Winner, Winner! Porcelain Figure Dinner!

Another Edgar Awards has come and gone. The Hungry Detective has done its usual bad job of prognostication. 4 out 12 is not good, but I did get Best Novel. WooHoo! As for the rest. Oh well.

I am only listing the winners... and congratulations to them! A complete list of nominees and my picks can be found here.

Special thanks to Ms. Weinman's Twitter account. Cheers!

Best Novel
Blue Heaven - C.J. Box

Best First Novel by an American Author
The Foreigner - Francie Lin

Best Paperback Original
China Lake - Meg Gardiner

Best Fact Crime
American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century - Howard Blum

Best Critical/Biographical
Edgar Allan Poe: An Illustrated Companion to His Tell-Tale Stories - Dr. Harry Lee Poe

Best Short Story
“Skinhead Central,” - T. Jefferson Parker (from The Blue Religion, edited by Michael Connelly)

Best Juvenile
The Postcard - Tony Abbott

Best Young Adult
Paper Towns - John Green

Best Play
The Ballad of Emmett Till - Ifa Bayeza

Best Television Episode Teleplay
“Prayer of the Bone,” Wire in the Blood - Patrick Harbinson

Best Motion Picture Screenplay
In Bruges - Martin McDonagh

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award
“Buckner’s Error,” Joseph Guglielmelli (from Queens Noir, edited by Robert Knightly; Akashic Books)

Raven Awards
Edgar Allan Poe Society, Baltimore, Maryland
Poe House, Baltimore, Maryland

The Simon & Schuster/Mary Higgins Clark Award
The Killer’s Wife - Bill Floyd

Edgar 2009 Predictions

Here we are again, and I'll be honest since their announcement last January I have hardly looked over the list. Elaborate plans to read more of the nominated fell through very quickly. The relative obscurity of some of these titles made it difficult to track down books via the library.

I am sure the books are all fine, written by gifted and talented writers. And I don't think anyone wants the Edgar's to turn into a popularity contest, but many of the noms in the 'Big Three' Fiction category are definite thinkers. They almost seem like a rejection of what was generally agreed as the best books of 2008. Still it awfully easy for me to 'Monday Morning Quarterback' the whole thing. So let me again wish all the nominees the grandest of congratulations and best of luck on the 30th of April.

The Hungry Detective's picks are in RED.

Best Novel
Missing - Karin Alvtegen
Blue Heaven - C.J. Box
Sins of the Assassin - Robert Ferrigno
The Price of Blood - Declan Hughes
The Night Following - Morag Joss
Curse of the Spellmans - Lisa Lutz

This is a tough race to handicap. BLUE HEAVEN is my pick for no discernible reason. I loved CURSE OF THE SPELLMANS I felt it was a real step up from the previous novel, but the comedic form is not generally awarded here. MISSING and THE NIGHT FOLLOWING could be THE JANISSARY TREE of 2009, but I'm guessing not.

Best First Novel by an American Author
The Kind One - Tom Epperson
Sweetsmoke - David Fuller
The Foreigner - Francie Lin
Calumet City - Charlie Newton
A Cure for Night - Justin Peacock

Why SWEETSMOKE? I don't know. I looked Mr Fuller's book over a few times, and my general feeling each of time was 'This is Crime Fiction?' The book has been called a hybrid novel. Which in this case should be code for there is just enough 'Crime Fiction' to sneak into the outer rings of the genre. However, the book does push the genre into themes and a time period little seen in Crime Fiction. I think the message of SWEETSMOKE will win the day.

Best Paperback Original
The Prince of Bagram Prison - Alex Carr
Money Shot - Christa Faust
Enemy Combatant - Ed Gaffney
China Lake - Meg Gardiner
The Cold Spot - Tom Piccirilli

I want to go with MONEY SHOT here, but Megan Abbott's win last year for QUEENPIN lessens the odds greatly. Not just because both are female authors, but mainly because both are 50's Pulp Noir. I'm going with the CHINA LAKE. Ms. Gardiner works is well regarded, and besides I dig women who write thrillers.

