Side Dishes

• I, for one, am looking forward to hearing “The Little Death,” the second volume in Blackstone Audiobooks’ New Adventures of Mike Hammer series, and the first one scripted by Max Allan Collins. “I based it on material Mickey had prepared in the ’50s for both a radio version and a television one; I had adapted this during Mickey’s lifetime into the short story ‘The Night I Died,’” Collins explains. This Blackstone audio is due out at the beginning of next month.

• As the USA Network series Monk winds down to its final episode on Friday, December 4, Sandra Parshall offers a fond farewell to the show in Poe’s Deadly Daughters.

• Non-surprise of the month: Burn Notice wins a fourth season.

• Do protagonists have to be likable? L.J. Sellers (Secrets to Die For) ponders that question in a guest post for The Lady Killers.

• Victor Gischler--comic book writer.

• Damn! It looks like Tommy Lee Jones has pulled out of the project to turn Michael Connelly’s 2005 novel The Lincoln Lawyer into a movie. He would have been an asset.

• Want to win a free copy of In the Heat (2008) or Lonesome Point (2009), both written by Shamus Award winner Ian Vasquez? You should begin by clicking here.

• Star Zachary Levi previews the coming third season of Chuck.

• Talk about clever commercials!

• And Man from U.N.C.L.E. star Robert Vaughn’s 77th birthday party was certainly a gala affair. (Hat tip to The HMSS Weblog.)