CWA Specsavers Crime Thriller Shortlist Announced

Two novels from Transworld imprints and a further two from Little, Brown have been shortlisted for the CWA Goldsboro Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel of the Year at the Specsavers Crime Thriller Awards.
Paula Daly’s Keep Your Friends Close (Bantam), which reveals what happens when a marriage falls apart with fatal consequences, is up against Wiley Cash’s This Dark Road to Mercy (Doubleday), a tale of blood and vengeance in a little town in North Carolina.
Also in the running are The First Rule of Survival (Constable) by Paul Mendelson, a thriller set in modern Cape Town where the discovery of two missing children reveals unwelcome truths, and Louise Penny’s story of rampant police corruption in an isolated Canadian hamlet with no links to the outside world, How the Light Gets In (Sphere).
Meanwhile the shortlist for the CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger for Best First Novel sees Antonia Hodgson’s The Devil In The Marshalsea (Hodder & Stoughton), which depicts the savage world of an 18th century gaol, facing M J Carter’s tale of murder, gambling, opium wars and crime, The Strangler Vine (Penguin Fig Tree). Two other debut novels are shortlisted: The Axeman's Jazz by Ray Celestin (Mantle), which follows an unknown axe-man who gives his address as "Hell", and The Silent Wife by A S A Harrison (Headline), in which Chicago is the backdrop for the slow, murderous disintegration of a marriage.
Robert Harris and Louise Doughty are both shortlisted for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Best Thriller of the Year, for An Officer and a Spy (Random House) and Apple Tree Yard (Faber and Faber) respectively. Harris’ novel is a fictional telling of The Dreyfus Affair, while Doughty’s is a psychological thriller about a respected female scientist and the single reckless decision that leads to her standing trial for murder.
Also in the running for that award is I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes (Transworld), a race against time for a retired US intelligence expert who is drawn back into the world of forensic criminal investigation, and Greg Iles’ Natchez Burning (HarperCollins), where a son’s attempts to defend his father from charges of murder puts him in contact with a hardened, violent gang.
Lucy Santos, director CWA, called them “powerful and fantastic shortlists which we know will provide hours of reading pleasure for all", thanking sponsors Goldsboro Books and Ian Fleming Publications.
The winners will be announced at the awards on Friday 24th October at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London, along with winners in categories for film and television.
This September, ITV3 will run a Crime Thriller Season, featuring a TV series dedicated to crime writing. "The Crime Thriller Club", sponsored by Specsavers, will feature "Living Legends", a series of interviews with bestselling authors in the world of crime and thriller fiction. The authors interviewed this year will be Dean Koontz, Denise Mina, Robert Harris, Val McDermid, Michael Connelly and Lynda La Plante, who will all be members of the CWA Hall of Fame.
Each episode of "The Crime Thriller Club" will also include The Crime Thriller Book Club, in which six novels will be critiqued on air. This year’s selected titles are: Before We Met by Lucie Whitehouse (Bloomsbury); Entry Island by Peter May (Quercus); Letters To My Daughter’s Killer by Cath Staincliffe (Constable & Robinson); Treachery by S J Parris (HarperCollins); The Tilted World by Tom Franklin & Beth Ann Fennelly (Mantle); and Watch Me by James Carol (Faber & Faber).
Good luck everyone.

Hat tip: The Bookseller

2012 CWA Dagger Shortlist and Specsavers Awards are announced

The Specsavers Crime Thriller Awards Shortlists 2012 has been announced.  The winners of 12 Awards will be announced at The Specsavers Crime Thriller Awards on Thursday 18 October at the Grosvenor House Hotel.

The awards include –

 The CWA Gold Dagger for the Best Crime Novel of the Year,

The CWA Steel Dagger for the Best Thriller of the Year,

The CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger for the Best New Crime Writer of the Year,

The Specsavers Bestseller Dagger and Film and TV-based Daggers.

The CWA Gold Dagger (sponsored by Constable and Robinson)

Vengeance in Mind by N.J. Cooper (Simon and Schuster)

The Flight by M.R. Hall (Mantle)

The Rage by Gene Kerrigan (Harvill Secker)

Bereft by Chris Womersley (Quercus)

The CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger (sponsored by Goldsboro Books)

Heart-Shaped Bruise by Tanya Byrne (Headline)

Land More Kind than Home by Wiley Cash (Bantam)

Good People by Ewart Hutton (Blue Door)

What Dies in Summer by Tom Wright (Canongate)

The CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger – sponsored by Ian Fleming Publications

Dare Me by Megan Abbott (Picador)

A Foreign Country by Charles Cumming (HarperCollins)

The Fear Index by Robert Harris (Hutchinson)

Reamde by Neal Stephenson (Atlantic Books)

The Specsavers Awards are as follows -

The Specsavers Bestseller Dagger which is by public vote.

