Tweeting from Crimefest

I'm currently away at Crimefest and having been taking electronic notes. Myself and a few others have been tweeting too which you can read on twitter at https://twitter.com/#!/search/%23CrimeFest2012 and get a flavour of the panels.

International Dagger 2012 - Shortlist

And the 6 shortlisted titles for the 2012 International Dagger are....

Andrea Camilleri - The Potter's Field tr. Stephen Sartarelli
Maurizio De Giovanni - I Will Have Vengeance tr. Anne Milano Appel
Asa Larsson - Until Thy Wrath be Past tr. Laurie Thompson
Deon Meyer - Trackers tr. K L Seegers
Jo Nesbo - Phantom tr. Don Bartlett
Valerio Varesi - The Dark Valley tr. Joseph Farrell

More about the selected titles and other shortlists announced tonight can be found at the CWA's website

I'll be setting up the usual polls when I return from CrimeFest.

Review: The White Lie by Andrea Gillies

The White Lie by Andrea Gillies, Short Books Ltd, February 2012, ISBN: 1780720394)

Andrea Gillies is the author of the non-fiction book KEEPER which won the Orwell Prize 2012 and she now turns her hand to fiction with possibly award-winning results with the labyrinthine THE WHITE LIE.

The book opens:

2008

“My name is Michael Salter, and I am dead; dead, that much I know for sure.”

Michael is the reader's guide and interpretor as he takes us from the present, to further in the past and even further back again. All the events occur at Peattie, an old country estate adjacent to a loch. The plot is quite simple: fourteen years previously, nineteen-year-old Michael disappears in the loch while out with a family member, supposedly drowned; no body is found so the family cover it up and say that he has gone away, left them for a new life down south. There are rumours in the village that he's committed suicide but the Salters say no more about it to anyone outside the family, and little to insiders. However the family dynamics are completely changed and the repercussions extend further and further as the family expands. Finally a birthday party brings things to a head, everyone's talking about Michael, and eventually the truth is revealed to the reader.

Put quite so baldy it seems unlikely to be a gripping read and yet THE WHITE LIE is fascinating and puzzling and even when you think you know what happened at the loch somebody else says they were lying and you're no further forward. Indeed as Hugh Laurie's Dr House says “Everybody lies” - though to be fair they may not know that they are lying.

Beautifully written and replete with mysteries and family secrets I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It's one that requires concentration, as at first I did have to keep referring to the family tree at the front to keep the large cast straight. The setting is convincingly brought to life and you really feel present in that house and at the family meetings and when you do get to the resolution you'll want to go back to the beginning and reread to see if you can pick up more clues second time around.

This may only be a crime novel in the tangential way that Catherine O'Flynn's WHAT WAS LOST is but I'd recommend it to both genre and non-genre fans alike.

Euro Crime Cited on The Black Path

A quote from Maxine's review of Asa Larsson's Until Thy Wrath Be Past has been used on the back of the hardback release of The Black Path which is published 7 June by MacLehose Press.Here are Maxine's reviews of Until Thy Wrath Be Past and The Black Path (US Edition).

Website & Email Issues

Just to let you know the Euro Crime website is unavailable at the moment as is my eurocrime email account. Don't know what's happened - I'm blaming my web host - but apologies if you've sent an email in the last 24 hours as I haven't been able to download them. I can be contacted via twitter or on my alternative email karen at weatherwax dot co dot uk.

International Dagger - Shortlist Speculation

The shortlist for the CWA International Dagger will be announced at CrimeFest on Friday. I've listed the eligible titles by author, rather than by month published, below. Which six books do you think will make the shortlist? And/or which six books would you have put on your shortlist?

