In Reference to Murder

Author R&R with Stefan Kanfer

Stefan Kanfer joins In Reference to Murder today to take a little "Author R&R" (Reference and Research). Stefan is the author of fifteen books, including the bestselling biographies of show business icons: Groucho; Ball of Fire (Lucille Ball); Somebody (Marlon Brando); and Tough Without a Gun (Humphrey Bogart). He's also written many social histories, among them The Last Empire, about the De Beers diamond company, and Stardust Lost, an account of the rise and fall of the Yiddish Theater in New York.

Stefan penned two novels about World War II and served as the only journalist on the President's Commission on the Holocaust. He was the first by-lined cinema critic for Time magazine, where he worked as writer and editor for more than two decades. He has received many writing awards and was named a Literary Lion of the New York Public Library. He lives in New York where he serves as a columnist for the City Journal of the Manhattan Institute.

Stefan's new thriller The Eskimo Hunts in New York follows Jordan Gulok, an Inuit (an Eskimo in common parlance), and a former Navy SEAL. In his freelance capacity, he can do things that are beyond the authority of the uniformed services—like tracking and "dispatching" malefactors. Jordan has an expense account and liberty to travel throughout the U.S. In turn, the U.S. government has plausible deniability should he ever get caught stretching or violating the law. The book finds Gulok in New York as he tries to stop a lethal international group manufacturing toxic pharmaceuticals and selling them to victims in Africa, Asia, Europe and America.

Stefan sent along some thoughts on the research process:

Research is—or should be—as integral to fiction as to nonfiction. There are many exemplars to cite. Think of James Joyce holed up in Paris or Trieste, sending for maps of Dublin so that he could get every street right as he recalled the sounds of O’Connell Bridge and smells of the pubs around the River Liffey for Ulysses. Or Marcel Proust, driven around Paris at night because he was too allergic to go out during the day, noting the colors and aromas of flowers in the parks, and the half-high chatter of people leaving parties, meticulously set down in Remembrance of Things Past. Or Mark Twain, or Graham Greene or Somerset Maugham in foreign locales, noting everything down for later use...the list is truly endless.

Writing thrillers demands no less of a writer. The protagonist of The Eskimo Hunts in New York is an Inuit, and I had to do many interviews with tribal people to get him right. (I also steeped like a teabag in the libraries of Manhattan to make certain I had the correct locales, even though I was born in the City and have lived in and around it most of my life.)

Of course, fiction without imagination is a dry affair—a matter of reportage with a change of names. We all know political novels like that, whose pages break in the hand when they’re read a year later. On the other hand, imagination without research is like constructing a castle without an architectural plan—the first strong wind will knock it over. My hope is that I’ve achieved a balance between fancy and authenticity in Eskimo; the readers, however, are the only proper judges of that.     

—Stefan Kanfer

Check out an excerpt from The Eskimo Hunts in New York, and follow Stefan via his website, on Facebook or Twitter.

Mystery Melange

Book sculpture "The Thinking Man" by Kinjio

The Love Is Murder conference, held February 1-3 in Chicago, has announced the nominees for the 2013 LOVEY Awards. (Hat tip to Crimespree.)

Likewise, the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association announced the nominees for the Dilys Award, given to the mystery titles that member booksellers have most enjoyed selling. This year's list includes Granddad, There’s a Head on the Beach by Colin Cotterill; Broken Harbor by Tana French; Mr. Churchill’s Secretary by Susan Elia MacNeal; The Expats by Chris Pavone; and Before the Poison by Peter Robinson. (Hat tip to Mystery Fanfare.)

Poisoned Pen announced two conferences this year, including CozyCon 2, to be held Saturday May 4 at the Phoenix Public Library, and also the Annual Poisoned Pen Conference, scheduled for Saturday July 6 at the Arizona Biltmore. Both one-day events will feature many bestselling crime fiction authors, with exact lineups to be announced soon.

Lee Lofland announced that bestselling author Lisa Gardner is the Writers' Police Academy 2013 keynote speaker. Held in Jamestown, N.C.,  the three day conference scheduled for September 5-8 features  hands-on, interactive and educational experiences in all aspects of law enforcement.

