Bullet Points: Pre-St. Patrick’s Day Edition

• In the run-up to the 50th anniversary of Raymond Chandler’s death on March 26, Larry Harnish has been mining the back issues of the Los Angeles Times for controversial, clever, or coincidental material about the creator of private eye Philip Marlowe that he can fit into his Times blog, the local history-oriented Daily Mirror. He’s turned up some true oddities, including Roy Huggins’ short review of The Little Sister from 1949, a look back at Chandler’s City of Angels, and the tiny death notice for Cissy Chandler, the wife whose passing may have helped hasten the master author’s demise. You can now mine Harnish’s collection of clips here.

• The latest short-story contribution to Beat the Pulp is a tight little nut of a tale called “Identity Theft,” by Robert Weibezahl.

• Prose perfectionists take note: Baltimore Sun copy editor John E. McIntyre endeavors to bring good grammar to hard-boiled fiction. I can’t tell whether he’s serious when he suggests that this piece will be part of a series, but I hope so. (Hat tip to Elizabeth Foxwell.)

• March is apparently “Love Your Indie” Month, celebrating the continuing existence of small independent bookstores. The time is now to go out and buy books from the establishment you’re always saying is important for your neighborhood, but that you only too rarely visit. (Yeah, you know who you are!) Joe Hill, Stephen King’s son, is sweetening the prospect by holding a contest, the prize being a now-rare, signed and slip-cased copy of his 2008 novella, Gunpowder. The simple rules for entering are here.

• Here’s a book I haven’t thought about in a long time.

• And here’s another.

• The life of Margery Allingham, the creator of detective Albert Campion and Britain’s “other Queen of Crime,” is recapped at rewarding length in The East Anglian Daily Times. What I don’t think I knew before this was that Allingham wasn’t altogether healthy for most of her days. Bipolar depression? Breast cancer? A thyroid imbalance that led Allingham’s sister to “compulsorily commit her” to hospital treatment for extreme weight gain? You’ll find the complete story here. (Hat tip to Sarah Weinman.)

• Since I’ve almost finished reading Robert Wilson’s The Ignorance of Blood, his fourth and reportedly last Inspector Javier Falcón novel, I was delighted to see CrimeFicReader Rhian Davies’ fine interview with the author at It’s a Crime! (Or a Mystery ...).

• Declan Burke’s review of The Ignorance of Blood is here.

• Novelist James Reasoner seems to have taken on the task of resurrecting the name of Orrie Hitt all by himself. His latest blog post about the author--which includes a “Greatest Hitts” checklist--appears here. By the way, here’s a terrific Hill book cover that I haven’t seen used in any of Reasoner’s posts. Nothing like a “pig-farm girl” to get your heart a-thumpin’.

• Another pulp culture giant falls.

• Gordon Harries, the proprietor of Needle Scratch Static, raises questions about his recently announced association with Hub Magazine by reposting his excellent examination of Dashiell Hammett’s Red Harvest in his blog. UPDATE: Harries has now posted a clarification that provides further information on the Hub matter.

• Chess and good mystery fiction are both about deception, careful strategizing, and properly reading one’s opponents. So why not combine the two subjects?

• For Scotland’s Press and Journal newspaper, novelist Allan Guthrie talks with fellow author Tony Black about his soon-forthcoming fifth novel, Slammer, which focuses on a prison guard pushed to the breaking point. Right up front, Guthrie admits that “I’d do very badly inside. ... The lack of privacy and the boredom would do me in pretty swiftly--if a sharpened pork chop to the heart didn’t get me first.” Find the whole piece here.

• Lisa Lutz (Revenge of the Spellmans) is the subject of January Magazine’s latest “Author Snapshot.” Click here for the Q&A.

• It’s sad to hear about the death of actor Ron Silver, who was brought down by cancer this last weekend at age 62. While I didn’t agree with his post-9/11 neo-conservative politics, I certainly admired his appearances on the large and small screens. Looking back through his numerous credits, I’d forgotten that he appeared in both McMillan & Wife and The Rockford Files. And I have no memory whatsoever of him as a regular on the extremely short-lived Brenda Vaccaro series, Dear Detective.

• A month after posting five trailers for movies made from thriller writer Alistair MacLean’s novels, Gravetapping’s Ben Boulden has returned with three more.

• Northern Irish wordsmith Jo Bannister (Closer Still) talks with blogger Gerard Brennan.

• Dan Wagner of The Hungry Detective previews the “plethora of crime fiction” due out this spring. Jonathan Rabb’s Shadow and Light, Ace Atkins’ Devil’s Garden, and Tom Rob Smith’s The Secret Speech are all on my must-have list too.

• I loved Bryan Burrough’s non-fiction book Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933–34, so I’m looking forward to Michael Mann’s film adaptation of the book. However, I still keep thinking that I ought to see Warren Oates’ face somewhere in this new movie’s trailer.

• And raise your hand if you remember seeing the five-episode, 1978 Rockford Files spin-off series, Richie Brockelman, Private Eye. Uh, I don’t see any fingers in the air ...