Mystery Melange

The Publishing Gives Back blog is hosting an auction this week to raise money for the American Red Cross and other Sandy relief charities, with various editors and agents offering up editorial and critique services to the highest bidder. The individual auction offerings will only be up for bids for one week, so hurry and put in your best offer.

Early bird pricing for ThrillerFest VIII (held July 10-13 in New York City) ends midnight on November 30th.  Special guests will include 2013 ThrillerMaster Anne Rice, 2011 ThrillerMaster R.L. Stine, T. Jefferson Parker, Michael Connelly, Michael Palmer, and Steve Berry.

The California Crime Writers Conference early registration is open for writers and would-be authors. Elizabeth George is the keynote speaker and will also lead a workshop on "Finding Your Process." Other workshops will offer information on contracts, writing tips, and the latest crime-fighting techniques, plus agents and editors will also be on hand for manuscript critiques. The conference takes place June 22-23, 2013, in Pasadena.

This Saturday, December 1, is the third annual Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day in close to 1,100 participating stores in all 50 states, Canada, England and Australia. For more information and an interactive map (that hopefully includes a store near you), check out the event's website.

The Q&A roundup this week includes Marshall Karp, author of the books NYPD Red and Bloodthirsty, who chatted with the Scene of the Crime blog; Chuck Wendig interviewed Chris Baty, author and the founder of NaNoWriMo, who talked about what goes into writing a good character, and more; and Sophie Littlefield was this week's "Five on Friday" guest over at Jen's Book Thoughts.

Congrats to some of the latest crime fiction award winners:

• Broken Harbour by Tana French won the 2012 Irish Book Award in the Crime Novel category. (Runners Up: Slaughter's Hound Declan Burke; Vengeance by Benjamin Black; The Istanbul Puzzle by Laurence O’Bryan; Too Close for Comfort by Niamh O’Connor; and Red Ribbons by Louise Phillips);

• Åsa Larsson's Till offer åt Molok won the Swedish Crime Academy's 2012 award for Best Swedish Crime Novel and Peter Robinson's Before the Poison won the Academy's Best Foreign Crime Novel prize;

• And the Cat Writers' Association awards for mysteries featuring cats went to Carole Nelson Douglas, creator of the Midnight Louie series, who won a CoE for her short story "Butterfly Kiss" as well as her novel Cat in a Topaz Tango, while Shirley Rousseau Murphy, creator of the feline P.I. Joe Grey, won a CoE for her novel Cat Striking Back and the Muse Medallion for Cat Telling Tales.

Due to the Thanksgiving holidays, news from the crime-fiction media world is a bit light this week, but I hope everyone enjoyed their holiday weekend.

MOVIES

Paramount is planning a remake of Young Sherlock Holmes, a series from 1985 that followed teenage versions of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. Digital Spy also noted that a script for a third entry in Warner Bros' Robert Downey, Jr./Jude Law film version of Sherlock Holmes is currently in development.

Bryan Cranston is joining the cast of the indie drama Eye of Winter. He'll play a nearly blind crook who takes as hostages the owner of a floundering motel and her daughter, using them to help extract money from a dirty cop.

A trailer for writer-director Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly was released. The film is based on a novel by George V Higgins and features Brad Pitt playing an enforcer character who investigates a heist that occurs during a poker game played by mob bosses.

TV

CSI and CSI: New York are trying a personal take on upoming crossover episodes in February, with Detective Mac Taylor (Gary Sinise) traveling to Las Vegas to meet his girlfriend, only to determine she has been kidnapped. Then, later that week, CSI’s D.B. Russell (Ted Danson) will briefly relocate to New York.

Omnimysery News reports that the BBC has several new crime dramas in development, including What Remains, Happy Valley, By Any Means, and Hinterland, a detective series based in the coastal Welsh town of Aberystwyth. The Beeb also renewed George Gently for a seventh season, and BBC Four will air the Italian crime drama Young Mantalbano, based on short stories by crime novelist Andrea Camilleri. 

