In Reference to Murder

Mystery Melange

Crime Writers of Canada announced the Arthur Ellis Awards for Excellence in Canadian Crime Writing, including Best Novel to Donna Morrissey for The Fortunate Brother and Best First Novel to Elle Wild for Strange Things Done. You can check out all the winners and finalists via the CWC's official website.

The winner of the Bloody Words Light Mystery Award is Elizabeth J. Duncan for Murder on the Hour. The annual Canadian award is handed out to a "mystery book that makes us smile." (HT to Mystery Fanfare)

The longlists for Australia Sisters in Crime’s 17th Davitt Awards were announced, with a record 99 books in contention for adult, young adult, children's and nonfiction titles. A short list will be announced in mid to late July, with the winners presented at a gala dinner in Melbourne in late summer.

Mystery Readers NorCal is hosting an International Historical Mystery Literary Salon with Annamaria Alfieri and Michael Cooper in Berkeley, California, on May 31. Mystery Fanfare has more information and reservation details.  

Noir at the Bar travels to Edinburgh on May 31, with authors schedule to appear and read from their works including Vic Watson, May Rinaldi, C J Huntley, Sarah Sheridan, Neil Broadfoot, Ian Skewis, Doug Johnstone, Jake Steele, Mac Logan, Lucy Cameron, Claire McCleary, and Aly Monroe.

London's Heffers Bookshop and British Library Publications are sponsoring a discussion on June 6 of  Lois Austen-Leigh’s The Incredible Crime. This crime novel was written by a great, great niece of Jane Austen – supposedly on the very desk used by her illustrious ancestor – and was shrouded in mystery after it fell out of print. Now the British Library is re-issuing the book as part of the library’s Crime Classics series. (HT to Shots Magazine)

One day later on June 7, Goldsboro Books in London will be the site of a discussion titled "Agatha Christie’s Far-Reaching Influence." The panel will feature Sophie Hannah, author of the first new Hercule Poirot mysteries since Agatha Christie’s death; Ragnar Jónasson, bestselling author of the Snowblind crime series who has translated 14 of Agatha Christie’s titles into Icelandic; John Curran, Edgar-nominated author of Agatha Christie’s Secret Notebooks (2009) which won the 2011 Agatha, Anthony and Macavity Awards and his Agatha Christie’s Murder in the Making (2011) was also nominated for all four awards; and Agatha Christie’s own great-grandson, James Prichard.

On June 8, the St. Louis, Missouri central library is hosting its annual Suspense Night, which brings together popular mystery writers from across the country for an evening of readings and a panel discussion on the craft of suspense writing. Featured authors this year include Reed Farrel Coleman, Blake Crouch, Hilary Davidson, and Peter Baluner.

The inaugural CrimeCom is headed to Indianpolis June 9-11. The various demonstrations, meet and greet sessions, and panels will feature such themes as the FBI Diving Team, blood spatter and crime scene reconstructions, and search and rescue dogs. Organizers describe it as "a true crime theme park for adults, minus the rides."  

On July 19, thriller writers Karin Slaughter and Lee Child will discuss their work in a panel hosted by bestselling author and journalist SJ Parris. The event is sponsored by the Sunday Times as an exclusive feature for members of The Times and The Sunday Times. For more information, follow this link.

Noireland is a new international crime fiction festival "with a distinctly Irish accent" in Belfast that will take place at the Europa Hotel from October 27 to 29 of this year. Details are a bit sketchy but organizers promise more info to come.  (HT to Crime Fiction Ireland.)

Profile Books is set to publish nine rediscovered short stories by Ruth Rendell that will be released as A Spot of Bother: New Tales of Murder and Mayhem this October. It is the first time the stories have been collected together under Rendell’s name, with seven out of the nine never before published in book form.

Writing for Radio Times, author Andrew Wilson makes the case for why Agatha Christie was cruel, not cozy - and how the beloved crime fiction writer was appalled by fluffy TV adaptations of her books.

If you're a fan of true crime and looking for good books to read in the genre, this list isn't a bad starting point. Or, if serial killer tales are more your "taste," (please, no fava bean or chianti jokes), this list of 100 books is a good overview on the topic.

