SELLING SCANDINAVIANS

Yesterday I was very relieved to discover that the Royal Wedding dress did not have a marketing sticker on it that said 'The Next Princess Diana'.

Is it not possible for publishers to ignore Stieg Larsson, and Henning Mankell, and try to sell authors on their own merits?

It was bizarre that Henning Mankell's The Man from Beijing was sold with a sticker of Kenneth Branagh playing Wallander, when the book had no connection with the Ystad detective at all except that part of the book was set in Sweden.

But then we also had Johan Theorin and Jo Nesbo both marketed as the 'Next Stieg Larsson'. Camilla Lackberg sold with 'If you like Jo Nesbo you will love this' stickers. Hakan Nessser was favourably compared with both Stieg Larsson and Henning Mankell by someone who obviously thinks their books are similar.

Even Professor Leif G.W. Persson was sold with a sticker that proclaimed he was reminiscent of Henning Mankell and of course Stieg Larsson, but not as pretty as Camilla Lackberg. [I added that last bit myself, in case you wondered.]

Even Camilla Ceder's debut novel Frozen Moment comes with the blurb 'Move over Wallander'.

In my excitement I mistakenly posted on Friend Feed that Villain by Shuichi Yoshida did not mention any Scandinavians on the cover, but then remembered an article in the Wall Street Journal entitled Shuichi Yoshida, Japan's Stieg Larsson?

Enough is enough I thought as I viewed the cover of Camilla Lackberg's latest novel The Gallows Bird, sent to me by the very generous Maxine of Petrona.

No stickers, no mention of other Scandinavians with the blurbs on the front cover merely stating 'Seven Million Books Sold' and 'The hottest female writer in Sweden at the moment'.

Do male crime writers ever get described as the 'hottest'?

But in small print on the back cover is the sentence 'Translated by Stieg Larsson's and Henning Mankell's Steven T. Murray'.

Do writers get upset when their translator is marketed as another more famous writers property? I should not think so if it boosts sales, and I expect that will happen despite the very small print.

Read Steven T Murray's complete list of translations here.

Reviews of some excellent books translated by Steven T. Murray.

Review of Shadow by Karin Alvtegen

Review of Detective Inspector Irene Huss by Helene Tursten

Review of The Stone Cutter by Camilla Lackberg

I would have pointed out that the photo of Camilla Lackberg on the back cover of The Gallows Bird is far too small, but for the fact that the Swedish female crime writer closest to my age is Maj Sjowall.

DEATH ON A GALICIAN SHORE: DOMINGO VILLAR

The body of a fisherman, Juan Castelo, known as El Rubio, is washed up on the beach at Panxon. His hands have been tied in a way that made it unlikely that he had committed suicide. Taciturn Galician Detective Inspector Leo Caldas, and his fiery Aragonese assistant Rafa Estevez begin a slow methodical investigation that involves looking into the loss of a fishing vessel, the Xurelo, over a decade earlier. Three young fisherman including El Rubio had swum to safety, but the elderly Captain Antonio Sousa had gone down with his boat, and his body was recovered later in a trawler's net. But the superstitious locals believe they have seen Captain Sousa near the harbour.

Death on a Galician Shore was translated from the Spanish by Sonia Soto, and is the second book by Domingo Villar that features Inspector Leo Caldas. This novel won the 2009 Brigada 21 Prize for best crime novel in Spain, following up on the success of Water-Blue Eyes which won of the Brigada 21 Prize for best first crime novel, and the Sintagma prize.

This crime novel is a straightforward police procedural in which Leo Caldas, questions witnesses and suspects, and gradually with a little luck solves the case. As would be expected there are a few twists and turns along a trail scattered with false clues.

The questioning and re-questioning of suspects is a little repetitive, but it is definitely not only the criminal investigation that makes this book such a great read. The descriptions of Galicia and the subtle interplay between the characters take the reader right into the action. You can almost smell the plates of seafood, or the salty sea breeze and feel the rain in your face blowing in off the Atlantic.

When he went to university, his father left his job in Vigo and moved permanently to his wife's old family home, which he had gradually restored.

The land, initially providing comfort in his time of affliction, was now a profitable business, and the nights of weeping were no more than a shadow in the memory.

Wine, the downfall of so many men, had been his salvation.

Throughout the book Caldas and his relationships with his father, Uncle Alberto, Estevez, Alba, the woman who left him, and retired Doctor Trabazo play a key role in creating atmosphere in this beautifully written novel.

There are scenes set in the hospital between Leo, his father and Uncle Alberto which are both witty and bittersweet; so when the doctor tells Alberto he will be as good as new in a month, he asks:

'Have you still got your Book of Idiots?'

