It's the birthday of Bill Paxton, born this day in 1955. His fame stems from his career as an actor in several blockbuster films, including The Terminator, Aliens, and Twister. But very few people know that he also wrote two important books. The Hidden Adventures of Sherlock Holmes II explores a story with Sherlock Holmes on the island of Malta in pursuit of hidden treasure. Unfortunately this gem is out of print.
The second book, a work of non-fiction, is a biography of an obscure but important boxer from Pittsburgh, PA named Harry Greb. Harry was a lightweight and middle weight champion who fought between 1913 and 1926 and assembled a spectacular record. Greb died after an operation for a minor injury, a fate that ironically would also claim the life of his biographer, Bill Paxton, who went under the knife in 2017 to repair a heart valve and died shortly afterwards.
Paxton's film career as an actor is well known, but my favorite movie of his is a lesser known crime caper that shows his acting chops in a way that few other performances can.
In 1998 he appeared in the film, A Simple Plan. which exposed the fates of three ordinary folks who stumble across a plane filled with millions of stolen dollars. The men's plan is...simple. Hide the money and wait a few months to see if anyone comes looking for it. Then, if no one does, they split the loot and live happily ever after. As you may have guessed, it doesn't quite work that way. Greed takes over, and by the end of the film, almost everyone involved in the theft has been killed. Bill Paxton's character and his wife survive, but are forever changed by the crime and it's aftermath.
Voracious readers of crime novels suffer from two curses worthy of the labors of Hercules. The first curse is "What to do when you come to the end of an author's series?". The second curse is "What do I read next?".
The solution to both questions? Read award winning Mike Faricy's "Jack Dillon" crime series. Jack Dillon (known as "Dildo" among his friends) is a U. S. Marshall assigned to fly to Ireland and return with a multi-million dollar fraudster. It's not a glamorous job. His boss, who despises Jack, only gives it to him because there's no one else available. It should be a easy assignment.
It isn't. The Russian Mob has other plans for a witness against their criminal operations. But Jack Dillon comes prepared for any outcome. Along the way, Jack falls in love with his police escort, and the prisoner transfer results in a no holds barred shootout that will leave you eager to read the next book in the series.
The story moves fast and has a generous amount of action and humor. Except for a shot of Irish whiskey or a pint of Guinness, what more could you want?
It's the birthday of Jeffery Deaver, born May 4th in Chicago. As befitting someone who was born in Chicago, he has been fascinated by crime from a young age. This led him first to a career in journalism, and then to the legal profession.
Both of these choices provided ample opportunity for criminal activity, but at some point he must have determined that the risk/reward ratio was not in his favor. Thus, he turned to writing.
Fortunately for us, his interest has been used to create over 40 novels as a best selling crime writer, including one of his best known novels, The Bone Collector. One of his biggest inspirations was Ian Fleming, creator of the James Bond novels. He has also credited Alfred Hitchcock, Raymond Chandler, and Agatha Christie as models.
But he hasn't limited himself to the old masters. Some of his work has been inspired by changes in technology, resulting in the frightening novel, The Blue Nowhere, where his protagonist pursues a murderous hacker who kills using the internet.
His most famous hero is Lincoln Rhyme, a quadriplegic detective, who has been described by critics as a modern day "Sherlock Holmes", due to his intellectual skills. This character, along with his partner Amelia Sachs, has appeared in 16 novels, and has a special appeal for his creator.
Although his novels have been described as a "ticking-clock" while the story races to the end, Deaver's writing process is anything but seat-of-the-pants. He spends several months outlining his novel, and can wind up with 200 pages in his outline before he even starts to write Chapter One. Then when he is finished, he rewrites the book as many times as needed to create his award winning novels.
In 2021 he received the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America in recognition of his contributions to the crime writing genre.
Photo Credit: Niko Giovanni Coniglio
"As Hemingway said, there are no great writers, only great rewriters." - Jeffery Deaver
It's the birthday of crime writer Sue Grafton, author of the Alphabet series, which featured wise-cracking P. I. Kinsey Millhone. The first novel in this series,A Is For Alibi, was nominated for a Shamus Award for Best Novel, but lost to Lawrence Block's Eight Million Ways To Die.
