Mystery Melange

The Left Coast Crime Award nominations, or "Lefties," were announced this week. They include the nominees for Best humorous mystery novel:  Donna Andrews, The Hen of the Baskervilles (Minotaur Books); Timothy Hallinan, The Fame Thief (Soho Crime); Lisa Lutz, The Last Word (Simon & Schuster); Brad Parks, The Good Cop (Minotaur Books); and Cindy Sample, Dying for a Daiquiri (Cindy Sample Books). For all the other fun categories, check out Janet Rudolph's Mystery Fanfare blog.

Also to be handed out at the Left Coast Crime conference are the Dilys Wynn Awards from the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association, for mystery titles booksellers most enjoyed selling. This year's list includes Seven for a Secret by Lyndsay Faye; The Black Country by Alex Grecian; Spider Woman’s Daughter by Anne Hillerman; Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger; Pagan Spring by G.M. Malliet; and The Land of Dreams by Vidar Sundstol.

Submissions are being accepted for the Helen McCloy/Mystery Writers of America Scholarship for Mystery Writing, which seeks to nurture talent in mystery writing—in fiction, nonfiction, playwriting, and screenwriting. The scholarship ($500) shall be used to offset tuition and fees for writing workshops, writing seminars, or university/college-level writing programs in the U.S. For how to submit an application before the February 28 deadline, check out the MWA website.

Author/blogger Bill Crider profiled the new anthology Iron Head and Other Stories, the first in a series of charity anthologies from the Fight Card authors cooperative, a group of some of today's finest short fiction writers. Compiled by Paul Bishop and Jeremy L. C. Jones, all of the proceeds from these anthologies will go directly to an author-in-need (in this case, revered western writer Jory Sherman) or to a literacy charity.

Jon Stock wrote recently for The Telegraph on what he terms is the latest book craze, "Chick Noir" (by both male and female authors) including works by SJ Watson, Gillian Flynn, Natalie Young, Lucie Whitehouse and more.

Novelist Ann Cleeves listed her picks for the "top 10 crime novels in translation," that reaches far beyond Scandinavia.

Speaking of international crime, the formation of the brand-new Crime Writers' Association of South Asia was announced at the recent Zee Jaipur Literary Festival in India. The organization plans to host special events like a possible crime fiction conference in Delhi, as well as champion the efforts and careers of authors.

This week's crime poem over at the 5-2 is "Literati" by H.B. Ussach.

The Q&A roundup this week includes Terry Shames, who joins the Mystery People to chat about her latest Samuel Craddock mystery, The Last Death Of Jack Harbin; and Catherine Dilts stopped by Mysteries and My Musings to discuss the first novel in her Rock Shop series.

Just the Facts, Ma’am

The nominees for the 2014 Edgar Award Best Fact Crime are a varied bunch, but all offer fascinating accounts of ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances, as victim, perpetrator, or defender. You can certainly read them for their historical and entertainment value alone. But they also offer insights into human nature that provide a frame of reference for crime fiction writers.

Duel with the Devil: The True Story of How Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr Teamed Up to Take on America's First Sensational Murder Mystery by Paul Collins: The account of a landmark turn-of-the-19th century murder and the trial that ensued, with iconic political rivals Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr joining forces to make sure justice was done.

Mortal Sins: Sex, Crime, and the Era of Catholic Scandal by Michael D'Antonio: Part history, part journalism, and part true-crime thriller, Mortal Sins reveals a long and ferocious battle for the soul of the largest and oldest organization in the world. This is an account of the scandal that has sent the Catholic Church into a tailspin and the brave few who fought for justice.

The Good Nurse: A True Story of Medicine, Madness and Murder by Charles Graeber: Registered nurse Charlie Cullen was quickly dubbed "The Angel of Death" by the media after his arrest in 2003. He may well be the most prolific serial killer in American history, with his "career" spanning sixteen years and nine hospitals, as he became iImplicated in the deaths of as many as 300 patients.

The Secret Rescue: An Untold Story of American Nurses and the Medics Behind Nazi Lines by Cate Lineberry: The compelling untold story of a group of  U.S. Army nurses and medics stranded after a plane crash and their fight to escape Nazi-occupied Europe. Aided by courageous villagers who risked death at Nazi hands to help them, the medics' months-long ordeal captured the attention of the American public.

The Hour of Peril: The Secret Plot to Murder Lincoln Before the Civil War by Daniel Stashower: The riveting true story of the “Baltimore Plot,” an audacious conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War as he traveled by train from Springfield to Washington for his inauguration. Over a period of thirteen days, legendary detective Allan Pinkerton and the young widow Kate Warne, America’s first female private eye, worked feverishly to detect and thwart the plot.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Sundance always ends up with some interesting film news, including the fact that IFC Films picked up North American rights to Jim Mickle’s Cold in July, a neo-noir thriller based on the novel by Joe Lansdale. It stars Michael C. Hall as a man who kills a burglar who breaks into his Texas home, only to find that the man’s father, an ex-con (played by Sam Shepherd), is determined to have revenge. 

