Capital Crime Returns in September 2022

 Capital Crime Returns in September With Richard Osman, 

Anthony Horowitz, Dorothy Koomson and Paula Hawkins to Headline. 

Richard Osman, Rev. Richard Coles, Kate Mosse, Robert Harris, Dorothy Koomson, Bella Mackie and Paula Hawkins are amongst the authors confirmed for Capital Crime, London’s only crime and thriller festival, which returns 29th September-1st October after its hugely successful inaugural event in 2019

Taking place in London’s stunning Battersea Park, Capital Crime will be hosting over 164 panellists, bringing together readers, authors, industry figures and the local community for the first major literary festival held on the site. With a Goldsboro Books pop-up bookshop in the iconic Pump House Gallery, the first ever Fingerprint Awards ceremony, alongside an array of London’s tastiest local street food vendors and bar area, it promises to be a weekend of fun, innovation and celebration of crime fiction.

On the opening night (Thursday 29th September), Anthony Horowitz, Kim Sherwood and Charlie Higson will be discussing all things Bond, and the role the capital city has played in the fictional spy’s life, and the 007 car from Sherwood’s incredible new novel, ‘DOUBLE OR NOTHING’ will be on display at the heart of the festival, in association with Alpine and Ian Fleming Publications

Thursday’s programming will comprise of a series of events dedicated to Capital Crime’s social outreach programme, in which two sixth form students and their teachers from schools in and around the capital will be invited to meet with authors and publishing professionals to demystify the industry and attract new and diverse young voices into publishing.

Robert Harris will be in conversation with comedian and podcaster Andrew Hunter Murray, discussing dystopian fiction, and there will also be a very special opportunity for aspiring authors to pitch their novel idea to agents David Headley (DHH), Emily Glenister (DHH), Camilla Bolton (Darley Anderson) or Phillip Patterson (Marjacq). The first evening will close with the very first Fingerprint Award Ceremony. The winners, selected by readers across five categories Crime Novel of the Year; Thriller Novel of the Year; Historical Crime Novel of the Year; Debut Novel of the Year and Genre-Busting Novel of the Year, will be announced alongside a very special Lifetime Achievement Award and Industry Award of the Year.

Friday’s events include Jeffrey Deaver, Michael Robotham and Mark Billingham interviewed on the theme of ‘Crime Across Continents’ by Victoria Selman, and Mark Edwards, Will Dean, Erin Young and Chris Whitaker speaking to Tariq Ashkanani about setting their thrillers in the US. In addition, Abir Mukherjee, Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Anna Mazzola and Jessica Fellowes will be speaking to Suzy Edge about historical crime writing, and Dorothy Koomson and Kate Mosse will be in conversation about their work with the Women's Prize and the versatility of crime fiction. Claire McGowan, David Beckler, Catriona Ward, Chris Carter, Nicci French, W.C. Ryan, Stuart Neville and Eva Bjorg Aegisdottir will also be taking part in panels on the themes of courtroom dramas, ghost stories, crime set in Brighton and medicine in crime fiction, amongst other topics, throughout the day, and the first two rounds of Capital Crime’s quiz ‘Whose Crime Is It Anyway?’ will take place, featuring teams of debut authors.

Saturday will see Peter James interviewed on his writing career by clinical psychologist Chris Merritt; bestsellers Jeffrey Archer, Lucy Foley and Clare Mackintosh in conversation with Barry Forshaw and a Polari Panel hosted by Paul Burston. Other events include former President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom Baroness Hale in conversation with Harriet Tyce; bestselling Icelandic author Ragnar Jonasson in conversation with the Prime Minister of Iceland Katrin Jakobsdottir; Sarah Vaughan, Louise Candlish and Paula Hawkins discussing the experience of screen adaptations, before rounding off the festival with Richard Osman in conversation with Bella Mackie.

The final round of ‘Whose Crime is it Anyway?’ will also take place, as well as panels on the topics of spies, Grand Dames, detectives and comedy crime featuring Vaseem Khan, Robert Thorogood, Antti Tuomainen, Steve Cavanagh, Jane Casey, Catherine Ryan Howard and Steph Broadribb

As well as panels and events, there will be exciting public events throughout the weekend, including launch events for Elly Griffiths’ breath-taking new thriller Bleeding Heart Yard, The Perfect Crime Anthology, which brings twenty-two bestselling crime writers from across the world together in a razor sharp and deliciously sinister collection of crime stories, and an interactive treasure hunt inspired by Peter James’s latest blockbuster, Picture You Dead. There will also be entertainment, including a crime-themed comedy performance from The Noise Next Door on Thursday.

The full programme can be found here.