Sue's writing career started long before her award winning series took off and led to best sellers and critical acclaim. The story starts with her birth in Louisville Kentucky to a mother who was a teacher and a father who was a lawyer (with a two year stint in the army during WWII). It was her father, C.W. Grafton, who planted in her the writing bug. He wrote crime novels at night and published four during his short career. His first novel, The Rat Began To Gnaw The Rope, won the Mary Roberts Reinhart Award in 1943.
Her father taught her vital writing techniques and inspired her to start her first novel at age 18. Sue wrote seven novels in those early years, two of which were published, but these did not bring her commercial success.
Sue Grafton's Alphabet Series got it's inspiration from a bitter divorce and custody battle with her husband. While she fantasized about creative ways to kill him in order to preserve her sanity, she started writing down her thoughts. As she later described it, she wrote out her frustrations because she didn't want to spend the rest of her life in prison wearing a drab outfit.
Over the next 35 years the series extended through the alphabet all the way to Y is For Yesterday, published in 2017. Sue Grafton passed away on December 28, 2017. This left her last planned novel, Z Is For Zero, unfinished.
In 2009, Sue Grafton was awarded the Grand Master Award by the Mystery Writers of America in recognition of her contribution to the crime genre.
"Ideas are easy. It’s the execution of
ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats." - Sue Grafton
It's the birthday of journalist and crime writer Laura Lippman, born January 31, 1959. From a very early age she knew she wanted to be a novelist, though she confessed once that she didn't know "how anyone became a novelist".
It didn't stop her. Her first novel was written at age five, and was illustrated by the author. It was about a caveman, written in his native language. Sales were modest. She still has the original. (One wonders what this first edition is worth.)
He writing career began with small newspapers in Texas, She moved form there to Baltimore Sun, where she was hired as a journalist in 1991. Her first novel, Baltimore Blues, was written in her spare time and published in 1998. It was a finalist for the Shamus Award. Several more novels followed, and by 2004, she had published eight more novels, and had won multiple awards, including the Agatha, Anthony, Barry, Edgar, Macavity, Nero, and Shamus Awards (some of them twice). Not everyone was thrilled, however.
Her bosses at the Baltimore Sun resented her "spare time" writing success and demoted her to a small bureau office away from the fast paced downtown Baltimore newspaper office. Lippman left to become a full time novelist, and crime readers have been deeply grateful ever since. After more than two dozen novels and several short story collections, Laura Lippman is still writing crime novels, still winning awards, and still making history.
And those editors who resented her success and told her she couldn't write? No one will remember their names down the road. Kinda makes you feel all warm and fuzzy, doesn't it?
Credit and Thanks to Crime Reads and the Hoover Sun for their assistance in writing this post!
This week we celebrate the birthday of crime writer Julia Buckley, born on December 30th. She's the author of over 20 mysteries, including several series. My favorite? Her Undercover Dish books which feature an adorable chocolate lab, delicious recipes, and devious murders. If you're a fan of death by poison, and Murder She Wrote, you'll love this four book series as much as I did. I recommend reading them in order, starting with The Big Chili.
A lifelong reader, her mother (a librarian herself) took here to the library at an early age and encouraged her to read. During this period, Julia was introduced to dozens of
writers, including Ngaio Marsh, Agatha Christie, Patricia Wentworth, and
Dorothy Sayers.
Julia later became a teacher, and has taught in Chicago schools for many years. Her first book, Madeline Mann, appeared in 2007, a three part cozy series. Her latest series, the Hungarian Tea-House Mysteries, features a woman who solves crime in her family's tea shop. The first book in the series is Death in a Budapest Butterfly. All the books in this series show the influence of Hungarian folklore and the cozy writing style which has made her books adored by fans.
Julia holds a special place in my heart, as she was the first writer to interview me on her blog after the publication of my cozy mystery, way back in 2008. You can learn more about Julia Buckley through her blog, Mystery Musings.
Considering how productive and popular Julia has been, shouldn't there be a TV pilot by now? Anybody have Hallmark's phone number?
Since that time he has published 8 more novels and a collection of short stories. He has received Ten Major Award Nominations and Three Awards, including the Anthony Award for Best Short Story.
