Detectives’ Work Never Ends

Damn lucky Brits! The second series of the Danish TV thriller The Killing, which made such a splash when it was shown in the UK last spring, is set to debut on BBC 4 on Saturday, November 26. Karen Meek offers a synopsis of the new series in her Euro Crime blog. And Robin Jarossi has still more over at Crime Time Preview.

A Boxer Rebellion

The first I heard that Gold Dagger Award-winning novelist Robert Wilson (A Small Death in Lisbon, The Ignorance of Blood)--who’s been published in the past by HarperCollins--was taking his next novel to British house Orion instead, came in one of his recent Facebook posts:

Thought I’d tell you, because I now I have a signed contract, that my new book, Capital Punishment, will be published by Weidenfeld Orion in January 2013. This is the first book in a new series featuring my latest protagonist, Charles Boxer. Apart from being a kidnap consultant who provides a special after-sales service for his clients, he also runs a charitable foundation for finding missing persons.

Now, though, UK critic Rhian Davies (aka CrimeFicReader) offers up more details about Capital Punishment, which is scheduled for a January 2013 release.

Top of the Crop

While I continue to evaluate and reassess my own reading choices over the last 11 months, with an eye toward picking my favorite books, Publishers Weekly is already out with a rundown of what it says are the Best Books of 2011. Included on that list are nine works from the mystery- and thriller-fiction shelves:

• The End of Everything, by Megan Abbott (Reagan Arthur)
• Started Early, Took My Dog, by Kate Atkinson (Reagan Arthur)
• Revenger, by Rory Clements (Bantam)
• Hurt Machine, by Reed Farrell Coleman (Tyrus)
• A Simple Act of Violence, by R.J. Ellory (Overlook)
• Field Gray, by Philip Kerr (Putnam)
• The Most Dangerous Thing, by Laura Lippman (Morrow)
• A Trick of the Light, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
• Two for Sorrow, by Nicola Upson (Harper)

You’ll find short write-ups about each of these novels, plus comments on other PW favorites in many categories, here.

Another Milestone Passed

Barry Newman, star of the 1974-1976 NBC-TV legal drama Petrocelli, turns 73 years old today. Wherever he is, we hope Mr. Newman is making the most of this occasion.

Have You Done It Yet?

Just a quick reminder: If you haven’t already submitted your entry to The Rap Sheet’s latest book-giveaway contest, it’s not too late. On offer are four copies of Anthony Horowitz’s new Sherlock Holmes novel, The House of Silk, all signed by the author.

For a chance at winning one of those copies, simply e-mail your name and postal address to jpwrites@wordcuts.org. And please write “House of Silk Contest” in the subject line. Entries will be accepted until midnight on Monday, November 7. Winners will be selected at random and their names announced on this page the next day. (Sorry, but this competition is open to U.S. and Canada residents only.)

Sleep Happy, Mr. Watson

During a ceremony held last night at the Mandarin Oriental in Knightsbridge, London, the winners of this year’s Galaxy National Book Awards were announced. In the crime and thriller category, the prize went to Before I Go to Sleep, by S.J. Watson (Doubleday).

Also nominated in that same group were: The Fear Index, by Robert Harris (Hutchinson); Heartstone, by C.J. Sansom (Pan); The Family, by Martina Cole (Headline); The Impossible Dead, by Ian Rankin (Orion); and Trick of the Dark, by Val McDermid (Sphere).

A complete rundown of the victorious books in all 2011 Galaxy Award categories can be found here.

(Hat tip to It’s a Crime! [or a Mystery ...])

Jim’s Women

This has been a big media week for 83-year-old film and TV actor James Garner. His first-ever memoir, The Garner Files, was released on Tuesday, and it invited reviewers to not only comment on the book but also wax nostalgic about some of their favorite Garner performances over the decades. For my own part, I was fortunate enough to interview Garner for The Rap Sheet.

Closing out the week, I thought it might be fun to pick up a video compilation I stumbled across recently on YouTube. Above, you will see just a few of the attractive women Garner--playing Los Angeles private investigator Jim Rockford on The Rockford Files--worked for, or with, over that series’ six-year run. I’m afraid I can no longer put names to everyone in that video, but I do recognize Lindsay Wagner (who was then in her early 20s, and appeared in two early episodes of the show), along with Joan Van Ark and Suzanne Sommers. Sadly missing, though, is Gretchen Corbett, who played Elizabeth “Beth” Davenport, Rockford’s incredibly patient attorney and sometimes girlfriend. To see them together, we must refer to a different video:

From Far Corners of the Blogosphere

• Should his success with the new Sherlock Holmes novel, The House of Silk, inspire other authors to follow in his path, Anthony Horowitz has put together a list, appropriately, of “Ten Rules for Writing a Sherlock Holmes Novel.” My personal fave is No. 7:

It’s quite difficult to pastiche nineteenth century English in a way that won’t put off twenty-first century readers, particularly younger ones. I have to say that I plucked quite a few words out of the original stories to act as guideposts, to give the text a sense of authenticity. My favourites are: ‘snibbed’, ‘foeman’, ‘sickish’ (used by Lestrade) and ‘passementerie’. That said, the book is actually being written in around 1916 and I would imagine that by this time Watson’s own language and writing style would have become more modern.

• I have some good memories of the 1981-1986 ABC-TV series The Fall Guy, mostly because it featured Heather Thomas in skimpy attire. But is it necessary to adapt that show for the big screen?