One of the featured trailers at the Sundance Film Festival last week was Anton Corbijn's A Most Wanted Man. The spy thriller stars Phillip Seymour-Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, Robin Wright, Grigoriy Dobrygin, and Willem Dafoe.

A trailer was released for David Grovic’s directorial debut, The Bag Man, which stars Robert De Niro and John Cusack "on opposite ends of the same slimy side of the road."

TELEVISION

NBC has decided not to move forward with the Murder, She Wrote reboot staring Octavia Spencer although the network won't rule out trying to find another way to "reimagine" the series.

Top film-maker Ridley Scott is developing a TV crime series dubbed as Glasgow's answer to The Sopranos, to be based on the Alex Morrow novels of Scots crime writer Denise Mina. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

TNT picked up the first and second seasons of Transporter to debut on the network in fall 2014. The initial run had a bumpy time on Cinemax, but TNT thought it did well enough for a go and hired X-Files veteran Frank Spotnitz as new showrunner. The series stars Chris Vance as a professional "transporter" who operates in a seedy underworld of dangerous criminals and desperate players.

Bentley Productions (the company behind Midsomer Murders), has optioned the rights to the debut crime novel Never Forget by Lisa Cutts, about a "straight-talking, ambitious young woman starting out on a police career."

The BBC picked up the third season of Swedish crime series Wallander. The show is an adaptation of Henning Mankell's best-selling detective novels featuring Krister Henriksson as a hard-drinking, depressed Nordic detective. In addition, the fourth three-episode season of the Beeb's own English-language version of the Wallander books is set to air on the network later this year.

ABC has just given pilot orders to the drama projects Forever and Exposed. Forever follows Doctor Henry Morgan, New York City’s star medical examiner, who happens to be immortal. Exposed, based on a Scandinavian format, centers on an investigative journalist who stops at nothing to uncover the truth including some questionable alliances.

ABC also picked up Agatha, a character-driven procedural about a former convict turned big city criminologist brought in to help local police crack a case—but the chief detective she's been hired to help is the estranged father she hasn't seen in fifteen years.

Fox picked up Dead Boss, based on the UK series of the same name, a comedic mystery about an overachiever wrongfully convicted of murdering her boss, who "has to rely on her train wreck of a sister to prove her innocence."

Sharon Stone was just announced as the star in TNT's action-drama pilot Agent X, written by The Bourne Identity's William Blake Herron. The show centers on America's first female Vice President (Stone), who learns the job comes with a top secret duty: protecting the Constitution in times of great crisis with the aid of her Chief Steward and a secret operative designated “Agent X.”

Richard Dormer, Christopher Eccleston, Michael Gambon, Sophie Grabol, Jessica Raine, and Oscar nominee Stanley Tucci are set to star in Fortitude, a 12-part series set in the Arctic Circle. Tucci and Dormer will play the town's sheriff and a detective who are trying to make sense of a mysterious murder.

Kara Killmer was cast as a lead in NBC's pilot Tin Man, a futuristic thriller drama that follows a robot (Patrick Heusinger), accused of the first-degree murder of his creator, and the female public defender forced to fight for his cause.

Stephen Fry has signed on to play Prime Minister Trevor Davies in the 24: Live Another Day reboot.

Omnimystery News reported that filming has begun on season eight of Foyle's War, to follow Foyle's battles in the dangerous world of espionage as a Senior Intelligence Officer for MI5.

Pedro Pascal (Graceland) has landed a recurring role on The Mentalist as FBI Special Agent Marcus Pike, a charming blue-collar cop with FBI smarts who is attracted to Lisbon and tries to sweep her off her feet.

Rashida Jones has signed on to star in Tribeca, TBS’s single-camera comedy pilot from Steve Carell, who created and wrote the show with his wife, Nancy. "Tribeca is a satirical look at a police procedural anchored by Angie Tribeca, an outs
poken 10-year veteran of the LAPD’s elite RHCU (Really Heinous Crimes Unit)."

Book Love

Print book lovers take heart: eBook reading is still rising, but it's not replacing print, according to a Pew Research study. Seven in ten Americans reported reading a book in print in 2013, which was up four percentage points from the previous year. This would seem to indicate that more people are reading more books in various forms. A win win!

Book lovers around the world tend to be devoted and passionate about the printed (or digital) word. It's always heartening to see stories that reaffirm how similar we are, even in the face of disasters, such as the hundreds of writers and artists who are preparing tributes to Iraq's historic books hub, Al-Mutanabbi Street, hit by car bomb in 2007. Then there are the thousands of Latvians, often braving freezing temperatures, who marked the start of Riga's tenure as one of two European Capitals of Culture for 2014 by forming a human chain and moving 2,000 books by hand to the new national library building.

It's the power of the book in action.

