Conversation with a Kiwi

I had the rare opportunity this past weekend to meet Craig Sisterson. A New Zealand-based features writer, he’s responsible for the fine blog Crime Watch and also created his country’s annual Dame Ngaio Marsh Awards. Sisterson and his friend David Morrow, an accountant from Perth, Australia, were passing through Seattle on their travels across the American West. The three of us got together for lunch at one of my favorite gastropubs, the 74th Street Ale House in the Greenwood neighborhood, and proceeded to carry on a two-hour-long discussion about crime fiction. Actually, Craig and I did most of the yapping, while Dave--an extremely pleasant fellow, but a less voracious reader than the two of us--tried not to nod off into his salmon.

Except during occasional Bouchercons and Left Coast Crime conventions, it isn’t often that I have the chance to talk in person with other crime-fiction bloggers, so this was a most welcome occasion, and one I hope can be repeated sometime in the near future.

The photo above shows Craig on the left; I’m on the right. It’s not my best shot, unnecessarily accentuating the gray that’s crept into my beard over the years. But it will serve forever to remind me of a rainy autumn lunchtime very well spent.

“The Greater Good”

Although many TV viewers will be tuning in tonight for the series finale of AMC’s Breaking Bad, let me also note that this evening will bring to a close season seven of Foyle’s War, starring Michael Kitchen and Honeysuckle Weeks. Omnimystery News has a preview:

In an episode titled “Sunflower,” Foyle is given the distasteful task of protecting art historian Professor Peter Van Haren, an undercover ex-Nazi and a valuable MI5 intelligence asset against the Russians. But when Van Haren lectures a group of students on the self-portraits of the artist Rembrandt, his presence causes a young man to suffer a frightening flashback which ends in tragedy.

You can enjoy a video preview of the episode here.

“Sunflower” will be broadcast as part of PBS-TV’s Masterpiece Mystery! series, beginning tonight at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

I wasn’t sure what would become of Foyle’s War, after that British show brought World War II to an end. But former Detective Chief Superintendent Christopher Foyle (Kitchen), currently living in London (not Hastings) in 1946, has made the most of his new career with MI5. His police experience, honesty, and take-no-bullshit style make him an interesting fit in the world of international spies and clandestine plotting. Meanwhile, Samantha “Sam” Stewart (Weeks)--now married to an ambitious but caring young politician--is demonstrating great savvy as his sleuthing associate. I hope that UK network ITV will commission still more Foyle for the near future.

If you need to catch up on the previous two episodes of season seven, before watching “Sunflower,” read Leslie Gilbert Elman’s critiques--here and here--in Criminal Element.

UPDATE: Leslie Gilbert Elman recaps “Sunflower.”

Ginsberg Lands the Parker

Members of the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association (SCIBA) met last evening to celebrate the winners of its 2013 book prizes. As the Los Angeles Times reports, the recipient of this year’s T. Jefferson Parker Mystery Award is What the Heart Remembers, by Debra Ginsberg (NAL). Unfortunately, SoCal resident Ginsberg was not at the event to receive her commendation.

The other finalists in this same category were: Strawberry Yellow, by Naomi Hirahara (Prospect Park), and Suspect, by Robert Crais (Putnam). To see what books were vying for SCIBA awards in other categories, click here.

Chandler’s Long Road to “The Long Goodbye”

(Editor’s note: Raymond Chandler’s sixth private-eye novel, The Long Goodbye, was released in Great Britain on November 27, 1953. [The U.S. edition wouldn’t appear for another four months.] Six decades later, we are still talking about that work. Below, Tom Williams, the author of A Mysterious Something in the Light: The Life of Raymond Chandler--released last year in the UK, but only now available in the States from Chicago Review Press--recalls the difficulties Chandler encountered in producing The Long Goodbye. You can follow Williams on Twitter @twilliams81 or read much more in his blog.)

Occasionally, late a night, I like to imagine what would have happened had Raymond Chandler successfully written the version of The Long Goodbye that he originally envisioned in the early 1950s. Although it is often forgotten now, Chandler did not set out to write another Philip Marlowe mystery. In fact, Philip Marlowe wasn’t going to appear in the book at all. Instead of employing his private investigator’s wise and laconic narration, the novel was going to be told in the third-person and it would have marked a significant shift in the way Chandler approached his work. In the end, however, Chandler found that he could not make the book work in the way he wanted, and so he started afresh, producing The Long Goodbye instead.

Why could he not make it work? It was not like he hadn’t written in the third-person before. A number of Chandler’s early short stories were like this, but when it came to writing novels, he chose to make Marlowe’s voice central to everything he did. The effect was a powerful one and Philip Marlowe is a compelling, sympathetic hero, as anyone who has read the novels knows. But, above all, writing in the first-person allowed Chandler to reach the emotional register that he aspired to. It let him engineer the detective he imagined, a detective who was more than just a tough guy; and though he was not the first to do it, Raymond Chandler wrote in such a way that his novels felt fresh and arresting.

By 1951, Chandler’s career was in the ascendant. His novels were becoming increasingly popular, he had established a name for himself in Hollywood as a temperamental but often very skilled screenwriter, and his work, though rare, was in demand. Still, despite this Chandler felt frustrated with Marlowe. He was starting to wonder if he could move away from his narrator, and in The Little Sister (1949), thought that the detective had become an increasingly complex character. He worried that Marlowe was starting to look “pretty ridiculous as a small-time private detective ...” At the same time, he was fettered by the genre itself and, to alleviate some of his frustration, he considered ending The Little Sister without identifying the murderer at all. In the end, that idea came to nothing but it shows that Raymond Chandler was looking for ways to move beyond crime writing, and when he started to think about The Long Goodbye he imagined he was finally ready to take a risk.

(Left) 1953 British first edition

It is worth remembering, too, that Chandler had always had an ambition to do this. From the very start of his pulp-fiction career he had seen crime writing as a way to learn to write whilst still bringing in some money. That is not to say he didn’t enjoy the genre, but rather that, at the beginning, crime writing was going to be a springboard to something else. As early as 1939 (the year The Big Sleep was published) he was looking forward to a post-Philip Marlowe career, and he wrote in a notebook that he would only do a few more mysteries before writing a melodrama, to be set in England, called English Summer. But, as Chandler came to find, it wasn’t all that easy. Various pressures and distractions got in the way. There was Hollywood, there was his drinking, and, above all, there were his frequent worries about the health of his wife, Cissy. She was 18 years older than Chandler and her physical condition, which had always been troubling, was taking a turn for the worse in the late ’40s. Watching her become increasingly frail was devastating to Chandler. All of this combined to leave the author feeling exhausted and, the more tired he felt, the more frustrated he became with his work.

In 1951, he set about trying again and this time he started to write a novel in the third-person, without Philip Marlowe. At first it came easily but, as so was so often the case with Chandler, his creative spirit dried up. Halfway through, he realized that the book just wasn’t working. He found that, though he could write good scenes, the coherence that Philip Marlowe brought to his fiction was lacking and so he gave up. Instead, he started to rewrite the story from Marlowe’s perspective. Chandler confessed to his British publisher, Hamish Hamilton,

It begins to look as though I were tied to this fellow for life. I simply can’t function without him.