............

'Well, add that doctor to it,' he said, pointing feebly at the door through which the doctor had departed.

The differing attitudes to suspects, and to life, of the lonely laconic Leo Caldas and the rumbustious Rafa Estevez, from Zaragoza, add a little spice of humour to the story.

'You know I'm not keen on dead people, Inspector,' said Estevez a little sheepishly.

'And the living aren't too keen on you,' murmured Caldas,........

There is also humour involved in Leo's performances on the local Vigo radio station as he struggles to improve community relations by answering questions on 'his program' Patrolling the Waves despite the various distractions.

I really enjoyed reading Death on a Galician Shore despite the fact there were no pyrotechnics just a straightforward story told with skill, and a lot of empathy for the characters.

A successful European crime fiction series that is neither Nordic, Italian or French, would be a bit special.

Maxine of Petrona's review of Death on a Galician Shore at Euro Crime

Jose Ignacio's review at The Game's Afoot

My review of Water-Blue Eyes the first Leo Caldas book.

Leg of veal, boned and chopped small, was simmered over a low heat all morning together with onions,leeks, carrots and seasoning. After about three hours on the hob, the chick peas were added and, at the very end a sofrito of onions, garlic and paprika.

MORE DETECTIVE FEVER

Earlier in the month I posted about the Six Detective Series to Savour selected by Johanna McGeary of Time magazine, and asked 'What other Detective Series Do You Enjoy?'

I was grateful to receive a stimulating and varied list of detectives, although unfortunately blogger was misbehaving and ate some replies.

HarryBosch/Mickey Haller: Michael Connelly

V.I.Warshawski: Sara Paretsky

Kinsey Milhone: Sue Grafton

Sharon McCone: Marcia Muller [the only author on this list I have not read]

Eduard Martinez and Borja 'Pep' Masdeu: Teresa Solana

Inspector Adamsberg: Fred Vargas

Salvo Montalbano: Andrea Camilleri

Harry Hole: Jo Nesbo*

Erlendur: Arnaldur Indridason

Thora Gudmundsdottir: Yrsa Sigurdardottir

and of course Martin Beck: Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo.

I would add a few of my own choices:

Morse: Colin Dexter

Rebus: Ian Rankin

Andy Dalziel and Peter Pascoe: Reginald Hill

Reg Wexford: Ruth Rendell

Annika Bengtzon: Liza Marklund

Hannah Scarlett and Daniel Kind: Martin Edwards

Inspector Sejer: Karin Fossum

Some of these series are in their dotage, or retirement, and some are still only in nappies. But I would suggest they should all exhibit features common to good crime fiction: great characters, good plots, compelling atmosphere, believable situations, a simple style, and with some exceptions* a degree of violence and gore acceptable to most readers.

The classic Martin Beck books are particularly brilliant in that they encapsulate almost every factor that has gone on to make the modern crime fiction novel so popular.

a] Social commentary

b] Cynicism

c] Team work, and the difficulty of working in a team.

d] Humour, light or dark.

e] A distrust of superiors.

f] A feeling of loneliness and despair expressed by various characters.

g] Superbly drawn characters.

h] A brooding atmosphere.

No human being, particularly a young attractive woman, is so alone that there is no one to miss her when she disappears.

[Roseanna: Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo 1965]

I am looking forward to starting my Martin Beck re-read project later in the year.

Update: Even More Detective Fever. Did I really forget the following?

Chief Inspector Van Veeteren: Hakan Nesser

Kurt Wallander: Henning Mankell

Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn: Tony Hillerman

ANZAC DAY 2011

A day to remember.

Expeditions which are decided upon and organised with insufficient care generally end disastrously.

Lloyd George, Memorandum to War Council, December 1914

SERIOUS CONTENDERS

The short list for the CWA International Dagger is to be announced on Friday 20 May at Crime Fest in Bristol. Therefore it is time to read some of the serious contenders beginning with Death on a Galician Shore by Domingo Villar.

Cristina came to take their order for the main course. She offered them bacalao a la gallega, cod with potatoes, or squid in its ink with rice. Caldas chose the squid.

A promising start.

HOTEL BOSPHORUS: ESMAHAN AYKOL

Kati Hirschel is the owner of a crime fiction bookshop in Istanbul, a city where she was born before returning with her parents to Germany at the age of seven. She returned to Istanbul and has now been living there for thirteen years reacting like a local 'Istanbullu' to the daily trials and pleasures of the city.