House star Hugh Laurie is close to a deal to star as the famous pirate Blackbeard in in the NBC series Crossbones.

Law & Order: SVU has signed Jane Kaczmarek to play Suffolk County district attorney Pam James, as a foil for DA Rafael Barba (Raúl Esparza) when the two clash during a rape trial.

From Eurocrime: Erin Kelly's The Poison Tree has been made into two one-hour episodes, the first of which will be shown on 10 December at 9pm on ITV1.

GAMES

Legacy Games has released an interactive video game titled Return to Cabot Cove, based on the popular Murder, She Wrote television series starring Angela Lansbury as Jessica Fletcher.

Thanksgiving-Eve Mystery Melange

The Mystery Lovers Kitchen blog has posted several Thanksgiving recipes, in case you're still looking for something to fill out your menu. Check out Potato Bacon Soup with Parmesan Cheese from Daryl Avery; Green Bean Casserole from Peg Cochran; and three spoon-bread recipes from Cleo Coyle.

Looking for some unusual Thanksgiving decorating ideas? Here you go.

Janet Rudolph updated the Thanksgiving Crime Fictiion bibliography in her Mystery Fanfare blog (with a few recipe links thrown in for good measure).

In case you missed it, Richard Pangburn reviewed Michael Dibdin's crime novel Thanksgiving for Friday's Forgotten Books last week, a title he calls "one of the most intelligent literary murder mysteries in existence."

Publetariat reprinted part of a blog post from a few years ago, but the subject matter is relevant. The holidays are a great time to commit your memories—both past and present—to paper, as a memoir and/or as fodder for a short story. The key is to keep your stories personal, anchor your story in its era, and include sensory details.

The indie publisher West Pigeon Press has a new anthology of dark fiction titled For When the Veil Drops. I'm honored to have a story in that anthology, with fellow authors A.A. Garrison, Paul L. Bates, Bryan Brown, Robin Wyatt Dunn, J.R. Hamantaschen, Christian Larsen, Samuel Minier, Nick Medina, Doug Murano, Joshua Clark Orkin, Yarrow Paisley, Lydia Peever, Michael Trudeau, and Michael Wehunt. There is a free giveaway contest right now on Goodreads through November 23.

Untreed Reads has some new Thanksgiving-themed short stories in eBook form, including "The Pecan Pie Affair" from T. Lee Harris; the historical "Joseph's Captivity" from KB Inglee; "Calories" from Albert Tucher; "A Death in the Family" from George Seaton; and also the new anthology, The Killer Wore Cranberry: a Second Helping.

The Q&A roundup this week includes author and investigative reporter Hank Phillippi Ryan talking about the release of her new book, The Other Woman, and juggling careers. Also, Stephen Blackmoore chatted with CrimeSpree about debut novel City of the Lost, a blend of hardboiled crime and supernatural pulp.

Blogger/reviewer Jen Forbus is thankful for her experiences at the recent Murder & Mayhem in Muskeo conference and listed the "Top Ten Things I Learned."

The Science Channel picked up the soon-to-be-ending Fringe sci-fi/crime drama and will celebrate with a Thanksgiving marathon that includes the complete first season, as well as a new series examining some real-life fringe science.

If Fringe isn't your taste, other Thanksgiving TV marathons include NCIS, Season 3 on USA November 21, an NCIS "Gibbs That Keeps On Giving" marathon November 22-23 and yet another NCIS marathon November 25; a Bond Movie Marathon November 22-24 on Syfy; a Castle marathon, November 22 on TNT; a Law & Order: Criminal Intent marathon, November 22-23 on Oxygen, and Law & Order: SVU marathon, November 24-25 on USA Network.

When you're out and about on Black Friday looking for early Christmas present ideas, you can't go wrong with a book. To give you an assist, the Wall Street Journal's Gift Guide 2012: Mysteries has some tips; Barnes and Noble offers a list of mysteries from their Gift Guide; and the New England Independent Booksellers Association also has a 2012 Holiday Catalog with ideas.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Oscar-winning actor Sean Penn is jumping into the action thriller genre in a movie called Prone Gunman. Adapted from Jean-Patrick Manchette's book, the film centers on Martin Terrier, an international operative betrayed by his own organization, who goes on the run in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse. As Hollywood Reporter notes, Penn may be looking at this as a potential action-film franchise.