It was an admission of defeat in some ways, but not one that he came to regret. The Long Goodbye can’t be viewed as a failure. Just read it and you’ll see. It contains some of Chandler’s most powerful prose and his dissection of the relationship between the much-scarred Terry Lennox and Philip Marlowe is deeply moving. Philip Marlowe’s loneliness, the result of a series of moral decisions (no spoilers here!), leave him bitter and isolated, and in this novel he is seen as an almost tragic hero. He tries to do what he thinks is right even if he leaves him less happy in the end.

The novel’s ultimate success is something that could only come about because Chandler was striving to write a different type of book, and it is in the failing to do so that his secret lies. The Long Goodbye is hardly a murder mystery--the death that moves the plot forward happens off stage and Marlowe never even sees the body--and yet it has captured the imagination of millions of readers over the last 60 years. Why? Because Chandler wanted to write something that wasn’t bound by the rules of the mystery genre, but he found himself enmeshed in its rules anyway, because of Philip Marlowe. It is the way he managed to disentangle himself from the strictures of genre--without giving them up completely--that makes this novel so good. You don’t read The Long Goodbye to find out who committed the murder, but you keep reading for the language, for the characters, for connections you have with the narrator. This, ultimately, is the stuff of great writing and though Raymond Chandler would never write the novel he dreamed of for so long, his books will always be amongst the finest in the English language.

READ MORE: “Writing The Long Goodbye,” by Mark Coggins; “Chandler’s Hard-boiled England: World War II, Imperialism, and Transatlantic Exchange,” by Will Norman (Post45).

Gypsy Roaming Your Way

When we posted our list last Friday of who won the 2013 Shamus Awards, we neglected to mention an additional prize recipient. North Carolina writer Lynn C. Willis was named the winner of this year’s Private Eye Writers of America/St. Martin’s Press Best First Private Eye Novel competition for the tentatively titled Wink of an Eye, introducing detective Gypsy Moran. This award includes a publishing contract. Congratulations to Ms. Willis!

Problems with Preferences

A month ago, author Patti Abbott declared the beginning of a new flash-fiction challenge. The theme came from a 1913 Detroit newspaper headline, “Michigan Man’s Tastes Get Him Into Trouble.” Stories were to run 1,000 words or fewer, and be posted today. Sure enough, Abbott has collected several submissions in her blog and provides links to still more found elsewhere on the Web.

Where Readers Dare

I’m hoping that The Rap Sheet’s well-read visitors will help me out with a little project I have been working on lately, focusing on the once-acclaimed Scottish thriller writer Alistair MacLean.

Below is a poll asking you to choose your favorites from among MacLean’s more than two dozen novels (listed here in the order of their publication). Feel free to select one or more of these books. If you need to refresh your memory about MacLean’s works, click over to this site and then hold your cursor above the “Book Reviews” tab; a pop-up menu will lead you to concise plot summations.

And if you’d like to share your opinions--positive or negative--about MacLean’s oeuvre, please do so in the Comments section at the bottom of this post.

This survey will remain open until the beginning of November 2013.

Bouchercon in Albany -- A Capital Idea

While most of us weren’t able to attend this year’s Bouchercon in Albany, New York, The Rap Sheet’s indefatigable and much-admired British correspondent, Ali Karim, was there with bells (and a buzz) on. I’ve accompanied Ali through more than one of these conventions, and he’s a whirling dervish of activity, greeting the many authors and critics he knows, introducing himself (and anyone he’s with) to novelists he has wanted to meet for years, and eventually winding down with copious glasses of beer, gin, or some comparable alcoholic refreshment. In between, Ali has his camera out and poised to snap photographs of the friends and famous faces he spots.

Even if you weren’t at this last weekend’s Bouchercon, you can get a sense of what it offered simply by browsing among Ali’s numerous images from the event. Here’s a selection of the many shots he took.

(Left to right) Ali Karim, Australian lawyer and former Ned Kelly Awards judge Sarah Byrne, and author Steve Hamilton (who is also the current president of the Private Eye Writers of America).

Heather Graham (Pozzessere), Ali Karim, and Tess Gerritsen.

Larry Gandle of Deadly Pleasures, historical mystery writer J. Robert Janes, and British novelist R.J. (Roger) Ellory.

Crime and suspense author Brendan DuBois with the seemingly ubiquitous Ali “Batman” Karim.

Matthew Quirk, author of The 500.

R.J. Ellory, Lawrence Block, Carla Buckley, French translator Robert Pepin, Steve Hamilton, and editor Otto Penzler.

Andrew Pyper, author of The Demonologist, answers questions during a “meet the author” session.

Ali Karim with Bouchercon 2013 chair Al Abramson.

And what do you know, it’s Mr. Karim again, this time hanging out with author Jeffery Deaver and Andrew Gulli, publisher of The Strand Magazine.

Finally, this is Ali Karim’s Don Sandstrom Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in Mystery Fandom. Nobody deserves it more.

READ MORE: “Bouchercon 2013: The Week That Was,” by Les Blatt (Classic Mysteries); “Back from Bouchercon,” by Max Allan Collins; “Report from Bouchercon Albany,” by Lee Goldberg; “Bouchercon 2013,” by Jen Forbus (Jen’s Book Thoughts); “Back from Bouchercon 2013,” by Gerald So (My Life Called So); and several Bouchercon postings from Peter Rozovsky.

Death of a Mystery Writer

Like most of us, critic-columnist Mike Ripley was shocked to learn that English crime novelist Robert Barnard died late last week at age 76. “I hadn’t communicated with him for 18 or 19 months,” Ripley tells me, “and had no idea that he had been put in a nursing home [in Leeds] in January.” Quickly, however, Ripley pulled together an excellent tribute to Barnard, which was posted earlier today in Shots. It begins:

Robert Barnard was one of a quartet of writers born in 1936--his contemporaries being Reginald Hill, Jonathan Gash and Peter Lovesey--who formed a solid backbone for traditional English crime writing of the highest order in the last quarter of the twentieth century.

Unlike others of his generation, Robert Barnard’s zestful and witty novels did not benefit from television adaptations, nor indeed from large paperback runs in the UK. His books were often more easily available in America where he was probably better known as an exponent of the ‘cosy’ school of crime writing--a label he never denied or disparaged as he felt the main goal of a crime writer was simply ‘to entertain’. In this he tried to emulate Agatha Christie, for whom he had a great admiration, describing her as the writer “who has probably given more sheer pleasure than any other in this century” in his critical study A Talent to Deceive in 1980. He was no doubt proud of the fact that his first editor at the legendary Collins Crime Club was Elizabeth Walter, who was also Agatha Christie’s last editor, and Robert was the obvious choice to give the oration at Elizabeth’s funeral in 2006.