If you're a bookstore fan (and if you aren't, you should be!), you might want to add these "12 bookstores every reader should visit in their lifetime" to your bucket list.

As if you didn't already know, literacy matters. And reading is healthy, too.

A castle in Virginia that Mary Roberts Rinehart once visited and inspired her to write the mystery novel The Circular Staircase in 1908, can be yours for $2,199,000.

John Farrow, the pen name of Trevor Ferguson, who writes crime novels featuring Émile Cinq-Mars, applied the Page 69 Test to Perish the Day, the newest novel in the Émile Cinq-Mars series.

This is a timely list of "10 Great Books of Washington Intrigue."

Is Robocop one step closer to reality?

This week, the featured crime poem at the 5-2 is "Godwin" by Angel Zapata.

In the Q&A roundup, the Mystery People were busy interview bees this week, chatting with Scottish author Denise Mina who often uses true crime and scandal as a basis for her stories; the MPs also welcomed Ace Atkins to discuss his latest book featuring Robert B Parker’s Spenser, Little White Lies; and Mystery People's Director of Suspense Molly Odintz spoke with Lori Rader-Day about her new crime novel, The Day I Died.

Media Murder for Monday

Before I get to the latest crime drama roundup, a reminder that today is Memorial Day in the U.S., and as part of the National Moment of Remembrance, Americans are asked to observed a moment of tribute and respect at 3 p.m. local time.

Here are this week's news items about crime dramas, from screen to stage:

MOVIES

Sony Pictures Classics has acquired North American rights to The Silent Man, a film about the life of Mark Felt, the secret high-ranking FBI informant during the Watergate scandal, famously known as "Deep Throat." Liam Neeson plays the title role, with Diane Lane, Marton Csokas, Josh Lucas, Tony Goldwyn, Michael C. Hall, and Tom Sizemore also in the cast.

Blake Lively will star in CBS Films' adaptation of The Husband's Secret, the New York Times best-seller from Big Little Lies author Liane Moriarty. Lively will play Cecilia Fitzpatrick, a chronic perfectionist whose suburban bubble is burst when she finds a note from her husband addressed to her with instructions to open it in the event of his death - only to discover he's still alive and her life is built on a foundation of lies and murder.  

Ice Cube is attached to star in an untitled crime thriller from Patriots Day scribe Josh Zetumer. The project centers on a clandestine high-tech version of the witness protection program which makes clients disappear by offering them seamless exits into new lives.   

Lukas Haas is the latest actor to sign on for Steve McQueen’s forthcoming bank heist thriller Widows from New Regency and 20th Century Fox. He joins the list of A-list actors that includes Viola Davis, Robert Duvall, Liam Neeson and Colin Farrell. The film, written by McQueen and Gillian Flynn, will hit theaters November 16, 2018.

Filming has begun on the psychological thriller Spinning Man, based on a novel by George Harrar. The plot follows Evan Birch (Guy Pearce), a professor and family man, whose past reveals a number of illicit relations with his students. When a young woman is found murdered, Evan becomes the prime suspect, and a tough detective (Pierce Brosnan) has to uncover the truth.

John Wick fans take note: John Wick: Chapter 2 director Chad Stahelski says the third chapter in the series starring Keanu Reeves may start filming by the end of the year.   

TELEVISION

The 2011 film Hanna is being developed for the small screen by Amazon Studios. The original film co-starred Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett and followed a young girl raised by her father, an ex-CIA operative, who trains her as an assassin in northern Finland. Blanchett played the CIA agent who searches for the father and daughter to eliminate them.  

After the renewal status of Chicago Justice remained in limbo long after the rest of the schedules were announced, the show's fans will be saddened to hear finally that NBC has decided to cancel the show after just one season. The drama starred Philip Winchester as attorney Peter Stone, the son of Law & Order's Ben Stone, and Carl Weathers as State's Attorney Mark Jefferies. It also starred Justified's Joelle Carter, UnREAL's Monica Barbaro and Chicago P.D.'s Jon Seda, although it's not known whether Seda will return to P.D. next season.