Best Fact Crime
For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb, and the Murder that Shocked Chicago - Simon Baatz
American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century - Howard Blum
Havana Nocturne: How the Mob Owned Cuba and Then Lost It to the Revolution - T.J. English
The Man Who Made Vermeers: Unvarnishing the Legend of Master Forger Hans van Meegeren - Jonathan Lopez
The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher - Kate Summerscale

Having just read Ace Atkin's WHITE SHADOW, I am intrigued by HAVANA NOCTUNRE, but the Leopold and Loeb case casts a big shadow in the crime fiction world. Sociopaths are endlessly fascinating

Best Critical/Biographical
African American Mystery Writers: A Historical and Thematic Study - Frankie Y. Bailey
Hard-boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of American Crime Stories - Leonard Cassuto
Scene of the Crime: The Importance of Place in Crime and Mystery Fiction - David Geherin
The Rise of True Crime - Jean Murley
Edgar Allan Poe: An Illustrated Companion to His Tell-Tale Stories - Dr. Harry Lee Poe

I seriously think any one of these books could win, but I'm going Poe cause of the whole 150 birthday thing.

Best Short Story
“A Sleep Not Unlike Death,” - Sean Chercover (from Hardcore Hardboiled, edited by Todd Robinson)
“Skin and Bones,” - David Edgerley Gate (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, October 2008)
“Scratch of a Woman,” - Laura Lippman (from Hardly Knew Her)
“La Vie en Rose,” - Dominique Mainard (from Paris Noir; edited by Aurelien Masson)
“Skinhead Central,” - T. Jefferson Parker (from The Blue Religion, edited by Michael Connelly)

I am one of many who thought Mr. Chercover's TRIGGER CITY would make the Best Novel list. No real choice here, however, Mr Parker is a two-time winner of the Best Novel.

Best Juvenile
The Postcard - Tony Abbott
Enigma: A Magical Mystery - Graeme Base
Eleven - Patricia Reilly Giff
The Witches of Dredmoore Hollow - Riford McKenzie
Cemetery Street - Brenda Seabrooke

Best Young Adult
Bog Child - Siobhan Dowd
The Big Splash - Jack D. Ferraiolo
Paper Towns - John Green
Getting the Girl - Susan Juby
Torn to Pieces - Margo McDonnell

Best Play
The Ballad of Emmett Till - Ifa Bayeza
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Jeffrey Hatcher, based on the story by Robert Lewis Stevenson
Cell - Judy Klass

Best Television Episode Teleplay
“Streetwise,” Law & Order: SVU - Paul Grellong
“Prayer of the Bone,” Wire in the Blood - Patrick Harbinson
“Signature,” Law & Order: SVU - Judith McCreary
“You May Now Kill the Bride,” CSI: Miami - Barry O'Brien
“Burn Card,” Law & Order - David Wilcox

Best Motion Picture Screenplay
The Bank Job - Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais
Burn After Reading - Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
In Bruges - Martin McDonagh
Tell No One - Guillaume Canet, based on the book by Harlan Coben
Transsiberian - Brad Anderson and Will Conroy

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award
“Buckner’s Error,” Joseph Guglielmelli (from Queens Noir, edited by Robert Knightly; Akashic Books)

Raven Awards
Edgar Allan Poe Society, Baltimore, Maryland
Poe House, Baltimore, Maryland

The Simon & Schuster/Mary Higgins Clark Award
Sacrifice - S.J. Bolton
The Killer’s Wife - Bill Floyd
Stalking Susan - Julie Kramer
A Song for You - Betsy Thornton
The Fault Tree - Louise Ure

Awards are Thursday night. Once again my press credential have been lost in the mail, so I will not be in attendance. I'll be keeping an eye on the usually places for award reports, and I'll post the list of winners late Thursday or early Friday. Again best of luck to all nominees. Have a great night!

Blood's A Rover - Dust Jacket

Book 3 in Mr. Ellroy's Underworld Trilogy is finally nearing publication. The great Chip Kidd has been Mr. Ellroy's designer for many books dating back to, I think, WHITE JAZZ, but I am unsure if that trend continues with this book. It certainly has the look of Mr. Kidd's work

BLOOD'S A ROVER purportedly follows US Government shenanigans post RFK assassination into the early 1970's. As with the past novels in the trilogy Ellroy focuses his gaze on the unknown and unremembered bagmen of history. The tools of corruption fascinate Ellroy more so than the puppet masters.

The book is in stores on September 22, 2009.

The King of Lies - Review

THE KING OF LIES was Edgar nominated for Best First Novel, and the follow up DOWN RIVER won the Best Novel Edgar last year. Mr. Hart's track record is impressive.

THE KING OF LIES is at its core a family drama. The book opens with the discovery of the body of Ezra Pickens, the patriarch of a seriously maladjusted family. Left behind are a son and daughter who were abused by their father in equally dreadful ways. Each thinks the other is responsible for the murder. Work is the son, and it is with him that we discovery the tortured path of this family. It is here where one could use the over used phrase of Southern Gothic, but that would be cheat to imbue this book with kind of mysticism that doesn't suit the book. Family'a are just as screwed up North of the Mason-Dixon Line. Calling this Southern Gothic only serves to distance a reader from the palpable reality of THE KING OF LIES. The chief benefit of this tag is to be able to blurb William Faulkner's name, as if he is the only 'Southern' author of the last 75 years.