One reason often given as to why Bob Barnard was not the household name he should have been, was that he never had a central series hero, whereas Hill had Dalziel and Pascoe, Gash had Lovejoy and Lovesey (initially) had Sergeant Cribb, all characters which attracted the interest of television producers. In fact, Barnard had several series heroes--among them policemen Perry Trethowan (perhaps the most successful), Idwal Meredith and Charlie Peace and, under the pen name Bernard Bastable, even Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart!--but his series were never produced in concentrated bursts, Barnard preferring to employ a character when a plot or a central theme required it.

You can read all of Ripley’s remarks here.

Also check out fellow author Martin Edwards’ warm remarks about Barnard, whom he calls “one of the first friends I made in the crime writing world” and “personally very generous.” Edwards, it seems, knew that Barnard’s health was not good:

... [O]ne of the last times I saw him was at the Detection Club’s annual dinner in the Temple. By this time, he was becoming troubled by memory problems. For an intellectual whose memory had always been fantastic, this was a dreadful blow, and he felt unable to continue with his public speaking, something in which he excelled. I went to visit him and Louise at their home in Leeds last year, and we had a pleasant time together, but his health began to deteriorate, and this year the decline had been steep. For Louise, who has coped with great courage during the past difficult months, the loss is profound.

I’m sorry that I was never given the opportunity to meet Robert Barnard myself, and that I am quite seriously behind in reading through his oeuvre. If you haven’t yet sampled any of Barnard’s work yourself, here’s a list of books to get you started.

FOLLOW-UP: The Gumshoe Site says Barnard “died in his sleep on September 19 at the Grove Court Nursing Home in Leeds, England.”

READ MORE: “Robert Barnard, R.I.P.,” by Janet Rudolph (Mystery Fanfare); “Robert Barnard--A Talent to Entertain,” by Martin Edwards (‘Do You Write Under Your Own Name?’); “Robert Barnard: An Appreciation,” by Maggie Topkis (Felony & Mayhem); “Robert Barnard Obituary,” by Mike Ripley (The Guardian).

And Finally, We Have the Anthonys

I’ve been watching the Bouchercon 2013 Facebook page to find out which authors and books have won this year’s Anthony Awards. Here are the results reported there.

Best Novel: The Beautiful Mystery, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)

Also nominated: Dare Me, by Megan Abbott (Reagan Arthur); Trinity Game, by Sean Chercover (Thomas & Mercer); Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn (Crown); and The Other Woman, by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Forge)

Best First Novel: The Expats, by Chris Pavone (Crown)

Also nominated: Don’t Ever Get Old, by Daniel Friedman (Minotaur/Thomas Dunne); The Professionals, by Owen Laukkanen (Putnam); The 500, by Matthew Quirk (Reagan Arthur); and Black Fridays, by Michael Sears (Putnam)

Best Paperback Original:
Big Maria, by Johnny Shaw (Thomas & Mercer)

Also nominated: Whiplash River, by Lou Berney (Morrow); Murder for Choir, by Joelle Charbonneau (Berkley Prime Crime); And She Was, by Alison Gaylin (Harper); and Blessed Are the Dead, by Malla Nunn (Emily Bestler)

Best Short Story: “Mischief in Mesopotamia,” by Dana Cameron (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November 2012)

Also nominated: “Kept in the Dark,” by Shelia Connolly (in Best New England Crime Stories 2013: Blood Moon, edited by Mark Ammons, Katherine Fast, Barbara Ross, and Leslie Wheeler; Level Best);“The Lord Is My Shamus,” by Barb Goffman (in Chesapeake Crimes: This Job Is Murder, edited by Donna Andrews, Barb Goffman, and Marcia Talley; Wildside Press); “Peaches,” by Todd Robinson (Grift, Spring 2012); and “The Unremarkable Heart,” by Karin Slaughter (in Mystery Writers of America Presents: Vengeance, edited by Lee Child; Mulholland)

Best Critical Non-fiction Work: Books to Die For: The World’s Greatest Mystery Writers on the World’s Greatest Mystery Novels, edited by John Connolly and Declan Burke (Atria/Emily Bestler)

Also nominated: Blood Relations: The Selected Letters of Ellery Queen, 1947-1950, edited by Joseph Goodrich (Perfect Crime); More Forensics and Fiction: Crime Writers Morbidly Curious Questions Expertly Answered, by D.P. Lyle (Medallion Press); The Grand Tour: Around the World with the Queen of Mystery Agatha Christie, edited by Mathew Prichard (Harper); and In Pursuit of Spenser: Mystery Writers on Robert B. Parker and the Creation of an American Hero, edited by Otto Penzler (Smart Pop)

Lifetime Achievement Award: Sue Grafton

David Thompson Special Services Award: Marv Lachman

Congratulations to all of the winners and other nominees!

Still “Blue” After All These Years

Incredible as this may seem to the program’s numerous fans, it was a full 20 years ago today--at 10 p.m. on September 21, 1993 (then a Tuesday)--that the ABC-TV crime drama NYPD Blue premiered.

Not to be confused with Jack Warden’s 1967-1969 cop series, N.Y.P.D., the hour-long Blue was co-created by Steven Bochco (whose credits also included Hill Street Blues and L.A. Law) and David Milch (later best known for giving viewers the Western drama Deadwood). It focused on an ensemble of weary cops working out of Manhattan’s 15th Precinct, most prominently Detective John Kelly (played by David Caruso), Sergeant Andy Sipowicz (Dennis Franz), Kelly’s lovely ex-wife, Assistant District Attorney Laura Michaels (Sherry Springfield), and Captain Arthur Fancy (James McDaniel). TV Guide, in its 1993 Fall Preview write-up (see below), voiced concern that Blue was “another cop show--and TV has had so many, they do start to sound the same.” At the same time, though, the mag applauded the series’ “killer cast” and opined that it “is one of those rare shows that think we, the audience members, are smart.”

Between its debut and the airing of its final, 261st episode, “Moving Day,” on March 1, 2005, NYPD Blue lost some notable cast members, among them Caruso (later to resurface on CSI: Miami, Stringfield (who moved to ER), and subsequently Jimmy Smits (who’d played Detective Bobby Simone) and Kim Delaney (who had done a long stint as Detective Diane Russell). It also incited controversies with its occasional, modest nudity and its sometimes course language.

Yet the series carried on, blending often tense criminal encounters with close looks inside the personal travails confronting its lead characters--on and off the job. As was obvious by the number of awards it received, NYPD Blue maintained a high quality throughout its 12-year run, confirming what TV Guide had said way back in 1993, that “This show is a Bochco classic all around.”

Above: NYPD Blue’s write-up in the September 18-24, 1993, edition of TV Guide. Of the series that debuted with it that fall--from seaQuest DSV and The Nanny to The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. and Saved by the Bell: The College Years--only two, The X Files (which went off the air in 2002) and Frasier (which was cancelled in 2004), remained on the air nearly as long as Blue. Right-click on the image above for a more readable enlargement.

READ MORE: “The Groundbreaking NYPD Blue,” by Teri Duerr
(Mystery Scene); “Throwback Thursday: How NYPD Blue Revolutionised TV Crime Drama and Redefined the Cop Show,” by Paul Hirons (The Killing Times).