There's a new story up at Beat to a Pulp titled "One Ashore in Singapore," by Andrew Nette

The Q&A roundup this week includes a Scene of the Crime interview with Paige Shelton (author of the Farmer's Market and Country Cooking School mystery series); and Crimespree continues its fun Lego interviews with teacher/reviewer/author, Carole Barrowman.

There's a new trend in South Korea: book cafes that "are evolving into multi-purpose culture spots, replacing the fast-disappearing bookstores and even attracting library-goers," according to the Korea Herald. (Hat tip to Shelf Awareness.)

Finally, movies for bibliophiles: Bookriot lists "16 Great Library Scenes in Film."

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

The Screen Actors Guild Awards were handed out last night, with winners including Daniel Day-Lewis and Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln; Anne Hathaway for Les Miserables;  Kevin Costner for Hatfields & McCoys; Bryan Cranston, for Breaking Bad; and Claire Danes, for Homeland. The award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture (essentially the SAG version of "Best Picture") went to Argo.

Meanwhile, at the Producers Guild Awards, Ben Affleck, George Clooney and Grant Heslov received the Darryl F. Zanuck Award for producing the film Argo, and Showtime's Homeland won its first PGA Award in the drama series category.

Director David Fincher (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Fight Club) has expressed an interest in adapting Gillian Flynn's bestselling novel Gone Girl for the big screen. Flynn has written a screenplay for her novel, which centers on a wife who disappears on her fifth anniversary, leaving her husband as the main suspect

James Franco announced he will direct and star in a film adaptation of crime novelist James Ellroy's American Tabloid, which follows three law enforcement officers who are drawn together as the events of President Kennedy's assassination unfold. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

Joaquin Phoenix is replacing Robert Downey Jr. in director Paul Thomas Anderson's adaptation of the novel Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon. Phoenix will star as a detective solving a case brought to him by his ex-girlfriend in 1969 Los Angeles.

Twilight's Peter Facinelli has been cast to star alongside Dylan McDermott in the thriller Freezer from director Mikael Salomon. The two actors play unwitting of shadowy Russian thugs who falsely accuse McDermott's character of stealing millions from them.

TV

Lara Pulver, who starred as Irene Adler in the "Scandal in Belgravia" episode of the BBC's Sherlock, has joined the cast for the upcoming Ian Fleming biopic. She'll play play Ann O'Neill, an elegant Baroness whose wartime meeting with James Bond creator Fleming alters the course of their lives.

Sean Patrick Flanery is joining Dexter for a recurring role in what may be the series' last season. He'll play Jacob Elroy, and ex-cop who runs a private investigation service in Miami.

Actor James Brolin has signed on to play Rick Castle's father in an episode of Castle debuting Monday, Feb. 25.

The BBC released a promo photo of Merlin star Colin Morgan in his new role on the three-part series Quirke, starring Gabriel Byrne as a Dublin pathologist who solves crimes in the 1950s. The series is based on characters from the crime thrillers of Booker Prize winner John Banville (a/k/a Benjamin Black).

All sorts of news pilots have just been given orders from the networks, including from CBS, Backstrom, based on a character created by Swedish crime novelist Leif G. W. Persson. Stockholm police inspector Evert Backstrom, and a version of Beverly Hills Cop; from ABC, a Revenge-like drama called Betrayal; and from Fox, a pilot for The List about members of the Federal Witness Security Program who start getting killed. (Hat to Omnimystery News.)

Other pilots that have orders in hopes of snaring a coveted spot on ABC's 2013-14 lineup include Doubt, from House creator David Shore, about a former cop who's now a street-smart and low-rent lawyer; Killer Women, which follows the only woman in the Texas Rangers; and an adaptation of the British series Spy.

Creator and showrunner of The Mentalist, Bruno Heller, has also sold a pilot to CBS titled The Advocates, about a female lawyer and a male ex-con team up as victim advocates.

