In Reference to Murder

Media Murder for Monday

It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

Broken English Productions has hired Anthony Nardolillo to direct the heist feature, Shelter, marking their second collaboration after the crime drama, 7th & Union. Shelter centers on the head of a secret organization who assembles a crew to steal back artwork plundered during World War II from a modern day, Neo-Nazi billionaire oligarch. Filming is scheduled to begin this summer in Los Angeles.

After the news broke that Amazon was buying MGM - home of the James Bond franchise - fans were fearful the spy series would move to streaming only. But Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson (who co-own rights to the Bond properties) released a statement saying, "We are committed to continuing to make James Bond films for the worldwide theatrical audience."

A trailer was released for Gunpowder Milkshake which sees Karen Gillan (Dr. Who; Guardians of the Galaxy) and Lena Headey (Game of Thrones) as badass assassins.

TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES

BritBox is adapting ML Longworth’s crime novels into a limited series titled Murder In Provence and have attached Shelagh Stephenson, whose credits include Downton Abbey, to write the project. Roger Allam (Endeavour) stars as Antoine Verlaque, Investigating Judge in Aix-en Provence, with Nancy Carroll (The Crown) playing his romantic partner, Marine Bonnet. Together, they investigate the murders, mysteries, and dark underbelly of their idyllic home in the south of France. Their efforts are aided by Hélène (Keala Settle), a detective and Antoine’s trusted confidante.

In a preemptive bid, Aaron Kaplan’s Kapital Entertainment has landed the rights to I Don’t Forgive You, the upcoming debut novel of former police reporter, Aggie Blum Thompson. Billed as "a psychological thriller with a female lead," I Don’t Forgive You is about a photographer struggling to fit in among the Mom cliques in her new D.C. suburb when she is framed for a neighbor’s murder and must frantically try to uncover who is destroying her life by impersonating her on social media.

Sony Pictures Television-backed Eleventh Hour Films has optioned Jane Casey’s novel, The Killing Kind, and will adapt it into a limited series. Screenwriters Zara Hayes (Showtrial) and Jonathan Stewart (Meet You In Hell) have been attached to reimagine the book, with the former set to direct. The story centers on a barrister, Ingrid Lewis, who defends John Webster against stalking charges, only to have Webster turn on her. When a colleague is run down on a busy London road, Lewis is sure she was the intended victim, but Webster claims he is the only one who can protect her from the killer.

Parker Posey is set to star alongside Colin Firth, Toni Collette, Juliette Binoche, and Rosemarie DeWitt in The Staircase, HBO Max’s limited series drama adaptation based on the true-crime docuseries. The eight-episode series from Christine director Antonio Campos and American Crime Story writer Maggie Cohn explores the life of Michael Peterson (Firth), his sprawling North Carolina family, and the suspicious death of his wife, Kathleen (Collette). Posey will play Freda Black, assistant district attorney and prosecutor in the Peterson case.

Director Brandon Cronenberg will adapt author J.G. Ballard’s thriller novel, Super-Cannes, as a limited TV series. Super-Cannes is set in an ultra-modern high tech business park in the hills above the French Riviera city famed for its film festival, where a global elite has gathered to form a closed, uber-capitalist and high-tech community. But beneath the seemingly ideal workers' paradise, all is not well.

Tyner Rushing has booked a recurring guest star role alongside Chris Pratt in the upcoming thriller drama series, The Terminal List, for Amazon Prime Video. Tyner will play James Reece’s (Pratt) close friend Liz Riley, a former Army pilot, who is described as being "equal parts wit and warmth." The Terminal List follows James, a Navy SEAL, after his entire platoon is ambushed during a high-stakes covert mission. When James returns home, he experiences conflicting memories of the event and questions his own culpability. As new evidence comes to light, he realizes there are dark forces working against him, endangering himself and the people he loves. The series is based on the best-selling novel by Jack Carr, who serves as an executive producer alongside Pratt

Michiel Huisman (The Flight Attendant) has been tapped to star alongside Luke Evans in Apple’s action-thriller drama series, Echo 3, from Oscar winner Mark Boal (The Hurt Locker), Apple Studios, and Keshet Studios. Echo 3 is set in South America and follows Amber Chesborough, a brilliant young scientist, who is the emotional center of a small American family. When she goes missing along the Colombia-Venezuela border, her brother and her husband — two men with deep military experience and complicated pasts — struggle to find her in a layered, personal drama, set against the explosive backdrop of a secret war. Huisman will play Prince, a member of the "Echo 3" team and Amber’s husband

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO/AUDIO

A new Mysteryrat's Maze Podcast episode from Kings River Life magazine features the first chapter of The Big Dive, written by Bruce Most and read by actor Sean Hopper.

Speaking of Mysteries spoke with Ashley Weaver, author of the historical mystery, Peculiar Combination, which focuses on a professional safecracker and lockpicker who is asked to ply her trade for Britain’s war effort in WWII.