Before becoming a crime writer, Sean was a private investigator in Chicago, the setting for many of his stories. His resume includes stints as a scuba diver, a truck driver, a magician, and a salesman. Needless to say, he's been around the block. All of this has helped to infuse his stories with a gritty reality born of experience.
Besides his stories, Sean's advice to his fellow writers has inspired countless scribblers to follow in his footsteps. Some of his best advice can be found here.
There’s
no secret formula. The main thing is, you write Sounds obvious,
yet it amazes me how many people say they want to be writers but don’t
write. Odd, that. Anyway, you write, and then you write some more. You
revise, and then you revise some more. You show your work to others
and you learn from their reactions.
You read. I’m even more astounded by people who
claim they want to write, but they don’t read. Can you imagine a musician
who doesn’t listen to music? Of course not. So you read a ton, you read
constantly, and you read critically, with an eye to the workings of the
craft. I don’t mean reading books about how to write – I mean reading
fiction. Should go without saying, really.
Don’t
confuse reading books on the craft of writing with the act of
writing. You must write. And while it’s essential to
learn the craft, in the end you must write your own story in your own
voice.
On December 15, 1995, HEATdebuted in movie theaters. Starring Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro, the film covers the lives of a professional thief named Neil McCauley (played by DeNiro) and Vincent Hanna, the detective hunting him (Pacino). The film was a box office success, and soon became a cult classic for its accurate descriptions of police tactics and crime planning, especially in the area of bank robberies. The climactic bank robbery shootout scene was so well planned that the U.S. Army has shown it to new recruits as an example of best practices for falling back in a battle when faced with overwhelming forces.
Besides featuring Pacino and DeNiro, the film is packed with well known stars. Val Kilmer, Ashley Judd, Wes Studi, Ted Levine, Jon Voigt, and Tom Sizemore all portrayed important characters and gave outstanding performances.
The film was unusual in several respects. At 171 minutes, nearly three hours long, it broke one of the cardinal rules of successful filmmaking...keep it under two hours. Despite this, not a minute is wasted.
Every scene contributes to the viewers understanding and enjoyment. The film also used live gunfire for the audio. Shot on location in Los Angeles, the industrial landscape of many scenes lent a gritty authentic feel to the film. But perhaps the most important broken rule is the portrayal of the villain as a complex character with intelligence, emotional maturity, and a dedication to professionalism in his work. Neil McCauley isn't a hood or a thug. He's a professional thief, and he takes his work seriously. These are qualities he shares with the protagonist, Vincent Hanna.
One of the best scenes in the movie features a meeting with these two pros, when Hanna pulls over McCauley, not to arrest him, but to invite him for a cup of coffee. Seated across from each other in a restaurant, Hanna uses this as an excuse to quiz McCauley, hoping to learn about his futures plans, and perhaps convince McCauley to abandon his chosen profession. McCauley's frank answers earns him some respect, and both men reveal more about themselves than they may have intended.
HEAT is ranked as one of the top crime films of the 1990s and has influenced numerous works in film and in the written word. A prequel/sequel novel, HEAT 2was published in 2022 as a joint effort written by the director of the original movie, Michael Mann, and best selling crime writer Meg Gardiner.
A sequel film is in the planning stages, with production to start in 2026. Leonardo DiCaprio is being considered for one of the roles, as is Christian Bale.
As a young man, Burnett got his start in politics, working on political campaigns for the Governor of Ohio. He soon discovered that the line between crime and public service was a thin one. "I knew from my earliest memory of how politics
and crime were interwoven.", he said. He read everything he could get his
hands on, good or bad. The novels he thought most important as a writer included Hemingway’s AFarewell to Arms and The
Sun Also Rises, Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, and Appointment
in Samarra by John O’Hara. Not bad for someone typecast as a crime
writer.
With Burnett, plot played second fiddle to his character's
fate. “I don’t have any plot in my books. Just life. And the relationship
of characters and what happens to them”. In the end, most of his characters
succumb to their own flaws.
Perhaps no work expressed this philosophy more than the novel The Asphalt Jungle. Made into a classic film, it portrays the heist of a jewelry store by a group of skilled professionals. Despite their initial success, the robbers are picked off one by one through a combination of their weakness, greed, and plain bad luck.
