Who Is Lou Sciortino?: A Novel about Murder, the Movies, and Mafia Family Values

Here's one to interest Camilleri fan, Uriah at Crime Scraps. This will be out in May in the US and June in the UK.

Synopsis (from amazon.co.uk):
Lou Sciortino, grandson of the most feared boss of the L.A. mafia, has Prozac in his pocket and the Godfather in his blood. He knows he can't escape The Family but settles for laundering their money in peace - or so he thinks. When a bomb explodes at his film company's offices he's sent to Sicily 'for some sunshine' but ends up on the trail of a wannabe rock star who may or may not be linked to the shooting of a policeman in Uncle Mimmo's shop. In this crazy world where your friends are not your friends, killers are glamorous in black Armani, and grandfathers to be feared above all men, can the inimitable Lou solve the murder? Ottavio Cappellani's mesmerizing debut is punchy, pacy and truly stylish: a page-turner that takes Italy's biggest cliche and explodes it from every angle.

You can read more at the author's agent's page.

The website's back!/Competitions

I discovered when I got home from work half hour ago that the Euro Crime website had been disabled earlier today. A victim of its own success it had exceeded the monthly bandwidth allowance. I've coughed up and upgraded, so all is well again.

It's almost the last chance to enter March's competitions. If there any Americans reading who'd like to win some Wire in the Blood DVDs do have a look at the easy peasy competition.

And now it's time for tea!

The Cairo Diary by Maxim Chattam

One to look out for in June. From Minotaur's Spring catalogue:

A bestselling historical thriller from France, set in meticulously researched locales with a healthy dose of mystery and intrigue.

Cairo, 1928: Several children disappear and are found horribly mutilated in the tombs just outside the city. Has a ghoul from the Arabian Nights come to life? British inspector Jeremy Matheson follows the trail of the monster while grappling with his own past as well as with the charged political situation in British-occupied Cairo.

Mont-Saint-Michel, 2005: Marion has been spirited away from Paris and brought to a remote monastery by the French Secret Service.When she finds a diary dating from 1928 in the monastery library hidden inside an Edgar Allan Poe jacket and penned by Jeremy Matheson, she is inexorably pulled into the past as she follows his investigation.The two stories intertwine and culminate in an absolutely baffling climax and will leave the reader questioning his sense of the truth.

“One of the best contemporary thriller authors…there is a toughness to his stories, a truth to his characters and a writing style that, even though it flirts with the fantastical, always stays realistic. Chattam knows how to make the most of his readers’ fears and phobias.” —LE MONDE

After stints as an actor, night watchman and bookseller, MAXIM CHATTAM studied criminology in Paris. He is also the author of several plays and a well-received trilogy (The Soul of Evil, In Darkness and Evil Spells). He lives in Poissy, France.

Update: Read the Euro Crime review of The Cairo Diary.

British Book Awards - results

The full results are here but the winner of the BCA Crime Thriller of the year was Ian Rankin's 'The Naming of the Dead'.

The 6000...

The Guardian has a lengthy article on first time novelists and includes some interesting statistics at the end:

· Around 70,000 titles are published a year in Britain, of which 6,000 are novels

· Any large UK publisher will receive 2,000 unsolicited novel manuscripts in a year

· The average sale of a hardback book by a first-time writer is 400 copies

· Many publishers use this rule of thumb to work out advances: they pay 50 per cent of the royalty earnings expected from the first print run

· According to the latest edition of Private Eye, first novel The Thirteenth Tale by ex-teacher Diane Setterfield (author's advance £800,000) has sold 13,487 copies to date. Only 516,129 to go and the book's paid for itself...

One of the debut novelists mentioned is Ivo Stourton whose first (crime) novel is set in Cambridge and will be out in June. Read the whole article here.

The new Robert Harris?

From the Publisher's Lunch newsletter:

28-year-old screenwriter Tom Rob Smith's debut novel CHILD 44, pitched as in the tradition of Robert Harris and Martin Cruz Smith, set in the Soviet Union on the eve of Stalin's death, and based in part on real events, to Suzanne Baboneau at Simon & Schuster UK, at auction, for publication in spring 2008, by James Gill at PFD.

From his agent's page:

Tom Rob Smith is 28. He graduated from the University of Cambridge in 2001 with a First-class degree in English Literature and in the same year was awarded the Harper-Wood Creative Writing scholarship to the Italian University of Pavia. He has worked as a screenwriter ever since. His UK television work includes Doctors and Dream Team, and he also storylined Cambodia's first ever soap opera for the BBC World Service Trust. He has a number of feature-film screenplays in development, including Somewhere in the Shadow, adapted from a short story by Jeff Noon, as well as a number of projects for television. His debut novel Child 44 will be published in 2008. Rights have been sold in the UK, US, France, Netherlands, and Italy.

Born in England to a Swedish mother and an English father, Tom lives and works in London.

Mini Update to Euro Crime

As I'm going to be away for a few days from tomorrow, I'm just doing a mini update this weekend.