Meet the Thriller Author welcomed bestselling YA author, David Yoon, about his first adult thriller, Version Zero.

Queer Writers of Crime spoke with Barbara Wilson, author of a series featuring translator-sleuth Cassandra Reilly, which was made into a movie starring Judy Davis and Marcia Gay Hardin. She is a winner of two Lambda Literary awards and the British Crime Writers’ award for best thriller set in Europe.

Wrong Place, Write Crime chatted with Craig Faustus Buck about his career writing in television and his novels and short stories.

It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club featured Timothy Miller's The Strange Case of Eliza Doolittle, an entertaining escapade starring some of Victorian literature’s most beloved characters, from Sherlock Holmes to Dr. Jekyll.

The Red Hot Chili Writers interviewed The Thursday Murder Club author and Pointless star, Richard Osman, and also chatted with authors Rahul Raina (How to Kidnap the Rich) and Ajay Chowdhury (The Waiter).

THEATRE

You know things are opening back up and returning somewhat to normal when live theatre events are available once again. The Spoleto Festival USA’s opening weekend will see a staging of The Woman in Black at Festival Hall (formerly Memminger Auditorium). Stephen Mallatratt’s adaptation of the 1938 thriller novel by Susan Hill runs May 27 through June 13. With a nod to the pandemic, tickets for this performance are being sold in physically-distanced pods of two and four seats. All seats within a pod must be purchased at the same time in the same order, and face masks will be required for all ticket holders.

Likewise, the long-running Mousetrap by Agatha Christie has returned to London at the St. Martin's Theatre as the West End starts to welcome back live audiences. The world's longest-running show returns with two different casts and a host of U.K. stars (and social distancing for the audience).

Quote of the Week

FFB: An Air That Kills a/k/a The Soft Talkers

Margaret Millar (1915-1994) was married to Kenneth Millar, better known as crime fiction author Ross MacDonald, but despite having an Edgar Award and over 25 novels to her credit (with some critics saying she was the better writer of the two), she never gained the same popularity as her husband. My local public library only had one of her books in the stacks, but several MacDonalds. A likely reason for the neglect is that she didn't have a breakout series character like MacDonald's Lew Archer, writing mostly standalones.

The Millars made a good writing team, such as the times Margaret helped her husband with dialogue. "I did teach him to write better dialogue so that everybody didn't sound like him. In the first two books, all of the characters talked like Ken! I don't even know anybody who talks like Ken. And I told him he had to listen...And we went around to a lot of places: pawn shops, low bars...And he realized how different people talk." Apparently, Kenneth also once said that the best lines usually resulted from the many arguments the couple had. If you want to read a truly indepth article on the writing Millars and how they influenced each other's work, see if you can grab a copy of Mystery Readers Journal from Fall 2001 and read "Ross Macdonald and Margaret Millar: Partners in Crime" by Tom Nolan.

The Soft Talkers is the U.K. title for Margaret Millar's novel from 1957, originally released in the U.S. as An Air That Kills. It follows the seemingly perfect married couple, Harry and Thelma Bream. Harry's best friend Ron Galloway invites his pals to his lakeside hunting lodge for the weekend, but then fails to show up. The worried friends call Galloway's house and speak to his wife, Esther, to find out what's keeping him, but the wife tells them Galloway left a long time ago. Then Thelma drops the bombshell on friend-caught-in the-middle Ralph Turee that she is pregnant with Ron's child. The investigation grows cold, and it isn't until much time has passed, when Ron is found dead buckled into his submerged convertible, that the even colder, twisted truth comes to light.

Millar's attention to dialogue is evident, part of the meticulous detail she gives to building her characters. Although she admittedly wasn't a fan of action-driven plots, her meticulous weaving of plot, clues and misdirection are all in fine form here, as is her zingy prose, examples of which you can find on nearly every page, like these:

He had a sensation that he and Harry were stationary and the night was moving past them swiftly, turbulent with secrets. To the right the bay was visible in the reflection of a half moon. The waves nudged each other and winked slyly and whispered new secrets.

Thelma, the day-dreamer, who fed her mediocrity with meaty chunks of dreams until it was fat beyond her own recognition. Under this system of mental dietetics Thelma became a woman equpped with great psychic powers...

It was merely the skeleton of the truth. Only an expert could add the flesh and blood and muscle and all the vital organs that would make it a whole, borrowing a little here, a little there...

Although it's a shame Millar isn't as well known as MacDonald, it's nice to see that a couple of her novels have been reissued recently (by Stark House Press, Soho Syndicate, et al). Maybe new readers can discover why Anthony Boucher said of her writing, "Devilishly devious trick-plotting given substance by acute and terrifying psychological insight."

