In Reference to Murder

The Comedy is Finished

Charles Ardai, Editor of Hard Case Crime, is readying a lost novel written by the late Donald Westlake for release in February. It almost didn't see the light of day. Westlake wrote the book in the 1970s and sent a copy to fellow crime fiction author Max Allan Collins, but ultimately decided not to publish the work since he was afraid it would be confused with Martin Scorsese's movie from the era, The King of Comedy. Fast forward three decades later when Collins brings the book to the attention of Ardai, who knows a good thing when he sees one. Now readers everywhere will be able to enjoy what is likely the final work by the celebrated and talented Westlake.

Titled The Comedy is Finished, the novel centers on a group of people seeking to rekindle the passion of the social upheaval of the 1960s by kidnapping comedian Koo Davis, known for his longstanding USO tours during WWII, Korea, and Vietnam in support of the troops. The plot seems to be working well at first, but everything starts to fall apart for everyone involved: the kidnappers, the bewildered victim and the FBI agent leading the investigation, who hopes for redemption following Watergate-related career missteps.

Publishers Weekly praised Westlake's skill and versatility as a writer, as well as his sharply written and insightful prose, praise that could be heaped on many of the author's over 100 novels, collections and screenplays (penned under a dozen different names). He's probably best known for his series featuring the funny and unlucky master criminal John Dortmunder and also another, hard-boiled series with professional criminal Parker (written under the pen name of Richard Stark). However, several of his stand-alone caper novels like The Comedy is Finished are also masterful little gems.

Vince Keenan wrote a great review of the book that you can read on his blog, which also links to a story from Max Allan Collins about how the book came to be. Also, as a side note, Patti Abbott is going to be featuring Donald Westlake novels on her "Friday's 'Forgotten' Books" feature on February 17th to coincide with the release of The Comedy is Finished.

In Reference to Murder

I recently mentioned two crime fiction reference books, How to Write a Dick, from real-life PIs Colleen Collins and Shaun Kaufman, and also Crooks and Counselors: How to Write Accurately about Criminal Law and Courtroom Procedure from attorney Leslie Budewitz.

There are a few additional upcoming reference titles you may find both entertaining and enlightening, including Clues to Christie: The Definitive Guide to Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Tommy & Tuppence, and all of Agatha Christie's Mysteries, an eBook from Harper Collins (hat tip to Omnimysteries); Dangerous Instincts: How Gut Feelings Betray Us by Alisa Bowman and former FBI agent Mary Ellen O'Toole, who worked extensively on serial killer cases, a book featured in the Minneapolis/St. Paul Star Tribune; Crime Fiction from Poe to the Present by Martin Priestman (author of Detective Fiction and Literature and the Cambridge Companion to Crime Fiction); and Now Write! Mysteries: Suspense, Crime, Thriller, and Other Mystery Fiction Exercises from Today's Best Writers and Teachers, by Sherry Ellis and Laurie Lamson, the fourth in the "Now Write" series.

Looking ahead to April 2012, author, blogger and D. P. Lyle, M.D., has a sequel to his popular book Murder & Mayhem: A Doctor Answers Medical and Forensic Questions for Mystery Writers, this one titled More Forensics and Fiction: Crime Writers Morbidly Curious Questions Expertly Answered. If you haven't visited Dr. Lyle's helpful Writer's Forensics Blog, you should hop over and take a look.

Quaking Good Crime

 

Thanks to our little earthquake yesterday, the jokes have been streaming fairly steadily in the Twitterverse and on Facebook. It also made me think of crime fiction books with an earthquake as a plot device or setting, but I'm not the only one making the literary connection; immediately after the temblor, our local library put up a display of earthquake-themed books. Have I told you how much I love my library?

So, here are a few suggestions for your earthquake-reading pleasure, first from the Golden Gate Mysteries site that has recommendations aplenty about the San Fran region. It's a list of books about the 1906 quake, starting with the 1908 Travers: A Story of the San Francisco Earthquake by Sara Dean, to Locked Rooms, the 2005 book by Laurie R. King.

Other authors have used earthquakes in other regions and times, including The Earthquake Bird by Susanna Jones, which is set in Japan; Aftershock by Peter Corris, set in Australia; and Earthquake Weather by Terrill Lee Lankford, involving the 1994 Northridge quake, and The Walk by Lee Goldberg, both set in Hollywood.

In case you haven't been following the "laughtershocks" on Twitter, you can check out some of the fun here and here.

All kidding aside, this is a good time to remember that two areas of the world were hit by devastating earthquakes in the past year, Japan and New Zealand, both of which are still struggling to recover. Two different story anthologies were put together to help raise funds, including Shaken: Stories for Japan, including authors Kelli Stanley, Brett Battles, Timothy Hallinan and more; and Tales for Canterbury, edited by Cassie Hart and Anna Caro, with the themes of survival, hope and future. Also, the Spirit of Hope Charity Anthology is a project from the British graphics novel community, with proceeds benefitting both earthquake-hit areas.