The Wrap reports (via Dark Horizons) that two James Bond actors are in talks to join a John le Carré adaptation. Casino Royale villain Mads Mikkelsen and Skyfall's Ralph Fiennes may come aboard Justin Kurzel's Our Kind of Traitor, adapted from le Carré's most recent novel. According to reports, Mikkelsen is up for the "potentially show-stealing role of larger-than-life Russian gangster Dima, and Fiennes for British spymaster Hector."

Dark Knight Rises actor Tom Hardy has signed on to play Sam Fisher in the film adaptation of a popular video game based on Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell. Hardy's character is a highly-trained special operative in a fictional black-ops operation called Echelon.

Liam Neeson is in talks to join the cast of The All Nighter, playing a hitman who turns on his boss to protect his wife and child, and then must go on the run from both the mob and the cops. The thriller is based on a script written by Brad Ingelsby (who also
wrote the upcoming Scott Cooper film Out of the Furnace). 

Cinemablend has a trailer for the upcoming female buddy-cop movie The Heat, featuring Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy.

TV

The good news just keeps coming for author Jo Nesbo. Several of his books have already been adapted for the big screen, and now House executive producer Katie Jacobs has teamed with Nesbo for a new NBC drama based on his book I Am Victor. The potential series centers on a maverick divorce attorney, with White Collar's Mark Goffman penning the pilot.

The CW is developing Jane Whitefield, a drama project based on the Vanishing Act book series by Thomas Perry about a quirky young woman in search of her biological parents and her own identity, who runs a private investigation/"eraser" company in Portland. The pilot is being produced by Carol Mendelsohn (CSI) and written by Natalie Chaidez. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News and Crimespree)

Fresh off its wildly successful miniseries The Hatfields and McCoys, the History Channel is developing Texas Rising, a miniseries about the formation and rise of the Texas Rangers, the oldest law enforcement organization in North America.

CBS is giving its freshman Sherlock Holmes drama Elementary two extra episodes for a 24-episode season, but is trimming Vegas' order by one, from 22 to 21 episodes.

Joss Whedon's S.H.I.E.L.D. pilot about a secret intelligence organization has added two agents, played by Elizabeth Henstridge and Iain De Caestecker.

Crimespree also notes that USA has signed Bryan Greenberg and Stephanie Sigman to star in its pilot for a series based on the Elmore Leonard story "When the Women Come Out to Dance."

The original Hawaii Five-0 series included an episode featuring Hookman, a character who loses his hands and goes after the police officers he feels are responsible for his misfortune. The series reboot will do another take on that story and character, with Peter Weller (Robocop) serving as both director and villain of the episode.

Scream star Matthew Lillard has joined FX pilot The Bridge, based on a Scandinavian crime drama. The American pilot stars Diane Kruger (Inglorious Bastards) and Demian Bichir (Savages) as two cops who team up to track down a killer operating in the U.S. and Mexico.

Investigation Discovery is bringing back Deadly Affairs for a second season. The docu-drama features Susan Lucci hosting the series based on true-crime stories about relationships, sex, revenge and murder.

Nip/Tuck star Dylan Walsh is joining the cast of Revenge in a multiple-episode arc playing a new rival for Conrad Grayson (Henry Czerny).

MTV is is developing a mystery drama adapted from the young adult romantic thriller Blackwood by Gwenda Bond. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

ABC has cancelled two of its new fall season series: the paranormal 666 Park Avenue and Last Resort, featuring the very talented Andre Braugher, who we hope will find a new TV home soon.

Law & Order: UK has added two new cast members. Paterson Joseph play DI Wes Leyton, the replacement for Harriet Walter's DI Natalie Chandler, and Georgia Taylor will protray a defense barrister-turned-Crown Prosecutor.