Criminally Good Canadians

Crime Writers of Canada (CWC) have announced the winners of the 2021 Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence in Canadian Crime Writing. Formerly known as the Arthur Ellis Awards, the Awards launched in 1984 and recognize the best in mystery, crime, and suspense fiction, and crime nonfiction by Canadian authors. Here are the honorees:

Best Crime Novel sponsored by Rakuten Kobo, with a $1000 prize

Winner: Will Ferguson, The Finder, Simon & Schuster Canada

Also nominated:

• Marjorie Celona, How a Woman Becomes a Lake, Hamish Hamilton Canada; Penguin Canada
• Cecilia Ekbäck, The Historians, HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
• Thomas King, Obsidian, HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
• Roz Nay, Hurry Home, Simon & Schuster Canada

Best Crime First Novel sponsored by Writers First, with a $500 prize

Winner: Guglielmo D’Izza, The Transaction, Guernica Editions

Also nominated:

• Raye Anderson, And We Shall Have Snow, Signature Editions
• Chris Patrick Carolan, The Nightshade Cabal, Parliament House Press
• Russell Fralich, True Patriots, Dundurn Press
• Emily Hepditch, The Woman in the Attic, Flanker Press

The Howard Engel Award for Best Crime Novel Set in Canada sponsored by The Engel Family with a $500 prize

Winner: Katrina Onstad, Stay Where I Can See You, HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

Also nominated:

• Randall Denley, Payback, Ottawa Press and Publishing
• Helen Humphreys, Rabbit Foot Bill, HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
• Ann Lambert, The Dogs of Winter, Second Story Press
• Kevin Major, Two for The Tablelands, Breakwater Books

Best Crime Novella sponsored by Mystery Weekly with a $200 prize

Winner:  Sam Wiebe, Never Going Back, Orca Book Publishers

Also nominated:

• C.C. Benison, The Unpleasantness at the Battle of Thornford, At Bay Press
• Vicki Delany, Coral Reef Views, Orca Book Publishers
• Winona Kent, Salty Dog Blues, Sisters in Crime - Canada West

Best Crime Short Story sponsored by Mystery Weekly with a $300 prize

Winner:  Marcelle Dubé, Cold Wave, Sisters in Crime - Canada West

Also nominated:

• Twist Phelan, Used to Be, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine
• Zandra Renwick, Killer Biznez, Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine
• Sylvia Maultash Warsh, Days Without Name, Carrick Publishing
• Sarah Weinman, Limited Liability, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine

Best French Crime Book (Fiction and Nonfiction)

Winner: Roxanne Bouchard, La mariée de corail, Libre Expression

Also nominated:

• Stéphanie Gauthier, Inacceptable, Éditions Québec Amérique
• Christian Giguère, Le printemps des traîtres, Héliotrope NOIR
• Guy Lalancette, Les cachettes, VLB éditeur
• Jean Lemieux, Les Demoiselles de Havre-Aubert, Éditions Québec Amérique

Best Juvenile or YA Crime Book (Fiction and Nonfiction) sponsored by Shaftesbury with a $500 prize

Winner: Frances Greenslade, Red Fox Road, Puffin Canada, an imprint of Penguin Random House

Also nominated:

• Janet Hill, Lucy Crisp and the Vanishing House, Tundra Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House
• Sheena Kamal, Fight Like a Girl, Penguin Teen, an imprint of Penguin Random House
• Kelly Powell, Magic Dark and Strange, Margaret K. McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster Inc.
• Tom Ryan, I Hope You're Listening, Albert Whitman & Co.

The Brass Knuckles Award for Best Nonfiction Crime Book sponsored by Simpson & Wellenreiter LLP, Hamilton, with a $300 prize

Winner: Justin Ling, Missing From the Village: The Story of Serial Killer Bruce McArthur, the Search for Justice, and the System That Failed Toronto's Queer Community, McClelland & Stewart

Also nominated:

• Jeff Blackstock, Murder in the Family: How the Search For My Mother's Killer Led to My Father, Viking Press
• Norm Boucher, Horseplay: My Time Undercover on the Granville Strip, NeWest Press
• Silver Donald Cameron, Blood in the Water: A True Story of Revenge in the Maritimes, Viking Press
• Michael Nest with Deanna Reder and Eric Bell, Cold Case North: The Search for James Brady and Absolom Halkett, University of Regina Press

The Award for Best Unpublished Manuscript sponsored by ECW Press with a $500 prize

Winner:  The Future by Raymond Bazowski

Also nominated:

• Predator and Prey by Dianne Scott
• Notes on Killing your Wife by Mark Thomas
• A Nice Place to Die by Joyce Woollcott
• Cat with a Bone by Susan Jane Wright

Mystery Melange

The Margery Allingham Short Story Mystery Competition shortlist has been announced. The mission of the annual contest is to find the best unpublished short mystery – one that fits into legendary crime writer Margery’s definition of what makes a great story. The finalists include Antony M Brown for "For Laura Hope"; Chris Curran for "All the Little Boxes"; Camilla Macpherson for "Heartbridge Homicides"; and Hazell Ward for "As Dead as Dodo." The winner will be announced on July 1.