The four new reviews this week are:

HARRIS, JOANNE - Gentlemen and Players (reviewed by Yvonne Klein)

JACKSON, LEE - The Welfare of the Dead (audio book) (reviewed by me)

LEVACK, SIMON - Aztec: City of Spies (reviewed by Terry Halligan)

NOORT, SASKIA - The Dinner Club (reviewed by Karen Chisholm)


Just one more week to enter March's competitions:

Win one of five copies of 'Haggard Hawk' by Marcus Barr (UK & Europe)

Win one of five copies of 'Cross' by Ken Bruen (No restrictions)

Win one of ten copies of A Greater Evil/Evil is Done by Natasha Cooper (US, UK & Europe)

Win one of two sets of Seasons 1-3 of Wire in the Blood on DVD (R1) (US only)

Next month's prizes will include an award winner and a title recently longlisted for the Orange prize.

Gumshoe Awards - 2006

The nominees for the Best European Crime Novel in 2006 are:

Ken Bruen - The Dramatist
Gianrico Carofiglio - A Walk in the Dark
Philippe Claudel - By a Slow River (UK: Grey Souls)
Karin Fossum - When the Devil Holds the Candle
Barbara Vine - The Minotaur

(The Gumshoe Awards are given by Mystery Ink each year to recognize the best achievements in the world of crime fiction. The nominated books were chosen from those published for the first time in the United States in 2006. The winners will be announced on May 1, 2007.)

Susan Hill's Simon Serrailler series on tv?

There's just a bit on Susan Hill's website that says:

The three current crime novels have been bought for TV by Bentley Productions, Maker of the top ITV drama series MIDSOMER MURDERS and JUDGE JOHN DEED.

The first three being, 'The Various Haunts of Men', 'Pure in the Heart' and 'The Risk of Darkness'.

A fourth, 'The Going Down of the Sun' will be published either June 2007 or June 2008 according to amazon!

Gentlemen & Players

According to Book2Book, Joanne Harris's 'Gentlemen & Players' has been optioned for tv.

The agent Brie Burkeman in association with Serafina Clarke has just concluded an option on the television rights in GENTLEMEN & PLAYERS by Joanne Harris (Chocolat, Five Quarters Of The Orange) to Bentley Productions.

Peter Ransley (Fallen Angel, Fingersmith) is attached to adapt.

The Euro Crime review of 'Gentlemen & Players' (by Yvonne Klein) will be uploaded at the weekend and given the little I know about the plot, I think this will be quite a tricky proposition to stay true to the book.

Orion Newsletter

The second edition of the Orion newsletter - Most Wanted - has now been released. It covers Lisa Gardner, Boris Akunin and June Hampson. You can read it and subscribe here.

It includes the following snippet:

STOP PRESS: THE WINTER QUEEN is to be made into a film.

Paul Verhoeven will begin shooting in summer, 07 in St. Petersburg and in London. Milla Jovavich and Dan Stevens are to star.

A crime novel from Transita

I blogged about non crime author Christine Coleman back in October when she made an author visit to Mere Green library. She's published by Transita, a company which features main characters in the more mature age group.

I was pleased to see in London's Murder One, that they've recently published a crime novel - 'Blood Precious' by Sara Banerji - which came out in January.

Synopsis:

Snobbish, aloof and eighty years old, Lady Arabella Cunningham-Smythe wishes she were dead. Then at least she could join her late husband as they had planned so meticulously before he died.

But a band of well meaning friends and relations are determined to thwart her wishes. It is only when her beloved four year old granddaughter Naomi - who has magical powers - is kidnapped that things change. Lady Arabella must regain the will to live if she is to turn detective, successfully outwit a mass murderer – and learn to master her mobile phone.

You can read about the author and an extract from the book at the Transita website.

Casino Royale on DVD

The eagerly awaited two-disc collector's edition (R2) of Casino Royale comes out tomorrow (19th).

Special features:

Becoming Bond (30 mins)
James Bond For Real (30 mins)
Death in Venice (30 mins)
Bond Girls are Forever ( 50+ mins)
5 News wraps
Music Video

Amazon.co.uk have the trailer on their page, whereas Play has a teensy clip from the extras.

MI6 review the R1 version in terms of the 'technical merits of the disc and the special features'.

There will be less of Daniel Craig's flesh on show in the follow up according to a report on Digital Spy, in which the actor says that he doesn't want any more nude scenes.

The Mothering Sunday Updates to Euro Crime

A reminder of this month's competitions:

Win one of five copies of 'Haggard Hawk' by Marcus Barr (UK & Europe)

Win one of five copies of 'Cross' by Ken Bruen (No restrictions)

Win one of ten copies of A Greater Evil/Evil is Done by Natasha Cooper (US, UK & Europe)

Win one of two sets of Seasons 1-3 of Wire in the Blood on DVD (R1) (US only)

This week's new reviews are:

Players by Paul McAuley reviewed by Pat Austin
The Prone Gunman by Jean-Patrick Manchette reviewed by me

and revisiting the latest books by a couple of European masters:

Voices by Arnaldur Indridason, reviewed by Maxine (Petrona) Clarke,
Wash This Blood Clean From My Hand by Fred Vargas, reviewed by Karen Chisholm

Bibliographies have been added for - Anthea Cohen, Vangelis Hatziyannidis, Alan Hunter, Peter Lengyel, Lee Martin, Sophia McDougall, Laura Spinney, Carl Storm, Jerry Sykes and Brian Thompson - and updated for - Jan Kjaerstad, Scott Mariani and Sue Walker.

