The Los Angeles Times Book Prizes announced this year's honorees, highlighted by the Robert Kirsch Award for lifetime achievement recipient, James Ellroy. The award is given to an author with a substantial connection to the American West whose contribution to American letters deserves special recognition. Ellroy is perhaps best known for his Los Angeles-based crime novels such as L.A. Confidential and The Black Dahlia. The finalists in the Mystery/Thriller category also include Rachel Howzell Hall, We Lie Here; Laurie R. King, Back to the Garden; Tracey Lien, All That’s Left Unsaid; Alex Segura, Secret Identity; and Peng Shepherd, The Cartographers.
CrichtonSun, the estate of Michael Crichton led by the author's widow, Sherri Crichton, has made a seven-figure deal with Blackstone Publishing to acquire the worldwide print, eBook and audiobook rights to Crichton’s first series of novels, which he wrote under the pseudonym John Lange. The books were penned long before Jurassic Park and include the unconnected Odds On (1966), Scratch One (1967), Easy Go (1968), Zero Cool (1969), The Venom Business (1969), Drug of Choice (1970), Grave Descend (1970) and Binary (1972). All the books are set in the late 1960s and 1970s and were Crichton's tribute to Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels and to one of his favorite Alfred Hitchcock films, To Catch a Thief. The subjects range from secret treasures to heists, archaeology, unlikely heroes, classic villains and seductive and at times treacherous lovers. Sherri Crichton said. “In these eight early adventure books, Michael was honing his skills and themes that would later make him one of the most successful authors of all time. It is such an honor and pleasure to see the John Lange books freshly and newly published by Blackstone, to reintroduce these books to fans and also present them to a whole new generation of readers.” The titles will also be shopped to studios and streamers for potential film/television adaptations.
Last week, the Theakston Old Peculier crime fiction conference announced its headliners, and this week, CrimeFest 2023 announced Mark Billingham and Elly Griffiths will be the Featured Guests at the CrimeFest conference, one of Europe’s biggest crime fiction conventions. CrimeFest, sponsored by Specsavers, will take place from May 11-14 at the Mercure Bristol Grand Hotel in the UK, with up to 150 total authors currently scheduled to take part in over 50 panels. Billingham worked as an actor and stand-up comedian before publishing his first crime novel Sleepyhead in 2001, and his novels have now sold over 6 million copies. He has had 21 Sunday Times bestsellers and two TV series have been made of his books, Thorne on Sky starring David Morrissey, and In the Dark by the BBC. Griffiths is best known for her Dr. Ruth Galloway series as well as The Brighton Mystery series, set in the 1950s and 1960s. Also returning is last year’s featured guest, Andrew Child, brother of Lee Child and co-writer of the iconic Jack Reacher series.
The Back Room, an online program of virtual author panels spearheaded by Karen Dionne and Hank Phillippi Ryan during the pandemic lockdowns, will continue with new presentations this spring including bestselling and debut authors. The new lineup begins March 5 at 7 PM ET with a panel on "Bestselling Suspense" with Lyn Liao Butler, Eli Cranor, Adele Parks, and Shelby Van Pelt. These free events begin with authors playing a quick "get to know you" game of 20 questions, followed by the authors’ book recommendations, and then attendees are divided into 4 breakout rooms with one author assigned to each room. Attendees remain in their breakout room for the rest of the program, while the authors rotate through each room in turn. You’ll get fifteen minutes with each author to chat about whatever you like, similar to a virtual cocktail party. For more information and to register, head on over to the official website.
New York Times bestselling author Kyle Mills, who first took over the late Vince Flynn’s iconic Mitch Rapp series in 2015 and has since contributed eight consecutive bestsellers, is set to depart the Mitch Rapp franchise following his ninth and final book in the series, Code Red, later this year. Taking over franchise duties will be Don Bentley, who has a background in both the army and FBI, and is best known in crime fiction for his own Matt Drake series and the work he’s done in Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan Jr. series. As Mills noted on his Twitter feed and website, Mills wants to devote time to a new project based on his 2003 book, Fade, featuring former Navy SEAL Salam al-Fayed.
I've written about Cain's Jawbone before, the 1934 puzzle book dreamed up by The Observer’s first cryptic crossword inventor, Edward Powys Mathers, which requires sleuths to place its out-of-order 100 pages in the right order to solve six murders depicted within. The puzzle has only been successfully solved four times, and the most recent solver, John Finnemore, is penning his own murder-mystery sequel. It's currently known as "Untitled Mystery," though people who pledge during the crowdfunding campaign will learn what the actual title of the book. Finnemore's version, according to The Guardian, is a locked-room mystery that challenges readers to rearrange one hundred picture postcards to explain why a person was found dead in a locked study of a complete stranger. For those readers who don't want to take the time to solve the original, an official Cain's Jawbone Handbook will come out in late 2024 or 2025 with step-by-step instructions for solving the puzzle.
What to do if you're an author who spent fourteen years writing a crime novel that finally got published with Thomas & Mercer—but only sold a handful of copies? Turns out, it helps if you have a daughter who is active on TikTok.
This week's crime poem at the 5-2 weekly is "Gather Together Who I Am" by Faye Turner-Johnson.
In the Q&A roundup, Thomas White, author of mystery/horror titles, chatted about his latest, The Siren’s Scream, on the Dark Phantom blog; and Author Interviews chatted with Peggy Rothschild about her new novel, Playing Dead.
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