International Dagger 2013 - Shortlist

And the 6 shortlisted titles for the 2013 International Dagger are....

Pierre Lemaitre - Alex tr. Frank Wynne
D A Mishani - The Missing File tr. Steven Cohen
Roslund & Hellstrom - Two Soldiers tr. Kari Dickson
Ferdinand  von Schirach - The Collini Case tr. Anthea Bell
Fred Vargas - The Ghost Riders of Ordebec tr. Sian Reynolds
Marco Vichi - Death in Sardinia tr. Stephen Sartarelli 

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.

Petrona Award 2013 - Survey Results

The results are in!

Black Skies is the title most people want to win the 2013 Petrona Award whereas Last Will is the one people think will win the Award. The official winner will be announced at the CrimeFest dinner on 1 June by Barry Forshaw.

Review: Invisible Murder by Kaaberbol & Friis

Invisible Murder by Lene Kaaberbol and Agnete Friis translated by Tara Chace, January 2013, 352 pages, Soho Press, ISBN: 1616952563

Danish nurse Nina Borg works in Copenhagen at a Red Cross centre for immigrants offering medical and emotional support. She also works for the Network which offers help to illegal immigrants, and her husband Morten is not keen on this at all. When he has to leave Nina with their two children for a couple of weeks whilst he is on an oil-rig, he makes her promise not to do any work for the Network whilst he is away. Of course things don't go to plan and Nina is gradually drawn into a nightmare scenario which begins with her treating some sick Hungarian Roma refugees for what appears to be a bad bug but is actually something far worse.

Before Nina joins the main narrative we get to learn about Sandor, a Hungarian law student who has masked his Roma origins to fit in with non-Roma society, but whose half-brother Tamas is involved in making a huge amount of money in a transaction which involves him going to Denmark. Sandor is sent to find Tamas when Tamas breaks contact with his wealthy, criminal, backer.

A third strand involves Soren from the Danish security service who are preparing for a Summit meeting and Soren begins to investigate a terror threat which has a Hungarian connection.

And how does the elderly retired buildings inspector, Skou-Larsen, living next to a Mosque construction site fit in to all this?

THE INVISIBLE MURDER, the sequel to THE BOY IN THE SUITCASE, is a gripping thriller which sets the various narrative threads running before entwining them in a nail-biting race against time climax. Nina acts much more rationally in this second book, and yet still cannot seem to win and her ethical acts take a toll on both her and her family, physically, emotionally and personally. The authors weave politics into their characters' lives, from the issue of immigration in Denmark to the racism and prejudice faced by the Roma and this is what makes this series of books an interesting as well as an exciting read. This is crime fiction with a heart and I look forward to catching up with Nina's newest crises in DEATH OF A NIGHTINGALE later this year.

What's Your International Dagger Shortlist?

The 2013 CWA International Dagger Shortlist will be announced on Friday night at CrimeFest. Which of these titles below would be on your shortlist?

Jussi Adler-Olsen - Disgrace tr. K E Semmel (apa The Absent One) (Denmark, M)

Esmahan Aykol - Baksheesh tr. Ruth Whitehouse (Turkish, F)

Fabrice Bourland - The Dream Killer of Paris tr. Morag Young (France, M)

Andrea Camilleri - The Age of Doubt tr. Stephen Sartarelli (Italy, M)

Andrea Camilleri - The Dance of the Seagull tr. Stephen Sartarelli (Italy, M)

Massimo Carlotto - At the End of a Dull Day tr. Antony Shugaar (Italy, M)

Donato Carrisi - The Lost Girls of Rome tr. Howard Curtis (Italy, M)

Camilla Ceder - Babylon tr Marlaine Delargy (Sweden, F)

Patrick Conrad - No Sale tr. Jonathan Lynn (Belgium, M)

Roberto Costantini - The Deliverance of Evil tr. N S Thompson (Italy, M)

Mariusz Czubaj - 21:37 tr. Anna Hyde (Poland, M)

Arne Dahl - Misterioso (apa The Blinded Man) tr. Tiina Nunnally (Sweden, M)

Sandrone Dazieri - In a Heartbeat tr. A Turner Mojica (Italy, M)

Thomas Enger - Pierced tr. Charlotte Barslund (Norway, M)

Kjell Eriksson - The Cruel Stars of the Night tr. Ebba Segerberg (Sweden, M)

