Sweepings: The Trying to Catch Up Edition

Why is it that, no matter how much I work, the amount of stuff I still need to do is so much greater than what I’ve already done? It’s certainly been that kind of week. Consequently, there have been a number of things I’ve read and seen, but haven’t had a chance to comment on--until now. To wit:

• Irish author John Connolly, newly represented in UK bookstores by The Reapers, was kind enough last year to contribute to The Rap Sheet’s “One Book Project,” choosing Ross Macdonald’s 1964 Lew Archer novel, The Chill, as the crime novel he thought had been most criminally overlooked over the years. He returns now to the subject of that novel with a fine short essay in his blog. Connolly writes, in part:

I would describe this book as a ‘nearly perfect’ crime novel, although this implies that Macdonald erred in some way in its creation. I don’t think that’s true. Its imperfections are deliberate, a testament to Macdonald’s courage as a writer and his absolute refusal to fall back on sentimentality. While Alex Kincaid is another of Macdonald’s troubled young men, tainted by the actions of an earlier generation, he is also something of a jerk, and it’s difficult to feel a great deal of sympathy for him. By contrast, Macdonald kills off one of the book’s most attractive characters disturbingly early, and in doing so accentuates the horror of the murderous figure that stalks the novel.

Arguably, Macdonald is the first great psychological novelist that the genre produced. While [Raymond] Chandler tends to look for sociological explanations, Macdonald instead looks inward at the dynamics of families, and in particular the wrong done to children, especially by overprotective mother figures. In this sense, The Chill falls into a group of Macdonald’s books that touch upon Oedipal nightmares.

Connolly picked The Chill, Macdonald’s 11th Archer novel, as the first choice for his online book club to read. An excellent beginning.

• Following a booking at the blog written by its creator, Barbara Fister, the Carnival of the Criminal Minds moves on to German critic Bernd Kochanowski’s Internationale Krimis blog. Eschewing the usual practice of highlighting new crime-fiction-related posts, Kochanowski instead offers a catalogue of older Web entries (interviews, analyses, discussions) that readers may have missed before. And at the end, he presents a selection of German-language blogs that focus on mystery, crime, and thriller fiction. Too bad I didn’t continue with my German lessons from high school …

• While we’re on the subject of librarian Barbara Fister, let me mention, if a bit belatedly, the existence of an intriguing new interview with the author of In the Wind that was posted earlier this week in January Magazine. Fister talks about her writing process, her disgust with the level of capitalism surrounding book publishing these days, and how she uses writing as “a therapeutic way to deal with my negative feelings about George Bush.” Click here to read it all.

• Oh, no, not more crime-fiction awards …

• Ali Karim yesterday participated in Patti Abbott’s new “Friday’s Forgotten Books” series, recalling H.F. Saint’s first and last novel, 1987’s Memoirs of an Invisible Man (not to be confused with Chevy Chase’s 1992 film of the same name). But he was not the only participant. Abbott rounds up all the bloggers who chimed in here.

• I have been woefully remiss in not mentioning the May 2008 edition of Storyglossia, edited by Anthony Neil Smith (Yellow Medicine) and devoted entirely to crime fiction. There’s a feast here of terrific stories from the likes of Kevin Wignall (“A Place for Violence”), Megan Abbott (“Cheer”), Ray Banks (“Everything Must Go”), Vicki Hendricks (“Must Bite!”), and others. Hey, it’s the weekend now. You’ve got time to read. Get you pulp fix here.

• Did you know that novelist Declan Hughes (The Price of Blood) has started a blog? Or that David Housewright (Madman on a Drum) has been guest-logging all this week at Moments in Crime? Hell, the blogging bug seems to have infected even the best of us. Even the dead among us …

• TV Squad’s Bob Sassone and I must be of similar age, because we both seem to remember--often quite fondly--the same TV crime dramas. Earlier this week, he turned the spotlight on a blog called The Popcorn Trick, which had compiled a rundown (complete with video clips) of “The Top 25 Opening Credits of ’80s Television Action Shows.” Now mind, not all of these were great shows, but their main title sequences certainly made them appear worth watching. (Cases in point: Manimal, CHiPs, and T.J. Hooker.) Sassone writes that he’s surprised not to see Spenser: For Hire, Stingray, and Macgyver make the cut. I’m equally shocked--I say, shocked!--not to find the openings of Crime Story, The Equalizer, and Scarecrow and Mrs. King on the list. Where’s Lee Goldberg and his Main Title Heaven when we need them to offer the truly definitive countdown?