BBC One has cancelled its spy drama Hunted that starred Melissa George as the spy Sam Hunter, saying that "It hasn't found the mainstream audience it was hoped." However, Cinemax is working with series creator Frank Spotnitz on a new incarnation of the show.

PODCASTS/VIDEO

Elaine Viets spoke with St. Louis Public Radio about her former days as a columnist for the St. Louis Post Dispatch and her mystery novels featuring St. Louis mystery shopper Josie Marcus.

Best-selling Scottish crime writer Ian Rankin joined Neil Mitchell on Melbourne, Australia's 3AW 693 News Talk for a chat about, among other things, the return of his iconic character Rebus.

Pulp Serenade posted a clip of a conversation between Lawrence Block and Duane Swierczynski during NoirCon 2012.

Mystery author Chris Redding will drop by Blog Talk Radio tomorrow to talk about her new book (and its timing with Hurricane Sandy), titled Any Port in a Storm, which is set in the New Jersey beaches.

THEATER

New York Stage and Film's Annual Winter Gala will be held Dec. 9 at The Plaza Hotel and will honor Tony Award-winning producer Roger Horchow (Annie) and Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award winner Tony Shalhoub (Monk).

Theresa Rebeck's dark comedy Dead Accounts about "famlies and felonies" began Broadway
previews November 5th. It stars Tony Award winner Norbert Leo Butz, as a prodigal son and con man who returns home to his Ohio family, and Katie Holmes as the skeptical sister who awaits him.

Scooby-Doo Live! Musical Mysteries is a new touring musical theatre show based on the popular TV franchise from the 70s and still seen on Cartoon Network. The show features Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Inc. gang, who lead the audience "on a hilarious hunt to find a sneaky ghost who enjoys haunting an old theater." The tour starts in January 2013 in York, Pennsylvania and winds its way through various states and Canada through June.

GAMES/COMICS

DC Comics previewed its adaptation of the Stieg Larsson novel Girl With the Dragon Tattoo via a 30-second TV spot. The comic features the artwork of Leonardo Marco and Andrea Mutti.

In Reference to Crime Fiction

I came across some interesting recent and upcoming nonfiction books, a mix of niche reference to specific cultures and subgenres that look intriguing. Many are priced high enough that it's obvious they're destined to be library and textbook denizens (note the professor/authors and university presses) as opposed to off-the-shelf books, but if you're a fan of these particular subjects or need insights into Italian or Russian mysteries, you can seek these out.


Pimping Fictions by Justin D. Gifford, Assistant Professor of English at the University of Nevada, Reno. "Lush sex and stark violence colored Black and served up raw by a great Negro writer," promised the cover of Run Man Run, Chester Himes' pioneering novel in the black crime fiction tradition. In Pimping Fictions, Justin Gifford provides a hard-boiled investigation of hundreds of pulpy paperbacks written by Himes, Donald Goines, and Iceberg Slim (aka Robert Beck), among many others. Gifford draws from an impressive array of archival materials to provide a first-of-its-kind literary and cultural history of this distinctive genre.

Russian Pulp:  The Detektiv and the Russian Way of Crime by Anthony Olcott, Associate Professor of Russian at Colgate University and author of the Edgar-nominated Murder at the Red October. Using the detektiv and its counterpart—the many mysteries and thrillers set in Russia but written by Westerners—as evidence, Russian Pulp demonstrates that Russians and Westerners view the basic issues of crime, guilt, justice, law, and redemption in such fundamentally different ways as to make each people incomprehensible to the other.

The Importance of Place in Contemporary Italian Crime Fiction: A Bloody Journey by Barbara Pezzotti, who teaches Italian language and culture in New Zealand. By taking as its point of departure the privileged relationship between the crime novel and its setting, this book is the most wide-ranging examination of the way in which Italian detective fiction in the last 20 years has become a means to articulate the changes in the social landscape of the country.