Giorgio Faletti - The Killer in My Eyes tr. Howard Curtis (Italy, M)

Sebastian Fitzek - The Eye Collector tr. John Brownjohn (Germany, M)

Karin Fossum - In the Darkness, tr. James Anderson (Norway, F)

Santiago Gamboa - Necropolis tr. Howard Curtis (Colombia, M)

Pascal Garnier - How's the Pain? tr. Emily Boyce (France, M)

Pascal Garnier - The A26 tr. Melanie Florence (France, M)

Maurizio de Giovanni - Blood Curse tr. Antony Shugaar (Italy, M)

Thomas Glavinic - The Camera Killer tr. John Brownjohn (Austria, M)

Grebe & Traff - Some Kind of Peace tr. Paul Norlen (Sweden, F & F)

Wolf Haas - Brenner and God tr. Annie Janusch (Austria, M)

Gaute Heivoll - Before I Burn tr. Don Bartlett (Norway, M)

Marie Hermanson - The Devil's Sanctuary tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, F)

Keigo Higashino - Salvation of a Saint tr. Alexander O Smith with Elye J Alexander (Japan, M)

Hjorth-Rosenfeldt - Sebastian Bergman tr. Marlaine Delargy (Sweden, M & M)

Anne Holt - Blind Goddess, tr. Tom Geddes (Norway, F)

Anne Holt - Blessed Are Those Who Thirst tr. Anne Bruce (Norway, F) 

Fabrice Humbert - Sila's Fortune tr. Frank Wynne (France, M)

Arnaldur Indridason - Black Skies tr. Victoria Cribb (Iceland, M)

Pia Juul - The Murder of Halland tr. Martin Aitken (Denmark, F)

Kaaberbol & Friis - Invisible Murders tr. Tara Chace (Denmark, F & F)

Mons Kallentoft - Autumn Killing tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, M)

Mons Kallentoft - Savage Spring tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, M)

Lars Kepler - The Nightmare tr. Laura A Wideburg (Sweden, M & F)

Marek Krajewski - The Minotaur's Head tr. Danusia Stok (Poland, M)

Camilla Lackberg - The Lost Boy tr. Tiina Nunnally (Sweden, F)

Asa Larsson - The Black Path tr. Marlaine Delargy (Sweden, F)

Pierre Lemaitre - Alex tr. Frank Wynne (France, M)

Liza Marklund - Last Will tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, F)

Liza Marklund - Lifetime tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, F) 

Deon Meyer - Seven Days tr. K L Seegers (South Africa, M)

Zygmunt Miloszewski - A Grain of Truth tr. Antonia Lloyd-Jones (Poland, M)

D A Mishani - The Missing File tr. Steven Cohen (Israel, M)

Guillaume Musso - The Angel's Call tr. ?? (France, M) 

Fuminori Nakamura - The Thief tr. Satoko Izumo & Stephen Coates (Japan, M)

Jo Nesbo - The Bat tr. Don Bartlett (Norway, M)

Hakan Nesser - The Weeping Girl tr. Laurie Thompson (Sweden, M)

Kristina Ohlsson - Silenced tr. Sarah Death (Sweden, F)

Leif GW Persson - Linda, As in the Linda Murder, tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, M)

Roslund & Hellstrom - Two Soldiers tr. Kari Dickson (Sweden, M & M) 

Giorgio Scerbanenco - A Private Venus tr. Howard Curtis (Ukraine/Italy, M)

Ferdinand von Schirach - The Collini Case tr. Anthea Bell (Germany, M)

Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Someone to Watch Over Me tr. Philip Roughton  (Iceland, F)

Edney Silvestre - If I Close My Eyes Now tr. Nick Caistor (Brazil, M) 

Alexander Söderberg - The Andalucian Friend tr. Neil Smith (Sweden, M)

Teresa Solana - The Sound of One Hand Killing tr. Peter Bush (Spain, F)

Johan Theorin - The Asylum tr. Marlaine Delargy (Sweden, M)  

Antti Tuomainen - The Healer tr. Lola Rogers (Finland, M)

Noboru Tsujihara - Jasmine tr. Juliet W Carpenter (Japan, M)

Antonin Varenne - Bed of Nails tr. Sian Reynolds (France, M)

Fred Vargas - The Ghost Riders of Ordebec tr. Sian Reynolds (France, F)