• Meanwhile, TV Shows on DVD has the scoop on more special features to be offered with the first-season DVD set of Mannix, due out next month. It also looks as if the 1952 spy series Dangerous Assignment, starring Brian Donlevy, is finally coming to stores in late May. (I can’t say that I’ve ever seen Dangerous Assignment, but it’s been mentioned to me so many times, I may have to at least rent this one.) Finally, look for the second and last season of Burt Reynolds’ series B.L. Stryker on DVD come July 15. I admit, I wasn’t blown away by watching the first season of this ABC detective series again. But for a slow weekend day, it’s not a bad source of entertainment.

• Editor-author Elizabeth Foxwell has posted her enthusiastic defense of older mystery yarns--originally delivered during the recent Malice Domestic XX conference--on the Web. You’ll find it here.

• If you haven’t noticed yet, three fine offerings from the Spring 2008 issue of Mystery Readers Journal are available online (which is great for those of us who are too cheap to actually subscribe to the magazine). Steve Hockensmith (The Black Dove) considers the difficulties in writing about a Wild West known for its colorful language; Edward Marston (The Brighton Express) looks at British railways as “the defining phenomenon of the Victorian age”; and Steven Saylor reveals that his ancient Roman sleuth, Gordianus the Finder, is coming back from the grave in The Triumph of Caesar.

• In related news, Declan Burke reports that Mystery Readers Journal editor Janet Rudolph is looking for Irish writers to contribute to a forthcoming edition of her magazine devoted to Irish mysteries.

• Pulp Pusher’s Damien Seaman profiles London-based publisher Bitter Lemon Press, which has been bringing high-quality, translated foreign crime fiction to English-speaking audiences since 2004.

• Hercule Poirot--comic book sensation? Well, if that’s what it takes to get today’s population of non-readers interested in crime fiction, I guess it’s worth it.

• After a much too long hiatus, Angie Johnson-Schmit is back behind the mike with another author interview at In for Questioning. Her latest guest: Hard Case Crime publisher and author Charles Ardai. “In this week’s show,” Johnson-Schmit explains, “Charles talks about his two novels (Little Girl Lost and Songs of Innocence), why Las Vegas can be a cool place to write, and why ‘Schizophrenia Can Be Fun’ may be the title of his autobiography. He also shares his pick(s) for who he’d like to write the score for Little Girl Lost--The Musical, and why he doesn’t get sick of reading ’n writing.” Listen to their lively exchange here.

• For a Webzine with a tough-guy image, each issue of ThugLit certainly seems to creep onto the scene on little cat feet. Seriously, guys, somebody needs to crank up your publicity machine. You’re depending too much on people either happening serendipitously upon new issues, or else being notified by some hapless blogger (like Bill Crider or me) that each new edition has been released. That said, it’s hard to argue with the quality of what ThugLit produces every couple of months. The April/May edition includes stories by Kieran Shea (“Faith-Based Initiative”), Ben Nadler (“Hot Dog Money”), and Brian Murphy (“Who Do I Have to Kill to Get a Little Respect?”). The full contents can be found here. Oh, and in case you quibble with my contention that ThugLit’s PR efforts aren’t measuring up, just click over to the page where you’re supposed to register for e-mail updates. Every time I try to sign up, I receive an error message.

• How good are you with James Bond trivia?

• While a certainly elderly U.S. presidential candidate seems congenitally ill-equipped to voice coherent or consistent messages, Booklist’s Bill Ott is having no such difficulty selecting his favorite crime novels of 2008. Even though it’s only May. I wish I possessed that sort of clairvoyance. It almost makes publishing books for the next seven months irrelevant, doesn’t it?

• Finally, I want to bring to your attention two recent posts by Martin Edwards, whose new Harry Devlin novel (the first in nine years), Waterloo Station, is new in UK bookstores this month. First off, he laments the disappearance of Liza Cody from the fiction-writing world, after she brought us that shrewd investigator, Anna Lee (Dupe, Backhand). Second, he alerts us to the publication of the British Crime Writers’ Association’s new anthology, M.O.: Crimes of Method, the sequel to last year’s I.D.: Crimes of Identity. I’ve found Edwards’ blog, ‘Do You Write Under Your Own Name?’, to be consistently interesting, and have therefore added it to this page’s extensive blogroll.