Of Saints and Winners

• Saint’s alive! That exclamation means more here than you might suppose. First off, it’s being reported that Brightlight Pictures, a Vancouver, Canada-based independent TV production company, has plans to resurrect the classic 1962-1969 ITV thriller series, The Saint. Brightlight is scheduled to film a pilot episode later this season, featuring 43-year-old Scottish actor Dougray Scott as Simon Templar, a role originally made famous on the small screen by Roger Moore.

• Meanwhile, Gary Martin Dobbs promises that his blog, The Tainted Archive, will be filled with Saint-related stuff this weekend. Offerings include an “interview with Ian Dickerson of the Saint Club--Saint buff and close friend of the late [author] Leslie Charteris,” and “a complete episode of The Saint radio series starring Vincent Price in podcast format.” You should be able to find all of the promised contents here.”

• I’m quite often impressed with Jedediah Ayers’ blog, Hard-boiled Wonderland. Missouri writer Ayers has a fist-to-the-face writing style that wears surprisingly well, and he’s shown great dexterity as an interviewer. The most recent victim of his grilling: Jon Bassoff, the publisher of New Pulp Press and the author (as Nate Flexer) of The Disassembled Man. Look for their exchange here.

• The new chiller-thriller, Whiteout, starring lovely thespian Kate Beckinsale and based on Greg Rucka’s 1998 comic-book series, is set to open in U.S. theaters today.

• If you’ve been keeping up with Rap Sheet contributor Jim Winter’s online novel, Road Rules, for the last five months, then you should be well prepared to enter a contest he has planned. Beginning next Wednesday, he writes,

I will post seven very important questions about Road Rules, all of which you must answer correctly. From all those who answer correctly, I will select one winner who will receive his or her choice of the following:

-- A signed copy of Anthony Neil Smith’s Hogdoggin’
-- A signed copy of Victor Gischler’s Go Go Girls of the Apocalypse
-- A signed copy of Duane Swierczynski’s Severance Package
-- A possibly signed copy of John Scalzi’s The Android’s Dream, which is sort of an SF version of Road Rules (or is it the other way around?)

The deadline for entering Winter’s contest will be October 14, just before the start of Bouchercon in Indianapolis.

• Our friend Roger “R.J.” Ellory, who is celebrating the release of not just one, but two novels this month--The Anniversary Man in Britain, and A Quiet Belief in Angels in the States--also happens to be CrimeSquad’s “Author of the Month.” (No need to pinch yourself, Roger; it’s true.) By the way, because I neglected to mention this before, last month’s CrimeSquad novelist pick was Laura Wilson, whose second Detective Inspector Ted Stratton book, An Empty Death, is also freshly arrived in UK bookshops.

• Rumors to the contrary, it seems that “Twilight star Michael Sheen will not be playing Ernst Stavro Blofeld in the next (23rd) James Bond screen adventure.” More here.

• Just what we need--17 more James Patterson novels.

• Courtesy of Gerard Brennan’s fine blog, Crime Scene NI: “The Irish Film and Television Network Web site has released news of a 13-part [TV] series based on [Ken Bruen’s 2001 Jack Taylor] novel, The Guards. The pilot (running time 90 mins.) will [begin filming] on the 1st November. It’ll be shot on location, in and around Galway City. The cast is still to be announced.” Learn more here.

• How well do you know classic crime fiction? Click here.

• Chelsea Cain submits her new suspense novel, Evil at Heart, to Marshal Zeringue’s daunting Page 69 Test. Results here.

• Gravetapping’s Ben Boulden has gathered together the trailers for five movies based on novels by the late Donald E. Westlake. A delightful weekend distraction.

• Who does Peter Rozovsky have lined up for his next Noir at the Bar author evening out? None other than Dennis Tafoya, whose first novel, Dope Thief, has received compliments from several well-known periodicals. The public is welcome to attend this event, scheduled for Wednesday, September 30, at Philadelphia’s Pen and Pencil Club (1522 Latimer Street; 215-731-9909). The festivities start at 6 p.m. Oh, and Tafoya won’t be the only notable on hand that evening. Also expected to show up is Pete Dexter, who’ll read from his new book, Spooner.

• A race to the bottom: So who is the bigger idiot, the California “family values” lawmaker who was “caught on tape boasting about his sexual exploits” (but who now claims he was just kidding about having extramarital affairs), or the buffoonish South Carolina congressman who interrupted President Obama’s televised health-care-overhaul address Wednesday night by yelling “You lie!” when the president said--correctly--that his reforms won’t insure illegal immigrants? A tough choice, I know.

• Why didn’t I think to buy these wonderful comic books when they were new? Oh, yeah, that’s right: I wasn’t old enough to do anything with money but swallow it.

• And this is just out and out depressing.