Luis Fernando Verissimo - The Spies tr. Margaret Jull Costa (Brazil, M)

Marco Vichi - Death in Sardinia tr. Stephen Sartarelli (Italy, M)

Jan Wallentin - Strindberg's Star tr. Rachel Willson-Broyles (Sweden, M)

Carlos Ruiz Zafon - The Prisoner of Heaven tr. Lucia Graves (Spain, M)

Carlos Ruiz Zafon - The Watcher in the Shadows tr. Lucia Graves (Spain M)

New Reviews: Bilal, Enger, Ferris, Meredith, Russell, Santora, Sherez

Seven new reviews have been added to Euro Crime today:

Lynn Harvey reviews Parker Bilal's Dogstar Rising, set in Cairo in 2001 and featuring former policeman Makana;

Laura Root reviews the Petrona Award shortlisted Pierced by Thomas Enger, tr. Charlotte Barslund, the sequel to Burned.

Michelle Peckham reviews Gordon Ferris's Pilgrim Soul, the third in the Douglas Brodie series, set just after World War Two;

Terry Halligan reviews D E Meredith's follow-up to Devoured: The Devil's Ribbon featuring the Victorian forensic pathologists Hatton and Roumande;

Amanda Gillies reviews Leigh Russell's fifth DI Geraldine Steel book, Stop Dead;

Susan White reviews Nick Santora's Fifteen Digits

and Terry also reviews Stav Sherez's Eleven Days, the second in the Carrigan and Miller series.



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.

Help Needed - Janie Bolitho website

A new website has been set up for the late author Janie Bolitho: janiebolitho.info and the webmistress Jolene needs your help.

Biographical detail on the author is scant and Bolitho's DCI Roper series has not yet been reprinted and so copies are rare. Fortunately Allison and Busby have recently republished some of the Rose Trevelyan series, set in Cornwall.

If you have memories or information about Janie Bolitho, book reviews you want to share then Jolene would love you to get in touch via the website.

Janie Bolitho's Euro Crime bibliography (with a couple of reviews) is here.

Review: The Devil's Ribbon by D E Meredith

The Devil's Ribbon by D E Meredith, February 2013, 336 pages, Allison & Busby, ISBN: 0749012463

Reviewed by Terry Halligan.
(Read more of Terry's reviews for Euro Crime here.)

It is July 1858 and London is in the midst of a terrible cholera epidemic and many of the bodies that are being brought to St Bart's Hospital, Smithfield for examination and post mortem by Professor Adolphus Hatton and his able assistant Albert Roumande are infected with this dreadful disease. However, the two expert forensic pathologists have a very enthusiastic apprentice, Patrice, to teach and a great need to find diverse patients to demonstrate to him the skills he will need in his new profession.

During the Great Irish famine approximately a million people died during the years 1845 and 1852 and a lot of the remaining population emigrated both to London and America. There was a lot of racist antipathy directed towards these new Irish immigrants at that time and the body of leading Irish Unionist is found and Inspector Jeremiah Grey of the Yard requests the help of the two expert forensic pathologists in finding the cause of death and ultimately, hopefully, the killer.

In this multi-faceted story, in between the main narrative of the work of Professor Hatton and Albert Roumande, is given the back-story of the Irish killers discussing their next moves. Professor Hatton has dealt with other Scotland Yard detectives before, but not one as strange as Inspector Grey appears to be. He is a Welsh man and he dresses very flamboyantly and employs an Italian personal manservant who speaks very little English but appears to carry a personal firearm!

When it becomes clear that they are dealing with a series of connected killings the forensic pathologists must find, with the help of the policeman, the connections between the various victims and also identify who set off a huge bomb that exploded in the Burlington Arcade, Piccadilly, London killing many people.

The science of forensic pathology was in its infancy at that time of course and the investigatory techniques were very primitive in comparison to what we know today, but it is very interesting how much the pathologists of that time were able to discover with what limited evidence they had to hand and the primitive conditions they had to work in. The beginning of the science of fingerprinting is investigated.

I found this second book by D E Meredith even more gripping than the first, DEVOURED, and the amount of extensive research that she must have undergone was huge. As a British born child of Irish immigrant parents myself, I was particularly interested by this story, but I could not fault any of the author's detailed research and there were many new particulars she gave that I was completely unaware of.