Masters of the "Humdrum" Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961 by Curtis Evans, an independent scholar and book dealer. In 1972, in an attempt to elevate the stature of the "crime novel," influential crime writer and critic Julian Symons cast numerous Golden Age detective fiction writers into literary perdition as "Humdrums," condemning their focus on puzzle plots over stylish writing and explorations of character, setting and theme. By championing the intrinsic merit of these mystery writers, this book shows that reintegrating the "Humdrums" into mystery genre studies provides a fuller understanding of the Golden Age of detective fiction and its aftermath.

 

 

Mystery Melange

 

Lesa Holstine is holding a Christmas giveaway on her blog, with a chance to win two Christmas mysteries relating to food. Just drop her an e-mail to enter – but hurry, because tomorrow (November 15) is the deadline.

Crimespree is also sponsoring a giveaway of copies of Jamie Freveletti’s Dead Asleep and The Janus Reprisal. Just drop them an e-mail before November 16th.

Fan of cozy mysterys? Jenn's Bookshelves will be featuring her favorite cozy mystery series each day from December 1 – 8.

The spy museum in Washington, D.C., has just opened an exhibit titled
"Exquisitely Evil: 50 Yeras of Bond Villains." The Museum has partnered
with the Bond film producers to showcase over 100 artifacts from the
films, from airships and underground lairs to nuclear weapons and hungry
sharks. The exhibit also includes short videos and interactive
stations.

Publishers Weekly has named its list of Best Mystery/Thriller books of 2012. They include:

 

• Exit Plan by Larry Bond
• Creole Belle by James Lee Burke
• Kill You Twice by Chelsea Cain
• Black Box by Michael Connelly
• The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye
• Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
• Dead Anyway by Chris Knopf
• Live by Night by Dennis Lehane
• Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton
• Phantom by Jo Nesbo
• Mandarin Gate by Eliot Pattison
• Agent 6 by Tom Robb Smith

Amazon also released its list of the top books of 2012, including the Top 10 in the Mystery/Thriller genre:

• Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
• Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwen
• Live by Night by Dennie Lehane
• May We Be Forgiven by E.M. Homes
• Defending Jacob by William Landay
• Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton
• The Thief by Fuminori Nakamura
• Phantom by Jo Nesbø
• Creole Belle by James Lee Burke
• Broken Harbor by Tana French

Thanksgiving is Murder

Back in 2007, I compiled a brief annotated listing of Thanksgiving-themed mysteries. Janet Rudolph also updates her detailed turkey-day bibliography on her Mystery Fanfare blog every year. Grab a book while you're waiting for The Big Gorgefest Meal or while you're recovering from food coma. Best of all, reading has zero calories. In fact, the average 160-pound person burns 77 calories per hour while reading.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Warner Bros acquired screen rights to The Son, the latest thriller by bestselling Norwegian novelist Jo Nesbo, after a multi-studio auction. The novel, which won't be published until 2014, focuses on a young man in prison for crimes he didn't commit who escapes to avenge the killing of his father, an alleged corupt cop who turns out to be innocent. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

Mario Bello (The Touch) has joined the cast of the kidnapping thriller Prisoners, playing the wife of Hugh Jackman's character in the film. Prisoners follows a small town carpenter who tries to find his kidnapped daughter when the police can't. Jake Gyllenhaal plays the antagonistic detective assigned to the case.

Michel Roskam in talks to replace Limitless director Neil Burger on Animal Rescue, a Boston-set crime drama written based on one of Dennis Lehane's short stories. The plot hinges on a bartender who rescues a discarded puppy from a garbage can, only to become the target of the dog's mentally unstable former owner, while simultaneously getting caught in a criminal conspiracy in a mob-controlled bar.

Barry Forshaw, author of Death in a Cold Climate: A Guide to Scandinavian Crime Fiction and The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction, has written what he hopes is a comprehensive survey of British Crime Film: Subverting the Social Order.

Fox Searchlight released an international trailer for the new film Hitchcock, based on Stephen Rebello’s book Alfred Hitchcock And The Making of Psycho. The picture opened LA’s recent AFI Festival.