Mystery Melange

The International Thriller Writers are sponsoring a special event called "The Best First Sentence Contest." Held in conjunction with Master CraftFest, a one-day intensive retreat on July 8, the contest will choose five winners from entrants who send in their very best first sentence (for a novel) along with their name, email address, and phone number to bestfirstsentence@gmail.com. The five winners will receive a critique of 10 pages of their work from bestselling authors Steve Berry, Steven James, John Lescroart, David Morrell or D.P. Lyle. You do need to be registered for any of the ITW events—Master CraftFest, CraftFest, or ThrillerFest—OR be an active or associate member of ITW. The deadline is May 31. 

The January issue of Suspense Magazine focuses on up and coming authors and includes a Q&A with the writer and creator of the newest show on HBO, True Detective, starring Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson. The magazine's plans for the rest of the year include more author interviews, alongside expanded reviews, features, articles, stories, and news sections.

Simon & Schuster has made its e-book catalog available for purchase to participating public libraries in partnership with OverDrive, an e-book distribution company. The publisher's pilot program launched with 15 libraries on board (no word on if, or when, others might be added).

Writing a PI series or just enjoy reading about real-world cases? Shaun Kaufman and Colleen Collins, over at Guns, Gams and Gunshoes, listed seven of their favorite private investigator blogs from 2013.

Kathleen George, editor of Pittsburgh Noir and the Edgar-nominated author of the Richard Christie series, took the "Page 69" test to A Measure of Blood, the latest novel in the Christie series. The 69-page mark is one established by screenwriter/blogger Marshall McLuhan who suggested that you should choose your reading by turning to page 69 of a book and, if you like it, read it.

Goodreads announced it had hit the 100,000 author milestone in its Goodreads Author Program. To celebrate, the social-reading site is releasing a Goodreads author badge that will appear on all verified author pages, where members can continue to interact with authors via a Goodreads chat, comment on their blog or status update, or by following their reviews.

The Q&A roundup this week includes Mark Pryor chatting with The Mystery People; and Nik Morton takes Paul D. Brazill's "Short, Sharp Interview" test.

Here's another reason to support your favorite authors; even many so-called midlisters and some authors who have been on some bestseller lists aren't doing as well as you may think. A new survey from Digital Book World and Writer's Digest polled over 9,000 authors—traditionally-published, self-published and hybrid—found that 54% of traditionally-published authors and almost 80% of go-it-alone writers are making less than $1,000 a year.

Books are stilll proving to be popular fodder for Hollywood: four of the nine best picture nominations for this year's Academy Awards are based on books, as Shelf Awareness notes. Several other books were represented in additional categories.

Research is Sexy

In keeping with the underlying theme of this blog, "Reference," I like to occasionally give a tip of the hat to resources or authors' experiences with reference and research when writing their novels. The various approaches are as varied as the authors and the storylines themselves, but there are some similarities that often connect them all. Here are some recent takes on how it's done:

• Bestselling author Peter James has chatted on several occasions about his research experiences. His entry into the police procedural world was a bit rough in the beginning, coinciding as it did with a burglary—of his own home. That led to a long personal and career partnership with several Brighton detectives and James's realization that if you "get their world right, you might have a fan for life. Get it wrong and you’ll be in the trash can." And in another interview, he noted that "I never write about a place I haven’t been to."

• Jane Isaac is another fan of talking with members of law enforcement about their real-life experiences. She adds, "Often such information provides background material which never appears in the novel, or only converts to a couple of lines…But the details we learn provide more depth to our work, allowing us to describe scenes and people from an informed viewpoint…Ever read a book when you’ve questioned an event, a character, a place because it isn’t quite right? Failing to do your research will show."

• Sue Monk Kidd is known for her fiction that sometimes has historical elements, and as you might imagine, there's quite a bit of research involved in getting details right when dealing with plots set in the past. In a Q&A with Shelf Awareness, she talked about researching her first full-fledged historical novel The Invention of Wings, which went on for six months before she started writing. Even then, the research continued for the three years it took her to finish the book, as she looked up topics such as the kind of mourning dress widows wore in 1819 or what the emancipation laws in South Carolina were at that time.

• Allen Appel looked at the flip side of researching thrillers on his blog The Thriller Guy. He mentioned a quotation by author Michael Chabon in The Wall Street Journal that points out the pitfalls of researching novels, "Research is incredibly pleasurable and seductive and you have to be on your guard against it. It's very easy to use it as an excuse not to write….The Internet is there to say 'just one more link, just one more link.'" But not doing your research ahead of time can also cause problems. Bestselling author John Grisham was 100 pages into his legal thriller, The Associate, set at the Princeton Law School, when he found out that Princeton doesn't have a law school."

• And, as Appel points out in his blog post, even James Michener realized sometimes research can only get you so far, and as Michener explained, "The greatest novels are written without any recourse to research other than that writer's solitary inspection of the human experience. Flaubert, Dostoevsky, Jane Austen, Turgenev, and Henry James exemplify this truth…."

I'm always interested in hearing about other author's experiences with research—their techniques, philosophies, the good, the bad, and the ugly. What works for you? What doesn't? What words of advice would you give to newbie authors?

