Estocada by Graham Hurley
Michael Carlson
It’s 1937 and Dieter Merz is the ace of the Condor Legion, flying the new Messerschmidt 109 against Russian planes in the Spanish Civil War, called Der Kleine, the Little One. Toward the end of that year, Tom Moncrieff, an ex-Marine fluent in German, and trying to make his father’s estate in the Highlands into a shooting resort, is recruited by a shadowy part of British intelligence, to gather information about the Germans and their plans regarding the Sudetenland.
To Die in Vienna: Kevin Wignall talks to Crime Time
I’ve wanted to set a full-length novel in Vienna for a long time but couldn’t find a way of doing it that avoided the pitfalls of using such an iconic location. Most notably, how do you write about Vienna and avoid the long cinematic shadows cast by Carol Reed’s “The Third Man”, written by the great master of shady locations, Graham Greene?
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It’s a Noir World: Woody Haut in Retreats from Oblivion
Was it always like this? The feeling that nothing is real. Not just ersatz, but a fake of a fake, a photograph of a photograph of the world falling apart. That food you’re eating, it’s probably genetically modified. The building you’re living in, most likely made from cheap, probably flammable, materials.
The Killing Habit by Mark Billingham & The Old Religion by Martyn Waites
Barry Forshaw in The Financial Times
Those who consider Mark Billingham to be one of the most reliable practitioners of the modern British crime novel point to some added value: he has been building up through his books an all-embracing picture of modern British society. This latest novel utilises real-life crime – the still at-large ‘Croydon Cat Killer’, responsible for the death of hundreds of animals
Loner: Hildur Sif Thorarensen talks to Crime Time
Book number two of my Oslo Mystery series is perhaps a bit different from the first book, Loner, which deals mainly with murder and the surrounding circumstances. In the second one I explore sex work in Oslo and the people involved in the industry.
Oliver Twist & The Mystery of Throate Manor: David Stuart Davies talks to Crime Time
About ten years ago I was asked to contribute a story to a collection of Dickensian whodunits. The idea was for a series of mystery stories featuring characters from the novels of Charles Dickens. I chose Oliver Twist and Jack Dawkins aka the Artful Dodger.
Winner of the 2018 Petrona Award announced at CrimeFest
On 19 May 2018, at the Gala Dinner at CrimeFest, Bristol, Petrona Award judges Barry Forshaw and Sarah Ward announced the winner of the 2018 Petrona Award for the Best Scandinavian Crime Novel of the Year. The winner is QUICKSAND by Malin Persson Giolito, translated...
Ngaio Marsh Award longlist revealed
Craig Sisterson
Returning to the scene of the crime: Ngaio Marsh Award longlist revealed. Two authors who returned to crime writing after more than a decade away have today been named among an eclectic longlist for the 2018 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Novel.
Confessions of a squeamish thriller writer
Teresa Driscoll
I have a confession. I am a thriller writer who can’t stand the sight of blood… No. Really. It’s true. There will be journalists out there right now, saying – I hear there’s a Teresa Driscoll selling a lot of thrillers these days? Can’t be the Teresa Driscoll I knew. She was dead squeamish; seem to remember she passed out at her first inquest.
The Killing Habit by Mark Billingham
Michael Carlson
Someone is killing cats up North London way, and although Tom Thorne can’t help but feel tomicide is not his proper calling, he’s going to be seconded to his old Kentish Town stomping grounds, an improvement over his new commute from his partner Helen’s place in Tulse Hill up to Hendon. And he knows there is always the possibility the serial feline killer might move on to something more satisfying, for both of them. That’s the grim reality for Thorne, an honesty that makes him one of British crime fiction’s most compelling detectives.
PERSONAL INSECURITY: James Swallow
The author of Ghost talks to Crime Time
Hello, gentle reader. With nearly 2 billion users around the world, the chances are pretty good that you and most of the other people reading this own a smartphone. And you probably use those natty little headphones that came with it, right? You may even make use of the phone’s voice-responsive software apps that talk back to you like they’re a real person. All of it is cool tech, designed to make life more frictionless for the user.
What You Want to See: Kristen Lepionka talks to Crime Time
Be nice but not too fucking nice. That’s the last thing private investigator Roxane Weary’s father says to her before his death, and it sticks with her. As a PI, she has no problem with the not too nice part. But women—whether they’re PIs or writers or whatever—are expected to be nice. Likable. Polite. Mild-mannered. If you’re a woman who doesn’t fall into those categories, you might get a label like bossy, or shrill, or domineering, pushy, too emotional, difficult. And once you’re pegged as difficult, you’re in real trouble.
LOUISIANA REPUBLIC: Maxim Jakubowski talks to Crime Time
The first time I visited New Orleans was for a book fair, the now renamed BookExpo USA, then the ABA, which at the time moved yearly between American cities.
Thriller Roundup
Barry Forshaw in The Guardian
The best thrillers offer something more ambitious than simply raising the pulse rate of the reader. In Star of the North by DB John (Harvill Secker, £12.99), it’s geopolitical complexity: the book is set in the dictatorship of North Korea, and includes unusual protagonists as well as an unsparing picture of the regime, contrasting the wealth of the elite with the grinding poverty of the disadvantaged. North Korean/African-American Jenna Williams is desperate for news of her missing twin, who vanished in South Korea over a decade ago
Don’t Make a Sound: David Jackson talks to Crime Time
Last year, I took part in a crime writing event called Liverpool Noir. It was hosted by Waterstones in the centre of Liverpool, and was put together and expertly hosted by none other than Barry Forshaw, the esteemed editor of Crime Time. Barry is originally from this fair city and can still slip into a convincing Scouse accent on request (and after a few glasses of wine). During the discussions, Barry told us about how, like Dick Whittington, he felt drawn to the gold-paved streets of London to pursue his career in writing (I have no idea whether he took a cat with him).
Beast (Michael Pearce, director)
Michael Carlson
Michael Pearce’s debut feature Beast, which played at the London Film Festival in October, is set on Jersey, and begins at a birthday party for Moll, who has the spotlight stolen from her by her sister’s announcement of an impending baby. Moll, who is kept well under the thumb of her domineering mother Hilary, escapes from the party and spends the night dancing. But when her dancing partner begins to get aggressively amorous on the beach in the morning, she is rescued by Pascal, carrying the rifle he’s been using to poach rabbits.
New Crime Blu-rays & DVDs
Barry Forshaw
A declaration of interest: I supplied one of the Blu-ray extras for this definitive gangster movie from Roger: Corman. But even if I hadn’t, I’d be extolling the virtues of this violent and kinetic piece as one of the director’s best and most ambitious movies. The film — as well as being one of the liveliest crime movies you are likely to see — carries out its various levels of ambition with great panache. While the story of Al Capone’s most famous crime (the wiping out of his rival’s gang) is dispassionately told in documentary fashion, the visceral impact of the film (not least the copious bloodshed — something Roger Corman was never one to shy away from), it has the impact and intelligence of a far less sophisticated piece of work
Star of the North: D.B. John talks to Crime Time
On 19 December 2011 the North Korean public was told to stand by for an important announcement at noon. Many people, therefore, were gathered in front of television sets when Ri Chun-hee, the regime’s notorious news anchorwoman, appeared dressed in black. In a voice choking with emotion she announced that Kim Jong-il, the Dear Leader, who had ruled the country for seventeen years, had died. Working for the people until the very end, she said, he had suffered a heart attack on board his private train while travelling to one of his regular field guidance inspections. Even before she had finished speaking, a great outpouring of public grieving and mass hysteria was spilling into the streets.