This collection of short stories centered around Hanukkah
provides great entertainment and will appeal to everyone, regardless of your
religion. After all, you don't have to be Jewish to appreciate a painful
holiday spent with your boorish uncle or snoopy sister, wondering to yourself,
"Aren't you dead yet?". There's something refreshing in seeing
someone you despise get their just desserts (after a lavish dinner, of course).
And after reading these stories, those homicidal urges should be satiated.
If they aren't, please resist the urge to use this
collection as a HOW-TO guide to homicide (not that it doesn't contain a few
good tips). Otherwise, you'll be spending the rest of your life in a prison
cell, with plenty of time on your hands. Come to think of it, that's a lot of
reading time, isn't it? But I digress.
Several great crime writers contributed to this collection
edited by best-selling writer Tod Goldberg, many of whom I recognized, and a few who were new to me.
You'll enjoy them all. There's even a story by Tod's brother, Lee Goldberg, a best-selling
writer himself. Imagine having to edit your own brother's story submission...I
wonder how that went over at the holiday dinner?
Jake Needham's latest novel, Goodbye, Mr. Boogie, continues the saga of protagonist Samuel Tay, recently retired from the Singapore homicide squad. This series won the Barry Award for "Who The Hell Is Harry Black?" (recognition that was long overdue in my humble opinion).
In this latest installment, Samuel Tay is enjoying retirement, but still in demand for his expertise in criminal investigations. So it's no surprise when a friend from the Thailand Police sends an emissary to ask for help. It seems an international assassin is targeting a Global Summit in Bangkok, where several world leaders are meeting. There's just one problem. No one knows who this assassin is targeting, or if he really exists. And Tay's presence may just be a convenient way to use him as a scapegoat if things go sour.
Inspector Tay has a challenge on his hands. Only his loyalty to a friend convinces him to stay on the case. But with nothing to go on, not even a name, the challenge seems insurmountable. With help from a young female police officer, Tay begins to make progress when a suspect appears. He also discovers that his partner may be a romantic interest, and for a long time bachelor, this complicates his task.
Inspector Tay isn't above liberating some potential evidence without the benefit of a warrant. But when you're battling an international assassin, the rules can be flexible. Is that a good word to use when you're breaking the law? I like it. Let's use it...flexible. His quick hands turn out to be useful. But as the case races to it's conclusion, Tay begins to suspect that the obvious solution may not be the right one. Is Tay on the verge of cracking the case? Or is he being setup?
Readers say that books can transport us to another world. That's true. Whenever I finish an Inspector Tay novel, I lean back and close my eyes. In a few moments I am walking down the street where Samuel Tay lives. I ring the bell, and am invited in, offering a bottle of Irish whiskey. Tay produces the ice and the glasses. We retire to his back yard, surrounded by bamboo. We watch the birds, and enjoy the silence. No one speaks. There is no need for conversation. Tay smokes a cigarette. I don't mind. A former smoker understands. And that is all I need.
I was almost done with this book before it occurred to me that I didn't know the narrator's name. Not his real name anyway. He uses fake names throughout the novel to protect himself. After all, he's a thief...and a good one. He pays for scores. Never carries a gun. And he always cases the job before he goes in.
Except for this one time. Welcome to your nightmare. The sun has gone down, and it's going to be a long night.
We're on the Jersey Shore. The target is a high stakes gambler with 10,000 dollars in the house. Getting in is easy. But in a few minutes, the police have arrived.
Silent alarm? Not likely. A double cross? Far more likely.
The rest of the novel is a series of narrow escapes and a desperate attempt to get off an island whose only exit is guarded by a police roadblock.
Along the way, your hair will stand up on end with every creak of a door and every step around a dark corner. When the tension builds, the only sound will be your heatbeat filling your ears. But you'll also pick up a few tips about breaking and entering.
Did I just say that out loud? Never mind.
A Night At The Shore is a great introduction to a great series. Hop Aboard. After all, what else did you have planned for tonight?
Angel Dare's latest appearance in The Get Off starts with a bang (literally) and doesn't let up for 256 pages. Get ready for a wild ride. Christa Faust has quite a story here. My fingers were scorched just flipping the pages. Or is that just the scorching summer heat here in Missouri?