TV

It appears that the rumored deal between Netflix and AMC to resurrect The Killing for a third season is close to becoming a reality. AMC cancelled the the mystery drama a few months ago, but the producers have been working behind the scenes to find a new home for the series.

NBC gave a full-season pickup to NBC’s freshman series Chicago Fire. The firefighter drama stars Taylor Kinney, Jesse Spencer, Eamonn Walker, Monica Raymund, Charlie Barnett and David Eigenberg.

TNT has cast Eion Bailey (ER, Once Upon a Time) as the male lead opposite Mira Sorvino in the drama pilot Trooper.

C. Thomas Howell, who plays abrasive cop Bill "Dewey" Dudek, is being promoted to regular status in TNT's police drama Southland. 

NBC released a promo for its upcoming murder mystery drama Deception. The show stars Meagan Good as Detective Joanna Locasto who returns home for the funeral of  friend and begins to uncover dark secrets and clues about why her friend's life was in danger. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

FX has unveiled a first look at its upcoming spy drama The Americans, which stars Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys as two '80s-era KGB spies living undercover as a married American couple in Washington, D.C.

The FX parent company Fox also released a video trailer, this one for The Following, which stars Kevin Bacon as an ex-FBI agent recruited to recapture an escaped serial killer played by James Purefoy.

PODCASTS/VIDEOS

Author John Connolly, one of the editors of the new anthology Books to Die For, spoke with WCSH-TV about why the mystery novel enjoys such an enduring appeal and which books are the must-reads of the genre.

Tasha Alexander and Kim Harrison were the featured guest authors on the most recent Suspense Radio Online podcast.

THEATER

The Minnesota Opera has commissioned an opera from Pulitzer-winning composer Kevin Puts based on Richard Condon's 1959 Cold War thriller, The Manchurian Candidate. One of two film adaptations starred Frank Sinatra and Angela Lansbury in the tale of the son from a prominent US political family who's brainwashed into being an unwitting assassin.

An Overview or Two (or Three)

Last week, I noted some recent and upcoming nonfiction books about niche subjects in crime fiction. This week, I thought I'd point out some new crime fiction overviews that look interesting for both casual readers and those of you who are more into the academic side of things. 

Crime Fiction From Poe to the Present: A Historical and Critical Introduction to Crime Fiction from Edgar Allan Poe's First Detective Story to the Present Day by Martin Priestman, Professor of English at Roehampton University London. This book gives a historical and critical introduction to the genre of crime fiction, from Edgar Allan Poe's first detective story The Murders in the Rue Morgue in 1841 to the present day. It concentrates chiefly on three branches of crime fiction: the classic detective whodunit, the thriller in which the protagonist is opposed either to a powerful conspiracy or to society at large, and the hardboiled private-eye story, or detective thriller, which mixes aspects of the other two.

The Cambridge Companion to American Crime Fiction, edited by Catherine Ross Nickerson. From the execution sermons of the Colonial era to television programs like The Wire and The Sopranos, crime writing has played an important role in American culture. Its ability to register fear, desire and anxiety has made it a popular genre with a wide audience. These new essays, written for students as well as readers of crime fiction, demonstrate the very best in contemporary scholarship and challenge long-established notions of the development of the detective novel. 

The Crime Fiction Handbook (Blackwell Literature Handbooks) by Peter Messent, Emeritus Professor of Modern American Literature at the University of Nottingham. The Crime Fiction Handbook presents a comprehensive introduction to the origins, development, and cultural significance of the crime fiction genre, focusing mainly on its American, British, and Scandinavian forms. The book’s first main section presents an overview of the subject, addressing the politics of crime fiction and exploring some of its main variants  – classical and hard-boiled detective fiction, the private eye and the police novel, fictions of transgression. 

Veterans and Wounded Warriors

 

Today is Veteran's Day, and the traditional parades and ceremonies are a great way to celebrate the veterans of our armed forces. However, many veterans who have returned from tours of duty are still suffering from physical and psychological wounds that can take a lot of time and money to treat. The Wounded Warrior Project takes as part of its mission:

• To raise awareness and enlist the public's aid for the needs of injured service members.
• To help injured service members aid and assist each other.
• To provide unique, direct programs and services to meet the needs of injured service members.

