Crime Fiction Links of the Week for February 12, 2022

 

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 Death on the Nile, Reacher, Kimi, Supicion,  season 11 of Death in Paradise, Uncharted, Inventing Anna, the best mysteries and crime fiction of 2021 and much more.

Crime fiction in general:

• Crime Reads shares ten new crime novels, mysteries and thrillers coming out this week.
  
• Crime by the Book shares their favourite crime novels of January 2022. 
• Wendy Corsi Straub lists six crime novels with jaw-dropping twist endings.
  
• Rick Bleiweiss lists twelve great mystery and crime fiction writers from decades past. 
• Carl Nixon talks about crime fiction from New Zealand.
  
• Mia P. Manansala lists must-read crime fiction by Filipino authors.
  
• Paul French talks about crime novels set in Tehran, Iran.
• Emilya Naymark shares seven crime novels about women facing impossible choices. 
• Molly Odintz shares thrillers featuring great sex and terrible relationships.
  
• Bruce Leonard explains how learning to quilt helped him through his depression and inspired his latest mystery.
• Harry Farthing shares his appreciation for the works of thriller writer Rod Whittaker a.k.a. Trevanian. 
• Jill Callison profiles William J. Reynolds.
• Kristen Bird discusses the darker side of Jane Austen's novels. 
• Molly Templeton declares that bars are a great place to read. 
  

 

Best of 2021: 

• Andrew Gulli shares his favourite mystery and crime novels of 2021. 
• Robert Lopresti shares his favourite crime short stories of 2021.
  

 

Film and TV: 

• Olivia Rutigliano lists the crime movies with the best romantic chemistry.
  
• Cath Clarke calls Ballad of a White Cow an engrossing death penalty thriller from Iran. 
• Eric Allison declares that the prison drama Screw rings true from his perspective as a former prison inmate.
  
• Lucy Mangan calls Chloe a fierce and fresh social media thriller and praises the performance of Erin Doherty. 
• Jack Seale calls The Curse a sublime crime caper with a brilliant cast. 
  
• Leila Latif calls The Girl Before an irresistible thriller. 
• Katie Rife calls Catch the Fair One a brutally efficient revenge thriller. 
• Lucy Mangan calls The Fear Index an enjoyably tense financial thriller.
  
• Craig D. Lindsey calls Blacklight and insultingly slapdash thriller. 
• Peter Bradshaw calls Dark Glasses a weirdly plotted and baffling serial killer B-movie by legendary director Dario Argento.
  
• Leslie Felperin calls Help a poorly conceived thriller that gets domestic violence all wrong. 
  
• Paul Burke looks ahead at the new adaptation of The Ipcress File. 
• Garrick Webster looks ahead at the French crime drama The Promise. 
• Lisa Weidenfeld shares her thoughts on the latest episode of The Afterparty.
  
• Daniel Riley interviews Robert Pattinson, star of The Batman.
• Ryan Gilbey interviews Steven Knight, creator of Peaky Blinders.
  
• Kelly Weston revisits the 1976 thriller The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane.
• Olivia Rutigliano revisits the 1990 gangster film Miller's Crossing.
  
• Paul Levinson revisits the 2016 thriller A Kind of Murder. 
• Michael A. Gonzales talks about The Wire and its depiction of black life in Baltimore, Maryland.
• Stuart Heritage wonders how Mission Impossible 7 became one of the most expensive movies of all time.

 

Comments on Death on the Nile:

• Peter Bradshaw calls Death on the Nile a stale and two-dimensional whodunnit in spite of an stellar cast.
• A.A. Dowd declares that Death on the Nile takes a criminally long time to get to the crime.
• Marah Eakin declares that Death on the Nile is predictably cursed by its problematic cast. 
• David Fear discusses how Death on the Nile deals with the serious allegations against one of its stars, Armie Hammer.
  
• Leah Marilla Thomas shares a character and cast list of Death on the Nile.
• Guy Lodge uses Death on the Nile as exhibit 1 in his claim that star-studded Hollywood murder mysteries are making a comeback.
• Julia Sirmons revisits the 1937 Hercule Poirot mystery Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie, on which the movie is based.

 

Comments on Reacher:

• Paul Levinson is full of praise for Reacher.
• Ayo Onatade is also full of praise for Reacher.
• Claire Booth declares that Reacher finally offers a proper adaptation of Lee Child's popular thrillers.
  
• Peter White reports that Reacher has been renewed for season 2.
  

Comments on Suspicion:

• Paul Levinson calls Suspicion a top-notch whodunnit.  
• Paul Levinson also shares his thoughts on the latest episode of Suspicion.
  