The same team behind Fringe on Fox (J.J. Abrams and J.H. Wyman) are creating a new futuristic pilot for the network that's billed as an action-packed buddy cop show with all LAPD officers partnered with highly evolved human-like androids.

For an updated scorecard on all the various pilots currently in the network pipeline, Hollywood Reporter has a handy list.

Larry Manetti, 65, who played Magnum, P.I.'s sidekick Rick from 1980 to '88, has landed a recurring role in Hawaii Five-0 as a nightclub owner.

Omnimystery News provides a look at the teaser poster for the new ABC crime drama Red Widow, about the widow of a man murdered by Russia gangasters who is forced to work with them to repay his debt, while also serving as an inside mole for the FBI.

If you happen to be in New Zealand next month, check out the new crime drama, The Blue Rose when it debuts. It centers around a group of temp workers who band together to try to work out who killed a friend after her death in the Auckland harbour is officially called an accident.

PODCASTS/VIDEO

The latest Suspense Radio podcast features authors Kerry Copleand Smith and Dr. Barry Johnson.

Although this is originally from May of 2012, the Passive Voice blog posted a link the day from mystery author Hallie Ephron's AtGoogleTalks appearance (note that it's a relatively long clip, at about 50 minutes or so).

Bestselling novelist David Baldacci will guide a virtual field trip at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History via a free webcast will on March 5th at 1:00 p.m. ET / 10:00 a.m. PT.

Friday's "Forgotten" Books - Scared to Death

There aren't many biographical details available about British author Anne Morice (1918 - 1989), the pen name of Felicity Shaw, other than she studied in London, Paris and Munich and married documentary film director Alexander Shaw. But between 1970 and 1982, Morice published 17 mystery novels featuring Tessa Crichton, an actress who is the wife of Scotland Yard Detective Inspector Robin Price.

In the reference book And Then There Were Nine: More Women of Mystery by Jane S. Bakerman, Morice explained her choice of protagonist: "Since numerous members of my family (including my father, sister, two daughters and three nephews) are or were closely connected with the theatre and cinema, in one capacity or another, and I married a film director, this was the background I was most familiar with so created Tessa Crichton for the foreground."

Tessa is clever, confident, intuitive and often sarcastic, with a large circle of family, friends and colleagues that figure in most of her plots as either victim or suspect. Her first-person POV is filled with humorous takes on life and her singular psychological view of the people around her as she pokes her nose into cases, mostly based in London or the fictional small town of Roakes Common in Oxfordshire. Tessa's husband helps from afar while he's working on his own cases, and only steps in on occasion.

Scared to Death (1977) is in the middle of the series and finds Tessa in a different location as she participates in the Storhampton drama festival, starring in a play written by her cousin, Toby Crichton. Tessa has time to take in the local sights and culture, including the very rich and very loathsome Edna Mortimer, often seen around town wearing green velvet turbans and ankle-length mink coats, who says she is seeing her doppelganger everywhere she goes. Everyone attributes the sightings to a practical joke until Edna turns up seemingly scared to death. Tessa begins to wonder if one of the dead woman's greedy heirs was behind the deadly prank and looks for clues in a manuscript Edna was writing—a romanticized autobiography.

Morice's plots focus more on character than plot and legal details, and she once cheerfully admitted she didn't know much about real-life police procedure and didn't "think a crime novel should concentrate on the true stuff." But she always plays fair with her clues as she creates well-rounded characters and quirky settings.

Mystery Melange

Igloo book sculpture by Miler Lagos

Mystery Writers of America announced the 2013 Edgar Award nominations last week, including Best Novel nods for The Lost Ones by Ace Atkins, The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, Potboiler by Jesse Kellerman, Sunset by Al Lamanda, Live by Night by Dennis Lehane, and All I Did Was Shoot My Man by Walter Mosley.

The Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore in San Diego is sponsoring a Noir at the Bar event on January 31 with readings, authors, and adult beverages at the Players Sports Bar. Featured authors will include Eric Beetner, Aaron Philip Clark, Ed LaValle, Steve Willard, and Justin Robinson.