Criminal Minds brought Season 12 to an explosive end earlier this month, leaving fans wondering if everybody actually survived the events of the finale. Apparently, at least two characters' fates are still up in the air, after it was reported that negotiations between CBS and members Kirsten Vangsness and A.J. Cook have stalled with neither actress signing on for a Season 13 return just yet.  

Chicago P.D. female lead Sophia Bush is leaving the NBC cop drama series after four seasons. A possible exit for the actress was hinted in the recent Season 4 finale of Chicago P.D, which saw her character, Detective Erin Lindsay, on the verge of accepting a job with the FBI in New York.  

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, recently renewed for a 12th season, is bringing back showrunner Michael Chernuchin, who is taking over showrunning duties for SVU's foreseeable future. Chernuchin just came off of showrunner duties for Chicago Justice, which was recently canceled (as noted above).

The third and final season of the David Tennant- and Olivia Colman-starring detective drama, Broadchurch, will premiere on BBC America on June 28. The third season kicks off three years from Season 2 and sees Detective Sergeant Ellie Miller (Colman) and Detective Inspector Alec Hardy (Tennant) investigate a serious sexual assault that shocks the titular tight-knitted seaside town to its core.

Epix has released the first trailer for Get Shorty, its 10-episode original series that is a reimagining of Elmore Leonard’s 1990 bestselling thriller comedy novel (previously adapted into the 1995 feature film starring John Travolta, Danny DeVito, Gene Hackman and Rene Russo). Get Shorty follows Miles Daly (Chris O’Dowd), a hitman from Nevada who tries to become a movie producer in Hollywood where he meets Rick Moreweather (Ray Romano), a washed up producer of low quality films who is desperately hanging on to the rungs of Hollywood relevancy and begrudgingly becomes Miles’ partner and guide through the maze of show business.  

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO

Author Scott Turow discussed Testimony, his novel about war crimes during the Bosnian War, with St. Louis Public Radio.

BBC Radio's Marie-Louise Muir spoke with bestselling crime author Brian McGilloway, as he gets ready to release his new book, Bad Blood.

When John Grisham embarks on his first tour in 25 years this summer, he’ll also be recording at each stop for a new podcast set to launch later this summer. The Book Tour With John Grisham podcast will feature Grisham’s conversations about books and writing with other authors on his tour, including David Grann, Ann Patchett, Jodi Picoult, Harlan Coben, Greg Isles, Lisa Scottoline, Ace Atkins, and more. One episode will drop each week once it launches.

Critically-acclaimed novelist Karen Dionne spoke with Suspense Radio about constructing her new suspense novel The Marsh King’s Daughter, a story woven with a chilling premise and her own personal experiences growing up in an isolated part of Michigan’s upper peninsula.

Two Crime Writers and a Microphone hosts Steve Cavanagh and Luca Veste launched a new segment in the show - Critics Corner or Reviews That Make You Go Huh? They also discussed the popularity of psychological thrillers and welcomed guest author Brian McGilloway, who talked about his new book Bad Blood.

THEATER

The Metropolitan Opera and the English National Opera commissioned Nico Muhly to compose Marnie, based on Winston Graham's 1961 novel that was adapted into an Alfred Hitchcock movie. The opera will premiere at the London Coliseum in November of this year and later move to the Met for for its 2019-20 season. The psychological thriller is set in England during the late 1950s and centers on a woman who embezzles from her employer, gets caught, and is blackmailed into marrying one of her bosses.

Your Sunday Music Treat

In honor of Memorial Day, here's "Agnus Dei," the choral arrangement of Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings, as performed by the King's College Choir:

 

Quote of the Week

FFB: Miss Pink at the Edge of the World

Gwen Moffat, born in Brighton, Sussex in 1924, became the first professional female mountain guide in the UK. Her travels in the field provided settings for her crime novels set in the Alps, the Rockies and deserts of the U.S., and the Scottish Highlands and Hebrides. She has thrown that same pioneering gusto into her research in the past, working cattle on a Montana ranch for her novel Grizzly Trail or living in a house in the Mojave Desert for Last Chance Country.