This award honours the success of authors throughout their careers, and is chosen by the reading public.  Readers can register their vote for their favourite bestselling author online here.  The winner will be presented with the Bestseller Dagger at the awards ceremony on the 18 October, after all the votes are counted on 12 October.  The nominees are –

Ann Cleeves

Anthony Horowitz

Stuart MacBride

Jo Nesbø

Kathy Reichs

Specsavers TV and Film Daggers:

The Film Dagger

Drive (Icon)

The Dark Knight Rises (Warner Bros)

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (Sony)

The Guard (Optimum)

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Studio Canal)

The TV Dagger

Appropriate Adult (ITV Studios/ITV1)

Line of Duty (BBC/BBC2)

Sherlock: Series 2 (Hartswood Films/BBC1)

Wallander (Left Bank Pictures, Yellow Bird/BBC1)

Whitechapel: Series 3 (Carnival/ITV1)

The International TV Dagger

Boardwalk Empire: Season 2 (HBO/Sky Atlantic)

Dexter: Season 6 (Showtime Networks, John Goldwyn Productions, TheColleton Company, ClydePhillips Productions/FX)

Homeland (Teakwood Lane Productions, Showtime Productions, Cherry Pie Productions, Keshet Media Group, Fox 21/Channel 4)

The Bridge (Danmarks Radio, Sveriges Television/BBC4)

The Killing II: Forbrydelsen (Arrow Films/BBC4)

The Best Actress Dagger

Brenda Blethyn for Vera (ITV Studios/ITV1)

Claire Danes for Homeland (Teakwood Lane Productions, Showtime Productions, Cherry Pie Productions, Keshet Media Group, Fox 21/Channel 4)

Sofie Gråbøl for The Killing II (Arrow Films/BBC4)

Sofia Helin for The Bridge (Danmarks Radio, Sveriges Television/BBC4)

Maxine Peake for Silk (BBC/BBC1)

The Best Actor Dagger

Kenneth Branagh for Wallander (Left Bank Pictures,Yellow Bird/BBC1)

Steve Buscemi for Boardwalk Empire (HBO/Sky Atlantic)

Benedict Cumberbatch for Sherlock (Hartswood Films/BBC1)

Damien Lewis for Homeland (Teakwood Lane Productions, Showtime Productions, Cherry Pie Productions, Keshet Media Group, Fox 21/Channel 4)

Dominic West for Appropriate Adult (ITV Studios/ITV1

  

The Best Supporting Actress Dagger

Frances Barber for Silk (BBC/BBC1)

Kelly Macdonald for Boardwalk Empire (HBO/Sky Atlantic)

Archie Panjabi for The Good Wife (Scott Free Productions, King Size Productions, Small Wishes, CBS Productions/More 4)

Sarah Smart for Wallander (Left Bank Pictures, Yellow Bird/BBC1)

Una Stubbs for Sherlock (Hartswood Films/BBC1)

The Best Supporting Actor Dagger

Alun Armstrong for Garrow’s Law (Shed Media/BBC1)

Alan Cumming for The Good Wife (Scott Free Productions, King Size Productions, Small Wishes, CBS Productions/More 4)

Phil Davis for Silk & Whitechapel (Silk: BBC/BBC1)(Whitechapel: Carnival/ITV1)

Laurence Fox for Lewis (ITV Studios/ITV1)

Martin Freeman for Sherlock (Hartswood Films/BBC1)

‘Best Detective Duo’ by Public Vote

The British public will also have the chance to vote for their favourite detective duo by phone vote. The phone lines open at 12:00pm on 7 September 2012.

The shortlist is as follows:

DCI Banks – DCI Alan Banks & DS Annie Cabbot – Call 090 16 16 14 01

Above Suspicion – DC Anna Travis & DCS James Langton – Call 090 16 16 14 02

Scott and Bailey- DC Jane Scott & DC Rachel Bailey – Call 090 16 16 14 03

Lewis – DI Robbie Lewis & DS James Hathaway – Call 090 16 16 14 04

Whitechapel – DI Joseph Chandler & DS Ray Miles – Call 090 16 16 14 05

Vera – DCI Vera Stanhope & DS Joe Ashworth – Call 090 16 16 14 06

William Boyd to write new Bond novel

Ian Fleming Publishers have announced that William Boyd is to write the next James Bond novel. The untitled Bond novel will take Bond back to the 1960's and will be published in 2013. The full press notice is below.