Mysterious Press and Open Road Media are releasing twelve of James M. Cain's later works as eBooks. Cain is considered a founding father of hardboiled and noir fiction, including works such as The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity. Among the new eBook reissues are The Moth, a sweeping tale of love, loss, and the pursuit of beauty during the Great Depression; The Magician's Wife, about a love triangle that turns fatal when a life insurance policy holds the promise of financial freedom; and Past All Dishonor, which tells the story of a Confederate spy who risks his life to win the heart of a fallen woman.

February 15 is the deadline for the Jeffrey Archer Short Story Challenge sponsored by Kobo and Curtis Brown Creative. Send in your 100-word short in any genre of fiction, and you may win the grand prize of free enrolment in an upcoming Curtis Brown online novel writing course.

The Al Blanchard short story contest is also coming up relatively soon, with a deadline of April 30. The annual competition is sponsored by the Crime Bake Conference, although you don't have to be attending the conference to submit a story. In fact, the winner will receive free admission to the conference, among other prizes. Stories should be unpublished, no more than 5,000 words, and either by a New England author or have a New England setting.

The Q&A roundup this week includes Ian Rankin, chatting with the Wall Street Journal about bringing his popular literary creation, detective John Rebus, back to print. Also, Crimespree has been hosting a series of entertaining interviews with various authors—in Lego! The latest victim guest is Sean Chercover.

The Guardian's monthly calendar series, Poster Poems, is taking on crime and criminality. After a look at "hard-boiled" poets (François Villon and poetry from Carl Sandburg, Robert Browning, Amiri Baraka, Kenneth Patchen, Etheridge Knight, Denise Levertov, as well as prisoner-poet Richard Lovelace), readers are challenged to post their own poetic takes on all things crime in the comments.

And finally, if you love all things medical and forensic, British medical illustrator Emily Evans has created dinner plates using slides of microscopic views of real human tissues.

Author R&R with Mignon Ballard

The latest guest author to take some "Author R&R" (Reference and Research) here on In Reference to Murder is Mignon Ballard. A native of Calhoun, Ga., Mignon Ballard received her degree in journalism from the University of Georgia.

Mignon has published 19 novels, including three in a series set during WWII featuring Miss Dimple Kilpatrick, a small-town teacher who's an astute judge of character, quick-thinking and loyal to a fault. The Miss Dimple series captures a difficult but pivotal point in American history—the time women set out to work while their men are overseas—and they navigate how to survive while they support one another and their fighting men abroad. While that was a different era, there are elements of what these stories capture that transcend time and resonate for families today dealing with their loved ones deployed overseas.

Just released today, Miss Dimple Suspects is the third installment in the series and finds a worried Miss Dimple helping to look for Peggy, a first-grade student who has gone missing. During the search, Miss Dimple meets two kind women, Mae Martha and Suzy, who lend much-needed assistance. A few days later, Miss Dimple receives a distraught phone call from Suzy that is suddenly cut short, and she realizes that something is most definitely wrong. When Miss Dimple arrives, she finds that Mae Martha has been murdered. Suzy is nowhere to be found, and she becomes the prime suspect, but Miss Dimple knows Suzy wouldn't kill her friend and makes it her mission to identify the real killer. 

Mignon talks about how her own life experiences helped in researching the series and Miss Dimple Suspects:

Step back in time with me to a small town in Georgia during the war years of the 1940’s where the courthouse clock whirs just before striking; the town library sits between magnolia trees in a picturesque park, and almost everybody has credit accounts at both Lewellyn’s Drug Store and Harris Cooper’s Grocery. The library is built of logs with parquet floors and a stone fireplace at one end.  The Woman’s Club, presided over by bossy Emmaline Brumlow, is responsible for paying the librarian’s salary, and there’s a piano in the corner where readers can sit and pound out a tune if and when they are so inspired.

I’m familiar with these places because they were a part of my growing up years in a town very much like Elderberry during the 1930’s, 40’s,and 50’s, but my hometown was on the northern side of Atlanta. Because several of my characters volunteered at an actual ordnance plant in Milledgeville, Georgia, where explosives were made, I found it necessary to relocate Elderberry south of the capital. I did, however, retain the Cherokee names of some of the waterways as I found them too lovely and meaningful to try to replace.