In addition to her thirty-five novels, travel books and her autobiography, Space Below My Feet, Moffat has written short stories, such as the Holmes pastiche "The Adventure in Border County: Holmes and Watson visit Cumberland at Xmas." She's also been a broadcaster and written article for newspapers on mountain climbing, travel and camping, as well as crime fiction reviews for Shots Magazine.

Moffat's first-hand experiences with mountain climbing are put to obvious use in her novel Miss Pink at the Edge of the World. On a Scottish stack (i.e.a column of rock isolated from a shore by the action of waves) called the Old Man of Scamadale, two climbers die rather mysteriously. One of them, Trevor Stark, is a famous and much-hated TV celebrity who was scouting the area for a program, complete with boats and helicopters, against the wishes of the local laird (landowner) who avoided publicity and wanted to keep tourists away. The local police believe the deaths were accidents until the laird and his fellow climbers convince the police the two men were murdered—and promptly become the prime suspects since they alone had the expertise to pull off the crime.

Moffat got the idea for the plot from a conversation she overheard at Kyleakin Inn on Skye, overlooking Loch Alsh, where someone exclaimed, "The Killers is in!," showing a sharp grasp of ideas and their possibilities which the author also embued in her primary protagonist, Miss Melinda Pink. Miss Pink is politically incorrect, but at the same time feels herself drawn into cases of injustice and abuse, from trafficing in endangered species, to incest, to IRA terrorists. She's a middle-aged writer-magistrate-sleuth, a woman of  "imposing presence" who also possesses keen skills of observation and perceptions of human nature and life:

As she undressed she reflected that cannabis had similar effects to alcohol:  it was an intoxicant which prompted its dependents to unburden themselves. She wondered if the girl would regret her loquacity in the morning, but then there would be another cigarette to dull uneasy memories...She didn't think that it was a curious coincidence to find tragedy in a remote Highland inn; she was the kind of person people needed to talk to, and she knew only too well that horror was not a matter of place but of people.

Moffat is at her best with her descriptions of the solitary and atmospheric landscapes, as in this scene:

Westwards, she saw the bay that was called Calava demarcated by splendid headlands jutting into the pale and shining sea. The northern point was several hundred feet high, that to the south was dwarfed by another behind it which matched the neighbor across the bay. She stared in an enchantment that had nothing to do with climbing; she could admire a cliff for its lines unassociated with the quality of the rock. There were skerries and rocky islands, and in that brilliant but silent world the seascape had an air of unreality. It was like the coastline of Valhalla.

The author, now 92, currently lives in the Lake District of the UK and doesn't write as much these days. Her most recent novel was Gone Feral in 2007, although many others are out of print, including Miss Pink at the Edge of the World, last reprinted by the Black Dagger series in 1975.

Mystery Melange

CrimeFest 2017 announced the winners of its six award categories at the convention’s recent annual gala dinner. The Audible Sounds of Crime Award winner was Clare Mackintosh for I See You, read by Rachel Atkins; eDunnit Award winner was Laura Lippman for Wilde Lake; the H.R.F. Keating Award winner was Barry Forshaw for Brit Noir; the Last Laugh Award winner was Mick Herron for Real Tigers; the Best Crime Novel for Children (8 – 12)  winner was Robin Stevens for Murder Most Unladylike: Mistletoe and Murder; and the Best Crime Novel for Young Adults (12 – 16) winner was Simon Mason for Kid Got Shot.

Also revealed at CrimeFest was news that Sam Hepburn won the CWA Margery Allingham Short Story Competition with "Box Clever." Also shortlisted for this honor were Bruce Gaston ("The Case of the Unrepentant Killer"), Ryan Bruce ("Division"), Sam Cunningham ("The Silenced Witness"), and Chris Curran ("The Thought of You"). (HT to the Rap Sheet.)