Gumshoes Worth Praising

Thanks to a phone call from Ali Karim, The Rap Sheet’s correspondent at Bouchercon 2013 in Albany, New York, we can now report the winners of this year’s Shamus Awards. Those commendations were presented tonight during a banquet arranged by the Private Eye Writers of America (PWA).

Best Hardcover P.I. Novel: Taken, by Robert Crais (Putnam)

Also nominated: Robert B. Parker’s Lullaby, by Ace Atkins (Putnam); Hunting Rose, by Jack Fredrickson (Minotaur); Blues in the Night, by Dick Lochte (Severn House); and The Other Woman, by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Forge)

Best First P.I. Novel: Black Fridays, by Michael Sears (Putnam)

Also nominated: Hush Money, by Chuck Greaves (Minotaur); Murder Unscripted, by Clive Rosengren (Perfect Crime); Racing Sweetie the Devil, by Jaden Terrell (Permanent Press); and The Twenty-Year Death, by Ariel S. Winter (Hard Case Crime)

Best Original Paperback P.I. Novel: And She Was,
by Alison Gaylin (Harper)

Also nominated: Death Warmed Over, by Kevin J. Anderson (Kensington); Archie Meets Nero Wolfe, by Robert Goldsborough (The Mysterious Press/Open Road); False Negative, by Joseph Koenig (Hard Case Crime); and Pulse, by John Lutz (Kensington)

Best P.I. Short Story: “Ghost Negligence,” by John Shepphird (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine [AHMM], July/August 2012)

Also nominated: “The Sequel,” by Jeffery Deaver (The Strand Magazine, November-February 2012-2013); “After Cana,” by Terence Faherty (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, September/October, 2012);  “O’Nelligan and the Lost Fates,” by Michael Nethercott (AHMM, March 2012); and “Illegitimati Non Carborundum,” by Stephen D. Rogers (Crimespree Magazine, May/June 2012)

Best Indie P.I. Novel: White Heat, by Paul D. Marks
(Timeless Skies)

Also nominated: Stranger in Town, by Cheryl Bradshaw (CreateSpace); Enamored, by O’Neil De Noux (CreateSpace); One-Eyed Jack, by Christopher J. Lynch (CreateSpace); and Devil May Care, by James Mullaney (James\Mullaney#Books)

The Eye (Lifetime Achievement Award): Loren D. Estleman

Congratulations to the winners and nominees alike!

The Book You Have to Read: “They Don’t Dance Much,” by James Ross

(Editor’s note: This is the 129th entry in our ongoing series about great but forgotten books. Today’s piece comes from Steven Nester, the host of Poets of the Tabloid Murder, a weekly Internet radio show heard on the Public Radio Exchange [PRX]. Steve has become a regular contributor to this series; his last piece looked back at Bernard Wolfe’s 1957 spy thriller, In Deep. You’ll find Steve’s previous offerings here.)

When the romantic lead is named Smut and he owns a white-trash roadhouse, and the femme fatale is named Lola and drives a “Nile green roadster,” you know they didn’t meet in church. The outskirts of a Depression-era mill town provide the setting of James Ross’ classic country noir, They Don’t Dance Much, and when Smut Milligan turns his filling station into a nightspot that sells moonshine and runs crooked card games, it’s not difficult to see that sex, money, and bad, bad decisions will soon follow.

Published in 1940, They Don’t Dance Much has been chasing popular literary validation like a strumpet looking to be crowned Miss America. The novel gets respect from writers and aficionados, but it’s the type of book that not too many readers come across without searching: usually by those who read backwards into a genre to see from whence it all came. In this case, begin with Daniel Woodrell and work your way back to the late William Gay, then to Cormac McCarthy and to James M. Cain, and you’ll find it.

The book has held up well. Its prose is clean and direct, and there is plenty of irony, giving Ross’ yarn the authenticity and accuracy of something that is a true reflection of life. Mysterious Press/Open Road Media’s recently released edition of the novel contains an insightful introduction by Daniel Woodrell that is worth the price of admission. In it, he incisively summarizes Ross’ style and that of all others like him as “classically laconic, wised up American prose.” (The introductory essay to reissued classics is a literary art form in itself, and Woodrell’s gem is a sparkling example.)

They Don’t Dance Much is a fly-on-the-wall look at desperation and depravity, during a time when folks with low expectations made for the pot of gold, rainbow or not. After losing the family farm, Jack McDonald becomes the fly when Smut hires him to help him run his new enterprise. McDonald is naïve (“I was green as a stalk of corn, and the first two days Smut had to show me my way around”), but he’s no dummy. He gives us our first taste of Lola, a former flame of Smut’s. Now married to Charles Fisher, the richest man in town, Lola is a temptress with aspirations toward the downward side. The imagery depicting her foreshadows her cheapness of character, her small-town hussy flash, and her lack of respect for Charles.

She had on dark glasses and she was sunburned brown as a penny. She had on some sort of short-sleeved jersey and it looked like she had left her brassiere at home. She was taller than Charles Fisher.

Yeah, They Don’t Dance Much is that kind of book: smoldering and lubricious as you could get (in 1940) without having to conceal it in a brown paper wrapper.

They Don’t Dance Much could be subtitled The Education of a Country Nihilist, because if anybody comes out of this book with anything learned it’s McDonald; and what he gets out of it is not to expect too much out of life, no matter how rosy circumstances might appear. He’s an accomplished second banana, and as Smut plods along, rekindling an affair with Lola and fleecing mill workers of their wages, Jack begins to figure things out. Money gets tight as Smut racks up gambling debts and falls behind in payments to the bank and crooked politicians. Here’s where McDonald earns his keep: He learns that Bert Ford, a big customer with no visible means of support, has a small fortune in cash hidden on his farm. He lets Smut in on the secret, and a plot is hatched. The two torture and murder Ford for the money, then dispose of the body in a vat of fermenting beer. McDonald wants his cut so he can leave, but Smut is adamant about sitting tight until things blow over.

When Jack overhears the sheriff tell Smut that he needs to help him find a fall guy, Jack begins to sleep with one eye open. Afraid Smut’s money problems will drain his share, he plots to steal it. The two fight, then Smut tries to poison Jack. Jack almost becomes resigned to getting beat (“A murder is a bad thing. Here I was mixed up in one and it looked like experience was all I was going to get out of it.”). But finally he figures out how to use the rope Smut put around his own neck and hasten nature to take its course. A few anonymous letters to Charles Fisher, tipping him off to Lola and Smut, brings forth the bloody rage of a cuckolded husband, but no money.

They Don’t Dance Much was reissued in 1968 by the South Illinois University Press, with an afterward by George V. Higgins. In it he said, “James Ross was a writer out of his season. ... He advanced the craft of fiction as far as it could be advanced when he was writing, and nobody was paying attention. Very few, at least. Life’s hard, life’s very hard. It’s harder without luck. But that of course, was what he was telling us.”