The town is warm and welcoming in this place where friendships feature prominently. But murder is no stranger. I like for my readers to become acquainted with the characters and setting; to warm their hands by the fireside; hear the town clock whir and strike, smell the popcorn from the Jewel Theater and read the hometown news in the Elderberry Eagle. I want them to feel comfortable before they feel the need to look over their shoulder. Who in this kind place could possibly be responsible for the dark things happening here?

Several years ago I wrote a coming of age novel, THE WAR IN SALLIE’S STATION, set during that same period, and while writing it, did a lot of pre-Google research on that time in our history. I was a child when the war began and remember vividly the day Pearl Harbor was bombed. (I’d never heard of Pearl Harbor.) The war consumed our childhood, and shortages, rationing, and blackouts became an accepted part of our growing-up years. Of course the grammar school played a major role during that time and that is why I chose my title character, Miss Dimple Kilpatrick, as my lead investigator. The old brick building with the clanging, summoning bell is gone now but I still remember it keenly along with the smells of the schoolroom: the oily compound they used to clean the floors; chalk dust, muddy galoshes, and…ugh…forgotten banana sandwiches. The rooming house where many teachers lived still stands a few blocks away.

Because most of my memories are from a child’s perspective (no bubblegum or balloons, no new skates or bikes, making tin foil balls, etc.) I do have to rely on research, especially for dates and battles. The internet has been a great source of information on that subject. I also interviewed veterans; did a lot of library research; collected data from newspapers on microfilm; devoured old letters, and even obituaries. I can recall much of the music, movies, and entertainers from those days but it’s good to have the internet to refresh my memory. I doubt if many readers can remember when cars had no heaters, air conditioners, or turn indicators. Drivers signaled by sticking an arm out the window. And did you know that up until that time we stretched out our right arms to salute the flag until President Roosevelt deemed it too much like a salute to Hitler?

I recall those war years as a nobler time. But of course there’s always room for murder.                                                                                                            --Mignon F. Ballard

 

RT Book Reviews said of Miss Dimple Suspects that "A cozy should make you feel good, and this one does. Characters who are good friends, a strong sense of community and a satisfying outcome make this a winner." Miss Dimple Suspects and other books in the series are available via independent bookstores (check out these member stores of IndieBound and the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association) and in eBook form from Amazon.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Fresh off his nomination for Best Actor at the Golden Globes and Academy Awards, Bradley Cooper has just signed to star in the Warner Bros. adaptation of Howard Blum's book Dark Invasion. Cooper will play NYPD Captain Tom Tunney, a man who must put together a team during World War I to bring German spies to justice.

Will there be a Jack Reacher sequel? Paramount Studios is waiting to see how the film fares in Asia before making a decision, but the film hasn't performed well enough at the box office in the U.S. alone to make it a done deal.

Ewan McGregor has joined the cast of the espionage thriller Our Kind of Traitor, an adaptation of John Le Carre's 2010 novel about a British couple who become entangled with the Russian Mafia and the British Secret Service.

Dylan McDermott is set to star in the action-thriller Freezer, playing an everyman character kidnapped by Russian thugs and locked inside an industrial freezer for reasons unknown.

Martin Scorsese is moving ahead with his mob drama based on the Charles Brandt book I Heard You Paint Houses. He held a reading of Steve Zaillian's script for the project, which already has signed Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci to star.

The producers of RED 2, the action-thriller sequel to the original 2010 RED, released a trailer for the film. Stars Bruce Willis, John Malkovich and Helen Mirren are reprising their roles as older government agents who are nostalgic for their espionage days of yore, while Anthony Hopkins takes a turn as the villain.

TV

The new period police thriller Ripper Street premiered on BBC America. The series stars Matthew MacFadyen as Inspector Edmund Reid, head of the notorious H Division, the toughest district in London's East End. He's joined by Sergeant Bennet Drake (Jerome Flynn) as Reid's right-hand man and Captain Homer Jackson (Adam Rothenberg) as an American ex-Pinkerton agent and an expert in the world of early forensics.