The 2017 Petrona Award for the Best Scandinavian Crime Novel of the Year, announced this past Saturday, was won by Where Roses Never Die by Gunnar Staalesen tr. Don Bartlett (Orenda Books, Norway). The other finalists included The Exiled by Kati Hiekkapelto tr. David Hackston (Orenda Books; Finland); The Dying Detective by Leif G.W. Persson tr. Neil Smith (Doubleday; Sweden); The Bird Tribunal by Agnes Ravatn tr. Rosie Hedger (Orenda Books, Norway); Why Did You Lie? by Yrsa Sigurđardóttir tr. Victoria Cribb (Hodder & Stoughton, Iceland); and The Wednesday Club by Kjell Westö tr. Neil Smith (MacLehose Press, Finland).

The Crime Writers Association of the UK announced the longlists for its annual CWA Dagger Awards in various categories including the Gold Dagger for best crime novel, the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger, the International Dagger, Non-Fiction Dagger, Short Story Dagger, Debut Dagger, Endeavour Historical Dagger, and the John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger. Shortlists will come later, with the winners ultimately announced at a gala dinner in the fall. (HT Shots Magazine)

The shortlist for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year for 2016 include: Black Widow by Chris Brookmyre; After You Die by Eva Dolan; Lie With Me by Sabine Durrant; Real Tigers by Mick Herron; Out of Bounds by Val McDermid; and Missing, Presumed by Susie Steiner. The winner will be announced July 20 at the annual Harrogate Crime Festival.

Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance (MWPA) released its list of finalists for the 2017 Maine Literary Awards, including nods in the Crime Fiction category: Straw Man by Gerry Boyle; Solo Act by Richard J. Cass; and Led Astray by Kate Flora.

Mike Pettit's novel Key West Flashpoint was named the winner of the 2017 Mystery Writers Whodunit Award, to be presented at the 4th Annual Mystery Fest Key West, set for June 16-18 in Key West, Florida.

Crime Fiction/Mystery programming at Queens Book Festival will include Scott Adlerberg moderating an all-star panel of MWA-New York members to discuss the craft of mystery writing, with panelists including Hilary Davidson, Lyndsay Faye, Adam Sternbergh, Dave White, and Alex Segura. Later on, two Queens-based authors, Radha Vatsal and Alex Segura, will talk about their respective mystery series; and at 5 p.m., a Noir at the Bar caps off the day with a stellar lineup of readers, including Sarah Weinman, Jen Conley, Writer Thomas Pluck, Cathi Stoler Author, S.A. Solomon, SJ Rozan, Nick Kolakowski and Scott Adlerberg.

Atlas Obscura has a nice profile of Otto Penzler, the owner of the Mysterious Bookshop (founded 1979) as well as The Mysterious Press.

The Westminster Detective Library has been working to catalog and make available online all the short fiction dealing with detectives and detection published in the United States before 1891. With the help of undergraduate assistants, they've compiled 1,300 such stories from 800 to 10,000 words in length, as well as several poems about detectives. They've even come across detective stories written by Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain and Walter Whitman.

For fans of podcasts like Serial and shows like The Making of a Murderer, Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich compiled a listing of "The 10 Best True Crime Books" for Publishers Weekly.

The Spectator investigated Mike Ripley's new book on the world of the modern spy thriller where he describes how stiff Edwardian heroics soon gave way to the lurid antics of James Bond.

Speaking of James Bond, RIP Roger Moore, the suave actor who took on the role of the iconic spy in seven feature films.

Australia’s annual list of most borrowed books was revealed - and crime thrillers dominated.

One of the oldest and most enduring mysteries continues.

Another mystery: why do readers send authors their bad reviews?

If you've ever wondered how forensic artists do their thing, here are "15 secrets of forensic artists" to help enlighten you.

This week, the featured crime poem at the 5-2 is "Righteous Among the Nations" by Charles Rammelkamp.
 
In the Q&A roundup, the American Booksellers Association spoke with Anthony Horowitz, author of the ABA's #1 Indie Next List Pick for June, Magpie Murders; the Mystery People chatted with David Swinson about his Frank Marr trilogy; the MPs also sat down for a Q&A with Ausma Zehanat-Khan about the latest book in her series featuring a Canadian police duo; Kings River Life queried Dana Cameron about how one of her books, Site Unseen, is being turned into a movie on the Hallmark Movies and Mysteries Channel; Crime Fiction Lover welcomed Bill Beverly, whose debut novel Dodgers last year won the Gold Dagger at the CWA awards; and Steve Hamilton joined the Mystery People for a discussion of his latest Nick Mason thriller, the follow-up to The Second Life Of Nick Mason.