Her old friend from university Petra Vogel contacts her, because she is in Istanbul to make a movie. A few days later Kurt Muller, the film's director, is found murdered in his luxurious hotel suite, at the Hotel Bosphorus. Someone has thrown an electric iron into his bath. Kati decides in the tradition of Miss Marple to investigate.

This novel is full of interesting details about the complex relationship, and cultural differences between Turks and Germans. It could even be considered more of a social commentary and travelogue than a crime fiction novel. Kati Hirschel herself is a confused character; a Turkish citizen at home in Istanbul, but never fully Turkish, and also as is explained not fully German.

There is a lot of classic stereotyping in the narrative and sharp dialogue, which at times does get a bit annoying, for instance there really must be some Germans with a sense of humour. ;o) Do Turks only eat kebabs and toasted cheese? Do Germans only eat schnitzel, and sausage, while drinking beer?

"A German without beer in the house is like a football team without a manager," he said.

But Kati's mother lives in Berlin and her attitude to 'Gastarbeiters' is not much better.

"And now they're using our money to set up integration courses for the Turks. To be paid for by Mrs Hirschel."

Kati's burbling information dumps about friends, fatty kebabs, potential lovers, police corruption, and local mobsters hold up the progress of the plot, and some of her behaviour is frankly stupid. [End of chapter 5]

But as the book progresses Kati calms down, the reader can enjoy the bustling atmosphere of the city, and her character starts to grow on you.

Although this debut was slightly disappointing, with its exotic location and its feisty female investigator the series has the potential to develop hopefully in the Turkish location. I don't think readers would want Kati Hirschel to make too many trips to Berlin, and become yet another Northern European detective.

Author Esmahan Aykol was born in 1970 in Edirne, Turkey, and now lives in Istanbul and Berlin. Hotel Bosphorus is the first of three Kati Hirschel mystery novels, and has been translated into English by Ruth Whitehouse.

: the European Union should stand firm because Turkey has set its sights on becoming a member and is taking decisive steps in that direction. That was why the Turkish police were showing respect for human rights.

LAND OF MISS MARPLE AND LORD PETER

We are very lucky that there are still houses in England where the visitor would not be too surprised if Miss Jane Marple, or Lord Peter Wimsey with Harriet Vane answered the door.

BANDIT LOVE: MASSIMO CARLOTTO

Marco Buratti aka The Alligator is back in Massimo Carlotto's latest Italian noir novel Bandit Love, translated from the Italian by Anthony Shugar.

When Sylvie, the girlfriend of Marco's closest friend Beniamino Rossini is kidnapped, Marco, "Old Rossini", and Max la Memoria, must tussle with some of the new style mafias that have come to dominate Northeast Italy.

This is a short classic example of Carlotto's writing that leaves you slightly breathless and wanting more. The ending is abrupt and somewhat enigmatic, but the 177 pages are packed full of action, corruption, wisecracks, murders, unpleasant characters, politics, ideas and beautiful women.

" Is she another Lacan-quoting shrink like the last three?"

" No, I seem to have run out of those," he answered, resentfully. "She's a substitute teacher, a militant member of the worker's collective, divorced, no kids."

"Cute?"

" Not only is she cute," he exulted. "She smokes, she drinks, she's not taking a creative writing course and she doesn't have a gym membership."

The first person narrative by Marco tries to direct the reader through a complex harsh brutal tale of revenge and double cross and triple cross. With all the various characters the plot was a bit incoherent as it involved the theft of narcotics from the high-security, armor-plated storeroom in the cellar of the Department of Forensic Toxicology at the University of Padua, and gangsters from every country in the Balkans and further afield.

Just as all the characters are villains of one degree or another, so no country comes out as beyond reproach in the tangled mess Europe is in.

In the meantime, the law -abiding citizens of Northeast Italy continued to entrust their elderly relatives to illegal-immigrant nurses and caregivers; their house were still being cleaned and their meals were being cooked by undocumented house-keepers.

This is a typical Carlotto book angry that the old Robin Hood style criminals, who won't deal in drugs or traffic women, have had to make way for the more vicious new breed from abroad. Angry at the treatment of women, and angry at the politicians and police who let it happen.

If only it were longer......

"We're old school gangsters, relics of the past that's gone forever. They'll eat us alive."

Massimo Carlotto's Fugitive Experience

A review of Poisonville: Massimo Carlotto and Marco Videta

Link to Euro Crime review of Death's Dark Abyss

Euro Crime review of The Fugitive

A review of The Colombian Mule featuring Marco Buratti

A review of Master of Knots featuring Marco Buratti

THE READING ROOM

If I ever win the Euro Millions Lottery I am going to buy this house just for the name. ;o) Another reason is that it is situated in an idyllic Somerset village with an excellent pub.