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Sony Pictures has won a bidding war to adapt David Ignatius’s spy novel The Director, which will reunite the Captain Phillips team of producer Scott Rudin and director Paul Greengrass. The story centers around Graham Weber, who's only been director of the CIA for less than a week when a Swiss kid walks into the American consulate to announce the agency has been hacked and he has a list of agents’ names to prove it.

DreamWorks Studios has acquired the rights to remake the 2011 French thriller The Prey (La Proie). The film centers on a low-level crook who must break out of jail to save his family from his former cellmate who is a sadistic serial killer.

Scott Cooper is in negotiations to rewrite and direct Black Mass, the drama about the Boston crime kingpin-turned-fugitive Whitey Bulger. Meanwhile, talks are to be ongoing for Johnny Depp to possibly play Bulger in the film.

Actor Elijah Wood and his horror-thriller label are moving ahead with a planned trilogy of films following the rise of a serial killer at ages 9, 14 and 18. Craig Macneill is directing the first movie, titled The Boy, from a screenplay he wrote with Clay McLeod Chapman, who created the characters in his novel Miss Corpus.

The FX Network has bought the rights to air some of the award-winning movies from Hollywood this season, including American Hustle, Wolf of Wall Street and Lone Survivor.

TELEVISION

TV Guide takes a look at the exit of long-time SVU character Capt. Cragen and what this means for the series.

Omnimystery News reported that NBC has ordered a pilot based on the Spanish comedy crime drama The Mysteries of Laura (Los Misterios de Laura), which aired for three seasons. The story followa a recently-divorced female homicide detective who solves complicated cases while taking charge of two small potential criminals: her children.

NBC gave the go-ahead to State of Affairs, a pilot starring former Grey's Anatomy star Katherine Heigl. She'll play a key CIA attaché who counsels the president on global high-stakes incidents while navigating her complicated personal life. The pilot is being re-written and directed by by Joe Carnahan, who also directed the pilot for NBC’s Blacklist.

Benjamin Bratt has joined the cast of the revival of 24 on Fox. He'll play a man who commands the CIA operation in London that is pursuing Jack (once again played by Keifer Sutherland), who is now an exile and a fugitive from justice.

Kyle Chandler has signed to star in Netflix's untitled 13-episode psychological thriller from the creators of Damages. The project is about a family of adult siblings whose secrets and scars are revealed when the black sheep oldest brother returns home.

Oscar-nominated actress Joan Allen is joining the cast of The Killing for its fourth and final season on Netflix. The six-episode series will hinge a new murder investigation led by homicide detectives Sarah Linden (Mireille Enos) and Stephen Holder (Joel Kinnaman), with Allen playing Margaret O’Neal, the head of an all-boys military academy near Seattle.

Actor, comedian, writer and explorer Michael Palin has signed to star in the tthree-part mystery, Remember Me, for BBC One. He'll be playing an elderly man who becomes the sole witness to a violent death on the day he's due to move into an assisted-living home. A teenage care assistant (Jodie Comer of My Mad Fat Diary) and investigating police detective Rob Fairholme (Mark Addy of The Full Monty, Atlantis), "try to unravel the riddle of his mysterious history, and are drawn into an eerie and dangerous world of lost love and betrayal."

Fox is taking a new approach to pilots, focusing on series. One of the network's first orders is Runner (described as being to guns what Traffic was to drugs) that centers around on a woman who becomes embroiled in a U.S./Mexican war over weapons and terrorism after she discovers her husband isn't who she thought he was.

ABC has ordered a pilot for the supernatural crime drama Clementine. The project follows a habitual criminal who digs into the mystery of her origins after she becomes the target of a group of zealots over her latent supernatural abilities that could be harnessed for good or evil. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

ABC is shortening its series order for Killer Women, about the only woman in the testosterone-heavy Texas Rangers, due to disappointing ratings.

Mary Steenburgen has signed for a recurring role on Justified, playing a Southern belle who was the wife of Winn Duffy’s (Jere Burns) mentor in crime.

Showtime laid out what's next for Season 4 of Homeland following the game-changing third season finale. It will focus more on Carrie as a field operative doing her job in exotic locations, with Mandy Patinkin's character also playing an important role.

T
homas Dekker is returning to Fox as a regular on the network’s new drama series, Backstrom. The show is based on the Swedish book series by Leif G. W. Persson about an overweight, offensive, irascible detective who’s engaged in a constant struggle with his self-destructive tendencies.

Netflix announced that Lilyhammer will return for a third season in 2014. The series centers on former gangster Frank "The Fixer" Tagliano (Steven Van Zandt) as he enters the federal witness protection program trading the mean streets of New York for the icy fjords of Norway.

Justified showrunner Graham Yost told an audience at the Television Critics Association winter press tour that the team behind the show decided to end the FX series after its sixth season "before its stories became repetitive."