Media Murder for Monday

It's Monday, which means time once again for a roundup of the latest crime drama news:

MOVIES

Carnaby International has snapped up international sales rights to A Matter of Honor, an action-packed spy thriller based on Jeffrey Archer’s best-selling novel of the same title. Although the cast has yet to be announced, the project has signed on Emmy winner Jon Cassar (24, Forsaken, When the Bough Breaks) to direct and Keith Arnold (The November Man, Some Kind of Beautiful) to pen the screenplay. The story centers on a man who finds himself on the run pursued by Russia's FSB and the CIA after he collects the remnants of his father’s will that hold a secret dating back to the Cold War with more value today than he could have ever have imagined. 

Benedict Cumberbatch’s production company has acquired the feature film rights to Megan Hunter’s hotly anticipated debut novel, The End We Start From. The eco-thriller follows a mother and her newborn who are turned into refugees after London is submerged in flood waters, and they must search for safety in a country thrown into chaos.

Suicide Squad helmer David Ayer is in early negotiations to direct Universal’s Scarface, the new take on the gangster movie the studio has slated for an August 2018 release. (Antoine Fuqua had been in the mix to direct, but had to drop out for scheduling reasons.) Diego Luna is attached to star in the re-imagining of the core immigrant story told in both the 1983 film version directed by Brian De Palma, written by Oliver Stone, and starring Al Pacino. The new film will be set in Los Angeles, with a script by the Coen brothers.

Annapurna will co-produce Jacques Audiard’s The Sister Brothers, with John C. Reilly, Joaquin Phoenix, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Riz Ahmed attached to star in the thriller. The story is based on Patrick deWitt’s acclaimed novel of the same name and follows two brothers hired to kill a prospector who has stolen from their boss.

Fox Searchlight officially announced its acquisition of the David Lowery-directed Old Man And The Gun, the drama that stars Robert Redford and Casey Affleck. The film is based on the true story of Forrest Tucker (Robert Redford), from his audacious escape from San Quentin at the age of 70 to an unprecedented string of heists that confounded authorities and enchanted the public. Wrapped up in the pursuit are detective John Hunt (Casey Affleck), who becomes captivated with Forrest’s commitment to his craft, and a woman (Sissy Spacek), who loves him in spite of his chosen profession.

Ben Kingsley, Benno Furmann and Tuva Novotny are set to star in and Daniel Afredson to direct Death Of An Author, the first movie in a planned trilogy based on Swedish writer Hakan Nesser’s Intrigo thriller novels. The books, which have sold more than 20 million copies worldwide in 30 languages, are set in an undefined country somewhere in northern Europe and deal with the problems of escape, "with dark hidden secrets destined to surface – and with the concepts of guilt, revenge and atonement."

Angela Bassett has signed on to Paramount’s Mission: Impossible 6, playing the C.I.A. director. Production on the film starts this week with Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirky, and Alec Baldwin all joining Bassett in the Christopher McQuarrie-directed sequel.

Oscar-winning actress Sandra Bullock will star in Cash Truck, a film inspired by the 2004 French film Le Convoyeur, for Joel Silver’s Silver Pictures. The story centers on Alex (Bullock), an American who has fallen on hard times, who starts a job at a London armored car company that was the recent target of a deadly heist. She works her way into the confidence of the tight-knit crew and goes to dangerous and morally complicated lengths to pursue her own mysterious agenda.

Robocop star Joel Kinnaman and Oscar-nominated actors Rosamund Pike and Clive Owen are set to star in action thriller Three Seconds, directed by Andrea Di Stefano (Escobar: Paradise Lost).  The film stars Kinnaman as a reformed criminal and former special ops soldier working undercover for crooked FBI handlers to infiltrate the Polish mob’s drug trade in New York, who must return to prison to protect his identity as a mole and earn his freedom to return to his wife and daughter.