Book Industry Charitable Foundation (Binc) has been stepping up its game to help provide a lifeline to indie booksellers during the pandemic. The Unlikely Bookstore is sponsoring an online auction to help raise funds for Binc so they can continue to help more indies. Some of the fun items include an autographed basketball and book by John Grisham; a chance to have a character named after you in an upcoming novel by Hank Phillippi Ryan or book club Zoom call with Ryan; a signed copy of Lisa Unger's Confessions on the 7:45; some thriller book bundles, and much more.

The Nick Linn Lecture Series in Collier County, Florida, announced it will return to its luncheon-and-lecture format at The Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort in North Naples, as well as also offering virtual access. The upcoming featured lecturers include Brad Taylor, a retired Special Forces lieutenant colonel and author of American Traitor and End of Days, on Monday, February 28, 2022; and also Scott Turow, the master of legal thrillers from Presumed Innocent to The Last Trial, on Monday, March 21, 2022.

The Guardian is sponsoring an online masterclass for aspiring crime writers to help take you from idea to publishing deal. Novelist and screenwriter, Claire McGowan, will offer actionable and practical advice for creating a compelling, page-turning and marketable crime novel from start to finish. Sign up here for the workshop, which takes place July 17-18.

Crime fiction author Harlan Coben is apparently taking over Netflix. Fourteen of Coben’s best-sellers will soon be on the streamer, including several adaptations of his books already on Netflix, such as Safe, starring Michael C. Hall, The Stranger, starring Richard Armitage and Spanish-language series, The Innocent. Unfortunately for Myron Bolitar fans, no projects based on the author's series books featuring the sports agent detective are part of the Netflix deal.

Years before becoming one of America’s most celebrated authors, John Steinbeck wrote at least three novels which were never published. Two of them were destroyed by the young writer as he struggled to make his name, but a third – a full-length mystery werewolf story entitled Murder at Full Moon – has survived unseen in an archive ever since being rejected for publication in 1930. Although Steinbeck’s literary agents, McIntosh & Otis are still stating they will not be releasing the book, there are growing cries for the author's estate to relent and allow the book to be published. One of those is Professor Gavin Jones, a specialist in American literature at Stanford University, who writes about the work in his own upcoming nonfiction book, Reclaiming John Steinbeck: Writing for the Future of Humanity.

The New York Times took at look at the first mentions of famous authors in the newspaper through the years. Included among those is Agatha Christie, first mentioned in the gossipy Books and Authors column from Aug. 8, 1920, in which the Book Review reported, "An interesting story is told about how ‘The Mysterious Affair at Styles’ by Agatha Christie, a detective novel announced for Fall publication by the John Lane company, came to be written. The author had never before attempted to write a book, but made a wager that she could write a detective story in which the reader would not be able to pick out the murderer, although having knowledge of the same clues as the detective. She was at least successful enough to have her work chosen by The London Times as a serial for its weekly edition.”

Some new research shows that with clever science, a single fingerprint left at a crime scene can be used to determine whether someone has touched or ingested class-A drugs.

Speaking of drug offenders, maybe all the police need is a good hand selfie.

This week's crime poem at the 5-2 is "Joan of Arc (Or the Law of Unintended Consequences)" by Tony Dawson

In the Q&A roundup, Murder & Mayhem spoke with British crime writer, Zoë Sharp, about her Charlie Fox series; Writers Who Kill's E.B. Davis interviewed author Debra H. Goldstein about her cozy mystery, Four Cuts Too Many; and Author Interviews chatted with David Gordon, whose first novel, The Serialist, was a finalist for an Edgar Award and made into a major motion picture in Japan.

Media Murder for Monday

It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

Twilight franchise actor, Peter Facinelli, has signed on to direct his third feature film with the crime thriller, Headhunter. The story follows a twisted murder who sends three detectives on a whirlwind investigation revealing dark secrets and turning everyone into a possible suspect. Rich Ronat (Grand Isle) penned the script.

Fresh off his Oscar nomination for his performance as Sam Cooke in One Night in Miami, Leslie Odom Jr. has joined the growing ensemble of Knives Out 2. Daniel Craig returns to star as super sleuth, Benoit Blanc, with Kathryn Hahn, Dave Bautista, Janelle Monae, and Edward Norton also recently joining the cast. It was also announced just a few days ago that Kate Hudson will be involved with the project, although the plot and therefore all of the various actor roles are still under wraps.

Mel Gibson and Elisha Cuthbert are joining Josh Duhamel in the heist thriller, Bandit. The project is based on author Robert Knuckle’s novel and journalist Ed Arnold’s interviews with Gilbert Galvan Jr., who went by the name Robert Whiteman. Whiteman (to be played by Duhamel) was dubbed the Flying Bandit for successfully pulling off over sixty bank and jewelry heists during a notorious crime spree after he became involved with a lifetime gangster (played by Gibson).

TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES

Synchronicity Films is following up its BBC drama, The Cry, with another Helen Fitzgerald television adaptation, this time based on her 2009 novel, Bloody Women. The production company has signed up Lorna Martin, the co-creator of Women on the Verge alongside Sharon Horgan, to adapt the novel into an eight-part, darkly comedic thriller. Bloody Women tells the story of 33-year-old Cat Marsden, who decides to lay her past to rest before settling down to a new life in Italy with her fiancé. She decides to meet up with her previous partners, but on the morning of her wedding, Cat is arrested for murder - not just one murder, but three, with all of the victims ex-boyfriends who were viciously mutilated. Now she’s in jail, and the woman who is writing her biography has interviewed many people in Cat’s life—but no one is telling the truth

Netflix has given an eight-episode series order to an untitled global spy adventure starring and executive produced by Arnold Schwarzenegger in his first major foray into scripted television. In the series, created by Nick Santora (Jack Reacher; The Fugitive), a father (Schwarzenegger) and daughter (Monica Barbaro) learn that they’ve each secretly been working as CIA Operatives for years and realize their entire relationship has been a lie. Forced to team up as partners, the series "tackles universal family dynamics set against a global backdrop of spies, fantastic action, and humor."

ITV is adapting Graham Norton’s novel, Holding, for television. The four-part series will star Conleth Hill (Game of Thrones; Dublin Murders; Vienna Blood) who will take the leading role of local police officer, Sergeant PJ Collins, a gentle mountain of a man, who hides from people and fills his days with comfort food and half-hearted police work. When the body of long-lost local legend Tommy Burke is discovered, PJ is called to solve a serious crime for the first time in his career and has to connect with the village he has tried hard to avoid.

Kathleen Turner has been tapped for a lead role opposite Woody Harrelson, Justin Theroux, and Domhnall Gleeson in The White House Plumbers, HBO’s five-part limited series that revisits one of the biggest political scandals in American history, Watergate. Turner will play Dita Beard, a crusty, foul-mouthed lobbyist for the ITT corporation involved in some dirty deals with the Nixon Administration.

Alison Sweeney and Cameron Mathison are back in a new Hallmark mystery titled Murder, She Baked. The stars are reprising their characters from the popular Hallmark Movies & Mysteries franchise based on the Hannah Swensen mystery novels by Joanne Fluke. Sweeney will again play Hannah Swensen, with Mathison returning as Mike Kingston and Barbara Niven as Hannah's mother, Delores Swensen. Production begins this week in Vancouver on the movie, which will premiere this summer on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries.

Jon Bernthal, Josh Charles, and Jamie Hector have been tapped as the leads of HBO’s We Own This City limited series from The Wire’s EP David Simon and producer George Pelecanos. Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men) is set to direct and executive produce the series, based on Baltimore Sun reporter Justin Fenton’s book, We Own This City: A True Story of Crime, Cops and Corruption. The project chronicles the rise and fall of the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force — and the corruption and moral collapse that befell an American city in which the policies of drug prohibition and mass arrest were championed at the expense of actual police work.

Bruce McGill (Rizzoli & Isles), Maria Sten (Swamp Thing), and Hugh Thompson (Chapelwaite) have been tapped as series regulars opposite Alan Ritchson in the upcoming Amazon original series, Reacher, based on the Jack Reacher character from Lee Child’s international bestselling books. The first season, written and exec produced by Nick Santora (who also serves as showrunner), is based on the first Reacher novel, The Killing Floor, set in Georgia.

Juliette Binoche is set to star alongside Toni Collette, Colin Firth, and Rosemarie DeWitt in The Staircase, HBO Max’s drama adaptation based on the French true-crime documentary series. The eight-episode project from Antonio Campos and American Crime Story writer, Maggie Cohn, explores the life of Michael Peterson (Firth), his sprawling North Carolina family, and the suspicious death of his wife, Kathleen (Collette).

Alexa Mansour has joined the cast of Apple TV+’s Home Before Dark. Set to return on Friday, June 11, season two of the mystery drama follows reporter, Hilde Lisko (Brooklynn Prince), as she seeks to learn more about a mysterious explosion that hits a local farm. The investigation leads her to fight a powerful and influential corporation, jeopardizing the health of her family and Erie Harbor. Inspired by real-life young investigative journalist Hilde Lysiak, Home Before Dark also stars Abby Miller, Kylie Rogers, Aziza Scott, Michael Weston, Joelle Carter, Jibrail Nantambu, Deric McCabe, and Rio Mangini.

