“… so to have books and music in the same place at the same time: I’m happy, absolutely…”
The launch of R J Ellory’s Bekraste zielen (Bad Signs) in the Netherlands last month. Some interesting comments from Ellory on mainland Europe’s ‘cultural’ festivals on top of the book, writing and life. Worth a listen. Good music too (from Dotan).
In the UK, R J Ellory’s next novel arrives in early June: The Devil and The River.
… “three gripping crime novels”. Not to be missed!
Click on the pic or the link above to go to Amazon.
From earlier in February:
Introduced by British Library curator Kathryn Johnson, Mark Lawson chairs the event with authors P D James, Jason Webster and Henry Sutton. The authors discuss the history of the crime genre, their favourite classics and their own work.
Mari Hannah’s third Kate Daniels novel, Deadly Deceit is published on 11 April and she has a number of events planned. The list as it currently stands follows below. Stay aware of additions by keeping an eye on her events page.
Click to order from Amazon UK.
SIGNING: Forum Books – Corbridge
Saturday, 13th April, 11am – 12 noon
8, Market Place, Corbridge NE45 5AW
SIGNING: Waterstones Newcastle
Saturday, 13th April, 2pm – 3pm.
Emmerson Chambers, Blackett St, Newcastle, NE1 7JF
READ REGIONAL event at Stockton Central Library
Wednesday, 17th April, 6.30 pm
Church Road, Stockton, TS18 1YU
SIGNING: Waterstones Hexham
Saturday, 20th April, 12 noon until 1pm.
33 Fore Street, Hexham, NE46 1LU
SIGNING: Waterstones Morpeth
Saturday, 20th April, 2pm – 4pm
5, Sanderson Arcade, Morpeth, NE61 1NS
WORLD BOOK NIGHT – Read Regional event at Central Library Theatre, South Shields
Tuesday, 23th April at 6pm
Prince George Square, South Shields, NE33 3PE
From Corvus Books in the UK:
Thirteen-year-old Emily Houchens doesn’t have many friends. She spends her time alone in the woods near her house – her safe place, until she finds the body of a young woman.
Susanna Mitchell is searching for her sister, Ronnie, who vanished after leaving a late-night bar. The more she discovers about Ronnie’s life, the more she realises that her sister began to disappear long before she went missing.
The Next Time You See Me explores the fault-lines of a small community – their hidden desires and their other, secret selves.
Holly Goddard Jones is the author of Girl Trouble: Stories (Harper Perennial 2009). Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Tin House, Epoch, Best American Mystery Stories, New Stories from the South, and elsewhere, and she was a 2007 recipient of the Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award. She teaches in the MFA programme at UNC Greensboro and lives in North Carolina with her husband, Brandon. The Next Time You See Me is her first novel.
It’s published on 4 July by Corvus Books.
Oh the sense of loss on turning over the last page of the perfectly pitched The Ignorance of Blood, the final book in Robert Wilson’s Falcón quartet. I remember it well. To a degree, this loss was alleviated by excitement at the thought of what might come next, and a new series was promised. This has now arrived with Capital Punishment and its new series character, Charles Boxer. All the hallmarks of CWA Gold Dagger-winning Wilson’s writing are present: this makes for intelligent reading; with depth, emotion, strong characterisation and good plotting.
Boxer is ex-British army and ex-Metropolitan Police. Having then moved into security in the private sector, working for the leading company in kidnap negotiation worldwide, Boxer now supplies his specialised skills in a freelance capacity. And for those clients privileged to be in-the-know, Boxer offers a rare additional service.
In Capital Punishment, Boxer returns to London to the case of Alyshia D’Cruz, kidnapped on her way home after a drunken night out in Covent Garden with friends and work colleagues. Approaching her mid-twenties, Alyshia is the daughter of former Bollywood actor and now self-made Indian billionaire, Frank D’Cruz and his former wife, literary agent Isabel Marks. Where Marks may pursue a normally uneventful life, D’Cruz is considered by some to be a ‘…vastly rich ex-actor, who was well worth envying, despising and resenting.’
Quickly, Boxer identifies issues with the progression of the kidnapping, suggesting the kidnappers are more interested in tormenting Alyshia’s parents than in achieving financial gain. With Alyshia more at risk from torture and murder, Boxer needs to quickly ascertain the motivation behind the kidnapping…
‘What about the long term stuff, for big money?’