There is now a list of authors born in Scotland. (Any additions appreciated).

The news page was updated yesterday with links to the previous week's reviews and articles in the UK papers.

Details of all the updates can be found on the site progress page.

More Blue Murder episodes

TV Scoop reports that ITV will shortly begin filming three 90 minute episodes of Blue Murder. Blue Murder stars Caroline Quentin as DCI Janine Lewis and like Life on Mars, is set in Manchester.

Sunnie Gill recently reviewed the book of the second episode, Hit and Run, written by Cath Staincliffe.

Roger Jon Ellory at Mere Green Library

Last night Roger Jon Ellory braved the cross-city train line to come up to Mere Green library to give a talk and read from his forthcoming book. Though a native of Birmingham he has chosen to set his books in America. His new book, out in August, is 'A Quiet Belief in Angels' and is set both in Augusta Falls and New York and covers a time span of over fifty years. The audience got a sneak preview as Mr Ellory read out the prologue and the first chapter. There were many gasps from the audience when Mr Ellory revealed that he had ony spent six short visits in the US and most of his research was from maps. Nonetheless a friend of his has told him that he'd captured a New York neighbourhood perfectly, even though he hadn't been there. Mr Ellory hopes that he writes crime novels that leaving people thinking and remembering them unlike the quick thrill reads you can devour and remember nothing of a day later.

When asked if he had any specific writing schedule he replied that his was ridiculous as he worked an 85 hour week as a drug rehabilitation counsellor and would do a few hours writing after getting home at 10pm. At the weekend he would write 9-6pm, Sat and 9-8pm Sun and he rarely goes on holiday.

Mr Ellory didn't bring any books to sign but I hope he notices a surge in his public lending rights money as we commandeered every copy in Birmingham library for our display and every copy went out swiftly.

(The above is from memory, so I apologise if there're any errors. Mysterious Yarns also came and I hope she enjoyed it too.)

Mid month reminder of the competitions

Everybody can enter at least one of the competitions, no matter where they live. The geographical restrictions are in brackets.

--Win one of five copies of 'Haggard Hawk' by Marcus Barr (UK & Europe)
--Win one of five copies of 'Cross' by Ken Bruen (No restrictions)
--Win one of ten copies of A Greater Evil/Evil is Done by Natasha Cooper (US, UK & Europe)
--Win one of two sets of Seasons 1-3 of Wire in the Blood on DVD (R1) (US only)

This way lies competitions

The Return of Resnick?

From John Harvey's Winter newsletter, which you can read in full and sign up for here:

The Nottingham-based Five Leaves Press have commissioned a new story from me for their new Crime Express series of single, longish stories which will be issued in editions of around 1,000 copies. Some of you out there will be pleased to know that this features none other than Charlie Resnick, still labouring on within Notts CID and living, happily enough, with his former sergeant Lynn Kellogg, now an inspector in the Force Crime Directorate [and making a brief appearance as such in the aforementioned Gone to Ground]. My plan is for Charlie to meet up with another of my fictional characters, former police officer and professional soccer player and currently private eye, Jack Kiley, who makes the short journey from north London to Nottingham in the course of his investigation into the disappearance of a Iraq veteran who has gone missing with some unaccounted for arms and ammunition.

Jack and Charlie will find some common ground in Kiley’s one appearance at the Notts County ground, coming off the bench for Charlton Athletic in what was then the League Cup, and after a few shared pints and a few more reminiscences, proceed from a basis of mutual respect.

If all goes well, and the partnership feels right, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that they might both feature in the next-to-be-written novel. Not a full-scale Resnick novel as such, perhaps, but one in which he has far more than the walk-on role the Elder books allowed.

Alatriste film to be released in the UK?

I've been surfing away trying to find a release date for the film or dvd of Alatriste - the most expensive Spanish film ever, starring Viggo Mortensen, which is based on several Captain Alatriste books by Arturo Perez-Reverte. I've found mention of a release date of the film as May 2007. Meanwhile, residents of the Manchester area can go along to the Cornerhouse which is showing Alatriste on the 23rd, 24th and 25th March.


Read the Euro Crime review of the audio version of Captain Alatriste, the first book in the five book series.

Lewis on DVD (R2)

As of yesterday, the pilot and the three episodes of season 1 of Lewis became available on R2 DVD. Online, the set costs about £16.

From Play.com:

Kevin Whately returns in this new drama. Picking up five years after his mentor Inspector Morse's death, it sees Lewis, now an inspector himself, returning to Oxford after two years overseas. Back in his old stomping ground, he is teamed with a new sidekick Det Sgt. James Hathaway, and is anxious to prove himself!

Episodes Comprise:

1. Whom The Gods Would Destroy
2. Old School Ties
3. Expiation

Special Features

The Pilot Episode
"Behind the Scenes" Featurette