The Further Adventures of Charles Todd

It seems that like me, Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine editor George Easter has been wondering what would become of “Charles Todd” (aka David Watjen), half of the mother-son writing partnership that created historical mystery series around both Inspector Ian Rutledge and nurse Bess Crawford. His mother, Caroline Watjen (aka Caroline Todd), passed away in 2021, and there have not been any new entries in either line since 2023.

However, Easter reports Charles Todd contacted him recently with news that “Ian Rutledge and Bess Crawford live on. I signed a four-book contract with Mysterious Press. A Christmas Witness, a Rutledge Christmas novella, will be released October 21, 2025, and A Day of Judgment [the 25th Rutledge novel] will be released on February 17th of 2026. I am hard at work on the [manuscript] for the new Bess Crawford that will be released next.”

So, good news at last.

And Furthermore …

It happens almost every time: I publish one of my “Bullet Points” posts, only to realize soon afterward that I left out a few newsy items. So consider this an addendum to yesterday’s wrap-up.

• The Killing Times brings news today that 40-year-old Scottish actor Richard Rankin (The Crimson Field, Outlander, Trust Me) will fill the role of Detective Inspector John Rebus in a new small-screen adaptation of Ian Rankin’s novels, titled simply Rebus. The Nordic streaming service Viaplay, “recently launched in the UK,” has commissioned the forthcoming series. That streamer says Rebus will find its protagonist “at a personal crossroads after a fight with a notorious mobster in Edinburgh. He struggles with the job that is increasingly controlled by business-driven technocrats, while realising that he is living in an unhealthy relationship that he should end and that he has more or less been replaced in the role of father in his daughter’s life by his ex-wife’s new, wealthy husband. Now he must find his new position, both privately and professionally. In a world that is increasingly governed by politics and class differences, he feels that the system is becoming increasingly watered down. And if no one else follows the rules, why should he?” Viaplay will reportedly serve up the first six-episode season of Rebus in 2024.

• This from Deadline: “A second season of smash John le Carré adaptation The Night Manager is in the works at Amazon Prime Video and the BBC, with Tom Hiddleston set to reprise his role as protagonist Jonathan Pine. Under the codename Steelworks, Deadline understands Season 2 will film later this year in London and South America. Although it is yet to be formally greenlit by Amazon and the BBC, we hear that it is set to receive a two-season order.”

• Meanwhile, Season 3 of the ITV crime drama Grace, starring John Simm and based on Peter James’ books about Brighton police detective Roy Grace, will debut this coming Sunday, March 19, in Britain. The stories told in these latest three episodes are drawn from James’ novels Dead Like You, Dead Man's Grip,  and Not Dead Yet.

• The streaming-TV service Peacock has announced that Tony Shalhoub will return to his role as “defective detective” Adrian Monk in a new movie scripted by Monk series creator Andy Breckman.

• During an interview with Crimespree Magazine, in which author Charles Todd talks about The Cliff’s Edge (Morrow), the 13th and last Bess Crawford mystery he composed with his mother, Caroline (who died in 2021), Todd explains that his next novel with be the 25th installment in their series starring Scotland Yard inspector Ian Rutledge. “I am putting quality over quantity so I might not put out a book every six months,” he explains. “As soon as I get one book done, I start on the next one. I will not find another writer to work with me, because no one can automatically pick up where my mom left off. The next Ian book is with my agent, and we will see what happens from there, since my contract is up, but it will go on to some publisher. I am also writing a short story, part of an anthology, based on titles of songs of the entire album, ‘Back in Black’ by AC/DC. Each author wrote a story based on one of these songs.”

• In a Facebook post, author-screenwriter Lee Goldberg draws my attention to a March 28 non-fiction release titled Music for Prime Time: A History of American Television Themes and Scoring (Oxford University Press). Its author is Jon Burlingame, hailed as “one of the nation’s leading writers on the subject of music for films and television.” Library Journal notes in its review of this $35 book that it’s “a revised, updated, and expanded version of Burlingame’s Sound and Vision of 2000 … Burlingame comprehensively documents the themes and soundtracks that have become earworms for many TV viewers … [He] highlights theme song composers such as Nelson Riddle (Route 66), Lalo Shifrin (Mission: Impossible), Neal Hefti (Batman; The Odd Couple), Mike Post (Rockford Files; Hill Street Blues), and many talented but less heralded composers.” Goldberg enthuses: “I've been looking forward to this book for years.” Being another fan of classic film and TV themes, I’ll likely be ordering my own copy.

• Speaking of Oxford University Press, it has just published handsome new paperback editions of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories through its Oxford World’s Classics imprint. For various reasons, says blogger Kate Jackson at Cross-Examining Crime, these reprints “are a great choice if you are looking to upgrade your existing cop[ies] or you are wanting to dig deeper into the canon.”