History's Mysteries

I'm not sure anyone has been keeping statistics, but it's clear from the increasing number of various books—as well as the TV shows like Spartacus and The Tudors and movies like Poe and The Eagle—that historical fiction is a hot genre right now. Two historical novels related to crime fiction/mystery crossed my desk in the past few weeks: City of Ash by Megan Chance and Twelfth Enchantment by David Liss.

City of Ash is set against the backdrop of 1889 Seattle when the Great Fire nearly burned the young city to the ground. It alternates POV chapters between its two heroines, Geneva Stratford Langley, a spirited Chicago mining heiress and arts patron, and Beatrice Wilkes, an actress yearning to be her theatrical troupe's leading lady at the Regal Theater. When Geneva poses nude for a sculptor, bringing shame on her family, she's whisked away to Seattle where her jealous, scheming, ambitious husband, Nathan, hopes to establish himself in politics.

Geneva and Beatrice cross paths when Beatrice has an affair with Nathan, and Geneva unwittingly dashes Beatrice's dreams by being given the starring role in the latest theatrical production written by an up-and-coming playwright with whom Bea is falling in love. The chaos and tragedy of the Great Fire force the two women together as they forge an unlikely alliance to cross class and gender boundaries and fight against Nathan—who has betrayed them both—by enacting a truly wicked plan.

Megan Chance evokes the period and raw circumstances of turn-of-the-century Seattle with her descriptions: "a town knee-deep in mud and tidal stink...puddles beneath pilings, sagging awnings, streets paved with wooden planks that sank into the mud." She also creates sympathetic characters in the two women, one trapped in a loveless marriage and a virtual prisoner in her home in an unfamiliar town that has shunned her, and the other unwilling to trust anyone after living by her wits since the age of 15 and seeing her chance at stardom stolen from her time and time again.

David Liss got his start as an author of historical thrillers with A Conspiracy of Papers, which won Barry, Macavity, and Edgar best first novel honors, but with The Twelfth Enchantment, he turns his hand to the supernatural. The novel likewise takes place in the 19th century and features a heroine who, as with Geneva in City of Ash, also had a youthful indiscretion that tainted her in the eyes of society. The story is set in the world of Regency England and follows Lucy Derrick, a young woman with good breeding and no money who is forced to take refuge with an unpleasant uncle after the death of her father. She's also trying to avoid marriage to Mr. Olson, the local owner of a mill with brutal working conditions, her one and only matrimonial prospect.

Everything changes when a man collapses on her doorstep just after he begs her not to marry Olson. The mystery man turns out to be none other than poet and notorious rake Lord Byron, who has been stricken with a curse and draws Lucy into a dangerous conspiracy. Luddites are pitted against the Industrial Revolution and the secret Rosicrucian society also figures in, as Lucy tries to fight an inheritance fraud, solve the puzzle of Byron's curse and find the missing pages of alchemical manuscript that contains the key to creating and destroying evil magical beings called revenants. Lucy seeks out the help of others, including poet/engraver William Blake, but she's not sure who she can trust when her infant niece is abducted, and she uncovers life-changing secrets about her own family.

Like Geneva in City of Ash, Lucy is a woman pushed to the edge by the restrictions placed on women in her day, who finds a way to be a resourceful heroine and form new allegiances and question old ones in order to find redemption. Liss's writing has been referred to as "unusual and diverting," a description which definitely applies to Enchantment, a sort of Jane Austen meets Wilkie Collins by way of Charlaine Harris. In both books, a young woman who feels trapped by her circumstances and society uses bravery, determination and perceptive sleuthing to avenge the crimes against her and, in so doing, finds empowerment through helping others.

A Gateway to Classics

The Gollancz science fiction/fantasy imprint of Orion Books has announced it's launching a new site called the  SF Gateway this fall. Classic out-of-print SFF titles will be made available as eBooks, with more than 1,000 titles by almost 100 authors to start, and plans to increase the offerings to 3,000 titles by 2012 and 5,000 by 2014. Gollancz stated in the press release that "Wherever possible, the SF Gateway will offer the complete backlist of the authors included."

The SF Gateway will be closely integrated with a new online edition of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, with easy access to eBook editions for sale through all major online retailers. For crime fiction fans, this will be a chance to find sci-fi detective stories by such authors as Frederic Brown, Pat Cadigan, Philip K. Dick, Harry Turtledove and Jack Vance. Negotiations are ongoing to add more authors to the project, so there may be even more such titles to choose from eventually.

