Trawling for Tidbits

• Marcus Sakey submits his new novel, The Amateurs, to Marshal Zeringue’s Page 99 Test. The results are here. Meanwhile, The Rap Sheet’s own Dick Adler applauds Sakey’s book in the Chicago Tribune, commenting that its conclusion leaves “readers gasping with fright and pleasure at Sakey’s genius.” And click here for an interview Sakey did with Things I’d Rather Be Doing’s John Kenyon.

• Lee Goldberg, author of the Monk TV tie-in novels, talks with Lorrie Ham of the No Name Café site. Part I of their discussion can be found here, while Part II is accessible here.

• Theresa Schwegel (Last Known Address) is this month’s featured author in New Mystery Reader. An interview with her appears here.

• In case you didn’t notice, Marty McKee spent all last week touting TV series supervised by Stephen J. Cannell. He did this mostly by featuring the main title sequences from six Cannell productions in his blog, Johnny LaRue’s Crane Shot: Hardcastle & McCormick, Tenspeed and Brown Shoe, The Greatest American Hero (not my favorite Cannell series, though I did like watching Connie Sellecca), Riptide, Hunter, and the too-soon-cancelled World War II series, Black Sheep Squadron (aka Baa Baa Black Sheep).

• Nik Morton’s “I Celebrate Myself” is new in Beat to a Pulp.

• The International Thriller Writers organization is looking for submissions in four categories to its 2010 Thriller Awards contest. “Finalists will be announced in April 2010,” the ITW’s Web site explains. “Winners will be announced on July 10, 2010, at the Thriller Awards Banquet at ThrillerFest V in New York City.”

• Stieg Larsson’s translator, Reg Keeland (also known as former Seattleite Steven T. Murray) is profiled today in The Seattle Times. Read the story here.

• The third installment of Robert Ferrigno’s thrilling “Assassin” series, Heart of the Assassin, is officially due to be released tomorrow. But he already has a video trailer for the book posted here. (Hat tip to Cameron Hughes.)

• It looks like the current recession will drive Cold Case from Philly.

• Next month will mark the 45th anniversary of the debut of Goldfinger, the third James Bond movie starring Sean Connery. The HMSS Weblog is celebrating with a series of posts, beginning with a 1970s rendition of the title song by Shirley Bassey and “a list of 10 major decisions that helped shape the movie.”

• Craig Johnson talks with his fellow novelist, William Kent Krueger about the “emotional frontiers” of his characters, his affinity for Native Americans, and Krueger’s forthcoming Cork O’Connor book, Heaven’s Keep. Their exchange is here.

• Texas writer Bill Crider, author of the Sheriff Dan Rhodes mysteries (Murder in Four Parts), is set to edit a sequel to 2006’s successful “geezer noir” short-story collection, Damn Near Dead. Crider explains in his blog that “The anthology will debut at NoirCon (Nov. 4-7, 2010; Philadelphia, PA) with several of the contributors in attendance. And just who are the contributors?? Well, stay tuned ... Trust me, this will be quite a line-up!!”

• Oh, well. It looks as if speculation about Steven Spielberg directing a new movie based on Donald Hamilton’s famous Matt Helm spy novels was so much hot air. The word now is, he’ll only produce the film, not direct it. But at least it sounds as if there’s going to be a film. Or is that just so much speculation, too?

• Lost Carter Brown books! Who knew?

• Fans of the NBC-TV series Chuck are going to have to wait an extra, extra long time to see the third-season debut of that comedy-spy show.

• The Rap Sheet didn’t participate in last Friday’s “forgotten books” celebration. But I don’t want to fail to mention some of the excellent crime-fiction works that were highlighted: Bury Me Deep, by Harold Q. Masur; The Concubine’s Tattoo, by Laura Joh Rowland; Streets of Fire, by Thomas H. Cook; Gideon’s Fire, by John Creasey; Evans Above, by Rhys Bowen; and Friday the Rabbi Slept Late, by Harry Kemelman. A full rundown of Friday’s participants, plus a few more entries to this series, are available in Patti Abbott’s blog.

• This looks like a book I should read.

• Don’t miss Walter Mosley’s essay about the roots of America’s obsession with crime, found in last week’s edition of Newsweek.

• Finally, Mystery Scene’s Oline H. Cogdill asks that immortal question, “Does James Crumley fit the definition of a legend?”