Boris Akunin - The Diamond Chariot, tr. Andrew Bromfield
George Arion - Attack in the Library
Anouar Benmalek - Abduction, tr. Simon Pare
Laurent Binet - HHhH (Classed as fiction with thriller elements)
Mikkel Birkegaard - Death Sentence, tr. Charlotte Barslund
Xavier-Marie Bonnot - The Voice of the Spirits tr. Justin Phipps
Horst Bosetzky - Cold Angel: Murder in Berlin, 1949
Andrea Camilleri - The Track of Sand tr. Stephen Sartarelli
Andrea Camilleri - The Potter's Field tr. Stephen Sartarelli
Gianrico Carofiglio - Temporary Perfections tr. Antony Shugaar
Maxime Chattam - Carnage tr. Isabel Reid and Emily Boyce
Laurence Cosse - A Novel Bookstore
K O Dahl - Lethal Investments tr. Don Bartlett
Maurizio De Giovanni - I Will Have Vengeance tr. Anne Milano Appel
Zoran Drvenkar - Sorry tr. Shaun Whiteside
Thomas Enger - Burned tr. Charlotte Barslund
Kjell Eriksson - The Hand That Trembles tr. Ebba Segerberg
Kjell Eriksson- The Princess of Burundi tr. Ebba Segerberg (First UK publication)
Kjell Eriksson - The Demon of Dakar (First UK publication)
Giorgio Faletti - I am God tr. Howard Curtis
Karin Fossum - The Caller tr. K E Semmel
Friis & Kaaberbol - The Boy in the Suitcase, tr. Lene Kaaberbol
Sergios Gakas - Ashes tr. Anne-Marie Stanton-Ife
Sissel-Jo Gazan - The Dinosaur Feather tr. Charlotte Barslund (Moved from May 2011)
Michele Giuttari - The Black Rose of Florence
Juan Gomez-Jurado - The Traitor's Emblem tr. Daniel Hahn
Shiro Hamao - The Devil's Disciple
Keigo Higashino - The Devotion of Suspect X tr. Alexander O Smith & Elye J Alexander
Antonio Hill - The Summer of Dead Toys tr. Laura McGloughlin
Paulus Hochgatterer - The Mattress House tr. Jamie Bulloch
Anne Holt - Fear Not tr. Marlaine Delargy
Jørn Lier Horst - Dregs tr. Anne Bruce
Bogdan Hrib - Kill the General
Fabrice Humbert - The Origin of Violence, tr. Frank Wynne
Arnaldur Indridason - Outrage tr. Anna Yates
Claude Izner - Strangled in Paris
Bernhard Jaumann - The Hour of the Jackal tr. John Brownjohn
Eva Joly & Judith Perrignon - The Eyes of Lira Kazan
Mari Jungstedt - Dark Angel tr. Tiina Nunnally
Mons Kallentoft - Midwinter Sacrifice tr. Neil Smith
Mons Kallentoft - Summertime Death tr. Neil Smith
A J Kazinski - The Last Good Man tr. Tiina Nunnally 
Hans Koppel - She's Never Coming Back tr. Kari Dickson
Camilla Lackberg - The Hidden Child tr. Tiina Nunnally
Camilla Lackberg - The Drowning tr. Tiina Nunnally
Jens Lapidus - Easy Money, tr. Astri von Arbin Ahlander
Asa Larsson - Until Thy Wrath be Past tr. Laurie Thompson
Giulio Leoni - The Crusade of Darkness
Charlotte Link - The Other Child tr. Stefan Tobler
Ernesto Mallo - Sweet Money tr. Katherine Silver
Eduardo Mendoza - The Olive Labyrinth
Deon Meyer - Trackers tr. K L Seegers
Jo Nesbo - Headhunters tr. Don Bartlett
Jo Nesbo - Phantom tr. Don Bartlett
Hakan Nesser - The Unlucky Lottery, tr. Laurie Thompson
Hakan Nesser - Hour of the Wolf, tr. Laurie Thompson
Harri Nykanen - Nights of Awe tr. Kristian London
Kristina Ohlsson - Unwanted tr. Sarah Death
Guillermo Orsi - Holy City
Felix Palma - The Map of Time tr. Nick Caistor
Jean-Francois Parot - The Baker's Blood
Leif GW Persson - Another Time, Another Life tr. Paul Norlen
Claudia Pineiro - All Yours
Roslund-Hellstrom - Cell 8 tr. Kari Dickson
Yrsa Sigurdardottir - The Day is Dark tr. Philip Roughton
Dag Solstad - Professor Andersen's Night tr. Agnes Scott Langeland
Oana Stoica-Mujea - Anatomical Clues
Stefan Tegenfalk - Anger Mode
Johan Theorin - The Quarry tr. Marlaine Delargy
Helene Tursten - Night Rounds
Valerio Varesi - The Dark Valley tr. Joseph Farrell
Marco Vichi - Death in August tr. Stephen Sartarelli
Marco Vichi - Death and the Olive Grove tr. Stephen Sartarelli
Jan Costin Wagner - The Winter of the Lions tr. Anthea Bell
Carlos Ruiz Zafon - The Midnight Palace
Juli Zeh - The Method, tr. Sally-Ann Spencer

