Euro Crime reviewers' favourite reads of 2007

I've asked all the contributors to Euro Crime to choose their five favourite European reads of 2007 and I've now put that information together (with five from my whittled list of ten) here. I'd like to take the opportunity to thank: Pat Austin, Declan Burke, Karen Chisholm, Maxine Clarke, Crimeficreader, Sunnie Gill, Terry Halligan, Geoff Jones, Yvonne Klein, Carla McKay, Norman Price, Mike Ripley, Laura Root and Fiona Walker for their hard work which allows me to upload five new reviews every week.

Summarising the results, the most mentioned titles are:

3 votes:
Gianrico Carofiglio - Reasonable Doubts
Arnaldur Indridason - The Draining Lake (plus one vote for Voices)
Brian McGilloway - Borderlands

2 votes:
Colin Cotterill - The Coroner's Lunch
Karin Fossum - Calling Out for You (plus one vote for Black Seconds)
Reginald Hill - The Death of Dalziel
Gene Kerrigan - The Midnight Choir
John Lawton - Second Violin
Stuart McBride - Dying Light
Ken McCoy - Hammerhead
Jo Nesbo - The Devil's Star
Jo Nesbo - The Redbreast
Stef Penney - The Tenderness of Wolves
Ian Rankin - Exit Music (plus one vote for The Naming of the Dead)
Matt Rees - The Bethlehem Murders
Fred Vargas - Wash This Blood Clean From My Hand
Jan Costin Wagner - Ice Moon

Carla Banks, Ken Bruen and Andrea Camilleri also received two votes but for different titles.
See the breakdown by reviewer - here.

Can you have too many books?

I always enjoy Lucy Mangan's column in the Guardian but last weekend's should hit the spot with my fellow bibliophiles. I'm quoting some of the relevant paragraphs but it's worth reading the whole article to read about a unique filing system!

Oh, thank God. What a relief! And just at the last moment, too... I had, you see, been about to insert my absolute, final, will-be-accomplished-if-it-kills-me list of New Year's resolutions into the laminating machine. I would thereby have been committing myself irrevocably to a promise postponed for several years - namely, not to buy any more books until I've finished reading the ones arrayed along the Read Next shelf, piled up in the fireplace and stacked semi-neatly on the floor of the sitting room, study, bedroom and kitchen. And on the stairs. And under the bed. You get the idea. Lots of books. Unread.

Saving me this year from taking unwanted vows is a line I came across in Nick Hornby's The Complete Polysyllabic Spree from Gabriel Zaid's So Many Books!, in which Zaid says that "the truly cultured are capable of owning thousands of unread books without losing their composure or their desire for more".

In 2008 I'm gonna get cultured. Or at least stop thinking of my unread books as needless extravagance, overindulgence, inexcusable surplus and start revelling in living amidst such splendid confusion, with so many worlds at my fingertips. And in the fireplace. Either way, this will require that my acquisitive instincts continue to be indulged, not denied. Starting, of course, with Mr Zaid's gloriously exculpatory tome.

I've bought/acquired three books so far in 2008 and ordered another one. I use the library heavily but cannot imagine not increasing my book collection over the year...can you?

More George Gently

The George Gently programme repeated last night, supposedly set in the North-East (though the books are set in East Anglia!) was actually filmed in Ireland: Dublin and Wicklow. Having a look for filming locations, I stumbled upon the Irish film board website which indicates two more episodes are planned:

GEORGE GENTLY – Episodes 2 & 3
After the success of Episode 1 entitled GENTLY’S LAST CASE, which was shot on location in Dublin last Christmas, this BBC TV series is to come back to Dublin to shoot Episodes 2 & 3. Directed again by Ciaran Donnelly and produced by Element, this 1960’s detective series stars Martin Shaw as Inspector George Gently, one of the few good men at Scotland Yard where corruption is rife and unchecked. The series is set at a time when the line between the police and criminals has become increasingly blurred; when the proliferation of drugs is about to change the face of policing forever; when Britain’s youth stand on the brink of a social and sexual revolution. Episode one entitled GENTLY’S LAST CASE shot on location in Dublin in early ’07 and was very well received when it screened on the BBC.

You can watch George Gently online for six more days on the BBCiplayer (not sure if there are geographic restrictions and you may need to use IE).

George MacDonald Fraser RIP

George MacDonald Fraser, author of the Flashman novels has died aged 82. From his obituary in The Independent:

The novelist George MacDonald Fraser, author of the popular Flashman series of adventure stories, has died after a long battle against cancer.

The 82-year-old former soldier worked as a journalist for The Herald newspaper, then known as The Glasgow Herald, for many years.

He also wrote screenplays and a memoir of his experiences as an infantryman in the Burma campaign, but it is for his semi-historical novels based around Sir Harry Flashman that MacDonald Fraser will be best remembered.

The Flashman series is based on the bully character of Thomas Hughes' Victorian classic Tom Brown's Schooldays grown up and serving as an officer in the Army, fighting, drinking and womanising his way around the British Empire.

