Criminal Splatterings!!

With the London Book Fair just over a number of books are making a buzz.

Rumored to have been sold for six figures is Jax Miller’s Freedom’s Child. Miller made headlines in the European press shortly before the fair for selling this book to Harper U.K. in a six figure deal. Now the novel, which Claudia Ballard at WME represents, has also sold to Crown's Zack Wagman. Crown called the book a "propulsive, raucous thriller" about a woman in the witness protection program who "risks everything" to save the daughter she gave up for adoption. Miller, a pen name, now lives in Ireland, but grew up in the States. Under her real name, Aine O Domhnaill, she was shortlisted, last year, for the CWA Debut Dagger for unpublished writers.  More information can be found here.

Another novel on a number of radars is The Luckiest Girl Alive. It was acquired well before the fair in the States by Sarah Knight at Simon & Schuster, but its acquisition was announced just before the fair. Knight bought world rights to the book—it was originally shopped under the title Girl Ed—in a six-figure deal at auction. Written by Self Magazine editor Jessica Knoll, Luckiest Girl follows a New Yorker named Ani FaNelli, who seems to have at all: a dream job, a handsome fiancé and an apartment in trendy Tribeca. But, Knight explained, Ani is actually "clinging desperately to a veneer of perfection" that is about to come undone because a documentary film threatens to reveal "a violent, sordid incident from her past."

It looks as if Breaking Bad is not over yet.  According to the Independent i.e. Bryan Cranston of Breaking Bad fame is due to write a memoir.  Bryan Cranston says he will expose “dangerous” events in the Breaking Bad memoir.

The long list for the Desmond Elliott prize has been announced and the full list can be found here.  On the list is The Dynamite Room by Jason Hewitt (Simon & Schuster) which is set in July 1940w here eleven-year-old Lydia walks through a village in rural Suffolk on a baking hot day. She is wearing a gas mask. The shops and houses are empty, windows boarded up and sandbags green with mildew, the village seemingly deserted. Leaving it behind, she strikes off down a country lane through the salt marshes to a large Edwardian house the house she grew up in. Lydia finds it empty too, the windows covered in black-out blinds. Her family is gone.  Late that night he comes, a soldier, gun in hand and heralding a full-blown German invasion. There are, he explains to her, certain rules she must now abide by. He won't hurt Lydia, but she cannot leave the house.  Is he telling the truth? What is he looking for? Why is he so familiar? And how does he already know Lydia's name?

A painting of crime-writer Ian Rankin has been unveiled at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. The image of the Rebus creator was commissioned by friend and fellow author Alexander McCall Smith.  Edinburgh-based artist Guy Kinder painted the likeness after spending a day photographing Rankin. The portrait will be added to a collection at the Edinburgh gallery which celebrates some of Scotland's greatest writers.

According to the Guardian, Damien Lewis of Homeland fame has joined Ewan McGregor and Naomie Harris in the John Le Carré Film Our Kind Of Traitor.  Lewis is set to play a member of the British intelligence in the film.

The BBC are to do a new adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier’s classic gothic novel Jamaica Inn. The first episode of the 3 x 60 minute adaptation will be shown on 21 April 2014 at 9:00pm on BBC 1.

The BBC are to show Happy Valley a new six-part drama for BBC One, written by Sally Wainwright and starring Sarah Lancashire as police sergeant Catherine Cawood.

Interesting article in the Metro.  Swedish Crime writer Camilla Läckberg talks about the fact that her love of crime fiction started when she was seven years old.

Sherlock Holmes is coming to London in October!  The Museum of London are bringing a new exhibition of Sherlock Holmes to London between 17 October 2014 and 12 April 2015.  More information can be found here.  The exhibition will be asking searching questions such as who is Sherlock Holmes, and why does he still conjure up such enduring fascination. Also an interesting article in the Guardian where readers claim Sherlock Holmes is the perfect way to get back into the reading habit.

Congratulations go to William Kent Kruger for winning the 2014 Minnesota Book Award for Genre Fiction with his novel Tamarack County.  The award was given by The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library.  The other nominated finalists were The Book of Killowen by Erin Hart, The Cold Nowhere by Brian Freeman, and Wolves by Cary J. Griffth.

Congratulations also go to Martyn Waites whose novel Born Under the Punches won the Grand Prix du roman noir étranger.

In the Sunday Observer crime writer and poet Sophie Hannah talks about the contrasting literary disciplines, the poetry of sex and the genius of Agatha Christie.

PD Smith reviews James Ellroy: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction by Jim Mancall and declares it to be a wonderfully detailed A-Z guide of Ellroy’s work.

Brilliant blog post by David Mark in the Guardian where he talks about setting his books in Hull and them being too northern and why he hopes that since Hull will be the City of Culture in 2017 that views will soon change.

Hot on the heels of the publication of her latest best selling novel After I’m Gone Laura Lippman talks about her cultural highlights that are on her radar in the Guardian.  She also tracks down her ten best books on mysterious disappearances.  In more Laura Lippman news the film of Every Secret Thing is being shown as part of the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival which will take place in Manhattan, USA from April 16-27.

John O’Connell latest thriller round up can be found here and includes After I’m Gone by Laura Lippman, The First Rule of Survival  by Paul Mendelson and Treachery by S J Parris amongst others.

Very interesting article in the Guardian by Alison Flood where best selling author Andy McNabb and Matt Haig talk about the importance of keeping boys reading and the decline in men reading.

If you missed the 30 greatest TV detectives and sleuths on Channel 5 on 19 April 2014 then you can see a slideshow of them in the Telegraph.

Jake Kerridge in the Telegraph writes about Margery Allingham’s books and how the show the evolution from well-plotted, bloodless stories to psychologically acute crime novels.

According to the Telegraph both Philip Glenister (who is a friend of the author) and Rupert Penry Jones are in the running for the staring role in the television adaptation of Paul Mendelson’s crime novel The First Rule of Survival.

The much anticipated trailer for the David Fincher’s film adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl has been released and can be seen below.

The film stars Ben Affleck as Nick Dunne, a journo ousted from his job by cuts, who is then accused of the murder of his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) following her disappearance.

According to the Guardian actor Tom Hardy is due to play both the Kray twins in a new film about the East End gangsters.  The film to be called Legend will be written and directed by LA Confidential screenwriter Brian Helgeland. 

Following the news that Chiwetel Ejiofor is to play a villain in the next Bond film the Guardian have devised a quiz asking readers if they can match the Bond villain to their individual evil plots.

According to the Bookseller, Company Pictures the production company behind adaptations of The White Queen and Wolf Hall, has acquired a TV option for A K Benedict’s The Beauty of Murder (Orion).  Also according to the Bookseller, Film rights to Chris Kuzneski’s The Hunters (Headline) have been optioned by a new UK-based production venture.

Head of Zeus have according to the Bookseller has signed two books from debut novelist Clare Carson in six-figure pre-empt.  The first novel, titled Orkney Twilight, is the story of a daughter determined to discover the truth about her father, an undercover policeman, and is set in the island of Orkney.  It is due to be published in January 2015.

The winner of the 2014 Phillip K Dick Award has been announced yesterday at Norwescon 37, and the winner for the distinguished original science fiction paperback published for the first time during 2013 in the U.S.A was awarded to Countdown City by Ben H. Winters (Quirk Books).  The Philip K. Dick Award is presented annually with the support of the Philip K. Dick Trust for distinguished science fiction published in paperback original form in the United States.  The award is sponsored by the Philadelphia Science Fiction Society and the Philip K. Dick Trust and the award ceremony is sponsored by the NorthWest Science Fiction Society.