Nat Wolff has joined Sam Claflin in the crime thriller Semper Fi.  Claflin leads the cast as Hopper, and Wolff joins as his younger brother Oyster. Hopper is a straight-laced cop who fills his downtime as a Sergeant in the Marine Corps Reservists alongside a close-knit team of life-long friends. When Oyster accidentally kills a man and tries to flee town, Hopper stops him and forces him to face the music. After a stint in Iraq, Hopper battles his guilt and resolves to save his brother by breaking him out of prison, no matter what the cost.

Gary Shore (Dracula Untold) is set to direct thriller Red River, written by BAFTA and Oscar-nominated scribe Ronan Blaney. The story is set in an isolated town in Ireland, where a bloodthirsty drifter befriends an immigrant family and avenges their murdered family.

Zac Efron willl take on the role of Ted Bundy in a new film about the American serial killer. The drama, titled Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, will be told from the perspective of Elizabeth Kloepfer, Bundy’s longtime girlfriend who initially refused to believe the allegations but later reported him to the police. Bundy was executed in Florida in 1989 after confessing to the sexual assault and murder of more than 30 women.

In other films-based-on-true-crime news, two-time Oscar nominee Viggo Mortensen will star in the thriller Unabomb. The project centers on one of the largest manhunts in history as FBI agent Jim Freeman, played by Mortensen, takes on the unsolved case of the Unabomber, who terrorized Americans with 16 bombings over the course of two decades. Randy Brown adapted the screenplay from the book Unabomber by Jim Freeman, Terry Turchi, and Donald Max Noel.

Claire Foy, who stars as Queen Elizabeth on Netflix’s The Crown, is Sony’s choice to play hacker Lisbeth Salander in its adaptation of The Girl in the Spider's Web. Fede Alvarez is attached to direct the project, which is seen as a relaunch of the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo franchise.

Saban Films has picked up U.S. rights to Brian Smrz’s 24 Hours to Live starring Ethan Hawke and Chinese actress Xu Qing. Paul Anderson, Liam Cunningham and Rutger Hauer also star in the upcoming thriller, which will receive a theatrical release later this year. The story follows a career assassin who turns rogue after his latest mission goes awry.

Several commissioning editors at the London Book Fair have snapped up film rights to several thrillers. You can read more of the details via this link from The Bookseller.

A trailer was released for You Were Never Really Here, adapted from the Jonathan Ames novella, which stars Joaquin Phoenix as a war vet who devotes himself to saving women being exploited by sex traffickers. But things go very wrong when he tries to save a girl from a brothel in New York City.

TELEVISION

One of the shows left in limbo during last week's network upfronts was ABC's FBI drama series, Quantico. Since then, it was announced the show would indeed return with one major change: creator and executive producer Josh Safran will step down from his position as showrunner, and the episode count will be significantly shorter (13 vs. the usual 22).

The new BBC One drama, A Very English Scandal, which is based on the true story of the first British politician to stand trial for conspiracy and incitement to murder, has found its lead actor. Hugh Grant has been set to return to British television for the first time since the early ’90s as the disgraced center of the tale, MP Jeremy Thorpe. In 1979, Thorpe was tried, but acquitted, of conspiring to murder his ex-lover, Norman Scott. It nevertheless ended his political career.

Catherine Zeta-Jones' latest role will be for the Lifetime Network, starring as drug kingpin Griselda Blanco in the upcoming network movie Cocaine Godmother. The project will be directed by Academy Award winning-cinematographer Guillermo Navarro and is set to go into production this year with a premiere date in 2018.
 
Parks and Recreation alum Paul Schneider has signed on as a series regular opposite Hugh Laurie in the second season of Hulu’s drama series Chance. The psychological thriller based on Kem Nunn’s novel focuses on Dr. Eldon Chance (Laurie), a San Francisco-based forensic neuropsychiatrist who reluctantly gets sucked into a violent and dangerous world of mistaken identity, police corruption and mental illness. Schneider will play Ryan Winter, a tech multimillionaire who Detective Hynes (Brian Goodman) believes to be a serial killer.  

