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  • Diana Spechler: Who by Fire: A Novel (P.S.)

    Diana Spechler: Who by Fire: A Novel (P.S.)
    Spechler's unfliching, beautifully written debut strikes at the heart of how one catastrophic event creates a fissure so deep it breaks a small family into fragmented pieces. A little girl is kidnapped, presumed dead, and over a decade later her mother is still searching for answers, her older sister seeks solace in meaningless sex and her brother - who blames himself for the crime's commission - finds his life's solution among ultra-Orthodox Judaism. Spechler uses the inciting event to show the ways in which family members cling to and turn away from each other, do terrible things with the best intentions and show the comforts and prejudices of religiosity with a compassionate eye and voice.

  • Iain Levison: Dog Eats Dog

    Iain Levison: Dog Eats Dog
    First published in France a few years ago, Bitter Lemon press finally makes this darkly comic gem available in English. When a bank robber, bleeding profusely from his last and very botched job, lands in a sleepy New Hampshire college town, disaster is pretty much inevitable. Never is that more true than for Elias White, roped into being the robber's accomplice as a result of an ill-fated dalliance glimpsed through an open window, and for FBI agent Denise Lupo, whose ability is less dogged and more fragmented. Levison nails the academic atmosphere and its jarring juxtaposition with the criminal underworld, but most of all he's clearly having fun with his given premise.

  • Matthew Hall: The Art of Breaking Glass

    Matthew Hall: The Art of Breaking Glass
    If this debut were published in 2008 instead of 1997, I suspect it would have been greeted with the same acclaim and the same sense that this is a major talent with a great deal in store for his career. Because holy hell, this has tremendous pacing, wonderful characters and an offbeat and very unique voice. But since its original publication, the book is all but out of print and there's no new novel from Hall in sight, as he's concentrated on TV and screenwriting duties. So read this book and hope that a) some publisher decides to reissue it b) Hall follows it up someday.

  • Victor Gischler: Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse: A Novel

    Victor Gischler: Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse: A Novel
    After four crime novels, Gischler turns to something a little different - and a lot more unclassifiable - with this incredibly funny, violent, panoramic and pulpy apocalyptic novel. The world Mortimer Tate left behind was about to go into ruins but what he returns to nine years later is littered with machine guns, strip clubs and people looking out for their best interests (both literally and carnivorously.) With the help of an eclectic crew of sidekicks and gun-toting babes, Mortimer prepares to save the world at the lost city of Atlanta - whether he likes it or not.

  • Zoe Sharp: Third Strike: A Thriller

    Zoe Sharp: Third Strike: A Thriller
    Once again, Zoe Sharp finds a way to make the thriller genre her own by focusing on the psychological toll that violence takes upon a person. By the end of THIRD STRIKE, Charlie Fox is at a very dark place, fully cognizant of the consequences her actions have taken upon those she's been asked to guard and those she loves, and I was profoundly disturbed in a way I haven't been after reading a thriller in quite some time. This is a long, long way from mindless fluff, and if you're prepared to travel some very dark and thoughtful corners, this is the book (and series) to read.

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« The North Still Has Frozen Spots | Main | Darkening the English Mystery »

April 18, 2008

The London Times Gets List-Happy

Passover pre-empts the Weekend Update, but before I go gorge myself on Seder food, it's worth pointing to the London Times' special on the top 50 Crime Writers, not only because it will provoke the usual rounds of debate as all these lists do, but because of the accompanying articles:

And the list, whatever your thoughts, was picked by a pretty good panel of judges, I have to say.

Posted at 05:30 PM in World of Mystery |

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Comments

Nice post! :)

Posted by:Mikey | April 18, 2008 at 06:29 PM

Thanks for the pointer Sarah. An interesting list, perhaps a bit light on with 21st century writers, and not an Australian author among despite the fact that there are a few who have been acknowledged as genre ground breakers. - e.g. Patricia Carlon springs to mind, Michael Innes, Peter Temple. Seems to me to be a list a little influenced by the fact that the writer's work has become better known (even influential of the visual genre) through TV or film too.

Posted by:Kerrie Smith | April 18, 2008 at 07:01 PM

As such lists go, this is one of the better ones I've seen.

The three writers who leap out at me immediately as being missing: Ross Thomas, Larry Block and Michael Connelly. Oh, and Thomas Perry.

But still... Not bad.

Posted by:David J. Montgomery | April 18, 2008 at 07:10 PM

I can't believe they omitted Donald E. Westlake.

Posted by:John D | April 18, 2008 at 08:16 PM

No Ruth Rendell(In my opinion, she is the greatest in place of Highsmith), Margaret Millar, Ellery Queen, Thomas H. Cook.......

What a nonsense....Maybe, this article was intended to make a repartee to Daily Telegraph's feature article, this is also bad.

Posted by:Jun | April 18, 2008 at 10:12 PM

Ooops, My mistake. There is Ruth Rendell, ranking 18.

Posted by:Jun | April 18, 2008 at 10:24 PM

thanks for the suggestion! ;)

Posted by:Olivia | April 18, 2008 at 10:29 PM

Can't really argue with their "Tartan Noir" selections, but I wish Denise Mina had made it. In ten years I expect she'll be a consensus pick for lists of thsi sort.

Posted by:John C. Ford | April 20, 2008 at 08:12 PM

A smart list, but I agree with John D that Westlake should have been in there.

Posted by:Antony B | April 21, 2008 at 07:39 AM

Jun wrote:

"Margaret Millar, Ellery Queen, Thomas H. Cook......."

Don't worry, they're on MY list:

http://atthevillarose.blogspot.com/2008/04/30-mystery-writers-daily-telegraph-and.html

Posted by:Xavier Lechard | April 22, 2008 at 04:55 AM

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