Our tale begins with Angel seeking revenge on a gangster who harmed her. She stalks him for weeks, and as she's about to deliver the Coup de grâce with a fatal injection, something terrible happens. Another gangster kills her gangster. And this is just the beginning of a terrible day.
In the ensuing battle, several people get shot, including a police officer, and suddenly every law enforcement officer in the country is looking for Angel...and not as a witness. Oh, and in her attempt to seek medical assistance for wounds received in the battle, Angel gets a surprise. She's pregnant!
This girl can't catch a freakin' break to save her life. But she'd better catch one soon, or she'll be dead. She makes her way to the home of an old friend who arranges passage for her to a remote area of the Great Northwest, sort of a modern version of the Underground Railroad. Along the way she encounters various rural rednecks who turn out to be complex, fully developed characters, with the same hopes, dreams, and flaws as the people she left behind in L.A.
Who'd have thunk?
In many respects, they're better than Angel, and many of them (but not all) really seem to care about her. It helps that Angel has given them the impression that she's a blameless victim of domestic abuse (which is a bunch of hogwash). But hey, a few white lies never hurt anyone, right?
Doing double duty as the protagonist and the villain, Angel can be hard to like. But she's so brutally honest about her own flaws, that the reader can't help but admire her. And I do. Also, I wanted to find out what happens! That kept me reading, and it will keep you turning the pages as well. Have fun!
Find out more about Christa HERE. And enjoy this interview she did with The Poisoned Pen Bookstore.
Most World War Two fiction centers around the great struggles on the battlefield. Libby Fischer Hellmann has given us a fresh look at the conflict through her novel, Max's War. In it, we see the birth of fascism in Germany through the eyes of Max Steiner, a German Jew. All the familiar historical events are covered...the rise of Hitler, the purges of the Universities, Kristallnacht. We also see the back story, the secret war waged against the Nazis with the help of Europe's refugees. The writing is so fresh, so straight forward, you'd think Libby was writing about current events. And in a disturbing sense, she is.
Seen at such a personal level, it's easy for the reader to believe Max's suffering is happening to your next door neighbor. Fear and fury at the injustice will strike you like a punch in the mouth that you never saw coming. Libby's writing pulls you into the story and at times will shake your faith in humanity. Every small victory for Max will make you smile and turn the page with fresh hope.
By the time Max and his parents decide to leave Germany, their exit strategy has narrowed. Max's father, a prosperous businessman calls in every favor he can to help Max escape Europe. But some doors are closed in his face. Others open to betrayal.
Once safe, Max seeks justice (or is it revenge?) through the only avenue open to him. He joins the U.S. Army, and discovers his language skills and knowledge of Germany are invaluable to his new homeland. By the time Max returns to the fight in an American uniform, we're eager to follow his exploits and cheer him on.
Most readers may never know the extent to which escaped refugees like Max helped America win the war. German and Italian scientists helped build the first atomic bomb. Some, like Max, gathered intelligence and infiltrated enemy lines, saving countless lives along the way.
In a broader sense, this is story of every refugee who has fled to America for the past 400 years. Fleeing persecution for a better life is an old story in this country, and it continues to this day. Who will write the next great refugee novel of the migrants from South America and Mexico? Who will tell their story, their suffering and their success?
It's the birthday of Ian Fleming, born May 28, 1908. His younger days saw him
flourish in journalism and then in naval intelligence during World War II, where
he worked on schemes to mislead the Nazis. By 1952, he was semi-retired and bored. Living by the ocean in Jamaica, he decided to
write a novel. He based his story on some
of the spies and rogues he had met during his wartime activities, and created
one of the most famous spies in literary history...James Bond. He would go on to sell over 100 million Bond books.
All that changed in 1961, when LIFE magazine published an article about the new American President, John F. Kennedy. In the article, Kennedy mentioned that one of his favorite books was Fleming's fifth novel, From Russia, With Love. After that sales rocketed. All of his previous works, some of which had gone out of print, were re-issued. The first Bond movie was released in 1962. Dr. No starred Sean Connery as James Bond.