• While we’re on the subject of boob-tube beauties, Retrospace has posted its second collection of “Lesser Known TV Babes.” This set includes Karen Valentine, probably best remembered for her role on the series Room 222, but also noteworthy for her bikini-clad appearance in the 1974 TV film The Girl Who Came Gift-Wrapped. Retrospaces’s previous set of “Lesser Known TV Babes” is here.

• Save the apostrophe!

• This is intriguing, but hardly conclusive: “An author has uncovered a six-inch blade--which he believes was the one used by Victorian serial killer Jack the Ripper,” reports Britain’s The Sun newspaper. “Tony Williams found the knife amongst the possessions of his distant relative Sir John Williams, a chief suspect in the murders. The brutal attacks saw five prostitutes butchered in London’s East End between August and November 1888. Sir John was working as a surgeon to Queen Victoria at the time, but left London soon after the slayings.”

• How to fight like Star Trek’s Captain Kirk.

• For many of us, this story doesn’t exactly live up to its headline--“10 Things You Probably Don’t Know About [James] Bond”--but there are a couple of facts with which I was not familiar. Danger Man star Patrick McGoohan turned down the Bond role because he thought Ian Fleming’s character was “too promiscuous”? Really?

• Speaking of Agent 007, The Daily Mail today brings word that Daniel Craig’s shapely co-stars in the next Bond film, Skyfall, will be French actress Bérénice Marlohe and British star Naomie Harris. Am I the only one to ask in both cases, Who? (Hat tip to The HMSS Weblog.)

• This looks like a bad idea, if we want to support public libraries.

• Strangely, this list of “History’s 10 Most Famous Criminal Duos” doesn’t include William Burke and William Hare, who killed more than a dozen people in Edinburgh, Scotland, during the early 19th century in order to provide corpses for medical dissection.

• And there’s trouble ahead for partisan obstructists: A new Suffolk University poll found that even “a quarter of all Republicans and a third of all conservatives” in the United States believe “Republicans are intentionally stalling efforts to jumpstart the economy to insure that Barack Obama is not re-elected.”

Deadly Doggerel

Poetry fan and editor Gerald So is soliciting original, holiday-themed submissions to the blog, The 5-2: Crime Poetry Weekly.

He explains that these poems--which will be posted during the weeks of December 26, 2011, and January 2, 2012--“can involve Christmas, any holidays around the same time, New Year’s Eve, or New Year’s Day.” The deadline to get your work in is December 1. And the submission guidelines are here.

Holmes for Your Home?

I was given a copy of Anthony Horowitz’s new Sherlock Holmes adventure, The House of Silk, during Bouchercon in St. Louis. But it came with the instruction that I wasn’t to utter a single word about the book before its official release date of November 1. Sticking to that promise, I refrained from saying anything in print about The House of Silk--until this morning, when my generally favorable critique of Horowitz’s novel was posted on the Kirkus Reviews Web site.

That post offers background on this book:

Publicized as the first addition to the Holmes canon to have been penned with the endorsement of [Arthur] Conan Doyle’s estate (probably a quibbling distinction for most readers), this novel nicely captures the storytelling tone of Holmes’ inventor in a galloping adventure that boasts enough twists, ominous turns and urgent nocturnal escapades to make modern moviemakers salivate. That cinematic quality was predictable, given Horowitz’s background. In addition to his having composed a series of young-adult novels starring teenage spy Alex Rider (Scorpia Rising, 2011), he’s a screenwriter and the creator of the World War II-era TV detective series Foyle’s War.

From there the piece goes on to supply a few plot points and comment on Horowitz’s remarkably deft handling of Conan Doyle’s characters. While The House of Silk isn’t perfect, I was carried right along by the hurtling pace of Horowitz’s storytelling. There have been many attempts to revive the careers of Holmes and his chronicler, Doctor John Watson, in print, but I think few have succeeded as well as The House of Silk. I’m already hoping for a sequel.

Meanwhile, you now have the chance to own The House of Silk for yourself. Thanks to publisher Mulholland Books, The Rap Sheet has four copies--all signed by the author--of Horowitz’s brand-new historical novel to give away. To have a shot at winning one of those, all you need to do is e-mail your name and postal address to jpwrites@wordcuts.org. And please write “House of Silk Contest” in the subject line. Entries will be accepted between now and midnight next Monday, November 7. Winners will be picked at random and their names announced on this page the next day. (Sorry, but this competition is open to U.S. and Canada residents only.)

So, why are you dallying? The game’s afoot, folks! Send your contest entries in right away. You never know: one of these copies of The House of Silk might find its new home on your bookshelves.

Let the Frights Continue

Halloween may be officially over for 2011, but the flash-fiction Web site Thrillers, Killers ’n’ Chillers continues to celebrate it with a “hellicious” selection of 13 “dark delights.” As those stories roll out over the week, they should all become available here.

Mike Him Up, Guys

Following up on The Rap Sheet’s recent interview with James Garner, let me point out that Jon Winokur, the co-author of that actor’s brand-new memoir, The Garner Files, has been scheduled as a guest on the next edition of Ed Robertson’s two-hour radio program, TV Confidential. He will appear during the show’s second hour.

The first airing of Robertson’s exchange with Winokur will be tomorrow, Wednesday, at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, on Detroit’s WROM. The episode should also be heard this coming Friday, November 4, at 7 p.m. ET/PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org. Additional broadcasts on affiliated stations will run through Tuesday, November 8. The Winokur interview will then become available for listening on the TV Confidential Archives page, beginning on November 9.

Make a note of it.

FOLLOW-UP: The Los Angeles Times offers a very favorable review of The Garner Files here. And is it simply coincidence that this new memoir is being officially released today--on the 17th anniversary of Rockford Files co-star Noah Berry Jr.’s death?