Fox added new cast members to upcoming dramas: Kendrick Sampson is joining the miniseries Gracepoint, a remake of the UK’s police procedural Broadchurch; and Kelsey Chow (One Tree Hill) has been added to Hieroglyph, a show set in ancient Egypt about a notorious thief who is plucked from prison to serve the Pharoah (Reece Ritchie), "navigating palace intrigue, seductive concubines, criminal underbellies and even a few divine sorcerers."

Jane Alexander will guest-star in an upcoming episode of Elementary, playing a pen pal of Sherlock's (Jonny Lee Miller) whom he turns to for help with a case.

Eric Bogosian, who played Captain Danny Ross on Law & Order: Criminal Intent will join CBS's The Good Wife for a multi-episode arc. He'll play an agent in the Office of Public Integrity who is convinced that Peter Florrick (Chris Noth) is guilty of voter fraud and is willing to go to any lengths to prove it.   

Mark Boone Junior (Sons of Anarchy), Rosanna Arquette, and John Benjamin Hickey will guest-star on an upcoming episode of Law & Order: SVU. Hickey will play a man who comes home from a business trip to find his young son Nicky is missing from his bed. The investigation leads to Arquette and Boone, who portray a criminal couple known for child endangerment and pornography who are spotted with Nicky.

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO

The most recent Crime and Science Radio show is titled "The Body Tells the Tale," with DP Lyle and Jan Burke intervieweing Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson. Dr. Bass is the founder of the University of Tennessee Anthropological Research Facility, the so-called Body Farm. Jon Jefferson is a journalist, writer, and documentary film maker. Together, the duo write fiction as Jefferson Bass.

CBS Sunday Morning featured a piece on the timeless popoularity of Sherlock Holmes.

THEATER

Maria Mondelli's romantic thriller The Window has begun performances for its short run at the Cherry Lane Theatre in New York City. Set in 1954, the play centers on Eva, a young, lonely woman who lives vicariously through her neighbors until Eva's wealthy aunt arrives for a stay. The aunt's mysterious disappearances, a handsome strnager who seems to know too much about the aunt, and Eva's belief she heard someone murdered in a neighboring apartment all add up to the increasing suspense.

The Big Award Nomination Day

Despite the fact there are some other award nominations being announced today in Hollywood, we know that the Edgar nominations, handed out annually by the Mystery Writers of America, are the really important awards. Here are nominees for Best Novel, Best First Novel by an American Author, and Best Paperback Original:

BEST NOVEL

Sandrine’s Case by Thomas H. Cook (Grove Atlantic – The Mysterious Press)
The Humans by Matt Haig (Simon & Schuster)
Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger (Simon & Schuster – Atria Books)
How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny (Minotaur Books)
Standing in Another Man’s Grave by Ian Rankin (Hachette Book Group – Reagan Arthur Books)
Until She Comes Home by Lori Roy (Penguin Group USA – Dutton Books)
 

BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR

The Resurrectionist by Matthew Guinn (W.W. Norton)
Ghostman by Roger Hobbs (Alfred A. Knopf)
Rage Against the Dying by Becky Masterman (Minotaur Books)
Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews (Simon & Schuster – Scribner)
Reconstructing Amelia by Kimberly McCreight (HarperCollins Publishers)
 

BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL
 
The Guilty One by Lisa Ballantyne (HarperCollins Publishers – William Morrow Paperbacks)
Almost Criminal by E. R. Brown (Dundurn)
Joe Victim by Paul Cleave (Simon & Schuster – Atria Books)
Joyland by Stephen King (Hard Case Crime)
The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood (Penguin Group USA – Penguin Books)
Brilliance by Marcus Sakey (Amazon Publishing – Thomas and Mercer)

For all the nominees, check out the MWA website.

Mystery Melange

And it begins . . . the first nominations of the Awards Season come from the Hammett Prize, handed out annually by the North American Branch of the International Association of Crime Writers. This year's honorees include Craig Davidson for Cataract City; Heywood Gould, Green Light for Murder; Richard Lange, Angel Baby; Lisa Moore, Caught; and George P. Pelecanos, The Double.

One of the more unusual award winners recently may well be the author who won the 2012 St. Martin’s Press/Private Eye Writers of America Best Private Eye Novel Contest. His name is Alaric Hunt, and he's a convicted murderer who's been doing time in jail since 1988. Sarah Weinman profiled him in an article for the New York Times.

The Hogarth Shakespeare initiative is launching in 2016 to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, with contemporary bestselling authors retelling some of the Bard's plays. Jo Nesbo, author of the bestselling Harry Hole series, has recently been tapped to tackle Macbeth.

The winter edition of Plots with Guns is available, with new stories by Tom Barlow, Marie S. Croswell, C.J. Edwards, Rob Pierce, Brian Feehan, Holly Lopez, Sean O'Kane, and Rob Pierce.