Petrona Award Entries 2021

 

The Petrona Award are pleased to announce that 28 of the 29 titles that were eligible for the 2021 Petrona Award for the Best Scandinavian Crime Novel of the Year have been entered by the publishers.

The winner of the Award will be announced online later this year.

The rules for eligibility are:

• The submission must be in translation and published in English in the UK during the preceding calendar year ie 1 January – 31 December 2020.

• The author of the submission must either be born in Scandinavia* or the submission must be set in Scandinavia*.

• The submission must have been published in its original language after 1999.

(E-books that meet the above criteria may be considered at the judges’ discretion (does not include self-published titles))
*in this instance taken to be Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.

More details about the award and the history behind it can be found on the Petrona Award website. The winner of the 2020 Award was Little Siberia by Antti Tuomainen, translated from the Finnish by Anne David Hackson and published by Orenda Books.

The award is sponsored by David Hicks.

Entries

[10 titles are by Female authors, 17 by Male and 1 title is by a M & F pairing. There are 17 translators (10 Female (17 titles) and 7 Male (11 titles)) and 6 countries are represented (9 Sweden, 8 Norway, 6 Iceland, 3 Denmark, 1 Finland, 1 Germany).]

They have tagged these titles on Goodreads.

Jussi Adler-Olsen - Victim 2117 tr. William Frost (M, Denmark) Quercus

Eva Björg Ægisdóttir - The Creak on the Stairs tr. Victoria Cribb (F, Iceland) Orenda Books

Stefan Ahnhem -X Ways to Die tr.Agnes Broomé (M, Sweden) Head of Zeus

Fredrik Backman - Anxious People tr. Neil Smith (M, Sweden) Michael Joseph

Heine Bakkeid - Scatter Her Ashes tr. Anne Bruce (M, Norway) Raven Books

Lina Bengtsdotter - For the Dead tr. Agnes Broomé (F, Sweden) Orion

Kjell Ola Dahl - Sister tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Orenda Books

Katrine Engberg -The Tenant tr.Tara Chace (F, Denmark) Hodder Paperbacks

Thomas Enger & Jorn Lier Horst - Death Deserved tr Anne Bruce (M,Norway) Orenda Books

Anne Holt - A Necessary Death tr. Anne Bruce (F, Norway) Corvus

Jorn Lier Horst - The Inner Darkness tr. Anne Bruce (M, Norway) Michael Joseph

Ragnar Jonasson - Winterkill tr. David Warriner (M, Iceland) Orenda Books

Ragnar Jonasson -The Mist tr. Victoria Cribb (M, Iceland) Michael Joseph

Lars Kepler -Lazarus tr. Neil Smith (M&F, Sweden) HarperCollins

Camilla Lackberg - The Gilded Cage tr. Neil Smith (F, Sweden) HarperCollins

Jo Nesbo -The Kingdom tr. Robert Ferguson (M, Norway) Harvill Secker

Hakan Nesser - The Secret Life of Mr Roos tr. Sarah Death (M, Sweden) Mantle

Mikael Niemi -To Cook a Bear tr.Deborah Bragan-Turner (M, Sweden) MacLehose Press

Sólveig Pálsdóttir -The Fox tr. Quentin Bates (F, Iceland) Corylus Books Ltd

Agnes Ravatn - The Seven Doors tr.Rosie Hedger (F, Norway) Orenda Books

Max Seeck - The Witch Hunter tr. Kristian London (M, Finland) Welbeck

Lilja Sigurdardottir - Betrayal tr. Quentin Bates (F, Iceland) Orenda Books

Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Gallows Rock tr.Victoria Cribb (F, Iceland) Hodder & Stoughton

Gunnar Staalesen -Fallen Angels tr. Don Bartlett (M, Norway) Orenda Books

Jesper Stein - Die For Me tr. Charlotte Barslund (M, Denmark) Mirror Books

Viveca Sten - In the Name of Truth tr.Marlaine Delargy (F, Sweden) AmazonCrossing

Mats Strandberg - The Home tr. Agnes Broomé (M, Sweden) Jo Fletcher Books

Christer Tholin - Guilty? tr. Christina Lagaris (M, Germany) Christer Tholin

---

[Not Entered – Helene Tursten - Snowdrift tr.Marlaine Delargy (F, Sweden) Soho Press]

Ragnar’s Rupture

The Shots team were delighted to be able to attend Ragnar Jonasson’s launch party for his novel Rupture, a startling addition to his Dark Iceland series. I first met Ragnar a few years ago before he was published in English, when he joined the Quiz Team I was captaining at a Crimefest event in Bristol. I was impressed by Ragnar’s knowledge and insight into the work of Dame Agatha Christie.