In an article for The Guardian, author Isaac Asimov (whose works will also be included), said "I have always said that the ebook will not be the death of the physical book. The ebook will save so many wonderful books from being lost. We have to remember that what we read is the book – what we read it on, whether ink and paper or pixels on a screen, is just the interface. I'm honestly thrilled about this new project and delighted to be on the list."

Mom, I'm Bored!

Schools are beginning to let out for the summer, which means that in a couple of weeks you'll start hearing the "I'm bored" refrain. Although I suspect most children weren't like me and counting down the days until summer vacation just so they could spend the time reading, when your young'uns start looking for something to do, here are some reading suggestions.

The Canadian Children's Book Centre Awards just announced their shortlists, including the John Spray Mystery Award:

• Borderline by Allan Stratton ((HarperTrophyCanada) - ages 13 and up
• Dead Bird Through the Cat Door by Jan Markley (Gumboot Books)– ages 9-12
• The Mystery of the Cyber Bully by Mary Chan (Thistledown Press) – ages 9-12
• A Spy in the House by Y.S. (Lee Candlewick Press) - ages 13 and up
• Victim Rights by Norah McClintock (Red Dear Press) – ages 13 and up

Booklist also posted its top YA crime fiction:

• Bullet Point by Peter Abrahams (HarperTeen) - grades 9–12
• The Case of the Gypsy Good-bye by Nancy Springer (Philomel) - grades 6-9
• Griff Carver, Hallway Patrolby Jim Krieg (Penguin/Razorbill) - grades 4-7
• The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Hidden Gallery by Maryrose Wood (HarperCollins/Balzer and Bray) - grades 4-6
• The Liar Society by Laura Roecker and Lisa Roecker (Sourcebooks) - grades 7-10
• The Memory Bank by Carolyn Coman (Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine) - grades 4-6
• Nickel Plated by Aric Davis (AmazonEncore) - grades 8-11
• Revolver by Marcus Sedgwick (Roaring Brook) - grades 7-10
• Treasure of Dead Man's Lane and Other Case Files by Simon Cheshire (Roaring Brook) - grades 4-7
• You Killed Wesley Payne by Sean Beaudoin (Little, Brown) - grades 9-12

And if you find them a bit reluctant, remind these members of the Smartphone Generation that they can even download books to their phones and e-readers.

How to Write a Dick

A new crime fiction reference book is due out in July on Kindle and Nook, for all you authors who are thinking about writing a private eye novel. Real-life PIs Colleen Collins and Shaun Kaufman have written How to Write a Dick, which three-time Shamus Award winner Reed Farrel Coleman called "the best work of its kind I've ever come across because it covers the whole spectrum in an entertaining style that will appeal to layman and lawmen alike. This will be the industry standard for years to come."

Colleen Collins is a PI at Highland Investigation by day, an author by night, with articles on private investigations in PI Magazine, Pursuit Magazine and others and also 20 novels for both Harlequin and Dorchester. She has spoken at regional and national conferences about writing private eyes in fiction.

Shaun Kaufman has worked in and around the criminal justice field for nearly 30 years, as a former trial attorney and a current investigator. He's published articles in PI Magazine, the Denver Law Review, and authored numerous briefs for the Colorado Court of Appeals, Colorado Supreme Court, and the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Shaun is also a frequent conference speaker about investigations, crime scenes, how PIs effectively testify in trials.  

Some Top Notch Thrillers

Mike Ripley passed along a notice about the latest titles from the Top Notch Thriller imprint of Ostara Publishing (edited by Ripley), whose aim is to revive great British thrillers which don't deserve to be forgotten. In its first 18 months, Top Notch Thrillers has reissued 16 titles from the 1960s and 1970s, including books by John Gardner, Brian Callison, Duncan Kyle, Francis Clifford, Victor Canning and Geoffrey Household, with four more to be added this year. 

One of the latest reissues is the third in the "Quiller" series by Adam Hall, a/k/a Elleston Trevor, The Striker Portfolio. Quiller is an early antecedent to tough-guys Jack Reacher and Jason Bourne, the type who head into danger unarmed and alone. In The Striker Portfolio, we find Quiller in West Germany investigating the crashes of 36 military aircraft patrolling NATO's front line, as he tries to unravel a conspiracy and survive on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Before it's all over, Quiller is involved in "one of the most detailed car chase sequences in spy fiction," and earns his code name that ends with the suffix "9," which means "reliable under torture," which brings to mind the newly-revamped Bond movies starring Daniel Craig.

Another recently-featured title is The Eliminator by Andrew York (a/k/a Christopher Nicole), the first of seven books featuring British Security Service assassin Jonas Wilde, who cultivates the air of a "gentleman-yachtsman and slightly seedy playboy." The book was filmed as Danger Route in 1967 starring Richard Johnson, Gordon Jackson and Diana Dors.