Although it’s not read as much as it should be, They Don’t Dance Much hasn’t exactly been forgotten; it still seethes, it still smolders, it’s dirty (Higgins said that what Ross put on the pages most writers, including his hard-boiled contemporaries, put between the chapters), and as a result of all that the book might have suffered. But here it is, risen again in 2013--at a time when no one is very squeamish, especially about acts between humans that have become so commonplace they can be reported on the 6 O’Clock News or feature in “reality TV” shows. It’s time now for the prose to be the center of attention instead of the fictional scandal that moves the plot along. This year’s new edition of Ross’ novel offers an opportunity for a younger generation of readers and writers to give it a go and learn how much can be said by saying just enough.

Breaking Curls and Cracking Crimes

As The HMSS Weblog reminds me, today is “the 45th anniversary of, arguably, the best television theme of all time: ‘Hawaii Five-O’ by composer Morton Stevens.” The original version of the CBS-TV crime drama Hawaii Five-O, starring Jack Lord and James MacArthur, debuted on September 20, 1968 (and ran until April 4, 1980).

Rewards and Rejoicing in Albany

On this first night of Bouchercon 2013 in Albany, New York, three different sets of prizes were handed out to authors and others. Thanks to Ali Karim, our correspondent on the spot (who also walked away with one of those awards!), we have the names of the winners.

MACAVITY AWARDS

Best Mystery Novel: The Beautiful Mystery, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)

Also nominated: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn (Crown); The Blackhouse, by Peter May (Silver Oak); The Other Woman, by Hank Philippi Ryan (Forge); The Art Forger, by B.A. Shapiro (Algonquin); The Twenty-Year Death, by Ariel S. Winter (Hard Case Crime); and The Last Policeman, by Ben H. Winters (Quirk)

Best First Mystery Novel: Don’t Ever Get Old, by Daniel Friedman (Minotaur/Thomas Dunne)

Also nominated: Low Country Boil, by Susan M. Boyer (Henery Press); Mr. Churchill’s Secretary, by Susan Elia MacNeal (Bantam); and The Expats, by Chris Pavone (Crown)

Best Mystery Non-Fiction: Books to Die For: The World’s Greatest Mystery Writers on the World’s Greatest Mystery Novels, edited by John Connolly and Declan Burke (Atria/Emily Bestler)

Also nominated: Midnight in Peking: How the Murder of a Young Englishwoman Haunted the Last Days of Old China, by Paul French (Penguin); and In Pursuit of Spenser: Mystery Writers on Robert B. Parker and the Creation of an American Hero, edited by Otto Penzler (BenBella/Smart Pop)

Best Mystery Short Story: “The Lord Is My Shamus,” by Barb Goffman (in Chesapeake Crimes: This Job Is Murder, edited by Donna Andrews, Barb Goffman, and Marcia Talley; Wildside Press)

Also nominated: “The Unremarkable Heart,” by Karin Slaughter (in Mystery Writers of America Presents: Vengeance, edited by Lee Child; Mulholland); “Thea’s First Husband,” by B.K. Stevens (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, June 2012); “When Duty Calls,” by Art Taylor (in Chesapeake Crimes: This Job Is Murder); “Blind Justice,” by Jim Fusilli (n Mystery Writers of America Presents: Vengeance); and “The Sequel,” by Jeffery Deaver (The Strand Magazine, November-February 2012-2013)

Sue Feder Historical Memorial Award: An Unmarked Grave, by Charles Todd (HarperCollins)

Also nominated: A City of Broken Glass, by Rebecca Cantrell (Forge); Princess Elizabeth’s Spy, by Susan Elia MacNeal (Bantam); The Confession, by Charles Todd (HarperCollins); and Elegy for Eddie, by Jacqueline Winspear (HarperCollins)

BARRY AWARDS

Best Novel: The Blackhouse, by Peter May (Silver Oak)

Also nominated: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn (Crown); Trust Your Eyes, by Linwood Barclay (NAL); Defending Jacob, by William Landay (Delacorte); Live by Night, Dennis Lehane (Morrow); and Dead Scared, by S.J. Bolton (Minotaur)

Best First Novel: A Killing in the Hills, by Julia Keller (Minotaur)

Also nominated: The Yard, by Alex Grecian (Putnam); Sacrifice Fly, by Tim O’Mara (Minotaur); The Dark Winter, by David Mark (Blue Ridge Press); Black Fridays, by Michael Sears (Putnam); and The Professionals, by Owen Laukkanen (Putnam)

Best Paperback Original: Mr. Churchill’s Secretary, by Susan Elia McNeal (Bantam)

Also nominated: Pago Pago Tango, by John Enright (Thomas & Mercer); Blessed Are the Dead, by Malla Nunn (Washington Square); The Other Woman’s House, by Sophie Hannah (Penguin); Bloodland, by Alan Glynn (Picador); and Beneath the Abbey Wall, by A.D. Scott (Atria)

Best Thriller: The Fallen Angel, by Daniel Silva (Harper)

Also nominated: The Last Refuge, by Ben Coes (St. Martin’s); The Right Hand, by Derek Haas (Mulholland); A Foreign Country, by Charles Cumming (St. Martin’s); House Blood, by Mike Lawson (Atlantic Monthly); and Red Star Burning, by Brian Freemantle (Minotaur)

Don Sandstrom Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in Mystery Fandom: Ali Karim

DERRINGER AWARDS

The winners of these commendations were actually announced at the end of March, but the Derringer Awards themselves weren’t handed out until this evening.

Best Flash Story (up to 1,000 words): “The Cable Job,” by Randy DeWitt (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine [AHMM], September 2012)

Also nominated: “An Old-Fashioned Villain,” by Nick Andreychuk (Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, May 2012); “Dead Man,” by A.J. Hayes (from Off the Record 2: At the Movies, edited by Luca Veste and Paul D. Brazill; Guilty Conscience); “’Twas the Knife Before Christmas,” by Allan Leverone (Shotgun Honey, December 24, 2012); “Daddy’s Girl,” by Nicola Kennington (The Flash Fiction Offensive, July 22, 2012)

Best Short Story (1,001-4,000 words): “Getting Out of the Box,” by Michael Bracken (from Crime Square, edited by Robert J. Randisi; Vantage Point)

Also nominated: “A Special Kind of Hell,” by Hilary Davidson (from Beat to a Pulp: Round Two, edited by David Cramer and Matthew P. Mayo; Beat to a Pulp); “Dead Weight,” by Allan Leverone (from Burning Bridges: A Renegade Fiction Anthology, edited by Benjamin Sobieck, Heath Lowrance, and McDroll; e-book); “Nain Rouge,” by Barbara Nadel (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine [EQMM], August 2012); and “Baby Boy,” by Todd Robinson (from Protectors: Stories to Benefit PROTECT, edited by Thomas Pluck; Goombah Gumbo Press)

Best Long Story (4,001-8,000 words): “When Duty Calls,” by Art Taylor (from Chesapeake Crimes: This Job Is Murder, edited by Donna Andrews, Barb Goffman, and Marcia Talley; Wildside Press)

Also nominated: “The Pot Hunters,” by David Hagerty (AHMM, June 2012); “A Regular Story,” by Peggy McFarland (from Best New England Crime Stories 2013: Blood Moon, edited by Mark Ammons, Katherine Fast, Barbara Ross, and Leslie Wheeler; Level Best Books); “Peaches,” by Todd Robinson (Grift Magazine, April 2012); and “Double Wedding” Mo Walsh (from Best New England Crime Stories 2013: Blood Moon)

Best Novelette (8,001 – 20,000 words): “Wood-Smoke Boys,” by Doug Allyn (EQMM, March/April 2012)

Also nominated: “Iphigenia in Aulis,” by Mike Carey (from An Apple for the Creature, edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner; Ace); “Mariel,” by David Dean (EQMM, December 2012); “Pirate Dave and the Captain’s Ghost,” by Toni L.P. Kelner (from An Apple for the Creature); and “The Sunny South,” by Chris Muessig (AHMM, March/April 2012)

Golden Derringer Award (for lifetime achievement):
Loren D. Estleman

Congratulations to all of the victors and other nominees.