It came as little surprise when Karen Sullivan of Orenda Books picked up Ragnar’s work for the English market; with excellent translation by fellow writer Quentin Bates.

So the literary critics and crime-fiction reviewers gathered at David Headley’s Goldsboro Books in London’s West-End, so celebrate the latest work from the dark imagination of Ragnar Jonasson.

So what is Rupture all about?

1955. Two young couples move to the uninhabited, isolated fjord of Hedinsfjörður. Their stay ends abruptly when one of the women meets her death in mysterious circumstances. The case is never solved. Fifty years later an old photograph comes to light, and it becomes clear that the couples may not have been alone on the fjord after all…

In nearby Siglufjörður, young policeman Ari Thór tries to piece together what really happened that fateful night, in a town where no one wants to know, where secrets are a way of life. He's assisted by Ísrún, a news reporter in Reykjavik who is investigating an increasingly chilling case of her own. Things take a sinsister turn when a child goes missing in broad daylight. With a stalker on the loose, and the town of Siglufjörður in quarantine, the past might just come back to haunt them.

Haunting, frightening and complex, Rupture is a dark and atmospheric thriller from one of Iceland's foremost crime writers.

Ayo Onatade recently interviewed Ragnar, as part of his blog tour, and his insight can be sampled Here

We captured Karen Sullivan welcoming the guests and introducing Ragnar on video here –

And Shots have discounted copies available from our bookstore Here

And here are few photos from the event

Books to Look Forward to From Orenda Books

January 2017

Deep Down Dead is by Steph Broadribb.  Lori Anderson is as tough as they come, managing to keep her career as a fearless Florida bounty hunter separate from her role as single mother to nine-year-old Dakota, who suffers from leukaemia. But when the hospital bills start to rack up, she has no choice but to take her daughter along on a job that will make her a fast buck. And that's when things start to go wrong. The fugitive she's assigned to haul back to court is none other than JT, Lori's former mentor - the man who taught her everything she knows ...the man who also knows the secrets of her murky past. Not only is JT fighting a child exploitation racket operating out of one of Florida's biggest theme parks, Winter Wonderland, a place where 'bad things never happen', but he's also mixed up with the powerful Miami Mob. With two fearsome foes on their tails, just three days to get JT back to Florida, and her daughter to protect, Lori has her work cut out for her. When they're ambushed at a gas station, the stakes go from high to stratospheric, and things become personal.

1955. Two young couples move to the uninhabited, isolated fjord of Hedinsfjordur. Their stay ends abruptly when one of the women meets her death in mysterious circumstances. The case is never solved. Fifty years later an old photograph comes to light, and it becomes clear that the couples may not have been alone on the fjord after all...In nearby Siglufjordur, young policeman Ari Thor tries to piece together what really happened that fateful night, in a town where no one wants to know, where secrets are a way of life. He's assisted by Isrun, a news reporter in Reykjavik, who is investigating an increasingly chilling case of her own. Things take a sinister turn when a child goes missing in broad daylight. With a stalker on the loose, and the town of Siglufjordur in quarantine, the past might just come back to haunt them. Haunting, frightening and complex, Rupture is a dark and atmospheric thriller from Ragnar Jonasson.

February 2017

Cursed is by Thomas Enger.  When Hedda Hellberg fails to return from a retreat in Italy, where she has been grieving for her recently dead father, her husband discovers that his wife's life is tangled in mystery. Hedda never left Oslo, the retreat has no record of her and, what's more, she appears to be connected to the death of an old man, gunned down on the first day of the hunting season in the depths of the Swedish forests. Henning Juul becomes involved in the case when his ex-wife joins in the search for the missing woman, and the estranged pair find themselves enmeshed both in the murky secrets of one of Sweden's wealthiest families, and in the painful truths surrounding the death of their own son. With the loss of his son to deal with, as well as threats to his own life and that of his ex-wife, Juul is prepared to risk everything to uncover a sinister maze of secrets that ultimately leads to the dark heart of European history. 

March 2017

1997. Scarclaw Fell. The body of teenager Tom Jeffries is found at an outward bound centre. Verdict? Misadventure. But not everyone is convinced. And the truth of what happened in the beautiful but eerie fell is locked in the memories of the tight-knit group of friends who embarked on that fateful trip, and the flimsy testimony of those living nearby.2017. Enter elusive investigative journalist Scott King, whose podcast examinations of complicated cases have rivalled the success of Serial, with his concealed identity making him a cult internet figure. In a series of six interviews, King attempts to work out how the dynamics of a group of idle teenagers conspired with the sinister legends surrounding the fell to result in Jeffries' mysterious death. And who's to blame...As every interview unveils a new revelation, you'll be forced to work out for yourself how Tom Jeffries died, and who is telling the truth.  Six Stories is by Matt Wesolowski.