D E Meredith gives a very vivid atmospheric picture of life at this time and I was transported by this wonderfully evocative story telling right back to Victorian London. The book in its hardback edition has sumptuous packaging including, very unusually, a ribbon page marker (I wish that all publishers followed this example) and a printed hardback case. All in all, a delightful and most extraordinary second novel in this new historic mystery series about the Victorian forensic pathologists Hatton and Roumande. I look forward to reading subsequent stories in this series. Strongly recommended.

Terry Halligan, May 2013.

Review: Pierced by Thomas Enger

Pierced by Thomas Enger translated by Charlotte Barslund, December 2012, 544 pages, Faber and Faber, ISBN: 0571272460

Reviewed by Laura Root.
(Read more of Laura's reviews for Euro Crime here.)

One of four Scandinavian crime novels nominated for this year's inaugural Petrona Award, PIERCED is the second in Norwegian writer Thomas Enger's series featuring online news journalist Henning Juul. In this instalment of the series, Juul is approached by convicted murderer Tore Pulli, former gangland enforcer turned celebrity property developer. Pulli has been found guilty of the murder of Jocke Brolenius, a thuggish Swedish enforcer, and prime suspect in the murder of a friend of Pulli's, Fighting Fit gym owner Vidar Fjell. As one of the injuries sustained by Brolenius was a "Pulli punch", a jawbreaking manoeuvre Pull was famous for in his enforcer days, and Pulli's knuckleduster (kept for sentimental reasons in the study of Pulli’s house!) was found at the scene, the case seemed crystal clear against Pulli.

In the run up to his appeal, Pulli makes Juul an offer he can’t refuse - if Juul looks for evidence that will exonerate him of Brolenius’s murder, he will tell him what he knows about the fire that injured Juul, and killed Juul’s young son, Jonas. After Juul agrees to help Pulli, he calls in some favours due to his successful indentification of the villain of the previous novel in the series, BURNED. Juul can rely on the assistance of fellow journalist, Iver Gundersen, and his police acquaintances Brogelund and Pia Nockleby to obtain more information about Pulli and his world. Juul also discusses the case with the mysterious police informer 6tiermes7, who contacts him anonymously via online chat. Juul and Gundersen visit the gyms and bars frequented by Pulli and his shady group of friends to attempt to find out more from a group of people who are not significantly keener to talk to the media than to the police. Meanwhile in a separate strand of the novel, at first seemingly unrelated to the Pulli plotline, news camera-man, Thorleif Brenden and his partner are being stalked, and their idyllic upper middle class family life suddenly begins to be threatened.

As in the previous novel in the series, BURNED, Juul remains a sympathetic hero, still struggling to deal with the loss of his son and plagued by nightmares and flashbacks, and amnesia, but mostly managing to function better in his day to day life than in the previous novel. Enger depicts character and milieu very convincingly, and gives a credible and interesting insight into both the frantic environment of online news journalism, and the violent, sweaty milieu of the muscled enforcers. For the most part the book remains a remarkably pacy page turner despite its fashionable 500 plus page length, though I did feel that some of the Brenden subplot could have been omitted, and that Brenden's complete failure to contemplate seeking help from the police at the start could have done with some explanation. The mysteries in Juul's personal life are not fully resolved, with a humdinger of a cliffhanger at the very end of this novel, leading nicely into the next entry in this top notch Scandinavian crime series.

Laura Root, May 2013.

Free Teresa Solana Short Story

Crazy Tales of Blood and Guts, an ebook collection of short stories by Teresa Solana, translated by Peter Bush, has recently been released by Bitter Lemon Press:

Official Blurb: Fascinating short stories that include a rather bloody satire on installation art (“Still Life No.41”, shortlisted for the 2012 short story Edgar award), a wonderful story of gruesome revenge involving a wayward son-in-law, a surprising and hilarious tale of a pre-historic serial killer who invents God and psychoanalysis, and, inevitably, a vampire story told with venom and humor.

One of the stories, The First (Pre) Historic Serial Killer, can be read for free online here.

Award News: Petrona Award Eligibles 2014

Here is a list of books (45) that can be submitted for the 2014 Petrona Award for the Best Scandinavian Crime Novel of the Year ie:

• The submission must be in translation and published in English in the UK during the preceding calendar year ie 1 January – 31 December 2013.
• The author of the submission must either be born in Scandinavia* or the submission must be set in Scandinavia*.