Fleming continued to write and publish one Bond novel a year until his death in 1964. He was only 56 years old, but years of heavy drinking and a four pack a day cigarette habit resulted in a fatal heart attack,
Two more Bond novels were published posthumously, and since Fleming's death, his estate has authorized additional Bond novels, fourteen written by John Gardner and six by Raymond Benson. Others have been penned by Kingsley Amis, Anthony Horowitz and Jeffery Deaver. There have also been 27 Bond films released with the latest, No Time To Die, coming in 2021.
On April 19, 1973 Soylent Green premiered in the United States. This science fiction film became a cult classic, and foresaw the devastating effects of global warming decades before the phrase "climate change" came into popular use. It takes place in the year 2022.
The movie is also a murder mystery. The main character, Robert Thorn (played by Charlton Heston), is a police officer investigating the killing of a powerful man in an overcrowded New York City plagued by scorching temperatures and a lack of fresh food. Most people without wealth are condemned to eat government issued wafers made from questionable ingredients, such as Soylent Red, Soylent Yellow, and the infamous Soylent Green.
Soylent Green features several scenes between Thorn and his roommate, a retired police analyst named Sol Roth, played by Edgar G. Robinson. These scenes are the highlight of the film, and Robinson's performance was praised by critics, even those who didn't like the movie. In one scene, when Thorn presents a piece of fresh beef he's procured, Roth breaks down in tears.
Edgar G. Robinson was profoundly deaf at this stage in his career, and had to memorize not only his lines, but the lines of the other actors so that he could perform in front of the camera. This fact only served to demonstrate his skills and professionalism. Sadly, he passed away just a few weeks after production ended and didn't live to hear the praise surrounding his performance.
The film ends with Thorn learning about the motive for the murder he's investigating, and the terrible truth behind Soylent Green. If you've seen the movie, you know what I'm talking about. And if you haven't seen it, well...what in hell are you waiting for?
It's only fair that the movie King Kong, which ended with a gigantic ape climbing the Empire State Building, debuted in...of all places...New York City. The film had been inspired by the imagination of Merian C. Cooper, who learned about the hunt for the Komodo dragon and saw one of the first specimens brought back alive from Indonesia. This lead to the creation of a film in which a giant gorilla battles dinosaurs on a tropical island, is captured, and brought to New York City. The beast escapes, and wrecks havoc among the local population before being killed.
It was a winning plot, pulled off by some cutting edge animation (for the time), dangerous wildlife, and America's fascination with exotic locales. As Humphrey Bogart quipped in Casablanca, "You're not very subtle, but you are effective". The same could be said for Cooper's creation.
The movie was a huge success, entertaining audiences in the depths of the depression with escapist entertainment. King Kong has, since this initial success, inspired dozens of sequels in film, comics and fiction.
The backstory of how Cooper created filmdom's most famous monster can be located here, compliments of THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
62 years ago today, MGM's Village of the Damned made it's movie debut in the United States. Based on the science fiction novel The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham, it starred famed English actor George Sanders and Barbara Shelley. The screenplay was written by Sterling Silliphant, Wolf Rilla (who also directed), and Ronald Killoch.
It was originally planned for production in the United States but the studio caved in to objections from The Catholic League of Decency, which objected to the horror film's depiction of virgin conceptions which lead to the birth of demonic children.
As a result of these objections, the film was transferred to MGM's British studio. The script had to be rewritten, since it lacked the authentic feel of a small British country village where the action takes place.
As the movie opens, the village of Midwich is cut off from the surrounding towns and everyone falls into a coma. When they awake a few hours later, all the women of child-bearing age discover they are pregnant. Suspicions of infidelity soon turn to horror when the children are born after just a few months and undergo accelerated development. Within a few years, they are on the verge of puberty, and the villagers become increasingly alarmed at their strange appearance and powers.
George Sanders plays the role of Professor Gordon Zellaby, whose wife has also given birth to one of the alien children, a boy they name David. Because of his intelligence and education, the children ask Zellaby to educate them. Because of his intellect, the professor is one of the only local villagers who doesn't fear and shun the children, a fact that surprises his normally unflappable son, who proclaims with some shock "You're not afraid of us!". The professor tries to learn from David his true origins, but his son brushes him off, declaring "I wish you wouldn't ask such questions, father. We want to learn from you."