PHANTOMS OF BRESLAU: MAREK KRAJEWSKI

Update: This blog is now dormant and I have moved to Crime Scraps Review, where you can read all the old posts and lots of new material.

http://crimescraps2.wordpress.com

Marek Krajewski's Eberhard Mock series is traveling back in time and in Phantoms of Breslau [translated from the Polish by Danusia Stok] we are now in 1919.

The naked bodies of four young men are found battered and horribly mutilated on an island in the River Oder.

"All they are wearing are sailor's hats on their heads and leather pouches over their genitals."

The vice department of the Police Praesidium are called in with its chief, Criminal Councillor Ilssheimer and his best men, Criminal Assistant Eberhard Mock and Criminal Sergeant Kurt Smolorz. The dead men's strange attire is not the only reason for the vice department being brought in, Mock is personally involved, a note has been left demanding that he 'admits to a past mistake, and believe......'

When two potential witnesses questioned by Mock are murdered the mystery deepens. Mock struggles to cope with his own demons, stubborn superiors and dissolute subordinates as he attempts to find the murderer, and protect his loved ones.

The Eberhard Mock series is unusual, and features such an original protagonist that it is perhaps not for everyone. I really enjoy these books but don't know what that says about my character.

Decadent, eccentric, and outrageous characters have sexual liaisons with beautiful women, whilst also over eating and drinking vast quantities of schnapps. Mock, is violent like Gilou in Spiral, but has a classical education and that makes him a much more complex anti-hero; although of course they both share a taste for prostitutes.

The narrative with its episodic timed passages raises the tension, and also draws the reader into Mock's world with the descriptions that capture the atmosphere of the city. You can almost smell the tobacco, the beer, the smoked fish, and the blood.

Admiring the edifice of the modern market hall, he relished a chilled glass of schnapps, which cut the taste of the Bismarck herrings whose silver skins were slashed with black criss-crosses. He divided a hot potato with his fork and slathered half of it with the soured cream coating the herrings.

Phantoms of Breslau is a little bit different from the average crime fiction book, with its secret societies, a unique protagonist, truly obnoxious characters, and the historical setting this gripping novel continues an increasingly impressive series. With so many books using the same repetitive plots and locations it is a pleasant surprise to read truly unique crime fiction with a fascinating historical setting.

A good client in taverns and brothels. A good client with whom nobody had any sympathy-no innkeeper and no whore. And why should they sympathize with him? After all how were they to know that some monster was slaying people and writing him letters!

The former German city of Breslau is now the Polish city of Wroclau; Marek Krajewski, a lecturer in Classical Studies at the University of Wroclau, explains the changes in the ethnicity of the city's population in the interview.

My Euro Crime review of Death in Breslau

My review of End of the World in Breslau

My interview with Marek Krajewski and here.

'I LIKE A GOOD MURDER'

'I like a good murder that can't be found out' says Mrs Hopkinson in Emily Eden's novel The Semi-Detached House [1859]

There is 'a detective fever' [The Moonstone:Wilkie Collins] all these years later with crime fiction still the most popular genre.

In 2005 Johanna McGeary in Time magazine noted "Six Detective Series to savor", which were:

Maisie Dobbs- Jacqueline Winspear

Marcus Didius Falco-Lindsey Davis

Alan Banks -Peter Robinson

Guido Brunetti- Donna Leon

Bernie Gunther- Philip Kerr

Frederick Troy- John Lawton

How are these series going nearly six years after the Time article?

I haven't read either Jacqueline Winspear or Lindsey Davis, clearly an oversight I must remedy soon.

Jacqueline Winspear won the 2011 Bruce Alexander Historical Award for the best mystery novel covering events prior to 1950 with The Mapping of Love and Death, her 7th Maisie Dobbs book.

The Bruce Alexander Award was won in 2010 by Rebecca Cantrell's A Trace of Smoke, a novel I championed on this blog.

Lindsey Davis has written her twentieth Marcus Didius Falco book, Nemesis, is the recipient of numerous awards including the 2011 CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger, and is a featured guest author at Crime Fest 2011 in Bristol.

The other four series are all among my favourites, and are all still very successful.

Here is a link to my Euro Crime review of Bad Boy, the latest in the Alan Banks series.

The idiosyncratic career of Frederick Troy proceeds in various time frames, and I reviewed John Lawton's latest book A Lily of the Field here. There are also links to reviews of the rest of the series. John Lawton is attending 2011 Crime Fest.