The Lineup - So Dark For April

When most people think of poetry, they probably call up images of love sonnets, lonely clouds or maybe the shores of Gitchie Gumee. Crime, blood, gore, death, revenge? Not so much. Then what in the world is going on with the new poetry anthology The Lineup 4: Poems on Crime?

Editor Gerald So explains that "We hope this encourages poets and writers who discover—as I have—there are some moments, some images, poetry captures much better than prose." Even when those moments and images are down these mean streets where a man must go (Raymond Chandler) because the blood jet is poetry and there is no stopping it (Sylvia Plath).

After reading The Lineup, I can't possibly pick a favorite from the lot, because I've always been fond of both apples and oranges. But, being surrounded by daily news reports of war and unrest and a seemingly never-ending casualty-count coming out of Afghanistan, I was naturally struck by a contribution from Reed Farrel Coleman (who also served as a co-editor and wrote the introduction to the anthology). Titled "Slider, Part 7," it was inspired by the Babi Yar massacre outside Kiev during World War II. An excerpt goes thusly:

None prayed that he could hear.
Mostly they were silent.
Then the
pop pop pop pop pop
of the Lugers and Walthers
and with each bullet
the metal metamorphosis of human beings
into falling lumps of meat.
Then the quicklime
the dirt
more bullets
more bodies
more quicklime.
Layers and layers
like a trifle.

There are many more compact gems included in the anthology: "a mother / shakes on scabbed knees for her son / thrown in a river" (Kieran Shea); "as if the world were on the wagon / and we were practicing / a sober walk test for cops / who were bored" (Thomas Michael McDade); "Blood spreads, pools, shimmers, / Like taillights in the rain" (Steve Weddle). Plenty of powerful images, powerful words, words painting landscapes from nightmares we live, dream and remember. Check them out for yourself, and also read the entries in the other lineup, the month-long blog tour Gerald So arranged to celebrate the book's publication.

Here's an idea: today is Poem in Your Pocket Day, part of National Poetry Month. You can purchase a download of the eBook version of Lineup4 and print out your favorite poem to carry around in your pocket. Share it with a co-worker, a friend, a family member or that guy in rumpled clothes who's always sitting on the park bench giving the squirrels the evil eye. But don't be surprised if he starts quoting poetry back at you, poems he's memorized or maybe poems from his experiences. Because human nature hasn't changed all that much since 400 BCE when Plato wrote "Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history," knowing that every life becomes a poem in its own way.
 
And if the book inspires you, as it surely must, consider contributing your own offering to the next volume, accepting submissions through July 31st.

One of Our Thursdays Is Missing

British novelist Jasper Fforde has written several novels in his Nursery Crime, Last Dragonslayer and Shades of Grey series, but he may be best known for the series featuring Thursday Next. First introduced in The Eyre Affair in 2001, ace literary detective Thursday divides her time between Realworld (a Britain that is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike ours) and Bookworld where literary characters have their own existence.

Meek, mousy written-Thursday lives at the quiet end of Speculative Fiction in Bookworld, trying to keep her small four-book series respectful to her illustrious namesake and away from being remaindered. Every time someone picks up a Thursday Next novel in Realworld, written-Thursday has to be ready to jump into action and act out the parts, aided by her supporting cast that includes her pet dodo and Mrs. Malaprop.

In the sixth installment of the series (released this month), titled One of Our Thursdays Is Missing, written-Thursday Next gets called into action by the Jurisfiction department to investigate when a novel suffers an in-read breakup and deposits a narrative debris-field halfway across Bookworld. Upon closer investigation, written-Thursday realizes the real Thursday has disappeared and it's up to her literary counterpart to figure out what has happened.

When written-Thursday realizes someone has ground off the ISBN number from the wreakage, she finds herself playing the usual action-adventure heroine roles intended for her real counterpart, dodging the mysterious Men in Plaid who want her dead and navigating the Bookworld's elite as they try to deal with a border dispute between Racy Novel and Women's Fiction genres. Only trips to Realworld and up Bookworld's Mighty Metaphoric River will help written-Thursday save the day.

Fforde's genre-bending novel dips its pen into an inkwell-maelstrom of satire, romance, fantasy,  suspense, steampunk, science fiction and of course, detective fiction, a sort of publishing-world version of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Or, as the author himself said in an interview, Benny Hill meets Heart of Darkness. Fforde's creativity and imagination appear effortless and boundless—which is probably close to the truth, seeing as how the author says he sits down to write these books without much of a plan and finishes them in about 100 days or do. Maybe that's because his "years in the film industry makes me think visually and I construct the scenes in my head before putting them on paper."

The premise sounds confusing and the satire is so densely packed, you may find yourself stopping and re-reading passages over and over again to make sure you get all the references, but don't let that discourage you from an entertaining literary roller-coaster reading experience. And when you're done, head on over to the Thursday Next web site for all sorts of clever special features and extras.