(E-books that meet the above criteria may be considered at the judges’ discretion (does not include self-published titles))
*in this instance taken to be Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden .

More details about the award can be found on the Petrona Award website and the history behind it at Petrona Remembered.

Links are to Euro Crime reviews and gender, country and publisher details are also included.

Published in 2013


February

Leif GW Persson - Linda, As in the Linda Murder, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Doubleday
Antti Tuomainen - The Healer, tr. Lola Rogers (M, Finland) Harvill Secker

March

Marie Hermanson - The Devil's Sanctuary, tr. Neil Smith (F, Sweden) Little, Brown (Trapdoor)
Anne Holt - Blessed Are Those Who Thirst, tr. Anne Bruce (F, Norway) Atlantic
Camilla Lackberg - The Lost Boy, tr. Tiina Nunnally (F, Sweden) HarperCollins
Alexander Soderberg - The Andalucian Friend, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Harvill Secker
Johan Theorin - The Asylum, tr. Marlaine Delargy (M, Sweden) Doubleday

April

Gaute Heivoll - Before I Burn, tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Atlantic
Jarkko Sipila - Helsinki Homicide: Cold Trail, tr. Kristian London (M, Finland) AmazonCrossing
Mons Kallentoft - Savage Spring, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Hodder
Liza Marklund - Lifetime, tr. Neil Smith (F, Sweden) Corgi
Hakan Nesser - The Weeping Girl, tr. Laurie Thompson (M, Sweden) Mantle
Roslund & Hellstrom - Two Soldiers, tr. Kari Dickson (M, Sweden) Quercus

May

Viktor Arnar Ingolfsson - Daybreak, tr. Bjorg Arnadottir & Andrew Cauthery (M, Iceland) AmazonCrossing
Leena Lehtolainen - Her Enemy, tr. Owen Witesman (F, Finland) AmazonCrossing
Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Someone to Watch Over Me, tr. Philip Roughton (F, Iceland) Hodder & Stoughton
Dan Turrell - Murder in the Dark, tr. Mark Mussari (M, Denmark) Norvik Press

June

Lotte and Soren Hammer - The Hanging, tr. Ebba Segerberg (M & F, Denmark) Bloomsbury
Pekka Hiltunen - Cold Courage, tr. Owen Witesman (M, Finland) Hesperus Press Ltd
Gunnar Staalesen - Cold Hearts, tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Arcadia

July

Jussi Adler-Olsen - Redemption (apa A Conspiracy of Faith), tr. Martin Aitken (M, Denmark) Penguin
Sara Blaedel - Blue Blood (apa Call Me Princess), tr. Erik J Macki & Tara F Chace (F, Denmark) Little, Bown (Sphere)
Arne Dahl - Bad Blood, tr. Rachel Willson-Broyles (M, Sweden) Harvill Secker
Elsebeth Egholm - Three Dog Night (F, Denmark) Headline
Karin Fossum - I Can See in the Dark, tr. James Anderson (F, Norway) Harvill Secker
Grebe & Traff - More Bitter Than Death, tr. tbc (F, Sweden) Simon & Schuster
Mari Jungstedt - The Double Silence (F, Sweden) Doubleday
Lars Kepler - The Fire Witness (M & F, Sweden) Blue Door

August

Arnaldur Indridason - Strange Shores, tr. Victoria Cribb (M, Iceland) Harvill Secker
Kristina Ohlsson - The Disappeared, tr. Marlaine Delargy (F, Sweden) Simon & Schuster
Jan Costin Wagner - Light in a Dark House, tr. Anthea Bell (M, Germany) Harvill Secker

September

Anne Holt - Death of the Demon, tr. Anne Bruce (F, Norway) Atlantic
Steffen Jacobsen - When the Dead Awaken, tr. Charlotte Barslund (M, Denmark) Quercus
Liza Marklund - The Long Shadow, tr. Neil Smith (F, Sweden) Corgi
Jo Nesbo - Police, tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Harvill Secker
Hakan Nesser - The Strangler's Honeymoon, tr. Laurie Thompson (M, Sweden) Mantle

October

Jorn Lier Horst - Closed for Winter, tr. Anne Bruce (M, Norway) Sandstone
Martin Jensen - The King's Hounds, tr. Tara Chace (M, Denmark) AmazonCrossing
Leif GW Persson - He Who Kills the Dragon tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Doubleday