• If you’re wondering what has become of the blog Bookgasm, you’re not alone. It’s been offline since December—long enough that I was worried whether it was coming back. But according to editor Rod Lott, the dysfunction is only temporary. “Some issue with the SSL certificate,” he informed me in mid-February. Then, just yesterday—with the site still inaccessible—Lott wrote to say: “Since we last spoke, I hired a professional, who confirmed it got hacked. The site has been successfully cleaned of all the malware, as of today. Now it’s just a matter of him restoring the content, which he believes can be done.” I, for one, look forward to celebrating Bookgasm’s return—and seeing all of my links to it from The Rap Sheet operating again.

• And Republican right-wingers in the States are frothing at the mouth about the damage caused by “woke” politics. You’d think they would have come up with a solid definition of the term by now. Instead, says Salon, it’s become a “choose your own bigotry” label.

A Charming, Gracious Lady Gone Too Soon

It was late yesterday afternoon, shortly before the start of Bouchercon’s Anthony Awards presentation, when I heard that Caroline Todd—who, with her son Charles Todd, was supposed to present this year’s Best Critical or Non-fiction Work commendation—had passed away. As most Rap Sheet readers will know, the Todds together penned dozens of mysteries, primarily those starring early 20th-century Scotland Yard Inspector Ian Rutledge (A Fatal Lie) and World War I-era battlefield nurse Bess Crawford (An Irish Hostage).

Charles Todd brought the sad news via Facebook:

It is with a heavy heart that I along with my sister Linda [Watjen] and Caroline’s sister Martha must tell you we lost Caroline this morning, 8-27-21, at 10 a.m. She passed peacefully and was with Linda at the end. Caroline left the world a better place and was immensely happy to have met and gotten to know so many readers, authors and booksellers. She was to the very end a class act. More information will follow. I am delighted we have completed A Game of Fear featuring Ian Rutledge and the next in the Bess Crawford [series]. Caroline will always be alive in the hearts of all she touched. Everyone’s notes have been greatly appreciated. Charles

The tributes have since been pouring in. In a post on his blog, fellow novelist Martin Edwards calls Caroline Todd “a woman of charm, intelligence, and kindliness,” and adds:

I first became aware of the name of Charles Todd (the name under which the mother and son duo wrote) twenty-five years ago, when I delighted in their first historical mystery featuring Inspector Rutledge, A Test of Wills. The popularity of that book paved the way for a long and successful career. Their love of England shone through in their writing: it's not easy to capture the sense of a foreign country in a long series of novels, but they achieved this thanks to meticulous research and a great deal of empathy. …

Four years ago, when I agreed to give a talk in [the English village of] Grasmere to a group of Americans visiting the Lake District, I was surprised and delighted to find that their number included Caroline and Charles, who were on another research trip—as I say, they researched expertly and extensively together. I've also had the pleasure of including their stories in anthologies; their contributions were always entertaining and highly professional.

Blogger and editor Janet Rudolph describes Caroline as “one of the most gracious, warm, and charming members of the mystery community.” She offers these memories:

I first met Caroline many years ago when I was seated next to her at her publisher dinner at the Baltimore Bouchercon. She was the perfect dining companion. She shared so many wonderful and interesting personal stories. Since that meeting, we always made sure to have coffee or a short talk at every Left Coast Crime, Malice [Domestic], and Bouchercon. She was so very special and someone I counted as a friend.

Over the years she was on several panels that I moderated, but my last “meeting” with her was this summer at More Than Malice, the virtual Malice Domestic. She was on a panel I moderated on “Past as Prologue.” She was animated and interested, not just in her own writing and role on the panel, but in that of the other newer authors. The panelists all had such a good discussion that I was able to step back and enjoy, too. Caroline valued the younger new additions to the mystery world. And that's how I will remember her—always so gracious and welcoming.

I didn’t know Caroline Todd well, but like so many others, I had opportunities to meet and speak with her at Bouchercons, notably in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 2015 (click here and scroll down to see a photo) and in New Orleans in 2016. I was also fortunate enough to interview her and her son in 2002 on behalf of January Magazine, at a time when they were still hiding behind their joint “Charles Todd” pseudonym. Caroline reminded me very much of my British maternal grandmother, which is a compliment, indeed.

So far, I haven’t spotted any obituaries of Caroline Todd, nor have I found out so much as how old she was at the time of her demise. Word has also not got around as to whether her son Charles will continue writing their series in his mother’s absence (though I presume he will). But I shall update this post as I hear more.