The latest issue of Crime Factory (#15) is also out, with Justin Kirk discussing his role in thwarting what the press dubbed the “Hemet Attacks” on the Hemet Police Department, and in stopping an assassination of a police officer; journalist Tom Darin Liskey recounts getting mixed up with bikers and drug dealers in St. Louis in his teens; Steve Peacock takes us through his difficult journal in seeking justice and peace after being shot in the line of duty; and there's the usual great lineup of interviews, reviews, and  original short stories.

Publisher Jay Hartman has set up Untreed Reads book reading challenge for 2014. To participate, send you name and e-mail address to 2014challenge @ untreedreads.com through January 31. Your name will be added to their New Releases Newsletter and each month Untreed Reads will send you a coupon for a free download from their store. Then, read the book and leave a review in their store or as many other ebook sitesds (but you must reveal you received the free copy in exchange for the review).

The first book-less library has opened in the U.S. The facility, located in Bexar County, Texas, is instead fitted with digital readers,  laptops, tablets, and desktops. Patrons can check out audiobooks and eBooks as well as the actual eReaders.

The Q&A roundup includes two "Short, Sharp Interviews" over at Paul D. Brazill' blog, including Ryan Bracha and Mark Slade; Michael Connelly chatted with The Daily Beast about how he writes (and what he drinks while writing); and Brad Taylor chats with the Mystery People.

A study at Emory University found that reading a good book may cause brain and neurological changes that persist for days in a similar way to muscle memory.

If you live in the UK and have some extra time and money lying around, Random House is launching a creative writing course to begin in March. It will include videos, podcasts and texts from Random House authors and editors

The second annual Twitter fiction festival is also coming in March. The organizers are currently seeking authors from across the world to tell stories in 140-character bursts.

The BBC's popular Sherlock series, featuring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman as Holmes and Watson returns to BBC America on January 19th (it has already been showing in the UK). The Guardian has a tie-in quiz that lets you test your knowledge of the Holmes canon.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

Rupert Friend (currently starring in Homeland on HBO), is in talks to replace the late Paul Walker in Agent 47 from Fox International. The film is based on the elite assassin who is the star character in The Hitman video franchise.

Bruce Willis is set to star in the thriller Captive, playing a real estate developer who gets kidnapped in Brazil and has to find a way out of his armored-truck prison while a detective specializing in kidnap and ransom cases works to find him.

Here's your latest trailer for The Muppets Most Wanted, in which Kermit and the gang find themselves involved in a spy ring.  

TELEVISION

Fox has given a 13-episode series order to Backstrom, a one-hour crime drama from 20th Century Fox TV starring Rainn Wilson of The Office. The show is based on Swedish criminologist and novelist Leif G.W. Persson’s hit series of books.

A&E recently revealed the premiere date for their serial-killer drama Those Who Kill will be March 3, and they also released a still from the show featuring star Chloe Sevigny. The ten-episode series is based on a Danish series co-written by journalist turned crime novelist Elsebeth Egholm.

Meanwhile, HBO announced that its beloved mob drama Boardwalk Empire will end after its upcoming fifth season.

NBC picked up the drama Coercion (formerly M.I.C.E.), which is based on the Israeli format The Gordin Cell. It thriller centers on a decorated American war hero and CIA analyst whose parents and sister are part of a dormant Russian sleeper cell that has just been reactivated.

ABC canceled the series The Assets after only two weeks. The eight-part miniseries, set in the 1980s, was based on the CIA's hunt for the most notorious mole in U.S. history.

BBC One has confirmed that there will be four episodes in the new season of the period crime drama George Gently, although, as Omnimystery News reports, there is still no firm word on the broadcast date in the UK or the U.S.

Good news, Sherlock fans: Steven Moffat announced that he and Mark Gattis have planned out Seasons 4 and 5 of the popular BBC drama while sitting on top of the producton bus one day recently. Moffatt added that “The ideas…that day, I thought were the best we’ve ever had.”

David Morrissey (The Walking Dead), is to star in three-part thriller The Driver for the BBC, playing a taxi driver who "blames himself and his inadequacies after a family mystery and makes the mistake of accepting an offer to start driving for a criminal gang."

BBC America has greenlighted a six-episode Cold War spy thriller miniseries titled The Game. It stars Brian Cox and tells the story of the invisible war fought by MI5 as it battles to protect the nation from the threats of the Cold War.

Sundance Channel released a new poster for its upcoming drama The Red Road, which centers on a local sheriff (Martin Henderson) as he struggles to keep his family together while simultaneously policing two clashing communities. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

CNN announced it has ordered an eight-part documentary series about capital murder cases from executive producers Alex Gibney and Robert Redford, with Oscar-winner Susan Sarandon on board to narrate.

If you like a little comedy with your crime, Comedy Central has a show for you. It picked up an animated cop series produced by Rob Lowe, which is described as "an absurdist take on the gritty, sex-drenched crime dramas from the 1980s."

AMC announced its 2014 scheduling plans, including an April 13 return date for Mad Men and a November launch for Better Call Saul, the Breaking Bad prequel starring Bob Odenkirk. AMC's Revolutionary War spy drama Turn will also have a 90-minute premiere on April 6.