Betty Gabriel (Get Out) has been tapped for a regular role in the upcoming third season of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, starring John Krasinski. Gabriel, who will play Elizabeth Wright, the Chief of Station, replaces Marianne Jean-Baptiste, who was originally hired for the part last fall but exited the series over creative differences. Season 3 of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan finds the iconic spy (Krasinski) on the run and in a race against time when Jack is wrongly implicated in a larger conspiracy and suddenly finds himself a fugitive out in the cold.

The NBCUniversal streaming service, Peacock, has released a trailer for Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. The project (formerly known as Dan Brown's Langdon) follows the early adventures of famed Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon (Ashley Zukerman), who must solve a series of deadly puzzles to save his kidnapped mentor and thwart a chilling global conspiracy. The cast also includes Valorie Curry, Sumalee Montano, Rick Gonzalez, Eddie Izzard, and Beau Knapp.

The BBC released a first-look image for the Martin Freeman drama, The Responder. Freeman stars as Chris, a crisis-stricken, morally compromised, unconventional urgent response officer tackling a series of night shifts on the beat in Liverpool.

Also, CBS released trailers for its new series including NCIS: Hawai'i, FBI: International, and CSI: Vegas.

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO/AUDIO

Ellen Byron joined Eric Beetner as co-host of Writer Types to talk cozy mysteries and help introduce legendary thriller writer, Linwood Barclay (Find You First), and debut author, Mia Manansala (Arsenic and Adobo). Eric and Ellen were also joined by Jennifer J Chow and Olivia Matthews to discuss the origins of the cozy mystery as we know it today.

Queer Writers of Crime spoke with Alan R. Warren, author of several true crime books and host of the radio show, House of Mystery, now is in its tenth year on NBC in Los Angeles and other stations around the country.

Read or Dead took a look at reads set in the wilderness, particularly national parks.

Suspense Radio welcomed Cate Holahan, formerly an award-winning journalist and lead singer of Leaving Kinzley, an original rock band in NYC, turned bestselling author of domestic suspense novels. Holahan's fifth book, Her Three Lives, was just published in April.

Meet the Thriller Author spoke with Jeffery Deaver, bestselling author and creator of the Lincoln Rhyme series, about The Final Twist, the latest Colter Shaw novel which was published on May 11th.

Wrong Place, Write Crime chatted with Elizabeth Splaine about her various books, including Devil's Grace and the forthcoming, Swan Song.

The latest episode of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine podcast featured James Tipton reading from his series featuring Dr. John Watson, the story "The Beast of Easedale Tarn."

Crime Time FM sat down with Tim Glister to discuss his new novel, Red Corona, and the eight books that set him on the path to becoming a spy writer.

Quote of the Week

FFB: Murder at the Foul Line

In honor of the NBA finals starting on May 22, 2021, I thought it would be appropriate to choose a little basketball-themed murder for this week's FFB feature. In 2006, Otto Penzler released the anthology Murder at the Foul Line, with stories contributed by a Who's Who of crime fiction: Lawrence Block, Jeffery Deaver, Sue DeNymme, Brendan DuBois, Parnell Hall, Laurie R. King, Mike Lupica, Michael Malone, Joan H. Parker and Robert B. Parker, George Pelecanos, R. D. Rosen, S. J. Rozan, Justin Scott and Stephen Solomita.

Michael Malone's winningly deadpan "White Trash Noir," about domestic violence from a former NCAA star that seemingly drives his wife to murder, was nominated for the 2007 Edgar Award for best short story, but had to be withdrawn because it had been previously published in a collection by the author. There are other winners, though: Lawrence Block's hitman character Keller takes in a Pacers game in "Keller's Double Dribble," but the assignment doesn't go as planned and we get glimpses into Keller's past; "String Music" by George Pelecanos focuses on a streetwise D.C. kid trying to escape his troubled life by playing pickup basketball; Laurie R. King's "Cat's Paw" features the coach of a girl's junior high basketball team who is haunted by repressed memories and whose life is shaken up after she runs over a cat; and Jeffery Deaver's "Nothing But Net" is filled with Deaver's trademark twists and turns, featuring con men trying to swindle a naive NBA player.

Penzler would probably argue there's plenty more fodder for murderous takes on professional basketball. As he notes in his Introduction, "Perhaps the biggest difference in the game is the level of criminal activity. One of the big crime stories of the 1950s was when some Manhattan College, CCNY, and Long Island University players conspired to fix games so that certain gamblers could make a killing. The scandal rocked the sport for years, and those teams, then national powers, never recovered. Today, of course, that would be looked upon as kid stuff. Now we're really talking. Stars are commonly arrested for drug abuse, drunk driving, wife (and girlfriend) battering, barroom brawling, rape, and so many other acts of violence and criminality that it is difficult to keep track."