William Boyd to write new James Bond novel 

Boyd takes Bond back to the Sixties with all the style and flair of Ian Fleming 

William Boyd, the award-winning and bestselling author of Restless and Any Human Heart, is to write the next James Bond novel.

The novel, which is yet to be titled, will be published in the UK and Commonwealth in autumn 2013 by Jonathan Cape – Ian Fleming’s original publisher and an imprint of Vintage Publishing – and simultaneously by HarperCollins Publishers in USA & Canada.  Rights were sold in the English language by Jonny Geller of Curtis Brown, on behalf of Ian Fleming Publications Ltd.

William Boyd is the third author in recent years to be invited by the Ian Fleming estate to write an official Bond novel, following in the footsteps of the American thriller writer Jeffery Deaver, who wrote Carte Blanche in 2011, and Sebastian Faulks, whose Devil May Care was published to mark Ian Fleming’s centenary in 2008. 

Boyd is a writer of international acclaim whose 11 novels and short-story collections have been translated into over 30 languages with many of them adapted for film and television.  While the details and title of the next 007 adventure naturally remain secret, the author has revealed that next year’s publication will mark a return to 'classic Bond' and will be set in the late 1960s. 

Boyd comments: "When the Ian Fleming estate invited me to write the new James Bond novel I accepted at once.  For me the prospect appeared incredibly exciting and stimulating – a once-in-a-lifetime challenge.  In fact my father introduced me to the James Bond novels in the 1960s and I read them all then – From Russia with Love being my favourite." 

Corinne Turner, Managing Director of Ian Fleming Publications Ltd, comments: "William Boyd is a contemporary English writer whose classic novels combine literary elements with a broad appeal.  His thrillers occupy the niche that Ian Fleming would fill were he writing today and with similar style and flair.  This alongside his fascination with Fleming himself makes him the perfect choice to take Bond back to his 1960s world." 

As well as the publication of the new novel, 2013 is a significant year for Bond, marking 60 years since Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, was published by Cape in 1953.  Cape was also the publisher of the first ever official Bond novel following Fleming's death in 1964, when Kingsley Amis took up the mantle writing Colonel Sun as Robert Markham in 1968. 

Dan Franklin, Publisher, Jonathan Cape comments: "It is fantastic that Bond is returning to Cape, his birthplace, and even more so that he will do so in the hands of William Boyd.  I can’t think of anyone better qualified."

"In more ways than one, William Boyd really is the perfect author to write the next chapter in the life of James Bond," adds Tim Duggan, VP and Executive Editor of HarperCollins Publishers.  "His sophisticated storytelling, his knowledge of history and espionage, and his sheer inventiveness will all come together to make this novel as grippingly suspenseful as anything I’ve ever read." 

Jonny Geller, Managing Director of literary agency Curtis Brown observes: "This is a dream come true – a fantasy literary combination.  Bringing together this country’s most beloved literary character with one of our finest contemporary writers will produce a classic James Bond novel, true to the spirit of Ian Fleming." 

Iris Tupholme, Vice President, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, HarperCollins Canada remarks: "William Boyd, whose mastery of plot and character has won him readers all over the world, is the right person to take the beloved James Bond in a new, fresh direction.  We are delighted to be publishing the new Bond novel in Canada." 

Boyd's most recent novel, Waiting for Sunrise, is published by Bloomsbury in the UK and HarperCollins Publishers in the US on 17 April.

Last month we reported on the blog that Vintage publishing acquiring exclusive English-language rights to the 14 Bond novels in worldwide, excluding US and Canada, for a 10-year period.  Furthermore we also reported on the blog that between 6 July and 5 September the London's Barbican will mark the 50th anniversary of James Bond with a unique exhibition showcasing the inside story of how design and style combined to create the world’s most influential and iconic movie brand. Designing 007 will transform Barbican spaces including The Curve and The Pit in a multi-sensory experience where screen icons, costumes, production design, automobiles, gadgets, special effects, graphic design, exotic locations, weapons, stunts and props combine to immerse the audience in the creation and development of Bond style over its auspicious 50 year history. 

The BBC have also got a piece on their website which can be found here about William Boyd writing the new Bond novel.  You can also listen to the radio interview that William Boyd did on Radio 4 this morning talking about Bond.