Work is a lawyer who has lived in his Daddy's shadow his whole life. Ezra has made sure of it. What I found most satisfying about the book was Mr. Hart though Work was exploring our place in a world that is all too often not of our making or choosing. The book is as much a crime story as it is a story about a man coming to grips with his life at long last. It is actually pretty inspiring to find a character that no longer believes that he needs to be stuck with an unhappy life with an unhappy wife. Part of crime fiction is that a character wallows in what he or she feels are unbreakable patterns and habits. What the book tackles equally as well is Work's feelings of selfishness about this brake from convention. He is both drawn to his chance at a new life and understandably terrified.

What works less well in the book is many of the female characters. For the first three quarters of the book we get four pretty thin caricatures of females. Work's wife is a shrill social climber, the childhood love interest is an indecisive cipher, the sister is an emotionally traumatized mess, the cop hunting Work is so dogmatic in her pursuit of him that she is unprofessional. The character traits suit the story and one can arguing a requirement of this kind of narrative fiction. But at times it felt as if this was being told us and not really shown to us. The hand of the writer forcing labels on his female characters. In the book's favor is that each of these women is given a moment or two in the book concluding chapters that help to justify their presence other than a few character descriptors. One wishes Mr. Hart would have taken more time earlier in the book.

That aside is it is easy to understand the huge amounts of praise being heaped on Mr. Hart. It is compelling stuff. His narrative style certainly allows the reader to become enveloped into a world were every day corruptions of the soul leave lasting effects.

Mr. Hart's third book, The Last Child, will be released on May 12th.

White Shadow - Review

Location, Location, Location. This dictum rules the realty market, but I would say that it is a less governing principle in the Crime Fiction world. Character is king in Crimelandia. That is not to say location does not have its place, but rarely do I put down a book or fail to read it because of location.

Unless that location is Florida.

Crime Fiction set in the state of Florida had its last big moment in the late 80's and early 90's. This period coincides with my entry into the Crime Novel, but almost all of the great Florida authors did nothing for me. Believe me I tried. When everyone was telling me how much they enjoyed the latest James W. Hall or the newest Carl Hiaasen, it was a bummer that I could only shrug my shoulders and wonder what the heck was wrong with me. If there is a palm tree on the cover and a vague mention of tropic climates in the title I don't even bother cracking the spine.

It was an odd sense of dismay when I discovered that the Ace Atkins had written a book set in Florida. Now let me state clearly that I think Ace Atkins is amazing. A great writer that thankfully over the last few books has gained greater attention. However, knowing that the book was set in Florida gave me pause since the book's 2006 publication.

WHITE SHADOW is the first of the faux-fiction written by Ace Atkins. It is also a break from his series character, Nick Travers. The book opens with the factual event. The assassination of Charlie Wall, former kingpin of Tampa. Charlie is a man nearing the end, his time has past. Drunk, he walks through the city, and neighborhoods he once ruled. It is the last night of his life.

The rest of the story follows three characters. The cop lost in a corrupt police force. The reporter who is looking for a break and a woman on the run from the mobsters that put Charlie in the ground. Oh, and Fidel Castro makes an appearance. The story plays out in Tampa and Cuba. Fidel is rising in the island nation and the Mob's time is coming to end.

It has been fashionable for sometime to strip away the peace and tranquility of the 50's to discovery that like most everything it was not so much rotten as it was curdled. Writers like Ross Macdonald were doing this way back then, but James Ellroy is the guy who turned this into a solid gold industry. WHITE SHADOW is not as good as Ellroy's LA Quartet, but it was pretty darn close. The moral anguish of these characters is palpable to the extent that it drives the book forward into a future that has little regard for human feeling and human life. Mr. Atkins really puts the hammer down in this book. It is head and shoulders above anything he has done to the this point. Lately, I have lamented about the lack of scope in much of the Crime Fiction I have been reading. WHITE SHADOW proves that in nearly 400 pages you can pack in a huge story without turning the book into a door stop. Fantastic stuff.

Mr. Atkins latest, Devil's Garden, was a part of The Hungry Detective's 2009 Spring Preview. That book is out now.

Rain Fall - Trailer

File this under things I didn't even know were happening. This has the look of a straight to video release. On the positive side I am generally pro Gary Oldman. Thanks to Jared Case and The Rap Sheet for making me aware.