Jessica Meraz has been cast as a series regular and Lourdes Benedicto will recur in the upcoming sixth season of TNT’s hit drama series Major Crimes. Meraz will play Det. Camila Paige, who has made a name for herself inside Criminal Intelligence before her transfer to Missing Persons. Benedicto will recur as the mother of a missing fifteen-year-old son. The duo join an ensemble cast that includes Mary McDonnell, Tony Denison, Michael Paul Chan, Phillip P. Keene and Raymond Cruz.

BBC Two's upcoming futuristic detective thriller City and the City has cast Lara Pulver, known for her portrayal of Irene Adler in Sherlock, as the wife of Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad in the European city-state of Besźeland.

Investigation Discovery has given the green light to a 10-episode second season of original series Murder Chose Me for a 2018 premiere. The show features stories and case files from Rod Demery of Shreveport, LA, that reflect on his 14 years as a homicide detective.

In case you missed all the upfront news, here are the fall schedules for ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox. Some of the late network decisions include CBS deciding to cancel crime dramas Training Day and Ransom.

The networks are beginning to drop trailers for their new shows in the fall, including one for NBC's Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders.

A trailer was also released for TNT's psychological thriller The Alienist, based on the novel by Caleb Carr and starring Luke Evans. Taking place in 1896 New York, the series focuses on two men tasked by Teddy Roosevelt with solving grisly serial murders, who are aided by a police secretary along the way.

Netflix dropped a new clip for the Rainn Wilson-starring crime thriller Shimmer Lake, about a crime in a small town and a sheriff’s attempts to get to the bottom of what happened - told in reverse chronological order, so it starts three days after the crime, and slowly works its way backwards to two days after, one day after, to the actual day of the event.

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO

Dennis Lehane joined Boston Public Radio station WGBH to discuss racism and his new psychological thriller, Since We Fell.

Scott Turow was a guest on CBS This Morning, chatting about his latest legal thriller, Testimony.

Inside Thrill Radio featured "Three of Tomorrow’s Hot Authors Today" as host Jenny Milchman spoke with Walt Gragg, Christina Kovac, and Mark Leggatt.

The Writer Types podcast featured special guests Catriona McPherson, Tom Pitts, David Zeltserman, Eddie Muller, and Shaun Harris.

The Great Detectives blog continued its list of the Best American Radio Detective Performances with Part Four: Honorable Mentions.

Your Sunday Music Treat

Many of you have heard the instrument known as the theremin. You might not realize you've heard it, but if you've ever watched old sci-fi and horror movies, you've most definitely experienced it at least once in the film score. The theremin is an electronic musical instrument controlled without physical contact by the thereminist's hand movements and is named after its Russian inventor, Léon Theremin, who patented the device in 1928. Even if you were familiar with instrument, did you know someone wrote a concerto for it?  Here's the Concerto for Theremin by Anis Fuleihan, with soloist Clara Rockmore and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leopold Stokowski:

 

Quote of the Week

FFB: The FBI, A Centennial History

In this latest blog post for the Friday's "Forgotten" Books feature hosted by Patti Abbott I thought this particular offering would be topical, considering how the FBI has been so much in the news lately (and since the protagonist of my Scott Drayco series is a former FBI agent).

The FBI: A Centennial History, 1908-2008, is a "coffee table" book format published by the U.S. Department of Justice, so you can rightly suspect it won't include Bureau controversies, scandals or missteps. But it does trace the agency's evolution from a makeshift band of 34 investigators to a full-fledged national security and intelligence agency with 30,000 special agents (at least 59 of whom, along with one professional staff member, have been killed in the line of duty).

There are overviews of the gangster years, World War II, the Cold War, espionage and terrorism, and synopses and 300 photos (some not previously shown to the public) from over 40 of the Bureau's best-known cases. You can also print a PDF of the book, and then, I suppose, put your laser-paper copy on your coffee table. If you'd prefer the glossy version, order the updated 2015 version from the GPO office.