Michael Gruber and The Good Son

Today’s guest blogger is Michael Gruber who is the author of 7 books under his own name and has ghost-written 15 books in the Butch Karp series for Robert Tanenbaum. His 2007 novel The Book of Air and Shadows was published to great acclaim. His latest novel The Good Son has been shortlisted for the CWA Steel Dagger. Below Michael talks about his novel The Good Son.

There is a note in my notebook from around three years ago that says, Woman, peace worker, Jungian, kidnapped by terrorists, SEAL son tries to rescue her. At the time, my wife, who had been through the Jung Institute in Zurich, some years ago was the regional coordinator of Pax Christi, the Catholic peace organisation, and her son was in the Navy and about to embark on SEAL training, because he wanted to become a bomb disposal guy and the training is largely the same as it is for SEALS. I thought that it was an interesting situation, quite apart from the tension and terror in our house, the warrior son and the peacenik mother. After some years, with the young man safely back home from Iraq, I decided to turn the idea into a novel. My fiction has two major themes. One is how culture influences our view of reality, especially in people who are the product of two very different cultures and the other is the underlying nature of human consciousness, especially as that relates to what may be called the unseen world.

I decided to make the mother a woman with a speckled past--eclectically religious, a Jungian, a Catholic, married to a Muslim and an occasional and heterodox practitioner of that faith. The son would be the product of an upper class Pakistani home, raised in Lahore. Then I worked out a series of events that brought the boy into the jihad against the Russians in Afghanistan, because I wanted him to be not only an elite American soldier, but also someone who understood Islamic jihadism from the inside.

The problem with this basic story is that it wants to slide into the old melodramatic mold, where the hero is brave and noble, and the victim is innocent, and the villains are very evil indeed. Melodrama arises from the unexamined assumptions of a culture; its purpose is to affirm those assumptions rather than prompt any deep examination of the culture’s values.

But one of the uses of fiction is to take the received wisdom of a writer’s society and hold it up to a hard light, and so we have the imperfect hero, even the anti-hero, and the villain who inspires sympathy. What I’ve tried to do in The Good Son is a version of that effort. The society in which I am located is loosely known as the West It is a liberal (in the original sense of the word), democracy, with a free-enterprise economy, the rule of law, equal rights, freedom of speech and religion, and is characterized (at least in its leadership) by a scientific world-view and, especially, an almost religious devotion to material progress. It further believes that these qualities have made it both powerful and rich. As members of this society we naturally assume that it is inherently right, and that all rational human beings will aspire to live in such societies, and that the only reason they do not is either a defect in the minds or education of people who live otherwise or the malign influence of wicked rulers. This assumption is called cultural imperialism, and it is very deep, even subconscious in most of us.

It is, however, an obvious fact that some people do want something different, and are willing to fight and die for it. Across the Islamic world, the Umma, or community of believers, we observe a deep current of rejection aimed at the basic cultural assumptions of the West. The primary value here is not political freedom or material progress but submission to the will of God, as expressed in the Qur’an, in the sayings of the Prophet Mohammed, and in the codification of these writings in Sharia law. Those who cherish such values look not ahead to material progress, but back in time, to an era when, they believe, the Umma had attained a perfect relationship with God and His laws. Education or exposure to Western ways does not seem to have much of an effect on this way of seeing the world. It is one of the horrible ironies of the 9/11 events that the leader of the attack was a man with an advanced degree in (what else?) urban planning.

Since the relationship of consciousness to culture is, in my view, at the core of any novel, I wanted to see what happened if I took this strange and alien consciousness seriously, on its own terms. In the book, this central theme is played out in two theaters: a struggle within the mind of the young soldier, and between the mother and the terrorist leader who holds her life in his hands. In the latter of these, I try to show what happens if we were to take the deep religious impulses of Islamic jihadism seriously, instead of treating them like a kind of nostalgic psychosis.

Good novels are supposed to make us look at ourselves and our culture through fresh eyes, and almost nothing does this as well as getting into the head of a character who shares not one of the assumptions on which we have constructed our own lives. (Of course, the actual way that novels do this is by packing all that sort of thing in what the author hopes is a ripping good yarn, and I have tried to do that as well.) In order to write this book I had to read a lot of material about Islam and its culture, and novels set in that culture, and the works of writers who thought that nothing I believed was true, and that death and murder were better than accepting a world that I was at entirely at home in. I gained at least partial entry to world that is, as one book I read has it, “lost in the sacred.” The experience shook me; I hope The Good Son does the same for its readers.

More information:- http://www.michaelgruberbooks.com