Deadly Game is by Matt Johnson.  Reeling from the attempts on his life and that of his family, Police Inspector Robert Finlay returns to work to discover that any hope of a peaceful existence has been dashed. Assigned to investigate the Eastern European sex-slave industry just as a key witness is murdered. Finlay, along with his new partner Nina Brasov, finds himself facing a ruthless criminal gang, determined to keep control of the traffic of people into the UK. On the home front, Finlay's efforts to protect his wife and child may have been in vain, as an MI5 protection officer uncovers a covert secret service operation that threatens them all...Picking up where the bestselling Wicked Game left off, Deadly Game sees Matt Johnson's damaged hero fighting on two fronts. Aided by new allies, he must not only protect his family but save a colleague from an unseen enemy ...and a shocking fate.

April 2017

Faithless is by Kjell Ola Dahl.  Oslo detectives Gunnarstranda and Frølich are back … and this time, it’s personal…When the body of a woman turns up in a dumpster, scalded and wrapped in plastic, Inspector Frank Frølich is shocked to discover that he knows her … and their recent meetings may hold the clue to her murder. As he begins to look deeper into the tragic events surrounding her death, Frølich’s colleague Gunnarstranda finds another body, and things take a more sinister turn. With a cold case involving the murder of a young girl in northern Norway casting a shadow, and an unsettling number of coincidences clouding the plot, Frølich is forced to look into his own past to find the answers – and the killer – before he strikes again.

May 2017

Fresh from events in Yemen and Cyprus, vigilante justice seeker Claymore Straker returns to South Africa, seeking absolution for the sins of his past. Over four days, he testifies to Desmond Tutu’s newly established Truth and Reconciliation Commission, recounting the shattering events that led to his dishonourable discharge and exile, fifteen years earlier.  It was 1980. The height of the Cold War. Clay is a young paratrooper in the South African Army, fighting in Angola against the Communist insurgency that threatens to topple the White Apartheid regime. On a patrol deep inside Angola, Clay, and his best friend, Eben Barstow, find themselves enmeshed in a tangled conspiracy that threatens everything they have been taught to believe about war, and the sacrifices that they, and their brothers in arms, are expected to make. Witness and unwitting accomplice to an act of shocking brutality, Clay changes allegiance and finds himself labelled a deserter and accused of high treason, setting him on a journey into the dark, twisted heart of institutionalized hatred, from which no one will emerge unscathed.  Exploring true events from one of the most hateful chapters in South African history, Reconciliation for the Dead is by Paul Hardisty and is a shocking, explosive and gripping thriller.

Block 46 by Johana Gustawsson.  Falkenberg. Sweden. Chief Inspector Bergström discovers the naked and frozen corpse of a woman on the beach of Olofsbo.  London. Renowned profiler, the tenebrous Emily Roy investigates a series of murders of children whose savagely mutilated bodies are dumped in the woods of Hampstead, in the north part of the city. They have the same mutilations that the Swedish victim: torn trachea, enucleated eyes and a mysterious Y etched on their arm.  How strange, a serial killer who suddenly changes his type of prey and hunting place... Could it be a duo of sociopaths? The many questions raised by the two cases bring Emily Roy to Sweden, where she meets an old acquaintance, the tenacious Alexis Castells, a French writer specializing in serial killers.  These two women with contrasting personalities set off in pursuit of killers who are as perverted as they are uncontrollable. A hunt that leads them to the horrors of Buchenwald concentration camp, in 1944.  In the fashion of Nordic crime fiction, between past and present day, “Block 46” reminds us of a duty to remember the cruelty of the Nazi concentration camps, and demonstrates that such inhumanity, in all various forms, is still very much relevant.

June 2017

 

Bo Luxton has it all – a loving family, a beautiful home in the Lake District, and a clutch of bestselling books to her name.  Enter Alice Dark, an aspiring writer who is drifting through life, with a series of dead-end jobs and a freeloading boyfriend. When they meet at a writers’ retreat, the chemistry is instant, and a sinister relationship develops…Or does it? Exquisite is by Sarah Stovell.

Wolves in the Dark is by Gunnar Staalesten. Reeling from the death of his great love, Karin, Varg Veum’s life has descended into a self-destructive spiral of alcohol, lust, grief and blackouts. When traces of child pornography are found on his computer, he’s accused of being part of a paedophile ring and thrown into a prison cell. There, he struggles to sift through his past to work out who is responsible for planting the material … and who is seeking the ultimate revenge. When a chance to escape presents itself, Varg finds himself on the run in his hometown of Bergen. With the clock ticking and the police on his tail, Varg takes on his hardest – and most personal – case yet.

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