November

Jens Lapidus - Never F**k Up (apa Never Screw Up), tr. Astri von Arbin Ahlander (M, Sweden) Macmillan
Leena Lehtolainen - Copper Heart, tr. Owen Witesman (F, Finland) AmazonCrossing
Jo Nesbo - Cockroaches, tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Harvill Secker

December

Anders de la Motte - Game, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Blue Door
Anders de la Motte - Buzz, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Blue Door
Anders de la Motte - Bubble, tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Blue Door
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Published in the US only (at the moment):
Anna Jansson - Strange Bird, tr. Paul Norlen, (F, Sweden) Stockholm Text

New Reviews: Jones, Monroe, Nakamura, Perry, Roslund-Hellstrom, Stanley

Six new reviews have been added to Euro Crime today:

Lynn Harvey reviews the third in Tobias Jones's Italian PI series, Death of a Showgirl;

Norman Price reviews Aly Monroe's Black Bear, the fourth in the Ellis Peters Award winning Peter Cotton series;

Amanda Gillies reviews the paperback release of Fuminori Nakamura's The Thief, tr. Satoko Izumo and Stephen Coates;

Terry Halligan reviews Anne Perry's latest Thomas Pitt novel, Midnight at Marble Arch, now out in paperback;

Susan White reviews the latest book from CWA International Dagger Award winners, Roslund and Hellstrom, Two Soldiers, tr. Kari Dickson

and Michelle Peckham says that Deadly Harvest is the best book so far in Michael Stanley's Botswanan Detective Kubu series.



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 2013 - Longlist

The longlist for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award 2013 has been announced. The winner will be announced at Harrogate however we the public will be able to vote on the shortlist of six, announced on 1 July, from 4 July.

The criteria: "...the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award was created to celebrate the very best in crime writing and is open to British and Irish authors whose novels are published in paperback from 1 May 2012 – 30 April 2013".

More about the award is on the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival website.

2013 Longlist (links are to Euro Crime reviews)

The Guilty One – Lisa Ballantyne (Piatkus)

Finders Keepers – Belinda Bauer (Transworld)

Rush Of Blood – Mark Billingham (Little Brown)

Dead Scared – S J Bolton (Corgi, Transworld)

The Affair – Lee Child (Transworld)

A Foreign Country – Charles Cumming (Harpercollins)

Safe House - Chris Ewan (Faber and Faber)

Not Dead Yet - Peter James (Macmillan)

Siege – Simon Kernick (Bantam Press)

Prague Fatale – Philip Kerr (Quercus)

The Rage – Gene Kerrigan (Vintage)

Birthdays for the Dead – Stuart MacBride (Harper)

The Dark Winter – David Mark (Quercus)

The Lewis Man – Peter May (Quercus)

Gods And Beasts – Denise Mina (Orion)

Stolen Souls – Stuart Neville (Vintage)

Sacrilege – S. J. Parris (Harper)

A Dark Redemption – Stav Sherez (Faber and Faber)

A New Lord Peter Wimsey Novel

The new Hodder catalogue has arrived today with details of a new Lord Peter Wimsey novel by Jill Paton Walsh. The Late Scholar will be published on 5 December 2013. This will be Jill Paton Walsh's fourth Peter Wimsey, the previous three had varying degrees of input from Wimsey's originator Dorothy L Sayers from half a book (Thrones, Dominations), some letters (A Presumption of Death) to the mention of a case (The Attenbury Emeralds).

The blurb from the catalogue:

Peter Wimsey is pleased to discover that along with a Dukedom he has inherited the duties of 'visitor' at an Oxford college. When the fellows appeal to him to resolve a dispute, he and Harriet set off happily to spend some time in Oxford.

But the dispute turns out to be embittered. The voting is evenly balanced between two passionate parties - evenly balanced, that is, until several of the fellows unexpectedly die.

The Warden has a casting vote, but the Warden has disappeared. And the causes of death of the deceased fellows bear an uncanny resemblance to the murder methods in Peter's past cases - methods that Harriet has used in her published novels...

TV News: JO

Starting on 19 May at 9pm on Fox UK is JO starring Jean Reno, Tom Austen and Orla Brady (and will be in English):

JO is a one-hour close-ended crime series about Joachim “Jo” Saint-Clair, played by Jean Reno (“Leon – The Professional”) a veteran detective in Paris’ elite Criminal Brigade tackling the city’s most challenging murder cases. Each episode will feature one case, while Jo’s personal journey has a series-long arc.