TNT has given a ten-episode order to King and Maxwell, based on the novels of David Baldacci, starring Jon Tenney (The Closer) and Rebecca Romijn (X-Men) as former Secret Service agents turned private eyes.

Steven Bochco, the creator of such shows as Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue, is behind a new pilot for TNT titled Murder in the First that is set in San Francisco area and involves two seemingly unrelated murder investigations. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

TNT has also ordered a pilot for an untitled quirky bounty hunter drama starring Geena Davis, inspired by the real-life story of bounty hunter Mackenzie Green.

CBS has given the greenlight to the political thriller pilot Hostages from writer-director Jeffrey Nachmanoff, Jerry Bruckheimer Television and Warner Bros. The plot revolves around a political conspiracy when a family is taken hostage - the family happens to be that of a successful surgeon (Toni Collette) who's just been tasked with operating on the President of the United States.

Syfy's series Alphas, about a crime-fighting team with unusual abilities, has been cancelled after two seasons.

ABC has delayed the premiere date for the third season of Body of Proof until February 19, to avoid scheduling conflicts. The new season has a revamped cast, including Mark Valley who joins the procedural as Tommy Sullivan, a man with a romantic connection to Dana Delany's Megan Hunt.

Tamron Hall has signed to host a new series for the mystery-and-suspense network, Investigation Discovery  The 13-part series, Deadline: Crime with Tamron Hall, features a core team of law enforcement correspondents who try to determine not only what happened with each profiled case, but why it happened and how it was investigated.

PODCASTS/VIDEO

Vermont Public Radio interviewed Quebec murder mystery author Louise Penny, discussing her Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series.

Philip Quarles and WNYC discusses and posts audio from a speech given by Rex Stout (creator of Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin), which he gave to a 1966 Books and Authors Luncheon. He discusses his career as a writer and his "beef" with the FBI.

Every Saturday from noon to 2 pm PT, Margaret McLean hosts It's A Crime Radio on itsacrimeradio.com or NBC News Radio KCAA 1050 Los Angeles and the Inland Empire. Topics include crime, law, and courtroom drama including the upcoming trial of James "Whitey" Bulger.

THEATER

Vancouver's Vertigo Mystery Theatre is presenting PatRick Hamilton's Gaslight, directed by Christopher Newton, with previews beginning January 26. The play is best known for its 1944 film adaptation starring Ingrid Bergman, Joseph Cotton and Angela Lansbury in her on-screen debut.

Friday's "Forgotten" Books - Naked Villainy

Lana Hutton Bowen-Judd (1922–1985) was born in Yorkshire, England and worked in a bank and as a solicitor's clerk in London during World War II, where she got first-hand experience she put to good use in her mystery novels. Although she wrote under the pseudonyms Ann Burton (three books featuring banker Richard Trenton), Mary Challis (four books featuring solicitor Jeremy Locke) and Margaret Leek (four books featuring attorney Anne Marryat), it was her series with Barrister Anthony Maitland, 48 titles in all, that was her main focus.

The Maitland series debuted with Bloody Instructions in 1961 and continued through the last installment, Naked Villainy, published in 1987 after Woods's death. The publisher included a brief "biography" Woods had created for Barrister Maitland, which was found among the author's papers, as a postscript to the book and the series. In it, Woods says she first met Anthony Maitland when she was 15 years old, when he walked into chapter three of the book she was writing, took over the story and stuck around for more.

The bio refers to Maitland's background—the death of his mother in giving birth to him, his journalist father who died during the War, going to live with his uncle, Maitland's own war experiences, marrying his wife Jenny, and going into law practice. It also describes his physical appearance as tall, a dark man with untidy hair and a thin intelligent face. He was injured in the war and took shrapnel in his shoulder, giving him a permanent disability and some pain. He has a "wickedly accurate gift of mimicry," a facility for foreign languages, and a stammer that only appears when he is angry. But Maitland also has a sense of humor and stubbornness and regards his profession with a touch of cynicism.