‘You mean the new tax on the rich?’ said Nelson, stabbing his fried egg viciously, as if it were the eye of a banker. ‘Make them pay for all the shit they’re putting us through. Steal their kids and give them an alternative education.’
The plotting of Capital Punishment beautifully elicits the highly topical from within our contemporary world of international crime. Alyshia’s kidnapping is merely the sharp flame that catches the eye. Soon, the story guides us through the funnel into the expanding hot air balloon, taking in gangs and drugs; the machinations of global finance and corruption in an era of recession; terrorism and counter-terrorism; Islamic fundamentalism; sex trafficking; personal grudges and revenge.
Boxer makes an attractive protagonist and an intriguing character. You’d want him on your side even though he’s not perfect with his ‘rare additional service’. Skilfully setting up the series, Capital Punishment raises the question but does not conclude on whether this may prove to be Boxer’s Achilles heel.
Mirroring the D’Cruz family relationship finding itself under the microscope because of the kidnapping, we also learn of Boxer’s own family circumstances and his relationship with his spirited teenage daughter. All the family characters have scope for an enduring presence throughout the series.
With Capital Punishment Wilson again takes up the gauntlet as master of the intelligent thriller. With Charles Boxer we have an explosion of character in the scene of international crime and specifically kidnap negotiation. With all probability this will be one of your top thriller reads in 2013, so add it to your chocolates for Easter weekend.
Capital Punishment was published in January 2013 by Orion in the UK. Find out more about the author here and Charles Boxer here.
Yes, there has been the taking of some time off. Yes, it was not really planned. And yes, it was much needed. Normality finally returns this weekend and the book reviews to be posted up will kick off with Robert Wilson’s fabulous Capital Punishment on Sunday. Let’s get back to some focus on reading and discussion on it.
And in other news, crimeficreader will be moderating the two Fresh Blood panels for debut authors at CrimeFest at the start of June. You can see the full weekend programme here and make your booking here. Will you be an early bird to catch those debut authors on the Saturday and Sunday mornings? Hope to see you there!
as it has 8 books on offer. These include A M Dean’s thriller The Lost Library and Pierre Frei’s novel Berlin. In the case of the latter it comes with a recommendation from John Lawton so it’s already sitting on crimeficreader’s Kindle. Click on the pic below to go to the Amazon page listing the 8 books.
… coming in December 2013, from Grove Press in the UK. Details below from the Atlantic Books catalogue. The book is yet to appear on Amazon UK (or US) but we will keep you updated as further information becomes available.
Click on the image to go to the site for further details.
The 2013 Flashbang Flash Crime Fiction Contest is now underway and you have until 1 March to get in your entry. Started by Sarah Hilary in 2012, the competition is going from strength to strength and this year we have small changes such as a £2 entry fee. It’s still a 150 maximum word count and the first prize is two free passes to CrimeFest. But new for 2013: the shortlisted authors will be invited to attend CrimeFest’s Crime Writing Seminar on Thursday 30 May 2013, at which the winners will be announced.
Being the generous lot we are, Sarah has drawn on her experience of overseeing this competition in 2012 to bring you some key tips for 2013. Just remember to read and keep the tips to yourself, if you want to win. No tweeting of this post to share the info!
Over to Sarah:
Make every word count. Judges are on the lookout for wasted words, or waffle. Decide on your story and stick to it. If you find yourself heading off on a tangent, ask yourself if the tangent is the story you really want to tell. Layers are great, but clarity is vital; if we can’t see the story for the words, then it hasn’t worked. When it’s written, read it through. Can you tell the story in fewer words? If you can, do. For Flashbang 2012, we rejected an entry that used half the word count on the names of train stations. Don’t do that. We want your 150 words, not someone else’s.Good luck!
Sarah Hilary lives in Bristol, where she writes quirky copy for a well-loved travel publisher. She’s also worked as a bookseller, and with the Royal Navy. An award-winning short story writer, Sarah won the Cheshire Prize for Literature in 2012 and the Fish Criminally Short Histories Prize in 2008. But here’s the most recent bit of BIG news for Sarah: her debut novel, SOMEONE ELSE’S SKIN, will be published by Headline in February 2014.