Each of the novels purports to come from packets of faux-autobiographical notes –the Flashman Papers – discovered in the 1960s. When the first instalment of these entirely fictional memoirs, created by MacDonald Fraser, first appeared in the US in 1969, around a third of its 40 reviewers believed they were a genuine historical find. One reviewer said that the works were "the most important discovery since the Boswell Papers".

Although many found Flashman's 19th-century racism and sexism distasteful, the books sold in huge numbers and MacDonald Fraser was praised for his attention to historical detail. He published the final book in the series in 1994.

Catherine O'Flynn wins Costa prize

After being short and long-listed for every literary prize going, Catherine O'Flynn's 'What was Lost' has won the 2007 Costa first novel award. From the Guardian:

All disheartened, kicked-in-the-teeth aspiring novelists should take heart: after being rejected by 14 literary agents, the 15th said yes, and former postwoman Catherine O'Flynn yesterday made off with one of the year's most prestigious literary prizes.

Her novel, What Was Lost, was named winner of the 2007 Costa first novel award after being longlisted but not winning the Booker and the Orange prize and being shortlisted for the Guardian's first book award. O'Flynn said: "I hope it does give people hope. It's very hard to get published and it's hard if you go in there with this burning ambition. I didn't have that, I was protected by my natural pessimism."

The judges described What Was Lost, based around the endless corridors and CCTV world of a city shopping centre, as an extraordinary book. "A formidable novel blending humour and pathos in a cleverly constructed and absorbing mystery."

Top Ten for 2007

I'll be publishing the Euro Crime reviewers' top 5 European reads of 2007, as soon as I've put the page together. In the meantime, here are my top ten reads from last year which happen to be all European. I do read mostly European books so I suppose it makes sense!

Rounding the Mark - Andrea Camilleri
The Scent of the Night - Andrea Camilleri
The Serbian Dane - Leif Davidsen
The Princess of Burundi - Kjell Eriksson
Calling Out for You! - Karin Fossum
The Chinaman - Friedrich Glauser
The Exception - Christian Jungersen
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson (published 2008)
The Devil's Star - Jo Nesbo
The Redbreast - Jo Nesbo

(The links are to my personal reviews, though the other titles have been reviewed on Euro Crime. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo review will be up next weekend.)

Which books are you looking forward to in 2008?

I've been updating some of the reference pages on Euro Crime: Discussions, Events, Links and Shops and have just uploaded the revised 'forthcoming titles pages' - ordered by author or by month.

From the Winter/Spring months, I'm particularly looking forward to reading:

(the very long awaited) Death's Sister by Louise Anderson
White Nights by Ann Cleeves
The Spoke by Friedrich Glauser
The Mesmerist's Apprentice by L M Jackson
The Ice Princess by Camilla Leckberg
Nemesis by Jo Nesbo
An Expert in Murder by Nicola Upson

So which new titles are you looking forward to reading?

Ken to play Shardlake

I missed this in the Observer a few weeks ago. Apparently the BBC are in talks to film C J Sansom's Tudor series with Kenneth Branagh as the main character:

Branagh, 46, plans to take the role of a hunchback lawyer named Shardlake who works for the key power brokers of the Tudor court, Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer. Negotiations to bring Shardlake, the idiosyncratic character at the centre of a series of mystery novels by CJ Sansom, to the small screen are believed to be in their final stages.

Read the Euro Crime review of the latest in the series, Sovereign.

Competition for UK residents - closing today...

Last chance to win a copy of Thirty-Three Teeth by Colin Cotterill (UK residents only)

Website update

I've just updated the 'News' page over on the website. There aren't many new links at this time of year.

Just a taster...

I'm not back yet in total but I have now finished The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo which is excellent as reported already by Ali. Here's the first paragraph from the prologue:

It happened every year, was almost a ritual. And this was his eighty-second birthday. When, as usual, the flower was delivered, he took off the wrapping paper and then picked up the telephone to call Detective Superintendent Morell who, when he retired, had moved to Lake Siljan in Dalarna. They were not only the same age, they had been born on the same day - which was something of an irony given the circumstances. The old policeman was sitting with his coffee, waiting, expecting the call.

It's out on the 10th January and amazon have it at half price. It would still be excellent value at full price. I suppose (sniffle) it's now a year's wait until #2...

Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas!


(from AllPosters)

Move over Trivial Pursuit (last minute present idea)

I don't know how the passed me by but I just found a mention in the Bath Literature Festival programme of a new board game called 'Bookchase'.

From the official site:

"Bookchase® is a board game about books. Important books & trivial books. Classic works and wonderful ideas for children. If it has been written & has any kind of relevance, you might find it in Bookchase®. Questions can be about anything - what pencil someone used to write with, to the name of an author's cat. From Homer to Horowitz, Proust to Pilkey, Dahl to Dickens, Nursery Rhymes to Crime fiction - all kinds of books and writing are here.

Who's qualified to play? Anyone! Never read a book - you could still win. Read all the best books in the world - you could still lose. Where's the fun if you knew who would win at the start and who's to say what might happen in the new, classic, fun, board game of chance and skill.