Murder at the Foul Line is the fifth installment in Penzler's sports mystery anthology series, so if you're not a fan of basketball, instead try Murderer's Row (baseball), Murder on the Ropes (boxing), Murder is My Racquet (tennis) and Sudden Death (football). I should point out that these books were published by the defunct New Millennium publishing arm, and that Penzler (and author David Baldacci) successfully sued the company claiming breach of contract. It's an unfortunate conclusion to what was originally an intriguing collaboration, but that doesn't change the fact the stories still stand on their own, with many sparkling three-pointers among them.

Mystery Melange

The British Book Awards announced the winners of this year's contest last week. Top honors in the Crime & Thriller category went to Robert Galbraith (a/k/a JK Rowling) for Troubled Blood. The other finalists included: The Sentinel by Lee Child and Andrew Child; The Patient Man by Joy Ellis; The Guest List by Lucy Foley; The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman; and A Song for the Dark Times by Ian Rankin.

The International Crime Fiction Research Group posted an overview of crime fiction in Argentina, noting that Argentinian fiction has been characterized as peripheral in the global domain even though this country presents a vigorous and complex tradition in the genre."

Rachel Mills Literary Agency and adult education centre Morley College are launching the BME Unpublished Fiction Prize, a contest for aspiring writers from Black and minority ethnic backgrounds seeking to break into publishing. The annual prize will award £500 to a previously unpublished author, and is intended to nurture and provide opportunities for aspiring novelists, promote diverse fiction across the broader literary landscape of Britain, and support Morley College’s ambitions to build an annual festival celebrating diversity in Britain. Applicants should submit a manuscript of the first 30 to 50 pages of an original novel, as well as a three-page maximum outline of the whole plot of the novel. Applications close on August 22.

A literary auction raising money to help vaccinate the world against coronavirus offer opportunities for book lovers to win signed novels by authors including Hilary Mantel and Robert Galbraith, as well as mentoring sessions from star publishers and agents. Bidding at Books for Vaccines runs until May 21. Since the auction is UK based, physical prizes can only be shipped to UK addresses, but the digital prizes such as Zoom calls, mentoring, and online critiques are open internationally. All money raised is going to Care International, a charity working to tackle vaccine inequality in poorer nations. (HT to The Guardian)

The American University in Dubai is hosting a Zoom conversation with Jasper Fforde (creator of Thursday Next), Leigh Perry (creator of Sid the Skeleton) and award-winning short story writer and editor, Josh Pachter, this Sunday, May 23, at 11 AM Eastern time. Registration is required but free, and you can sign up via this link.

One last final John le Carré novel, Silverview, is set to be published in October. Finished before his death in December, le Carré gave his blessing to publish the novel, which follows a bookseller who becomes embroiled in a spy leak. "The book is fraught, forensic, lyrical, and fierce, at long last searching the soul of the modern Secret Intelligence Service itself. It’s a superb and fitting final novel," said his youngest son Nick Cornwell, a novelist who writes under the pen name of Nick Harkaway. "This is the authentic le Carré, telling one more story."

Since my late mother was a librarian, I'm rather pleased to see Janet Rudolph's list of Library/Librarian Mysteries over at the Mystery Fanfare blog.

Nick Pirog, bestselling author of the Thomas Prescott series, the 3:00 a.m. series, and The Speed of Souls, applied the Page 69 Test to his new thriller, Jungle Up.

Art thieves have a new reason to look over their shoulder. Interpol’s new ID-Art app allows amateur sleuths, collectors, and dealers to access the international organization’s database of 52,000 stolen artworks. This official catalogue runs the gamut from looted antiquities to the subjects of well-known heists, such as Vincent van Gogh’s The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring (1884), which was stolen from a Netherlands museum during Covid-19 lockdown.

I didn't know that book nook shelf inserts were a thing, but apparently they are; and some of them are actually pretty clever.

This sounds like it came right out of a crime caper novel: A man suspected of burglarizing a Milwaukee bakery has been arrested after the owners of the establishment cooked up a scheme to identify the thief by printing his image on their sugar cookies.

This week's crime poem at the 5-2 is "Food Shopping in a Time of Pandemic" by Robert Cooperman.

In the Q&A roundup, Megan Abbott chatted with CrimeReads about her writing process, making "weird" choices, and her Diet Coke habit; and Author Interviews spoke with Linda L. Richards about her new novel, Endings, which follows a woman who reinvents herself as a killer for hire.