The physical support is important, but as a recent New York Times article pointed out, the emotional and psychological support is every bit as crucial, since for every soldier killed in war this year, about 25 veterans now take their own lives.

The organization not only provides a support system and helps provide for physical needs, it also helps veterans with job training and in securing jobs. You can help by giving financial donations, by participating in one of their 8K runs throughout the country, by shopping with affiliate companies or by downloading grocery coupons from their website that you can use at any store. There should also be an insert in your local newspaper today or tomorrow with more coupons. Buying these participating products will then help raise money for the Wounded Warrior Project.

For more information about the program and how to help, check out their website, or follow them on Facebook and Twitter.

This charity meets all of the qualifications for the Wise Giving Alliance Seal from the Better Business Bureau.

Ebooks for “Movember”

 

A few years ago, a small group of folks in Australia created what they called "Movember" (November + moustache). During November each year, men register with the charity and pledge to grow moustaches to raise vital awareness and funds for prostate and testicular cancer initiatives. It has since become a global event, and in 2011, over 854,000 Mo Bros and Mo Sistas around the world raised $126.3 million for the program. This is a topic that is near and dear to me personally, as someone who has a close relative battling stage 4 prostate cancer.

Editor-in-Chief Jay A. Hartman of the digital publisher Untreed Reads (disclaimer: I have two stories published by them), is participating this year, both facially and financially. In addition to growing his own example of fine moustachery, for every donation you make through the Untreed Reads Movember portal, he will provide you with a coupon good for an ebook of your choice from the UR catalog. Be sure to send an email to charity@untreedreads.com and let them know when you donated so they can hook you up with your free ebook. There is more info about that on the Untred Reads website. The Movember site also has information on prostate and testicular cancer, including stats, symptoms, tests, treatment and more.

Mystery Melange

 The latest issue of the recently-risen-from-the-dead Thuglit is out, with short fiction by Nik Korpon, Jen Conley, Mike MacLean, Marc E. Fitch, Katherine Tomlinson, Justin Porter, Patrick J. Lambe and Buster Willoughby; plus, there's Part II of Thuglit's exclusive first look at the upcoming novel by Todd Robinson from Tyrus Books.

Patti Abbott's story "Waiting for Her Chance" is the latest offering from the ezine Shotgun Honey.

Peter Rozovsky over at Detectives Beyond Borders has a preview of NoirCon 2012, which starts tomorrow in Philadelphia and runs through Sunday. This year's event has an amazing lineup including Guests of Honor Lawrence Block and Otto Penzler, Master of Ceremonies Charles Benoit, and Keynote Speaker Robert Olen Butler, among others.

Mike Ripley's latest entertaining "Getting Away with Murder" column for Shots Ezine includes reviews of Ruth Dudley Edwards' new book Killing The Emperors; a look at the spy thrillers of Len Deighton, Dan Fesperman, Eric Ambler and John Bingham; the new thriller from Simon Tolkien (the the grandson of  J.R.R. Tolkien); and much more.

Omnimystery News has its monthly "Firsts on the First" writeup about new series characters who will make their mysterious American debut in print during November.

If you are a member of Goodreads, there's still time for you to vote (through the 10th) in the first round of the Goodreads Choice Awards for Best Mystery & Thriller of 2012.

Janet Rudoloph has issued a call for articles about Florida Mysteries, i.e., those set in the Sunshine State, for the next issue of the Mystery Readers Journal (Volume 28: 4). She's looking for reviews and Author! Author! essays of 500-1500 words, first person, "upclose and personal about yourself, your mysteries, and the Florida connection." The deadline for submissions is December 1.

There's a new crime fiction conference in town; well, at least in Baltimore. Creature, Crimes and Creativity ("C3") is scheduled for September 13, 14 and 15 and will welcome authors Jeffery Deaver and Christopher Golden as keynote speakers. The conference is also sponsoring a short-story contest for attendees, with winners to be published in an anthology.

Also, congratulations to Calgary author Will Ferguson who won the $50,000 Giller Award, Canada's most prestigious literary award for English fiction, for his mystery novel 419.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Millennium Films has acquired the rights to Eliza Graves, a Joseph Gangemi screenplay based on the Edgar Allan Poe short story "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether." The thriller will be directed by Brad Anderson (The Machinist) and centers on a new doctor who arrives to apprentice at a mental institution where he falls in love with a patient under stange circumstances.

The Tom Hanks-produced JFK feature film Parkland has signed Paul Giamatti, Billy Bob Thornton, and Jacki Weaver in leading roles. The film revolves around the chaotic events aat Parkland Hospital in Dallas the day President Kennedy was assassinated.

Bryan Callen has been cast in the Universal Pictures project Ride Along, playing Miggs, a wily and somewhat sketchy undercover cop. He joins fellow cast members Ice Cube (as another tough undercover officer), Kevin Hart (playing Cube's future brother-in-law), John Leguizamo and Laurence Fishburne. The studio has set a January 17, 2014 release date for the film.

There's been a change at the helm of William Goldman's film adaptation of his 1985 crime thriller Heat, set to star Jason Statham. It was originally going to be Brian de Palma, but Simon West (Con Air, The General's Daughter) will now serve as director.

Collider has a new trailer for the documentary West of Memphis, about the investigation behind the "West Memphis Three" trio of innocent men who were wrongly convicted of murdering three young boys in Arkansas in 1993.

TV

Crimespree has a trailer for the upcoming third season of Luther, starring. Idris Elba. The airs in the States on BBC America.

Chloe Sevigny and James D'Arcy have signed on to star in A&E's crime drama Those Who Kill. Sevigny will play a detective who possesses a deep understanding of the serial killers she hunts, and D'Arcy will play a forensic profiler and Sevigny's partner. Glen Morgan (X Files) wrote the script for the pilot, which is based on the Danish series Den Som Dræber.

ABC has ordered a pilot titled Coup, with some heavy-hitters attached: Mad Men co-executive producer Chris Black wrote the project, and feature director Martin Campbell (Casino Royale) will serve as executive produce and director. Coup centers on a young American man whose wife is taken hostage in an overseas coup, and who must join forces with a dangerous mercenary to get her back.

ABC also bought Black Friday, a drama written by screenwriter Ken Nolan (Black Hawk Down). The thriller centers on a man who finds himself in the center of a perilous event where he is responsible for the safety of others and works to uncover the conspiracy behind it all.

Mike Colteri is joining the Fox midseason serial killer thriller The Following in the recurring role of FBI bureaucrat Nick Donovan. The series revolves around a deranged serial killer and the retired FBI profiler Ryan Hardy (Kevin Bacon) who is hunting him down.

Dark Knight actress Monique Gabriela Curnen has signed on for a recurring role in The Mentalist as an agent who works in the gang division of the CBI, alongside a police tactical team.

Shooting has begun on a TV movie based on Quebec crime writer Louise Penny's debut novel Still Life. Nathaniel Parker, who plays Inspector Thomas Lynley in the long-running British crime series The Inspector Lynley Mysteries, is starring as Inspector Armand Gamache of the Sûreté du Québec.

The Discovery reality show Mythbusters is planning a Breaking Bad-centric episode with appearances by Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul. Among the gruesome myths to be tested: an event from the show's first season, in which Paul’s Jesse Pinkman used hydrofluoric to dissolve a body in a bathtub instead of using a plastic container.

USA cancelled both Fairly Legal and Common Law but has renewed Burn Notice for a 13-episode seventh-season. Meanwhile, USA announced the return dates for Suits, White Collar and Necessary Roughness in January 2013.

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Elizabeth Foxwell notes that BBC Radio 4 is airing a new series, "Foreign Bodies: An Investigation into European Detectives", that looks at mystery fiction in an international context.

Patricia Cornwell joined MSNBC's Morning Joe to talk about her latest novel, The Bone Bed.