Pierce’s Picks: “Alex”

A weekly alert for followers of crime, mystery, and thriller fiction.

Alex, by Pierre Lemaitre (MacLehose Press):
There’s a big to-do being made of the fact that Alex comes from the same British publishing house that brought the English-speaking world Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and its sequels, but really, this novel should stand on its own--and it most certainly can. Best-selling French author Lemaitre already won an International Dagger award from the British Crime Writers’ Association for this book, and I would guess that it will grab American readers in the same way.

The tale begins with a “truly stunning” young woman named Alex Prévost being kidnapped from a Parisian street by a stranger who then beats her, has her strip naked, and suspends her in a crate from the ceiling of a chilly warehouse, all without explanation. Her rough-made cage is too small for Alex to stand or do much of anything else in, other than fend off the increasingly hungry rats who can’t decide whether she’s a threat ... or a soon-to-die source of sustenance. Meanwhile, Commandant Camille Verhoeven, a 4-foot-11 police detective with more smarts than the majority of his colleagues and a pugnacious side that brooks no bullshit even from his superiors, is charged with finding the missing woman. But he’s still tormented by his own wife’s abduction and slaying. Furthermore, he’s hampered by the fact that he doesn’t know who the young woman is, who her attacker was, or whether a crime was even committed. The only witness to Alex’s snatching has no eye or ear for detail, and there have been no reports of a missing person matching her description. Shortly after Alex realizes who her abductor is, Verhoeven discovers that this victim he’s trying to rescue may not be as innocent as he’s presumed.

Lemaitre’s character development, his carefully crafted and suspenseful pacing, his infusion of humor to balance out tension, and the backdrop of the French capital all contribute to this novel’s appeal. It’s not The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; it’s a thriller with literary aspirations and surprises enough to win an enthusiastic following of its own. Which is important, because the publisher says Alex is only the first installment in a “Commandant Camille Verhoeven trilogy.”

Bullet Points: Shiver Me Timbers Edition

• Bouchercon 2013 began today in Albany, New York. Although I shall once more not be attending this annual convention of crime writers and fans, The Rap Sheet’s chief British correspondent, Ali Karim, is on hand in the New York capital to take photographs, report the names of award winners, keep tabs on doings throughout the four-day event, and--I presume--spend plenty of quality time in the nearest bar, sampling gin with friends new and old. Stay tuned to this page for Bouchercon updates throughout the weekend.

• By the way, if any Bouchercon attendees want to brush up a bit on Albany’s criminal past, they might start with this story about an 1827 murder at a “stately mansion” overlooking the Hudson River.

• I haven’t seen the NBC-TV series Kingston: Confidential since it first aired back in 1976. But over the last few years I’ve started looking around on the Web for downloaded episodes or even clips from that show, which featured Raymond Burr as R.B. Kingston, the editor in chief/troubleshooter for an international news media conglomerate. What did I get for my troubles? Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Yesterday, though, I stumbled across the opening sequence from the series on YouTube, and have now added it to The Rap Sheet’s YouTube page. You can go directly to the Kingston: Confidential intro here. Now, if somebody would only release that Burr series on DVD ...

• This show, though, doesn’t register with me at all.

• I’m pleased to say that I have read most of the works on novelist Stav Sherez’s list, in Shots, of “The 10 Best Crime Novels You’ve (Probably) Never Heard Of.” The exceptions are Glen Duncan’s Love Remains and Barry Gifford’s Southern Nights, neither of which I recall ever seeing in bookshops.

• Meanwhile, the Classic Film and TV Café has posted its selections of “The Five Best TV Detectives.” There are no surprises here, though I would probably have substituted some character with a bit more grittiness--say, Lieutenant Mike Torello (Dennis Farina) of Crime Story, Sonny Crockett (Don Johnson) of Miami Vice, or Walt Longmire (Robert Taylor) of Longmire--for Angela Lansbury’s Jessica Fletcher.

• Two birthdays worth celebrating today: Scottish actor David McCallum (The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Invisible Man, NCIS) turns 80, while Batman’s Adam West will be blowing out 85 candles on his own birthday cake. I wish them both well.

• It’s about time Bob Newhart won an Emmy!

• Thanks to correspondent Nancie Clare, The Rap Sheet had last weekend’s Bloody Scotland festival well covered. But now the blogger who styles herself “Crime Thriller Girl” has begun weighing in with her own series of recollections from that convention. Click here to read about her experiences on Day 1.

• This may be something that only an editor could love. But, boy, I sure do love it. In his blog, Past Offences, Rich Westwood analyzes the correct spelling of whodunit/whodunnit and looks at the history of that term. The short answer seems to be that Americans (like me) prefer the one-n version, while Brits like the two-n style.

• Something to enjoy during this weekend’s downtime: “The Floater,” the premiere episode of 87th Precinct, a 1961-1962 NBC-TV drama based on Ed McBain’s detective novels.

• R.I.P. Richard Safarian, who directed episodes of The Wild Wild West, I Spy, and other 1960s TV espionage series.

• I’m not a big fan of James Patterson’s thriller fiction, but he won me over with this news. According to the Los Angeles Times,

Bestselling author James Patterson wants to support independent bookstores, and he’s putting his money where his heart is. On Monday he pledged to give $1 million to independent bookstores in the next year.

“We’re making this transition to e-books, and that’s fine and good and terrific and wonderful, but we’re not doing it in an organized, sane, civilized way. So what’s happening right now is a lot of bookstores are disappearing," Patterson told CBS’ This Morning.

Patterson says he hopes the funds will support everything from raises for staff who haven’t gotten them in years to larger projects. What’s essential is that the bookstores have a viable business model and that their shops include a children’s section.

People interested in learning more can fill out a form on Patterson’s website.

• Issue No. 14 of Crime Factory is now available. It includes an interview with Peter Corris, author of the Cliff Hardy private-eye novels, as well as Peter Dragovich’s look back at the film made from one of my all-time favorite Western novels, Ron Hansen’s The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford (1983). Oh, and too-infrequent Rap Sheet contributor Kevin Burton Smith has a short story in this issue, “The Peach-Streaked Blouse.”

• This is a great photo of the young John le Carré. Can there be any doubt that he was cut out to write espionage fiction for a living?

• Happy 80th birthday this month to Kirkus Reviews!

• And happy third anniversary to The Nick Carter & Carter Brown Blog and its compiler, “Scott” from Denver, Colorado.

