to see in future Crime Club newsletters? Let us know by clicking here.
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Crime in the papers
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Crime round-up in The Times
Marcel Berlins on Scandinavia’s latest crime star, Joyce Carol Oates and a gothic terror
Read the full review >
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War story
Tightrope, Simon Mawer's sequel to The Girl Who Fell from the Sky, pits damaged SOE agent Marian Sutro against Russian spies in post-war Britain
Read the full review >
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Thriller round-up in The Sunday Times
Book of the month? John Dugdale thinks he has found his book of the year in The Cartel by Don Winslow, pictured
Photograph: Richard Perry
Read the full review >
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Crime fiction round-up in The Sunday Times
Joan Smith explores the shadowy side of the Swinging Sixties
Read the full review >
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Crime bestsellers
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Hardbacks
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The Girl on the Train
Paula Hawkins
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Finders Keepers
Stephen King
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You Are Dead
Peter James
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State of Emergency
Andy McNab
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The Slaughter Man
Tony Parsons
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Paperbacks
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The Good Life
Martina Cole
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Personal
Lee Child
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Burn
James Patterson
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Twisted
Lynda La Plante
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I Let You Go
Clare Mackintosh
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Lists prepared and supplied by and copyright to Nielsen BookScan, taken from the TCM for the four weeks ending 20/06/15 |
Criminal Utterance
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“A detective story is really just the way you tell a narrative — you start with the ending. At the end, this person is dead. Now I’m going to go back and piece together the story that led to it… It’s about the final unknowability of any investigation.”
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Nic Pizzolatto, creator of cult TV series True Detective
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Free ebook
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After the Funeral
HarperCollins
Times+ members can enjoy this month’s free eBook: After the Funeral by Agatha Christie (offer closes June 30)
Download here >
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Win a murder mystery champagne lunch!
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Fancy yourself as a real detective? We are giving you the chance to win one of four pairs of tickets, worth more than £300 each, for the murder mystery five-course champagne lunch on the Belmond British Pullman.
To enter the competition, click here.
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