But when villagers begin to die mysteriously, the authorities confide in Professor Zellaby that the children are a serious threat to national security, and that other cities around the world have similar "colonies" of these parasitic aliens. They enlist Zellaby in a plan to destroy them before their powers grow beyond control.
Produced on a budget of 200,000 dollars, the box office topped 2 million, and became one of MGM's biggest hits of the year. It spawned a sequel in 1964, Children of the Damned, which was not as successful.
Diabolique Magazine produced an excellent podcast discussing the film, which you can access by clicking here.
Below is the original trailer released by MGM Studios.
J.D. Rhoades has written six books in the Jack Keller series, and this is the latest one. It's also the first one I've read, and now I want to read them all. Keller's come to North Carolina to try to reconnect with his son, and possible rekindle a romance. The story hints at some grave harm that Jack did to his boy, some act of violence that saved him, but also scarred him.
In the novels first chapter Jack defends some new immigrants at the local school, refugees from the Iraq war. Soon he's hired as their bodyguard by the father, an ex-police officer who fled the country and was given a new identity. But he may not have fled with just his children. There are an awful lot of people who seem to have an interest in this family. I could be military information they want, someone seeking revenge for a past wrong, or a far more simple motive...money. It's no secret that the United States poured hundreds of millions of dollars into Iraq after the war to rebuild it, and a lot of that cash (yes, cash) simply disappeared. Could some of that money be here?
Keller finds himself defending the children not just from schoolyard bullies and redneck bigots, but ruthless assassins and even some federal agents who may not have the refugees' best interests at heart. As a man with a rap sheet, Jack Keller also has to be careful not to attract the attention of law enforcement. This proves to be a difficult task once the shooting starts.
There are a lot of characters jumping into the narrative with different motives behind each character. Rhoades has a nifty technique to keep the reader from getting lost. He keeps many of the chapters short, sometimes just two or three pages. This helps pack a lot of information into the story, which is good, because the action starts early and never lets up. I liked it. You will too.
By now most of you know that Angela Lansbury has passed away. As she leaves us, a generation of television viewers who grew up on her portrayal of Jessica Fletcher in the mystery series Murder, She Wrote, pause to reflect on her legacy. For many, her TV stardom was the first introduction to this versatile actress. But her acting career spanned an incredible eight decades.
She made her first movie appearance in 1944 in the suspense film Gaslight. This earned her an Academy Award nomination for her sinister performance. In 2014, she made her last acting appearance in Noel Coward's comedy play Blithe Spirit as Madam Arcati, a spiritual guide and potential huckster.
I've seen most of Angela's roles over the years. Her portrayal of Eleanor Iselin in The Manchurian Candidate is a personal favorite. But her influence on my writing has a direct link to the success of her portrayal of a widowed amateur sleuth from the small town of Cabot Cove, Maine.
While still working on the first draft of In The Dismal Swamp, I decided to target the cozy mystery market. I didn't have an agent, and at the time, most of the publishers who I thought might work with me were focused on the cozy. It was then that I realized that I didn't know exactly what a cozy was...I just had a vague idea. Then someone (an agent?) mentioned Murder, She Wrote. "You want cozy? Jessica Fletcher's cozy!"
That's when I understood. I'd watched MSW for years and the successful formula of minimal violence, the absence of cuss words and quaint settings made sense for my manuscript. The basic structure was the same, whether it was film, television or printed fiction. And the rules for cozy are pretty strict. At one point, my editor suggested (strongly) that I remove the word "piss" from my manuscript, as it wouldn't pass muster.
Naturally I complied. It wasn't a big issue for me, but it did teach me an important lesson. You need to target your audience. It my case, it was a cozy publisher, and I eventually found one in Avalon Books of New York (which was later purchased by Thomas & Mercer).
Since then I've moved onto different sub-genres of the mystery novel. My current WIP is a heist novel, and you can bet I won't be pitching it to The Hallmark Channel. But I won't forget the lessons I learned from Angela Lansbury.
If you're a fan of cozy mysteries, you can purchase my novel using the link in the blog post above. I also recommend Nancy Cohen, Agatha Christie, Edith Maxwell, and Eva Gates.