 

Comments on Kimi:

• Mike D'Angelo calls Kimi an entertainingly dumb technothriller.
• Nick Schrader interviews Steven Soderbergh, director of Kimi.
  

 

Comments on season 11 of Death in Paradise:

• Matthew Moore reports that French actress Josephine Jobert, who plays DI Florence Cassell, is leaving Death in Paradise.
• Eve Crosbie also reports about various cast changes in season 11 of Death in Paradise.
  

 

Comments on Uncharted: 

• Peter Bradshaw calls Uncharted an action movie by committee, but praises the performance of Tom Holland.
  
• Brian Davids interviews Tom Holland, star of Uncharted and the Spider-Man movies.

 

Comments on Inventing Anna:

• Lucy Mangan calls Inventing Anna a brilliantly told true crime soap opera. 
  
• Hannah J. Davis wonders whether the true crime drama Inventing Anna glamourises con artists.
• Megan Kirby profiles Anna Sorokin a.k.a. Anna Delvey, the real con artist whose crimes are the subject of Inventing Anna.
  

 

Awards:

• The winner of the 2022 CWA Diamond Dagger has been announced.
  
• The longlist for the 2022 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction has been announced.  
• The finalists for the 2022 Audie Awards have been announced.
  
• The nominations for the 2022 Oscars have been announced with little love for crime films.  

 

Writing, publishing and promotion:

• Kate Elliott points out that an idea is not a story. 
• Kate Elliott asks what is a story.
  
• Cat Luria talks about new writing experiments she wants to try in 2022.
• Lauren Sapala discusses what to do when your inner critic is holding your inner writer hostage.
• Sara Gran talks about the art of writing suspense. 
• Rebecca Sacks shares some principles for writing great sex scenes.
  
• Lincoln Michel talks about word counts. 
• Cat Rambo shares some tips on crowdfunding and Patreon for writers.
  
• Draft2Digital announces that they are aquiring Smashwords. 
• Alison Flood reports that in person library visits have declined in 2021 due to the covid pandemic, but digital visits have increased.
  
• Alison Flood reports that more than 100 writers have signed a letter calling for urgent action in the case of the Rwandan poet Innocent Bahati, who went missing a year ago. 
• Adam Gabbatt reports about the Banned Books Club, a book club for teenagers on Pennsylvania, dedicated to books banned in some parts of the US.
  
• Philip Oltermann reports that the Stasi ran a poetry circle called "Working Circle of Writing Chekists". 
• Play with Narrative Device, an AI that writes the opening paragraph of a story based on two themes you enter. 

Interviews: 

• Hephzibah Anderson interviews Louise Welsh. 
• Cat Rambo interviews Joe R. Lansdale.  
• Criminal Element interviews Gregg Hurwitz. 
• Deborah Kalb interviews Wendy Corsi Staub.
  
• The Red Hot Chilli Writers interviews Dean Koontz.
• Lisa Haselton interviews William McGinnis. 
  
• Debbi Mack interviews Jennifer Graeser Dornbush. 
• John A. Hoda interviews Sybil Johnson. 
• Grace Topping interviews Ellen Byerrum.
  
• Deborah Kalb interviews Brendan Slocumb. 
• Richie Narvaez interviews Steven Torres.
  
• Wrong Place, Write Crime interviews Scotti Andrews. 
• Criminal Element interviews Mariko Tamaki.
  
• Locus interviews Marlon James.  
• Redditors interviews Marlon James. 
  
• Crime Time FM interviews Tim Lucas.
  

Reviews:

• James Davis Nicoll reviews Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
  
• Lesa Holstine reviews Abandoned in Death by J.D. Robb  
• Lizzy Sirett reviews The Locked Room by Elly Griffiths. 
• Mary Picken reviews The Heretic by Liam McIlvanney.
• The Civilian Reader reviews The Goodbye Coast by Joe Ide.
• Kirkus reviews The Runaway by Nick Petrie.
  
• Linda Wilson reviews The Second Cut by Louise Welsh. 
• Jon Morgan reviews Where Blood Runs Cold by Giles Kristian.
  
• The Quick and the Read reviews Blood Games by Liz Mistry. 
• Keturah Barchers reviews Black Chain by Dominic Martell. 
• Paul Burke reviews The Texas Job by Reavis Z. Wortham.
  
• The Book Decoder reviews Kidnap by Jane Adams. 
• Becky LeJeune reviews The Undesired by Yrsa Sigurdardóttir.
• Doreen Sheridan reviews The Overnight Guest by Heather Gudenkauf.
  