• I’m most pleased to see that Criminal Element’s Leslie Gilbert Elman has taken up the task of reviewing the current season of Foyle’s War, the historical whodunit starring Michael Kitchen and Honeysuckle Weeks. Her write-up about “The Eternity Ring,” last Sunday night’s installment can be enjoyed here. Foyle’s War will continue this Sunday, September 22, on PBS-TV’s Masterpiece Mystery! series with an episode titled “The Cage.”

• And yes, it’s Talk Like a Pirate Day. Time to get your aaaargh! on.

Movin’ Me Down the Highway

Earlier today, my predominately favorable review of Jim Fusilli’s new novel, Billboard Man (Thomas & Mercer), was posted on the Kirkus Reviews Web site. Click here to read the piece.

Prior to penning that critique, I conducted a brief e-mail interview with Fusilli, a New York City resident who, since 2008, has been The Wall Street Journal’s rock and pop music critic. I was curious about a few things having to do with Billboard Man and its 2012 predecessor, Road to Nowhere--both of which feature a traveling-man protagonist known as Sam Jellico (whose real name, revealed in Billboard Man, is Donald Harry Bliss)--and Fusilli was kind enough to answer my questions.

At the time, I didn’t know how much of our exchange might make it into the Kirkus article--and as it happens, not much did. So I’ve decided to offer the best portions of that interview below, covering Fusilli’s early fiction, his comeback novel, Narrows Gate, and what’s to be expected from future entries in his new series.

J. Kingston Pierce: Between 2001 and 2004, you published a quartet of novels featuring New York writer-turned-private eye Terry Orr, beginning with Closing Time and concluding with Hard, Hard City. But then you conceded in an interview that the P.I.-fiction field wasn’t necessarily the best place for your writing. What is it about the Sam Jellico/Donnie Bliss books that fits better with your desires and expectations as a novelist?

Jim Fusilli: I feel I outgrew the first-person narrative style that I used in the first four novels. Or at least I was eager to experiment with craft. I thought I’d put myself in a box and I wanted to do more. I was getting better simply because of the demands of having to do a novel a year. I was watching what Dennis Lehane, George Pelecanos, and Michael Connelly were doing, writers I had a chance to got to know a bit, and I saw they were writers who wrote crime stories, not “crime writers.” I wanted to reposition myself to be a writer first, regardless of genre and even if I loved genre-writing best of all.

Also, as you can imagine, I’m influenced deeply by musicians and the ones I admire the most always seem to want to stretch and to challenge themselves. I wanted to hold myself to the same standards I was demanding of musicians I was writing about for the Journal.

In the Sam series, the canvas is much broader: the entire U.S. vs. New York City. The stories are populated with people from a variety of backgrounds and geographic locations. Also, I’m using techniques that are popular in high-end TV these days, where I think we’re seeing great writing: fast-cutting from one plot point to another; many characters who contribute to advancing the arc of the story; threads that seem unrelated, yet come together slowly; and others.

JKP: What were your inspirations for this new series? If I had to venture a guess, I would say that you were an enthusiastic watcher of drifter-on-the-run-does-good TV shows in your youth--The Fugitive, Run for Your Life, etc.--and have made that genre your own here. But I could certainly be wrong. What’s the truth?

JF: You’re right. I mention contemporary TV often, but in some ways, Sam is like Richard Kimble in The Fugitive or Tod [Stiles] and Buz [Murdock] in Route 66, two series from the ’60s. He shows up in town and is drawn into mischief and misadventure. The new characters who appear in each book carry the story, to an extent, as they did in those shows. My books are populated with fully drawn “guest stars.”

JKP: There’s a good deal of subtle humor in Billboard Man. Was that intentional, or is it simply part of the way you compose fiction? And what value do you think humor has in crime and mystery tales?

JF: When I stopped writing novels in 2006, I set out to prove to myself, and maybe to the industry, that I could write in different styles and voices; that I was more versatile and maybe a bit more ambitious than I had shown. I wrote many, many short stories, many of which were published, and I found that using humor accelerated action and delineated characters. I know it sounds obvious, but if you can write funny, it’s fun.

In Narrows Gate, the novel that changed my career, there are characters who have varying means of expressing humor. That was a breakthrough for me--to be humorous in different ways as a means to create a hierarchy for the characters. I prize wit in people, so I prize in it characters too. My favorite characters are the witty ones. Also, there are several brief comedic bits in Narrows Gate that can work without context. I wanted to see if could write gags.

It’s the juxtaposition that makes it so valuable in creating a vivid reality in crime-fiction stories. Life is not an unending stretch of noir moments. Peculiar things happen, curious things, humorous things. Sometimes they happen a moment before terror begins. Why not exploit this? Give the reader a breather. And once they’re relaxed and laughing ...

JKP: What were your original expectations of--or concerns about--Sam Jellico, and how well do you think he’s developing in your books?

JF: Without giving too much away, I will say that I knew from the beginning that I wanted Sam to evolve. In Billboard Man, for example, he learns a hard lesson about the impropriety of his treatment of women. I hint at this in Road to Nowhere, but it’s explicit in Billboard Man. There’s a scene in Billboard Man in which he’s dressed down, and it’s what he deserved. He’s better for it, but it’s not easy to witness.

This required that I write vivid, multidimensional women characters. I was very conscious of that when I created [Billboard Man characters] Ginger, Cotillion, and Lola. They seem real to me in an almost tactile way. The men--Joe Blunt and Boone [Stillwell]--are archetypes, deliberately so.

JKP: Sam seems like such a controlled player. Do you really think he’s capable of carrying an extended series?

JF: Not as he is in Road to Nowhere. But if you think about his scenes with his late wife, Moira, that are revealed in flashback, you see the kind of man he was and might be again. As I said, in Billboard Man he grows. I think he’s someone worth caring about. He’s a tragic figure.

JKP: Are you currently at work on a sequel to Billboard Man? If so, can you say a little about that story’s plot?

JF: I always have the next book done by the time the current book is published. It’s my way. Again, it’s one of those things I learned from musicians. When something is done, move on. So the day after a manuscript is finished, I start something new, if only the research and sketching.

In Billboard Man, Sam is exposed. His real identity is revealed. The Wall Street powerbroker, Francis Cherry, wants him to come back to New York. In the next book, we find out why and whether he will. Also, there’s a character who appears in the first pages of Road to Nowhere, but who is never heard from for the remainder of that book or in Billboard Man. She’s a major player in the next book, so much so that she could carry the story by herself. There’s a small universe of recurring characters in the first two novels that contribute to the third book.

JKP: Perhaps the most interesting relationship in these yarns is that between Sam and his estranged college-student daughter. How do you imagine that relationship progressing?

JF: At the heart of this series is the question of whether Sam and his daughter, who he calls Pup, can be a family again--whether they can be repaired or repair each other. Another question: What role will Cherry play in bringing them together or forcing them to remain apart? I see the series as having two end points on the distant horizon: Will Sam seek to avenge his wife’s murder? And will he and Pup reunite?