Crimetime Preview makes note of new TV crime dramas coming in 2014 to UK audiences (some are American crossovers; hopefully others will get a global distribution in the not-too-distant future).

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO

Erik Arneson has teamed with Scott Detrow, a reporter for KQED in Sacramento, for the podcast TITLE 18: WORD CRIMES.The show will feature short crime fiction stories, with the debut show including Scott reading Arneson's "For the Honesty," originally published at Out of the Gutter.

THEATER

The Red Bull Theater's Off-Broadway revival of Joe Orton's Loot begins previews Jan. 9, prior to an official opening Jan. 16. The story is described as a "merciless satire of religious hypocrisy, middle-class British morality, and blind faith in authority," and involves a couple of young thieves, Scotland Yard, and the body of a r
ecently-deceased woman that goes missing.

New Year, New Round of Conferences

You may not think of January when you think of writers' and readers' conferences, but in fact, there are several such events coming up this very month. From the Baker Street Irregulars, to the ALA Midwinter Meeting, to Murder Goes South, the fun stretches from California to New York, through Pennsvylania and down to Georgia. Most of these events still have registration slots available, so it's not too late to sign up.

January 16-18, 2014
Baker Street Irregulars & Friends Weekend
New York, NY
The annual gathering of the oldest literary society dedicated to Sherlock Holmes

January 24, 2014
Murder on the Menu
Cerritos Library, Cerritos, CA
Fifteen authors will be participating in panel discussions and book signings, including Avery Aames, Cara Black, Kate Carlisle, Carol Costa, Denise Hamilton, Betty Hechtman, Naomi Hirahara, Linda O. Johnston, Jenn McKinlay, Matt Richtel, Pamela Samuels-Young, Steve Scarborough, Sheldon Siegel, Kelli Stanley and Simon Wood.

January 24-26, 2014
San Diego State University Writers Conference
San Diego, CA
There are numerous panels and breakout sessions on various aspects of the craft of writing, including two panels titled "Building Suspense, One Page at a Time" and "Crafting the Perfect Crime Mystery," with such notable authors as Joseph Wambaugh, T. Jefferson Parker and Don Winslow.

January 24-28, 2014
American Library Association Midwinter Meeting
Philadelphia, PA
List of attending authors TBA, but special guests include David Baldacci

January 25, 2014
Murder Goes South
Smyrna, GA
Featuring authors Debby Giusti, Deborah Malone, Pamela V Mason, Bryan Powell, Tamar Myers, Larissa Reinhart, Louise B Richardson, Lane Stone, and Tina Whittle.

Mystery Melange

Are you a fan of reading challenges? It's a fun way for many readers to motivate themselves to read more books in the coming year. Here are some of the challenges I've come across that you might enjoy: My Reader's Block celebrates the vintage mystery with categories such as Golden Age Mysteries or "Silver Age Mysteries," which John at Pretty Sinister Books summarizes nicely; Mysteries in Paradise also notes The A-Z Mystery Challenge being run at Red Headed Book Child; if you're an Agatha fan, check out the Agatha Christie monthly reading challenge; there's a Short Story Reading Challenge; and one of my personal favorite ideas is The Banned Book Challenge. For more challenges, check out this website.

The new issue of Thuglit is available for your criminal pleasure. Check out the new stories from Max Sheridan, Eddie McNamara, Harry St. John, R.J. Martin Jr., Rob W. Hart, Jen Conley, Adam McFarlane and Stuart Smith and Stephen Zippill.

Pulp Metal Magazine has also started publishing stories online again, with two new offerings for the new year, "The Colors Of Fall" by B. R. Stateham and "The Weather Prophet" by Paul D. Brazill.

Bouchercon 2014 has issued a call for short story submissions for a conference-related anthology to be edited by Dana Cameron. Stories should be between 3,500 and 5,500 words, with a deadline of March 31.

Mike Ripley's latest "Getting Away with Murder" column for Shots Ezine includes the usual fun roundup of news and reviews, including two new private-eye novels and a look at the Essex Book Fest.

The long-running (in Internet terms) blog, Poe's Deadly Daughters, will be closing down shop on Poe's birthday later this month. The seven authors involved—Julia Buckley, Sharon Wildwind, Sandra Parshall, Elizabeth Zelvin, Sheila Connolly, Jeri Westerson, Darlene Ryan (aka Sofie Kelly), and Lonnie Cruse—will be taking this opportunity to devote more time to writing. We'll miss their posts, but wish them all the best.

Editor/authors Adrian McKinty and Stuart Nevill announced they'd delivered Belfast Noir to publisher Akashic Books for one of the next installments in their "city noir" series. The new anthology will include stories from from Glenn Patterson, Eoin McNamee, Garbhan Downey, Lee Child, Alex Barclay, Brian McGilloway, Ian McDonald, Arlene Hunt, Ruth Dudley Edwards, Claire McGowan, Arlene Hunt, Steve Cavanagh, Lucy Caldwell, Sam Millar and Gerard Brennan.   