• Paul Dinh-McCrillis reviews Woman Last Seen by Adele Parks. 
• Brian Greene reviews The Day He Left by Frederick Weisel. 
• Doreen Sheridan reviews Greenwich Park by Katherine Faulkner.
• Raven Crime Reads reviews Bitter Flowers by Gunnar Staalesen, translated by Don Bartlett. 
• Doreen Sheridan reviews String Fellow by Simon Jacobs.
  
• Sonja van der Westhuizen reviews Cold by Mariko Tamaki. 
  
• Rebecca Munro reviews Real Easy by Marie Rutkoski. 
  
• Lesa Holstine reviews Four Thousand Days by M.J. Trow. 
• Pam Guynn reviews The Appeal by Janice Hallett. 
• Lesa Holstine reviews Homicide and Halo-Halo by Mia P. Manansala. 
• Doreen Sheridan reviews Better Off Read by Nora Page and tries a recipe from the book.
  
• Grab This Book reviews The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward.
• Grab This Book reviews The House of Footsteps by Mathew West.
• Runalong the Shelves reviews 36 Streets by T.R. Napper. 
  
• Beth Kanell reviews Paris Noir: The Suburbs, edited by Hervé DeLouche.
  

 

Classics reviews:

• In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel revisits the 1935 mystery Vultures in the Sky by Todd Downing. 
• Martin Edwards revisits the 1938 spy thriller Traitor's Way by Bruce Hamilton.
  
• Judith Reveal revisits the 1951 mystery The Metropolitan Opera Murders by Helen Traubel.
• In Search of the Classic Mystery Novel revisits the 1952 mystery The Youth Hostel Murders by Glyn Carr.
  
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1953 adventure novel Danger in Paradise by A.S. Fleischman. 
• Crossexamining Crime revisits the 1953 non-fiction book Blood in their Ink: The March of the Modern Mystery Novel by Sutherland Scott.
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1954 Brad Dolan hardboiled crime novel Back Country by William Fuller. 
• Crossexamining Crime revisits the 1960 suspense novel Sing Me a Murder by Helen Nielsen.
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1963 crime novel By Her Own Hand by Frank Bonham.
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1973 gothic novel House of Dark Illusions by Caroline Farr.
• Paperback Warrior revisits the 1974 spy thriller The Cooler by George Markstein.
• Joe Kenney revisits Corpse on Ice, a 1975 novel in the Stark men's adventure series by Joseph Hedges.
• B.V. Lawson revisits the 1975 short mystery collection The Animal Lover's Book of Beastly Murder by Patricia Highsmith.
• Happiness is a Book revisits the 1985 Sergeant Alberg mystery The Suspect by L.R. Wright.
• Paul Weimer revisits the 1988 spy novel Scholars of the Night by John M. Ford.
  

 

Con and event reports:

• Crime by the Book shares the line-up of the 2022 Iceland Noir festival in Reykjavik, Iceland. 
• Promoting Crime Fiction shares the program for the 2022 Mystery Fest in Portsmouth, UK.
• Clare Brennan shares her thoughts on The White Handkerchief, a musical play about the events of the so-called "Bloody Sunday" in Northern Ireland in 1972, that is performed in Derry, Northern Ireland.
• The recipient of the 2022 CrimeFest bursary for a crime fiction author of colour has been announced.
  

 

Crowdfunding: 

• Volume 7 of The Long List Anthology: More Stories From the Hugo Award Nomination List, which includes a story by Cora, is looking for funding.

 

Research:

• Neil Bradbury writes about strynchnine and why it was so popular as a murder weapon among crime fiction writers in the late 19th and early 20th century.
  
• Rachel Rear talks about trying to make sense of the murder of her stepsister Stephanie.
  
• Daniel Boffey reports about a drug gang's sound-proofed toture chamber in a container that was found in the Netherlands. 
• Walker Caplan reports about the mock execution of Fyodor Dostoevsky in 1849, which would go on to influence his writing.
  
• S.A. Barnes shares a history of ghost ships. 

Free online fiction:

• "What the Morning Never Suspected" by Anna Scotti in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine Fiction Podcast.
  
• "A Virtuous Thief" by J.R. Lindermuth in Mysteryrat's Maze Podcast
  
• "The Dead Man Downstairs" by Anthony Barton in Mystery Tribune. 
• "Dog Food" by Christopher Cleary in Mystery Tribune.
  
• "Shooting the Breeze" by Clifford Beal in Mystery Tribune. 
• "Redemption Night" by Mike MacLean in Mystery Tribune. 
• "Dark Sparrow Winter" by John D. Nesbitt in The Five-Two.
  
• "Helmie" by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. 
  
• "Ballroom Blitz" by Cora Buhlert.

 

Trailers and videos: 

• Watch a trailer for The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey.
• Watch a trailer for the new adaptation of The Ipcress File.
  
• Watch a trailer for No Exit.