JKP: In the crime/mystery/thriller fiction field--both modern and historical--whose work do you most enjoy reading these days?

JF: If you don’t mind, I prefer not to answer that question. I’ve made many friends in the worlds of mystery, crime, and thrillers--it is the most welcoming community, as you know. I always feel I’m slighting someone when I start mentioning writers I enjoy. I will say that when I was studying how to develop characters that emerged organically from setting, I read Daniel Woodrell and Kent Haruf with the same intensity as I read Willa Cather and other great American authors. I don’t know if Haruf is considered a genre writer, but everyone should read him.

JKP: Finally, didn’t you tell me not long ago that you’d like to write a sequel to Narrows Gate? What’s the status of that book?

JF: I’ve been asked to write a sequel to it, yes. It’s been a challenge. I wrote Narrows Gate as if it were the last novel I’d ever write--I had no idea that it would be published, never mind be successful. Everything I wanted to say about the subject is in that book: the Italian-American experience; the demythologizing of The Godfather myth; the value of loyalty and the meaning of friendship; how we derive our sense of identity; and the price we pay in our struggle to succeed.

But as I worked on early drafts, I was pleased to rediscover several characters, particularly Benno and Bell, who are vivid and compelling, at least to me. There’s a suggestion in Narrows Gate of where they can go--and where they can fail. I’ve developed a few new characters who are staring to feel real. Also, Narrows Gate ended in 1946, which is at the precipice of a fascinating period in American history. I think I’ll be all right. I’ve got about 600 pages that are an awful mess, but there’s a story in there.

Chasing After Fame

It was 50 years ago today that The Fugitive, the American drama series created by Roy Huggins and starring David Janssen, debuted on ABC-TV. That program about a physician accused of his wife’s murder, and his subsequent struggle to track down the One-Armed Man he’s convinced holds the answers to her slaying, eventually ran for 120 hour-long episodes over four years, becoming one of the most respected small-screen productions in history. Stephen Bowie opines in the A.V. Club blog that it “may be the perfect television drama.

That’s not to say that The Fugitive is superior to today’s best dramas, or even to its finest contemporaries, like The Defenders and Ben Casey. But The Fugitive achieved a perfection of form that was unique: It was part crime procedural, part action-adventure, and part character-driven melodrama. It was fusion TV. The push and pull between the contrasting generic elements meant that episodes were highly varied, but with so many different traditions to draw from, nearly always satisfying. The Fugitive achieved a phenomenally consistent level of quality--which makes this a particularly tough list to compile.

You will find my own tribute to The Fugitive--posted four decades after its final episode aired, on August 29, 1967--by clicking here. And in celebration of today’s 50th anniversary, Bowie provides an interesting alternative ending to Richard Kimble’s saga here.

Finishing Touches in Scotland

(Photo © 2013 by Alex Hewitt/Writer Pictures)

(Editor’s note: Below, Nancie Clare files her third and final report from this last weekend’s Bloody Scotland crime-writing festival, held in Stirling, Scotland. Be sure also to read her interview with Lee Child, her observations on the conference’s opening events, and her notes on Bloody Scotland’s first full day of activities.)

The schedule was lighter on Sunday and, as it turned out, I had already seen many of the participating authors in other panels the previous day. So I decided to attend Caro Ramsay’s event featuring the preparation of dishes taken from The Killer Cookbook, a 2012 paperback collection of recipes--supplied by crime-fiction writers--that she edited. I had heard from one of the scheduled panelists, Craig Robertson (Witness the Dead), that he was going to make blood pudding. How appropriate.

By the time the doors to the MacLaren Suite (where this panel presentation was to take place) finally opened, though, the program had changed. According to Ramsay, bustling behind a long table heaped over with glasses, spirits, jars of condiments, and fruits, the folks from Health and Safety had been along and determined that seven mystery authors cooking with high heat and sharp knives was not on. However, mixology was OK.

So two squads were lined up: Team Boy (Craig Robertson and Gordon Brown) vied against the women on Team Blonde (Lin Anderson, Alex Gray, Catriona McPherson, and Ramsay). Team Boy chose to make Tom Black’s Killer Margarita (Black being the husband of Sue Black, director of the Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification at Dundee University), while Team Blonde tackled The Peter James Vodka Martini Writing Special. I looked about and no one else seemed to see the irony that in the middle of Scotch country, we were straining to sample tequila and vodka. Since there wasn’t quite enough booze, Team Blonde also made Aline Templeton’s Bloody Mary Tomatoes.

In the meantime, Alex Gray distributed scones served with raspberry jam and “squirty” cream (UK-speak for whipped cream in an aerosol can) that she had made earlier at home, while someone else was passing around “flapjacks,” oats mixed with dates and honey. Call it the Stirling Silly Season or just a Bloody Good Time; either way it was tasty chaos.

Unfortunately, I had to leave the party early to queue up for the festival’s finale: “At the Top of His Game,” a sold-out event showcasing author Lee Child.

If you have never had a chance to see Lee Child in a public presentation, do your best to remedy that sometime. By his own admission, he went into writing to be an entertainer, and he obviously feels right at home on stage. (Unlike, say, Jo Nesbø, who got his entertaining chops early on as a footballer and a rock star, Child admits that he has no musical talent; so, as he said, appearing at events such as these is his outlet.)

Author Peter Guttridge (The Devil’s Moon) once more acted as interlocutor, and he took Child down memory lane to his boyhood in Birmingham, England--which, Child readily admitted, could get quite obstreperous. In fact, Child was a bit of a “wide boy,” engaging frequently in fisticuffs (often to defend his younger brother, Andrew Grant) and sewing razor blades under the lapels of his school jacket (a defense against someone grabbing him by the lapels. As Child explained, “You only do it once.”). The surprise was not that he went to such lengths, remarked Child, but that he knew how to sew.

For a two-year-old festival, Bloody Scotland drew some impressive crowds. (Photo © 2013 by Alex Hewitt/Writer Pictures)

These tales of a rough-and-tumble youth, Child admitted, inform the character of his series protagonist, Jack Reacher.

At one point, Child was asked whether it was true that he “planned to end the Reacher series after 21 books, an homage to John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee.” Child acknowledged he had always planned such an ending, but now that he’s nearing 21 books (this year’s Never Go Back being his 18th), he isn’t so sure anymore. He said that he had plans to kill Jack Reacher off in an appropriate manner--say, having him take a bullet meant for someone else and then bleeding out in a motel bathroom. Now, he reckons he may not do that. Instead, Reacher might just stroll into the sunset, giving Child’s daughter, Ruth (now in her early 30s), a chance to pick up the franchise.

Another thing learned from this event: Child is a thoughtful wordsmith in that he considers writing a one-on-one experience with each reader. Yes, many people may buy and read his books, but when you pick up any of his Reacher tales, it is really the two of you communing. He finds that meaningful. And I think it shows in the writing.

So that concludes Bloody Scotland for 2013. Next year’s festival will convene on September 19, the day after the referendum on Scottish independence from the United Kingdom is held. It should be an interesting time.

READ MORE: “Video: Bloody Scotland 2013,” by John Dingwall
(Daily Record).