FOLLOW-UP: Jiro Kimura has a nice obit of Caroline Todd in The Gumshoe Site, which includes her age at passing:

Caroline Todd, one-half of the mother-and-son writing team that authors under the joint pseudonym Charles Todd, died peacefully on August 27 in Delaware. The former Associated Press reporter started to co-write (with her son, Charles Todd, the former corporate trouble-shooter) [by producing] A Test of Wills (St. Martin’s, 1986), introducing Inspector Ian Rutledge, a Scotland Yard inspector with shell shock from World War One. This historical novel won the 1997 Barry Award and was nominated for the Edgar Award in the first novel category, resulting in their continuing to produce almost one Rutledge book every year. In addition, they started another historical mystery series featuring Bess Crawford, a British army nurse in World War One, starting [with] A Duty to the Dead (Morrow, 2009). An Unmarked Grave (Crawford #4, 2012), A Question of Honor (Crawford #5, 2013) and The Shattered Tree (Crawford #8, 2016) won the 2013 Macavity, the 2013 Agatha and the 2017 Mary Higgins Clark Awards, respectively. The 24th Rutledge book, A Game of Fear, and the 13th, not-yet-titled Crawford book will be published in 2022 from Morrow. To my surprise, I have found out the real names of Caroline Todd and Charles Todd are Carolyn Teachey Watjen and David Wheaton Watjen, respectively. She was 86.

READ MORE: “We Have Lost One of the Great Writers of Our Era—Caroline Todd,” by George Easter (Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine); “Remembering the Late Caroline Todd,” by Oline H. Cogdill (Mystery Scene); “Caroline Todd, A Celebration” (Jungle Red Writers).

Battling Crime in the Wake of War

As my maternal grandfather told me when I was a boy, he was only 14 or 15 years old and living in Canada when World War I broke out in Europe in 1914. Yet he had several older brothers who quickly volunteered to join the British Army, and my grandfather wanted to go with them. So he lied about his age, and was sent to the front lines in France. Amazingly, he didn’t die, though he did have some scares (one of them involving a rat that sneaked up on his trench from no-man’s-land one night, and that he almost shot, thinking it was a German soldier). And he was seriously injured by a bomb blast that left shrapnel in one of his legs. The field medics wanted to amputate that limb and send him home, but my grandfather told them he’d rather die than lose his leg. For the rest of his long life, he suffered with the pain of metal bits working their way out of his flesh.

Eventually, he did return to Canada—as did all of his brothers. I seem to remember him saying that their German-born mother cried for days, after her sons were safely home. Though I could be wrong about that. Sadly, my grandfather is no longer around to set me straight.

I thought of my grandfather often as I wrote my piece about post-World War I mysteries, which appears today in CrimeReads—just two days before the centennial, on Sunday, November 11, of that war’s conclusion. He was an enthusiastic reader; in fact, it was partly the prevalence of books in his home that led me to become a book lover. (My mother was an equal influence on me in that regard.) Whether he would have appreciated any of the novels featured in my piece, I can’t say. Perhaps not, for in one way or another, their stories all focus on loss—the loss of friends, the loss of one’s moral or mental bearings, the loss of confidence that the world remains a safe place.

I, of course, came to these crime and mystery novels without my grandfather’s baggage—and was glad of the opportunity to dive into the tales about which I write today. My focus is on nine crime, mystery, and spy novels that take place shortly after the end of the fighting in Europe. Works by Robert Goddard, Alex Beer, Charles Todd, and Christopher Huang are among those under consideration. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it’s a start for readers interested in how fictional detectives—and others—were affected by those four years of fighting, and how their lives and careers changed afterward.

Again, click here to find my post-World War I mystery picks.

READ MORE: “Words of War: History and Mystery Meet in Battlefield Trenches,” by J. Kingston Pierce (Kirkus Reviews); “Interview with WWI Historical Novelists,” by Elise Cooper (Crimespree Magazine); “At War with the War,” by Xavier Lechard (At the Villa Rose); “Raymond Chandler on the Western Front, 1918,” by Bethany Reynard (First World War Centenary).

Three Cheers for the Edgar Winners

The 2015 Edgar Allan Poe Awards, sponsored by the Mystery Writers of America, were handed out this evening during a banquet in New York City. Below are the winners, courtesy of Mystery Fanfare.

Best Novel: Mr. Mercedes, by Stephen King (Scribner)

Also nominated: This Dark Road to Mercy, by Wiley Cash (Morrow); Wolf, by Mo Hayder (Atlantic Monthly Press); The Final Silence, by Stuart Neville (Soho Press); Saints of the Shadow Bible, by Ian Rankin (Little, Brown), and Coptown, by Karin Slaughter (Ballantine)

Best First Novel by an American Author: Dry Bones in the Valley, by Tom Bouman (Norton)

Also nominated: Invisible City, by Julia Dahl (Minotaur); The Life We Bury, by Allen Eskens (Seventh Street); Bad Country, by C.B. McKenzie (Minotaur/Thomas Dunne); Shovel Ready, by Adam Sternbergh (Crown); and Murder at the Brightwell, by Ashley Weaver (Minotaur/Thomas Dunne)