I really enjoy Philip Kerr's Bernie Gunther series and If The Dead Rise Not, the sixth novel in the series, won the 2009 CWA Ellis Peters Award for Best Historical Crime Novel. The seventh novel in the series Field Grey sits temptingly on my TBR shelf.

I recently finished reading Donna Leon's A Question of Belief and was reminded how much I enjoy reading about Guido Brunetti and his supporting cast; perfect Paola, cool Signorina Elettra, reliable Vianello and the truly obnoxious Vice- Questore Patta.

Thanks to the ever generous Maxine of Petrona I have the next book in the series Drawing Conclusions on my TBR shelf.

What other detective series do you enjoy, and do you think they will still be going strong in five or six years time?

HMP DARTMOOR

The Honeytones website has been updated and now contains a letter from the Social Inclusion Officer at Dartmoor Prison. A letter that made me cry.

RIVER OF SHADOWS: VALERIO VARESI

The Po Valley is deluged with rain and the river is about to break the banks spreading out into the floodplain. A huge barge steers erratically down the swollen river, and when it eventually it runs aground there is no one on board.

Commissario Soneri is called to investigate an apparent suicide at the hospital in Parma where an elderly man, 76 year old Decimo Tonna has jumped, or been pushed out of a third floor window.

When Soneri discovers the barge was owned by Anteo Tonna, Decimo's elder brother and both men were involved with the Fascists during the war he goes to the riverbank to investigate the missing bargeman.

River of Shadows is the first in a series featuring Commissario Soneri written by journalist Valerio Varesi, and translated by Joseph Farrell, professor of Italian at the University of Strathclyde. The series has been adapted and is one of Italy's most popular television dramas.

This was a little bit of a curate's egg of a novel as far as I was concerned.

I really enjoyed the wonderful descriptions of the Po River, the sharp political asides, and the way Soneri chats with the bargemen to elicit little snippets of information about past conflicts between the blackshirts and the partizans.

But River of Shadows was a little slow in plot development, and we did not learn enough about Soneri for this reader to become as attached to him as I am to Montalbano, or Brunetti. He has a lawyer girlfriend Angela with a taste for love in dangerous locations, and he possesses a mobile phone with a ringtone that played Verdi. Doesn't everyone in Italy?

But Soneri does not seem to like working with his colleagues, and where Andrea Camilleri would have had Salvo Montalbano drooling over what reads like a superb meal Valerio Varesi only mentions it in passing.

A wager was celebrated like a rite and a fixed menu was prescribed. Culatello as a starter, followed by anolini in brodo and then wild boar with polenta. Gutturnio was a non-negotiable wine.

"So nothing at all came from the post mortem?'

I am one of those readers who resists change, and it takes a lot for me to devote myself to reading a new detective series. Soneri is not much fun, but this series does have a lot of promise with an interesting supporting cast such as his sexy girlfriend lawyer Angela, and the tiresome magistrate Alemanni always talking about taking early retirement.

And when it came to politics and the Po, I found myself warming to the story.

The same water which gives you food to eat also leaves you starving. People move away from the river and then come back to it, and those that live on its banks have no choice.

.........................

And therefore in the town too.....in a bend in the River Po, communists still faithful to Stalin and hardline Fascists could survive, just as the rosemary could survive between the walls and the embankment.

This novel should remind readers that you can't sweep away history, old grudges survive, especially in those countries that lived for years under autocratic empires, fascism and communism.

Thanks once again to Maxine of Petrona, who gave me the book.

You can read her fine review of River of Shadows here.

'I mean the new right wing, the shopkeeper's right wing, one which has taken off its black shirt and put on a tie.'

RESPECT FOR AGE

Last month Brian Oliver, Sports Editor of The Guardian, produced a list of the ten best modern European Crime Writers.

It was an idiosyncratic list and immediately had me searching my Oxford English Dictionary for a definition of modern [relating to present or recent past] because of the advanced age of several of those writers on the list. You would have to be an oldie like me to accept that 1975, the date of the last book in the Martin Beck series, as creeping in as recent past.

The list with year of birth:

Pierre Magnan 1922

Andrea Camilleri 1925

Maj Sjowall 1935 and Per Wahloo deceased

Petros Markaris 1937

Manuel Vazquez Montalban deceased

Jean-Claude Izzo deceased

Timothy Willams 1946

Henning Mankell 1948

Fred Vargas 1957

Arnaldur Indridason 1961

My own choice would have included Hakan Nesser 1950, Karin Fossum 1954 and Jo Nesbo 1960, but obviously in Europe the art of crime writing is considered something for the more mature author. Apart from Camilla Lackberg, I cannot think of any other big name crime author from Europe under forty.

But I expect there are some who have not yet been translated into English?