Crime Fiction Links of the Week for February 27, 2021

 

It's time again for Crime Fiction Links of the Week, our weekly round-up of interesting links about crime fiction from around the web, this week with Big Sky, Bloodlands, Behind Her Eyes, series 4 of Unforgotten, series 2 of McDonald and Dobbs, The United States vs. Billie Holiday, the future of NCIS, tributes to Margaret Maron and much more.

Crime fiction in general:

• Alison Flood offers a round-up of the best recent thrillers.
  
• Crime Reads shares ten new crime novels coming out this week. 
• Crime Reads shares ten crime novels coming out in paperback this month. 
• Crime Reads shares the best reviewed crime novels of February 2021.
  
• Crime Reads shares five debut crime novels coming out this month.
  
• Crime Reads shares eight true crime books to read this February. 
• Olivia Blacke discusses the enduring popularity of cozy mysteries. 
• Amy Pershing shares a highly subjective list of her top ten culinary mysteries. 
• Mike Ripley takes a look at the golden age of the British thriller in the 1950s and 1960s. 
• Crime Reads hosts a roundtable about the past, present and future of LGBTQ voices in crime fiction.
  
• Russ Thomas shares his ten favourite LGBTQ protagonists in crime fiction.
  
• Criminal Element shares a flowchart to find your next mystery or thriller to read. 
• Tatiana de Rosnay explains how smart homes can upgrade the sinister house trope. 
  
• Michael R. Brown shares his appreciation for the Nick Nightmare supernatural detective stories by Adrian Cole. 
• Mystery writer Margaret Maron has died aged 83. 
• J. Kingston Pierce remembers Margaret Maron. 

 

Film and TV:

• Hector Dejean shares his thoughts on season 1 of Lupin. 
• Lucy Mangan calls Big Sky derivative dross.  
• Alex McLevy shares his thoughts on the first episode of Clarice.
• Phuong Le calls Jailbreak an exciting prison break movie.
• Beatrice Loayaza calls the Ivorian film Night of Kings a prison drama steeped in magical realism.
  
• Peter Bradshaw calls The Stylist an insipid serial killer thriller three decades out of fashion.
  
• Saloni Gajjar shares her thoughts on the documentary Allen vs. Farrow. 
• Olivia Rutigliano looks aheads at the Sherlock Holmes spin-off series The Irregulars.
• The AV Club shares the best crime movies currently available on Netflix.
  
• Jon Land shares his ten favourite political thriller movies. 
• Martin Edwards revisits 1946 noir movie The Chase.
  
• Martin Edwards revisits the 1955 noir movie Cast a Dark Shadow.
  
• Martin Edwards revisits the 1978 crime movie The Silent Partner.
  
• Tanarive Due interviews Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins, stars of the 1990 serial killer thriller The Silence of the Lambs. 
  
• Simon Bland interviews director Barry Sonnenfeld and actor Danny DeVito about making the 1995 caper comedy Get Shorty.
  
• Rachel Swindale wonders how the covid pandemic may influence cinema.  
• Paul Hirons wonders why actress Morven Christie has left the British crime drama The Bay.
  

 

Comments on Bloodlands:

• Lucy Mangan calls Bloodlands a tense thriller with a dash of black humour.  
• Martin Edwards finds Bloodlands a bit contrived, but well worth watching.

 

Comments on Behind Her Eyes:

• Paul Levinson feels that the fantasy element in the thriller Behind Her Eyes feels tacked on. 
• Alison Flood interviews Sarah Pinborough, on whose novel Behind Her Eyes is based. 

 

Comments on series 4 of Unforgotten:

• Stuart Jeffries declares that series 4 of Unforgotten features the coldest of cold cases.
• James Donaghy shares his thoughts on the first episode of series 4 of Unforgotten.
  

 

Comments on series 2 of McDonald and Dodds:

• Eleanor Bley Griffith takes a look ahead at series 2 of the British crime drama McDonald and Dodds.
• Emma Bullimore interviews Tala Gouveia, one of the stars of McDonald and Dodds.

 

Comments on The United States vs. Billie Holiday:

• Marah Eakin interviews Lee Daniels and Andra Day, star and director of The United States vs. Billie Holiday. 
  
• Marah Eakin interviews Tyler James Williams and Trevante Rhodes, two of the stars of The United States vs. Billie Holiday.
  

 

Comments on the future of NCIS:

• Nellie Andreeva reports that NCIS New Orleans will end with season 7.
• Michael Ausiello reports that a new NCIS spin-off called NCIS Hawaii is in the works.
  

 

Awards: 

• The winner of the 2021 CWA Diamond Dagger has been announced.
• The finalists for the 2021 Solv Knven a.k.a. Silver Knife Awards have been announced.
• The winners of the 2020 Audie Awards have been announced.  
• The finalists for the 2020 Australian Romance Readers Awards have been announced.  
• Benjamin Lee reports about a controversy involving the Golden Globes.
  

 

Writing, publishing and promotion:

• Anne R. Allen shares five common storytelling mistakes. 
• Tiffany Meuret explains how and where writers can find their crew. 
• Tim Waggoner talks about the vagaries of writing careers.
  
• Alison Flood talks to several writers about their problems to write during the pandemic.
• Erika Kanda talks about the unusual problems of researching a story featuring wedding gowns.
• Molly Odintz hosts a roundtable about mentorship in publishing.
• Sarah Maria Griffin discusses her experiences with the Electric Zinemaker software.
• Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and founder of the famous City Lights Bookshop in San Francisco, California, has died aged 101.
• Peter-Astrid Kane shares some tributes to Lawrence Ferlinghetti.
  

 

Interviews:

• Ali Karim interviews Robert Goddard.
  