Do you enjoy reading both crime fiction and science fiction? Mulholland Books has some suggestions of interesting books that blend the best of both worlds.

In the Q&A roundup this week, Declan Burke interviews fellow author Michael Connelly about his two interlinked series featuring police detective Harry Bosch and lawyer Mickey Haller; and the Sons of Spade blog welcomed Zachary Klein to chat about the new publication of his Matt Jacob novels.

Media Murder for Monday

MOVIES

The 12th annual film noir festival Noir City returns to San Francisco January 24 through February 2, at the historic Castro Theatre. This year, the festival takes on an international flavor, adding films from France, Mexico, Japan, Argentina, Germany, Spain, Norway, and Britain to the traditional Hollywood classics.

An international trailer was released for A Most Wanted Man, Anton Corbijn’s adaptation of the John Le Carre spy novel. Headline stars Philip Seymour Hoffman and Rachel McAdams will be joined by fellow cast members Robin Wright, Wiilem Dafoe, Daniel Bruhl and newcomer Grigoriy Dobrygin.

20th Century Fox tweeted a film still from the upcoming adaptation of Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl, which shows Ben Affleck addressing a crowd as he stands in front of a photograph of his missing wife (Rosamund Pike).

Veronica Mars fans don't have much longer to wait until the film adaptation of the popular cult TV series hits the big screen in March; in the meantime, here's a video trailer. (Hat tip to Omnimystery News.)

Here are even more movie trailers to tide you over until their film's release: an extended clip from the new Jack Ryan outing, as Chris Pine takes on the iconic character from Tom Clancy's movies; and Ralph Fiennes is on the run in the latest trailer from The Grand Budapest Hotel.

TELEVISION

Fox decided to pass on the navy drama pilot Wild Blue, from the producers of Justified. The series was pitched as "a mixture of ER, The West Wing and Top Gun," but talks with Tim McGraw to star in the drama fell through.

The BBC teased the upcoming Sherlock Season Three with an online mini-episode (no spoilers) titled "Many Happy Returns." (Of course, those viewers in the UK have already seen the episode; Americans have to wait until January 19).

The BBC also released a trailer for Fleming: The Man Who Would Be Bond, its new drama centered on the author’s time with the British Naval Intelligence that inspired him to invent super-spy James Bond.

In more BBC news, BBC One announced that the third season of the crime drama Death in Paradise will premiere in January 2014. The first two season starred Ben Miller as Detective Inspector Richard Poole investigating a murder on the tiny Caribbean island of Saint-Marie. Omnimystery News reported on the upcoming third season (but it contains spoilers – avoid if you haven't seen the first two seasons).

Tony Award winner Joel Grey is set to star as a disgruntled airplane passenger on the January 15 episode of CSI on CBS.

The FX series The Americans returns on February 26. It stars Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys star as two sleeper KGB spies posing as Americans in suburban D.C. in the early 1980s

Angela Lansbury (star of Murder, She Wrote and numerous theater productions) has been made a Dame of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth.

Even though it was canceled, BBC's period crime-drama Ripper Street was voted the best TV show of 2013 in a survey by the website of British magazine Radio Times. It beat out Doctor Who, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead.

AMC released a trailer for its upcoming drama Turn, starring Jamie Bell as a farmer living behind enemy lines in British-occupied Long Island during the Revolutionary War. He and his childhood friends join together to form “The Culper Ring, an unlikely team of secret agents supporting the Rebel forces.

HBO released a sneak preview trailer for the dark police drama True Detective, starring Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey, which debuts January 12.

Deadline posted a timeline for all the midseason premiere dates for new and returning series on both broadcast and cable networks.

PODCASTS/RADIO/VIDEO

The most recent Crime and Science Radio, "The Devil’s Dozen: What Makes the Bad Guys Tick?" featured DP Lyle and Dr. Katherine Ramsland for a discussion of bad guys, who they are, what they do, and why they do what they do. Several cases from her excellent book The Devil's Dozen. were also discussed.

THEATER

Performances of the Olivier Award-winning production of The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-time have been canceled through Jan. 11, due to the partial roof collapse at the historic Apollo Theatre in December. The show is based on Mark Haddon's books about an autistic young man who tracks down the killer of his neighbor's dog, turning to his favorite fictional character, Sherlock Holmes, for inspiration.

The staged version of Greg Herren's mystery novel Dead Housewives of New Orleans will be presented at t
he New Play Bacchanal of Southern Rep and the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival. Directed by Aimee Hayes, the play features performances by Peggy Scott Laborde, Nell Nolan, Trixie Minx and others, and takes place on January 10 at the Marigny Opera House.

Happy New Year

 

Happy New Year to all of you, and thanks for being loyal readers of "In Reference to Murder" in 2013. May you have a happy, healthy and prosperous new year filled with many hours of reading and enjoying your favorite books.