Bookchase® draws on the huge diversity of thought and ideas since human beings first figured out how to write and think - ...but at the end of the day -it is still just a board game. Have fun. We have making it. The Bookchase® Team"

Also there are "1200 multiple-choice questions in 6 exciting categories - Children & Fun, Crime & Thrillers, Plays & Poetry, Fantasy & Sci-Fi, Travel Adventure, Classics & Modern".

And from next year you'll be able to submit your own questions online.

RRP is c. £30.

R J Ellory hits the big time

The new Richard and Judy book club list for 2008 has been announced and it's good news for R J Ellory whose 'A Quiet Belief in Angels' has been selected. His appears to be the only crime title chosen. The full list, from Publishing News is here:

9 January A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini (Bloomsbury)

16 January Random Acts of Heroic Love, Danny Scheinmann (Black Swan)

23 January The Rose of Sebastopol, Katharine McMahon (W&N)

30 January A Quiet Belief in Angels, RJ Ellory (Orion)

6 February Notes From an Exhibition, Patrick Gale (Fourth Estate)

13 February Then We Came to the End, Joshua Ferris (Viking)

20 February The Visible World, Mark Slouka (Portobello)

27 February Mister Pip, Lloyd Jones (John Murray)

5 March Blood River, Tim Butcher (Chatto)

12 March The Welsh Girl, Peter Ho Davies (Sceptre)

Regular readers of this blog might remember that R J Ellory gave a talk at Mere Green Library earlier this year and read an exclusive extract from said book.

For the Crime Fan who has everything...

$8.95 on Shakespeare's Den. You can also get Edgar Allan Poe and several other literary figures.

Hat Tip: Oline Cogdill's blog.

It's Christmas Crime (6) - Anne Perry (again)

Another year, another Christmas novella from Anne Perry:

Synopsis: The fifth in "Anne Perry's" series of charming Christmas novellas. Runcorn, Monk's ex-boss and a bachelor, travels to Anglesey hoping to stave off the loneliness of the Christmas season and the memories of Melisande, the woman he fell desperately in love with in "Dark Assassin". His efforts are in vain as he immediately meets Melisande's brother, John Barclay, and learns of Melisand's presence in Anglesey.
Although a widow, Runcorn believes that Melisande is too far above him in society for him to win her heart and then fate intervenes. The vicar of Anglesey's sister is discovered murdered and Barclay is implicated in the crime. Melisande, mindful of Runcorn's experience, asks him to help clear her brother's name, even though the official head of the investigation is Chief Constable Faraday, her soon-to-be fiance. As Runcorn investigates, he learns that life for an upper class woman is hard especially when you are considered unmarriageable. Could this be a reason for murder? And will Runcorn be able to solve the case, and in doing so perhaps win Melisande's heart, or will his efforts be in vain?

Read an excerpt from A Christmas Beginning on the Random House site.

Publishing News - Markaris and Maitland

From The Bookseller:

As part of its EuroCrime series, Arcadia has also paid a good four-figure sum for UK and Commonwealth rights in The Major Shareholder and Che Killed Himself by Greek writer Petros Markaris. Rights were obtained from Susanne Bauknecht at Diogenes Verlag, Zurich, with publication slated for 2009.

UK rights to Barry Maitland's forthcoming novel No Trace, in the same genre, have also been acquired by Arcadia from David Higham on behalf of Wenona Byrne at Australian Literary Management, with a four-figure sum once more changing hands. The book will appear in 2008.

No Trace has already been published in Australia and the US.

The column also has details of a new book by Emma Tennant which has Princess Di coming back from the dead to minister to Prince Harry...

Scandinavian Crime/Mystery novels coming out in 2008

Currently there's quite a bit of buzz on the mailing lists I'm on about my current read - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. By all accounts so far, it could be a rival for Vargas for the International Dagger.

I've put a couple of lists together on amazon for new Scandinavian crime novels coming out in 2008. One is for amazon.com and one for amazon.co.uk. They are slightly different due to books coming out earlier in one country than another.

New Scandinavian Crime/Mystery Novels (amazon.com)

Forthcoming Scandinavian Crime Novels (amazon.co.uk)

Make your reservations for Harrogate...

I've just seen the list of authors attending 2008 Harrogate Crime writing festival. My cat was looking at me quite strangely as I squeaked when I saw who was signed up...Euro Crime's crime writing hero...Jo Nesbo. Now I was all set to go to just Crime Fest as Karin Fossum and Yrsa Sigurðardóttir are attending that but now what shall I do. The main problem I have is that I work most Saturdays and can only take 3 off in a year so I'll have to beg some favours to swap my Saturdays off.

The list of authors attending can be found here.

Bargains on amazon.co.uk

Here's a very good deal - Amazon.co.uk are listing Reasonable Doubts by Gianrico Carofiglio at £4.99.

Need some convincing to splash out? Read Euro Crime reviews 1 and 2.

Then browse amazon's list of nearly 300 crime paperbacks at up to 50% off which includes other such gems like the paperback of The Coroner's Lunch.