From the Emmy® winning executive producer of Law & Order comes JO, a thrilling new crime drama starring legend of French and Hollywood cinema, Jean Reno.

Jo St-Clair is a veteran detective in Paris’s elite Criminal Brigade, tackling the city’s most challenging murder cases. All the while, his personal life is as challenging and dangerous as the cases he solves.

St-Clair is partnered with rookie detective Bayard, a good looking, college-educated cop whose by-the-book approach stands in marked contrast to St-Clair’s lone-wolf methods.

Supervising them is the tough-minded boss, Commisaire Dormont, who has suffered a long tumultuous history with Saint- Clair.

Brilliant and brutal, St-Clair matches wits with pathological killers to solve a series of shocking murders: a supermodel thrown off the Eiffel Tower; a young heiress brutalised during a sexual romp at the Hôtel de Crillon; a high-end jeweller burned to death on Place Vendôme.

Go to the Polls - Petrona Award

I have now set up two polls relating to the Petrona Award - as I do for the International Dagger - and they will close on 29 May. The announcement of the winner of the Petrona Award for the Best Scandinavian Crime Novel of the Year 2013 will be made on 1 June at CrimeFest.

The first poll is for:

Which book do you want to win the Petrona Award 2013.

The second poll is for:

Which book do you think will win the Petrona Award 2013.

The polls can be found on the top right of the blog.

The candidates are:

PIERCED by Thomas Enger, tr. Charlotte Barslund (Faber and Faber) (review on the Petrona blog)

BLACK SKIES by Arnaldur Indridason, tr. Victoria Cribb (Harvill Secker) (review on Euro Crime website)

LAST WILL by Liza Marklund, tr. Neil Smith (Corgi) (review on Euro Crime website)

ANOTHER TIME, ANOTHER LIFE by Leif GW Persson tr. Paul Norlen (Doubleday) (review on Euro Crime website)

New Reviews: Brett, Costantini, Martin, Seymour, Weeks, Womersley

Six new reviews have been added to Euro Crime today:

After a sixteen-year break, Charles Paris returns in Simon Brett's A Decent Interval, reviewed here by Mark Bailey;

Susan White reviews Roberto Costantini's The Deliverance of Evil tr. N S Thompson, the first in the Michele Balistreri trilogy, set in Rome;

Laura Root reviews the eighth in the historical Jim Stringer series by Andrew Martin: The Baghdad Railway Club;

Terry Halligan reviews Gerald Seymour's The Outsiders, now out in paperback;

Amanda Gillies reviews Lee Weeks's Dead of Winter the first in a new series featuring Detective Constable Ebony Willis

and Lynn Harvey reviews Australian writer Chris Womersley's noir The Low Road.


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.

TV News: The Fall

BBC Two's The Fall, a five episode crime drama begins on 13 May at 9pm:

Gillian Anderson stars as DSI Stella Gibson in the first part of this gripping new investigative thriller. When a murder in Belfast remains unsolved, Gibson is brought in from the London Metropolitan Police to help catch the killer.

Read more about the plot on the BBC's website.

Awards News: CWA Dagger in the Library 2013 - Longlist

The longlist for the 2013 CWA Dagger in the Library has been announced, with 13 authors vying for the title. In the order listed on the CWA's website. You can read Euro Crime reviews of many of the authors' books by clicking on the links below. As I currently specialise in translated fiction I've only read titles from 5 of the 13 authors so far, how many have you read?:

Belinda Bauer
Alison Bruce
S J Bolton
Peter May
Gordon Ferris
Tania Carver
Elly Griffiths
Christopher Fowler
Michael Ridpath
Jane Casey
Phil Rickman
Alex Gray
Frances Brody

"Unlike most other literary prizes, the Dagger in the Library is awarded not for an individual book but for the author’s body of work. Last year’s winner was Steve Mosby, and previous winners have included Mo Hayder, Colin Cotterill, Stuart MacBride and Craig Russell; whilst Lesley Horton and C J Sansom have been Highly Commended.

The nominated authors must be alive, preferably working in Britain and cannot have won the award before. As the award is for a body of work, authors should have published at least three books."