Sebastian Bergman on BBC4

One of the dramas I mentioned in my year of translated tv shows post earlier this year was Sebastian Bergman starring Rolf Lassgard. The first of the two episodes will be on Saturday 26 May at 9pm on BBC4:

Brilliant, difficult and politically incorrect, Sebastian Bergman is one of Sweden's leading police profilers. His life and and career are on the skids when he returns to his home town, two weeks late for his mother's funeral but just in time to help the local police solve the brutal murder of a 15-year-old boy.

Titled Den Fördömde in Swedish, "Sebastian Bergman" was released in 2010.

New Reviews: Black, Carver, Gregory, Hannah, Hill, Lock, McGilloway, Meyer, Rees

Competition: During May (closes 31st) you can win a copy of Tessa Harris's The Anatomist's Apprentice. The competition is open to UK residents. Answer the question and fill in the form here.

New Competition: Win YA Thriller Soul Beach by Kate Harrison here (UK/Ireland only)

Here are this week's 9 new reviews:

Amanda Gillies reviews Helen Black's, Twenty Twelve, which involves terrorism at the London Olympics;

Terry Halligan reviews Will Carver's The Two the second outing for Detective Inspector January David;

Terry also reviews Susanna Gregory's The Piccadilly Plot the seventh in the Thomas Chaloner Restoration series;

Susan White reviews Mari Hannah's debut, The Murder Wall the first in the DCI Kate Charles series set in Northumberland;

Lynn Harvey reviews Antonio Hill's debut, The Summer of Dead Toys, tr. Laura McGoughlin set in Barcelona and introducing Inspector Hector Salgado;

Lizzie Hayes reviews the paperback release of Joan Lock's Dead Image the first of six in the Victorian era, Sergeant Best series;

Laura Root reviews the latest in the Ben Devlin series from Brian McGilloway, The Nameless Dead writing that it "is one of the best books I have read this year";

Maxine Clarke reviews Deon Meyer's Trackers, tr. K L Seegers of which she states "this book may be the best thriller I've ever read"

and if you travel by train in the UK you can't have missed the posters for Emlyn Rees's Hunted, just out in paperback and reviewed here by Rich Westwood.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here along with releases by year.

Theakstons Crime Novel of the Year 2012 - Longlist

The longlist for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award 2012 has been announced. The winner will be announced at Harrogate however we the public will be able to vote on the shortlist from 5 July. From the press release:

Crime writing's most wanted accolade, the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award returns to highlight the cream of the crop of crime novels published by British and Irish authors (whose novels were published in paperback from 1st June 2011 to 31st May 2012). The winning author receives a cash prize of £3000 an a handmade, engraved beer barrel provided by Theakstons Old Peculier.

2012 Longlist (links are to Euro Crime reviews)

Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch (Gollancz)
Darkside by Belinda Bauer (Corgi)
Now You See Me by SJ Bolton (Corgi)
Where the Bodies Are Buried by Chris Brookmyre (Abacus)
The Burning Soul by John Connolly (Hodder Paperback)
The Calling by Neil Cross (Simon & Schuster)
The Hanging Shed by Gordon Ferris (Corvus)
Bryant and May and the Memory of Blood by Christopher Fowler (Bantam)
Blue Monday by Nicci French (Michael Joseph)
The Fear Index by Robert Harris (Arrow)
The Retribution by Val McDermid (Sphere)
The End of the Wasp Season by Denise Mina (Orion)
Black Flowers by Steve Mosby (Orion)
Collusion by Stuart Neville (Vintage)
The Impossible Dead by Ian Rankin (Orion)
Mice by Gordon Reece (Pan Books)
Agent 6 by Tom Rob Smith (Simon & Schuster)
Before I Go To Sleep by SJ Watson (Black Swan)

The names of the six shortlisted titles will be announced on Thursday 5 July 2012 and YOU – the readers – will be able to help decide which of the six short-listed authors will take home the most coveted title in crime fiction, by casting your vote online at www.theakstons.co.uk