Best Paperback Original: The Secret History of Las Vegas, by Chris Albani (Penguin)

Also nominated: Stay With Me, by Alison Gaylin (Morrow); The Barkeep, by William Lashner (Thomas & Mercer); The Day She Died, by Catriona McPherson (Midnight Ink); The Gone Dead Train, by Lisa Turner (Morrow); and World of Trouble, by Ben H. Winters (Quirk)

Best Fact Crime: Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood, by William Mann (Harper)

Also nominated: Kitty Genovese: The Murder, the Bystanders, the Crime that Changed America, by Kevin Cook (Norton); The Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller’s Tragic Quest for Primitive Art, by Carl Hoffman (Morrow); The Other Side, by Lacy M. Johnson (Tin House); and The Mad Sculptor: The Maniac, the Model, and the Murder that Shook the Nation, by Harold Schechter (New Harvest)

Best Critical/Biographical: Poe-Land: The Hallowed Haunts of Edgar Allan Poe, by J.W. Ocker (Countryman Press)

Also nominated: The Figure of the Detective: A Literary History and Analysis, by Charles Brownson (McFarland & Company); James Ellroy: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction, by Jim Mancall (McFarland & Company); Kiss the Blood Off My Hands: Classic Film Noir, by Robert Miklitsch (University of Illinois Press); and Judges & Justice & Lawyers & Law: Exploring the Legal Dimensions of Fiction and Film, by Francis M. Nevins (Perfect Crime)

Best Short Story: “What Do You Do?,” by Gillian Flynn (from Rogues, edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois; Ballantine)

Also nominated: “The Snow Angel,” by Doug Allyn (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine [EQMM], January 2014); “200 Feet,” by John Floyd (The Strand Magazine, February-May 2014); “Red Eye,” by Dennis Lehane vs. Michael Connelly (from FaceOff, edited by David Baldacci; Simon & Schuster), and “Teddy,” by Brian Tobin (EQMM, May 2014)

Best Juvenile: Greenglass House, by Kate Milford (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers)

Also nominated: Absolutely Truly, by Heather Vogel Frederick (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers); Space Case, by Stuart Gibbs (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers); Nick and Tesla’s Super-Cyborg Gadget Glove, by “Science Bob” Pflugfelder and Steve Hockensmith Quirk); Saving Kabul Corner, by N.H. Senzai (Paula Wiseman); and Eddie Red, Undercover: Mystery on Museum Mile, by Marcia Wells (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers)

Best Young Adult: The Art of Secrets, by James Klise (Algonquin
Young Readers)

Also nominated: The Doubt Factory, by Paolo Bacigalupi (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers); Nearly Gone, by Elle Cosimano (Penguin Young Readers Group/Kathy Dawson); Fake ID, by Lamar Giles (HarperCollins Children’s Books/Amistad); and The Prince of Venice Beach, by Blake Nelson (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers)

Best Television Episode Teleplay: “Episode 1,” Happy Valley, teleplay by Sally Wainwright (Netflix)

Also nominated: “The Empty Hearse,” Sherlock, teleplay by Mark Gatiss (Hartswood Films/Masterpiece); “Unfinished Business,” Blue Bloods, teleplay by Siobhan Byrne O’Connor (CBS); “Dream Baby Dream,” The Killing, teleplay by Sean Whitesell (Netflix); and “Episode 6,” The Game, teleplay by Toby Whithouse (BBC America)

The Simon & Schuster/Mary Higgins Clark Award: The Stranger You Know, by Jane Casey (Minotaur)

Also nominated: A Dark and Twisted Tide, by Sharon Bolton (Minotaur); Invisible City, by Julia Dahl (Minotaur); Summer of the Dead, by Julia Keller (Minotaur); and The Black Hour, by Lori Rader-Day (Seventh Street)

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award:
“Getaway Girl,” by Zoë Z. Dean (EQMM)

Grand Master: Lois Duncan and James Ellroy

Raven Awards:
Ruth and Jon Jordan, Crimespree Magazine
Kathryn Kennison, Magna Cum Murder

Ellery Queen Award:
Charles Ardai, editor/founder, Hard Case Crime

In addition, the mother and son who write as “Charles Todd” have received the inaugural Edgar Distinguished Service Award, which will apparently now be named in the Todds’ honor. And the winner of this year’s St. Martin’s Minotaur/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Competition is John Keyse-Walker.

Congratulations to all of the contenders!

READ MORE: “Best in Mysteries: The 2015 Edgar Award Winners,” by Sara Nelson (Omnivoracious); “2015’s Edgar Awards: Mystery’s Faithful Gather,” by Leslie Gilbert Elman (Criminal Element).