In Naked Villainy, Antony Maitland's final outing finds him defending the young Frenchman, Emile Letendre, who is accused of murdering his father, Georges. It appears to many to be an open-and-shut case, with motive, fingerprint evidence, and a half-dozen witnesses consisting of friends dining at the home of Georges' sister and brother-in-law, Francoise and Alan Johnson the night of the murder. But Maitland takes on the case, believing his client's claim that a witches' coven and a Black Mass were behind Georges' death. Unfortunately, the witnesses are all influential people who try to undermine Maitland's case by spreading rumors that the attorney has been coaching witnesses, a charge that could ruin his reputation and career.

Although Maitland's wife Jenny and other secondary characters who often appeared in the series (like Uncle Nicholas, Aunt Vera, and Maitland's friends Meg and Roger), are all present, their roles are secondary to the actual courtroom theatrics. This led Publishers Weekly to say of the book, Woods "is at her best here in the cut and thrust of courtroom drama," and Kirkus Reviews to call it "one of her best...(Maitland) ends his career with a case focused on the courtroom—where he always shone brightest."

The eFuture of Reading

It's difficult to process all the statistics and trends in the news these days concerning the present and future of publishing and books. Will there be books in any form, and more importantly, will there be readers? One very hopeful sign is Scholastic's recent Kids & Family Reading Report national survey, which included the following highlights:

• The percent of children who have read an ebook has almost doubled since 2010 (25% vs. 46%).


• Among children who have read an ebook, one in five says he/she is reading more books for fun; boys are more likely to agree than girls (26% vs. 16%).


• Half of children age 9–17 say they would read more books for fun if they had greater access to ebooks – a 50% increase since 2010.


• Eighty percent of kids who read ebooks still read books for fun primarily in print.

This study (and others) seems to indicate that if anything, eBooks are getting children more interested in reading, no matter what form it takes. This is good for literacy, for education, and for authors who still hope to have readers for their books in the decades to come.

Mystery Melange

Book Sculpture by Brian Dettmer

Book adaptations fared pretty well at the Golden Globes the other night: Argo, Lincoln, Silver Linings Playbook, Life of Pi, Game Change and House of Lies were all big winners.

The British Library is hosting a series of crime fiction events including the exhibition "Murder in the Library: An A-Z of Crime Fiction," beginning January 18th. Other events, including include panel discussions on "Real Crime" "The Story of Crime Fiction," and "The Female Detective," are scheduled in February and March.

Also coming up later this month: The Murder Goes South Festival of Readers and Writers of the Southern Mystery. Join authors Karen Kennedy, VR Barkowski, Fran Stewart, Tony Burton, Miranda Parker, Joseph Scott Morgan, Brandon Massey, Leslie Tentler, Cheryl Ritzel, Lee Kelly and Jo Cook on Saturday January 26 for all-day event in Smyrna, Georgia.

2013 has just begun, but the crime fiction reviews have plenty of suggestions for you to add to your reading list for the year. Marilyn Stasio at the New York Times, Margaret Cannon of the Globe and Mail, and Myles Knapp of the Mercury News all take a look at some of the latest crime fiction releases.

RIP to British mystery writer Gwendoline Butler, who died at the age of 90 on January 5; Butler was the author of over two dozen novels featuring Inspector John Coffin. Farewell also to author and reporter Jim Benét, who died in December at the age of 98; Benét penned two mystery novels and was a friend of Dashiell Hammett. (Hat tip to the Rap Sheet.)

In the Q&A roundup this week, Glasgow-based crime writer Malcolm Mackay chats with The Scotsman about his alter-ego, a hard-boiled hitman; author Brad Meltzer talks up his latest thriller with Omnivoracious.

The first no-book library is planning to open in San Antonio. Make that no print books, because the new BiblioTech public library, which looks like a modern library, will be filled with aisles of computers and gadgets and offer eReaders and eBooks for checkout.

Want a less stressful job? Try becoming a librarian.