Dagger Delights

The Crime Writers Association (CWA) Dagger Awards, the premier literary crime-writing awards in the United Kingdom, announced this year's shortlists. There are four Daggers which are not nominated by publishers: the Debut Dagger for unpublished works; the Dagger in the Library, nominated by librarians; the Publishers’ Dagger, nominated by an industry committee; and the Diamond Dagger for a lifetime contribution to crime writing, nominated by CWA members. Winners in all categories will be announced in a virtual live ceremony on Thursday, July 1. Here are the finalists:

CWA GOLD DAGGER

• S A Cosby: Blacktop Wasteland (Headline, Headline Publishing Group)
• Ben Creed: City of Ghosts (Welbeck Fiction, Welbeck Publishing Group)
• Nicci French: House of Correction (Simon & Schuster)
• Robert Galbraith: Troubled Blood (Sphere, Little, Brown Book Group)
• Elly Griffiths: The Postscript Murders (Quercus)
• Thomas Mullen: Midnight Atlanta (Little, Brown, Little, Brown Book Group)
• Chris Whitaker: We Begin at the End (Zaffre, Bonnier)

CWA IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER

• Robert Galbraith: Troubled Blood (Sphere, Little, Brown Book Group)
• Michael Robotham: When She Was Good (Sphere, Little, Brown Book Group)
• Catherine Ryan Howard: The Nothing Man (Atlantic Books)
• Stuart Turton: The Devil and the Dark Water (Raven Books, Bloomsbury Publishing)
• Ruth Ware: One by One (Vintage, Harvill Secker)
• Chris Whitaker: We Begin at the End (Zaffre, Bonnier Books UK)

CWA JOHN CREASEY (NEW BLOOD) DAGGER

• Eva Björg Ægisdóttir: The Creak on the Stairs (Orenda), Translator: Victoria Cribb
• Ben Creed: City of Ghosts (Welbeck Publishing)
• Egan Hughes: The One That Got Away (Sphere, Little, Brown Book Group)
• S W Kane: The Bone Jar (Thomas & Mercer, Amazon Publishing)
• Stephen Spotswood: Fortune Favours the Dead (Wildfire, Headline)
• John Vercher: Three-Fifths (Pushkin Press)

CWA SAPERE BOOKS HISTORICAL DAGGER

• John Banville: Snow (Faber)
• Vaseem Khan: Midnight at Malabar House (Hodder & Stoughton)
• Chris Lloyd: The Unwanted Dead (Orion Fiction, The Orion Publishing Group)
• Michael Russell: The City Under Siege (Constable, Little, Brown Book Group)
• David Stafford: Skelton’s Guide to Domestic Poisons (Allison & Busby)
• Ovidia Yu: The Mimosa Tree Mystery (Constable, Little, Brown Book Group)

CWA ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION

• Sue Black: Written in Bone (Doubleday, Penguin)
• Becky Cooper: We Keep the Dead Close (William Heinemann, Penguin)
• Andrew Harding: These Are Not Gentle People (MacLehose Press, Quercus)
• Debora Harding: Dancing with the Octopus (Profile Books Limited)
• Nick Hayes: The Book of Trespass (Bloomsbury Circus, Bloomsbury Publishing)
• Ben MacIntyre: Agent Sonya (Viking, Penguin)

CWA CRIME FICTION IN TRANSLATION DAGGER

• Fredrik Backman: Anxious People, translated by Neil Smith (Michael Joseph, Penguin)
• Roxanne Bouchard: The Coral Bride, translated by David Warriner (Orenda Books)
• Yun Ko-eun: The Disaster Tourist, translated by Lizzie Buehler (Serpent's Tail)
• D A Mishani: Three, translated by Jessica Cohen (Riverrun, Hachette Book Group)
• Mikael Niemi: To Cook a Bear, translated by Deborah Bragan-Turner (MacLehose Press, Quercus)
• Agnes Ravatn: The Seven Doors, translated by Rosie Hedger (Orenda Books)

CWA SHORT STORY DAGGER

• Robert Scragg: ‘A Dog Is for Life, Not Just for Christmas’ in Afraid of the Christmas Lights, edited by Miranda Jewess (Criminal Minds Group)
• Elle Croft: ‘Deathbed’ in Afraid of the Light, edited by Robert Scragg & Various (Criminal Minds Group)
• Dominic Nolan: ‘Daddy Dearest’ in Afraid of the Light, edited by Robert Scragg & Various (Criminal Minds Group)
• Victoria Selman: ‘Hunted’ in Afraid of the Christmas Lights, edited by Miranda Jewess (Criminal Minds Group)
• Clare Mackintosh: ‘Monsters’ in First Edition: Celebrating 21 Years of Goldsboro Books (The Dome Press)
• James Delargy: ‘Planting Nan’ in Afraid of the Light, edited by Robert Scragg & Various (Criminal Minds Group)

CWA PUBLISHERS DAGGER

• Faber & Faber
• Head of Zeus
• Michael Joseph
• No Exit Press
• Raven 
• Viper

CWA DEBUT DAGGER

• Ashley Harrison – The Looking Glass Spy
• Fiona McPhillips – Underwater
• Biba Pearce – Rough Justice
• Hannah Redding – Deception
• Edward Regenye – Lightfoot
• Jennifer Wilson O’Raghallaigh – Mandatory Reporting

CWA DAGGER IN THE LIBRARY

• C L Taylor
• Peter May
• Lisa Jewell
• James Oswald
• Denise Mina
• LJ Ross