• Suspense Magazine interviews Vincent Zandri.
• Queer Writers of Crime interview Rick R. Reed.
• Garrick Webster interviews Robbie Morrison. 
• Sons of Spade interviews Alexandra Amor. 
• E.B. Davis interviews Barbara Ross.
  
• Meg Gardiner interviews Jeff VanderMeer. 
  
• Alan Petersen interviews Sebastian Fitzek.
  

Reviews:

• Lesa Holstine reviews Faithless in Death by J.D. Robb.  
• Janet Webb reviews Quiet in Her Bones by Nalini Singh.
  
• Sandra Mangan reviews The Night Hawks by Elly Griffiths 
• For Winter Nights reviews The Night Hawks by Elly Griffiths.
  
• Stephanie Merritt reviews Daughters of Night by Laura Shepherd-Robinson.  
  
• Joy Kluver reviews Daughter of Night by Laura Shepherd-Robinson. 
• No More Grumpy Bookseller reviews Dangerous Women by Hope Adams.
• Angie Barry reviews Lola on Fire by Rio Youers.
• Sonja van der Westhuizen reviews Lightseekers by Femi Kayode.
  
• Raven Crime Reads reviews Smoke Screen by Jörn Lier Horst and Thomas Enger, translated by Megan Turney. 
• Crime by the Book reviews Smoke Screen by Jörn Lier Horst and Thomas Enger, translated by Megan Turney.
  
• Mary Picken reviews What Will Burn by James Oswald.
  
• Lesa Holstine reviews Nighthawking by Russ Thomas. 
• Ray Palen reviews The Ghost Moths by Harry Farthing.
  
• Blue Book Balloon reviews The Big Blind by Lavie Tidhar. 
• Doreen Sheridan reviews The Mission House by Carys Davies.
  
• Mary Picken reviews The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward.
  
• Janet Webb reviews Do No Harm by Christina McDonald. 
• Colleen Mondor reviews Don't Tell a Soul by Kirsten Miller. 
• Mary Picken reviews The Jigsaw Man by Nadien Mathieson. 
  
• Angie Barry reviews The Diabolical Bones by Bella Ellis.
• BOLO Books reviews The Postscript Murders by Elly Griffiths.
  
• No More Grumpy Bookseller reviews The Minders by John Marrs. 
  
• Crossexamining Crime reviews The Detective Fiction Reviews of Charles Williams (1930 - 1935), edited by Jared C. Lobdell.
  

 

Classics reviews:

• Crossexamining Crime revisits the 1903 mystery The Forest Lake Mystery by Palle Rosenkrantz, translated by David Young. 
• Bitter Tea and Mystery revisits the 1931 Inspector Maigret mystery The Dancer at the Gai-Moulin by Georges Simenon.
  
• Martin Edwards revisits the 1934 mystery The Robthorne Mystery by John Rhode a.k.a. Cecil Street. 
• Crossexamining Crime revisits the 1935 mystery Murder at Glen Athol by Norman Lippincott.
  
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1940 The Dean mystery "Stranger's Kill" by Merle Constiner. 
• B.V. Lawson revisits the 1947 crime fiction collection The Labours of Hercules by Agatha Christie.
  
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1948 thriller Nightmare by Edward S. Aarons a.k.a. Edward Ronns
  
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1958 Al Wheeler mystery The Lover by Carter Brown a.k.a. Alan Geoffrey Yates.
• Joe Kenney revisits Dead and Paid For, a 1976 novel in The Harker File men's adventure series by Marc Olden.
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1977 police procedural Police Chief by John Ball.
  

 

Con and event reports:

• Joy Kluver reports about the virtual First Monday Crime event for March 2021. 
• Several panels from the virtual 2021 Granite Noir crime fiction festival are available online. 
• Ayo Onatade reports that the 2021 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival will take place as a physical event in Harrogate, Yorkshire, in July 2021.
  
• Janet Rudolph reports that the Malice Domestic crime fiction festival has been postponed to 2022, but that there will be a smaller virtual event in 2021 called More Than Malice.
  

 

Research:

• Tori Telfer wonders why women are so successful as con artists.
• Keith Roysdon reports about the still unsolved murder of teenagers Kimberly Dowell and Etha Dixon in Muncie, Indiana, in 1985.
  
• Ioan Grillo investigates the global gun trade. 
  
• Jason Dearen reports how a fungus that attacks agricultural plants spread to humans via contaminated steroid injections. 
• Patty Hemrick shares eleven incredible things found in bogs.  
• Nicole LaPorte talks about the college admissions corruption scandal.
  
• Alma Katsu explains why the sinking of the Titanic still matters more 109 years later. 
• Krystal D'Costa wonders why Victorian houses went from status symbol to creepy.
  

Free online fiction:

• "The Sights on Cow Bayou" by Cesca Janece Waterfield in Mystery Tribune. 
• "Spider" by Adrienne Unger in Mystery Tribune.
  
• "Twitch" by Brandon Barrows in Tough. 
• "Punk Rock Reaper" by Mike Zone in Punk Noir Magazine. 
• "Palace of Swords Reversed" by K.A. Laity in Punk Noir Magazine. 
• "Who Doesn't Like Strawberries?" by Judge Santiago Burdon in Punk Noir Magazine.
  
• "Fancy That" by A.C.F. Wilson in Punk Noir Magazine. 
• "Choose Your Own Transgression" by Kristin Garth in Punk Noir Magazine.
• "The Snap" by James Lilley in The Five-Two.
  
• "Death Stopped for Miss Dickinson" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. 
  

 

Trailers and videos:

• Watch a trailer for The Ireegulars.  
• Watch a Mitchell and Webb skit about two rival actors playing Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson.