Bookgasm (Free subscription) | 07/07/2008
THE BLUE HAMMER was the last Lew Archer novel written by Ross Macdonald before Alzheimer’s had taken over, and holds all the earmarks of prime Archer material. Deep family secrets aplenty pepper this book, which are all tied to a stolen piece of artwork. For Archer, what seems like a very easy case gets a [...]
OS Galaxy (Free subscription) | 05/12/2008
Here's a list of the books I've recently read, with an Amazon-style star rating and a few comments. Florentine Finish - Cornelius Hirschberg Won the Edgar for best first mystery in 1964 The Drowning Pool - Ross Macdonald The second Lew Archer novel from 1950. Another hard-boiled P.I. story. Ripley's Curioddities - Ripley Publishing See a previous post on this one. Shake Hands For Ever - Ruth Rendell...
The Zen Of Steve (Free subscription) | 04/25/2008
Illustration, comics, children's book, typography and movie props — no one...
This Book Is For You (Free subscription) | 04/25/2008
I saw this on bookeywookey , and felt compelled to steal it. I'm a sucker for the book list: A is for Dorothy Allison: Cavedweller B is for Larry Brown: Big Bad Love: Stories C is for Raymond Chandler: The High Window D is for Roald Dahl: The BFG E is for James Ellroy: L.A. Confidential F is for Louise Fitzhugh: Harriet the Spy G is for Tim Gautreaux: Same Place, Same Things: Stories H is for Dashiell...
Euro Crime (Free subscription) | 04/20/2008
I prefer this list to the one in The Telegraph a while back. Links on the author's name take you to the Times's page about the author (which gives a suggestion as to which book to try); bibliographies are linked to their Euro Crime page: 1. Patricia Highsmith 2. Georges Simenon - Bibliography 3. Agatha Christie - Bibliography 4. Raymond Chandler 5. Elmore Leonard 6. Arthur Conan Doyle - Bibliography...
Crime Always Pays (Free subscription) | 04/17/2008
That blummin’ Declan Hughes (right), eh? Can’t sit still. No sooner is the ink dry on the latest in the Ed Loy series, THE DYING BREED , than the Irish Ross Macdonald is wibbling on about the fourth instalment, CITY OF THE DEAD, to Dana King over at New Mystery Reader, with the gist running thusly: “CITY OF THE DEAD sees Loy take the case of a woman whose father was murdered fifteen years ago; her...
Detroit Free Press (Free subscription) | 03/31/2008
It is Opening Day, and I'm thinking about a World Series.
Bartography (Free subscription) | 03/26/2008
Noblemania ! You really should check out this recentishly new blog from Marc Tyler Nobleman, the author of the forthcoming picture book biography Boys of Steel , about the creators of Superman. Now, if you'd written a picture book about the birth of the Superman comics, who would you want to illustrate it? Ross MacDonald , right? Care to guess who the illustrator of Boys of Steel is?
Bookgasm (Free subscription) | 03/21/2008
There are only a handful of books I’ve read that made want to scrub myself with a wire brush, having put me through the halls of creepiness. Declan Hughes’ second novel THE COLOR OF BLOOD is one of them, with some last-minute revelations that will make most readers queasy. This is not the type of [...]
Bill Boyarsky (Free subscription) | 03/20/2008
Steve Oney's piece from last June about Iraq war casualty Chris Leon is a National Magazine Awards finalist in profile writing. He shares the...
Crime Always Pays (Free subscription) | 03/19/2008
With his first two novels, THE WRONG KIND OF BLOOD and THE COLOUR OF BLOOD, Declan Hughes established his series protagonist, Ed Loy, as a private investigator very much in the mould of Ross Macdonald's Lew Archer. The novels, set in a fictionalised Dublin, Ireland, are largely concerned with dysfunctional families, and how the sins of the father (and / or mother) are almost inevitably visited on their...
Crime Always Pays (Free subscription) | 03/18/2008
David Thompson of Busted Flush Press gets in touch to give us an early squint at the funky new cover art for their U.S. publication of LONDON BOULEVARD, Ken Bruen's take on Sunset Boulevard , a detail of which (click on the pic) appears to feature Sir Kenneth of Bruen in a dust-up with one of his crime-writing brethren. Could it be – no! – Benny Blanco? Erm, no. Quote David: “I could not be more excited...
The Art Department (Free subscription) | 03/05/2008
This was a lot of fun to watch come together. Long time AD readers will remember that I couldn't praise Brian Francis Slattery's first novel, Spaceman Blues , enough. To be honest, hat made me a little nervous when Brian's scend novel, Liberation , came up in the schedule. Like Spaceman, Liberation is nearly impossible to describe and defies category, but essentially it is about America after a sudden...
The Rap Sheet (Free subscription) | 02/27/2008
• Editor, bookstore owner, and critic Otto Penzler surveys the mystery magazine scene for The New York Sun. • Bruce Grossman celebrates the mighty Macs--John D. MacDonald and Ross Macdonald--in his latest “Bullets, Broads, Blackmail & Bombs” column for Bookgasm. • More on the late Stephen Marlowe, this time from novelist Bill Pronzini at Mystery*File. • Bill Crider submits his new novel, Of
Bookgasm (Free subscription) | 02/27/2008
You people knew at some point I was going to force John MacDonald and Ross Macdonald into a really bad quick-service restaurant joke. Over a billion readers served! To serve as the middle of this sandwich, we have Carter Brown, whose books read like fast food. SOFT TOUCH by John D. MacDonald – Considered by [...]
