The Hungry Detective

The Foreign Desk at The Hungry Detective has alerted me that the massively acclaimed THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO was recently been adapted for the screen in its home country of Sweden. In fact, the second in the series, THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE is already in post-production with the third book in the trilogy filming for a a December 2009 release. Check out... the un-subtitled... trailer and cross your fingers that this gets a bigger US push than JAR CITY did a year ago. More information on all three films can be found at the Production company website .

On the plus side of the recent economic skid is this chart. This chart... well... charts the slide of the British Pound Sterling to our Americano Dollar. From nearly $2.00 in early August to what is today $1.60! For all of my youth the Pound basically converted to $1.50, but as The Hungry Detective's interest in English Premier League soccer grew so did the exchange rate. This made travel and the acquisition of UK released books nigh to impossible. Our cherished Billingham's, Booth's, Connolly's, Kernick's, McDermid's were all a heavy financial burden for this poor soul, and with shipping via the Royal Mail...Oof! Luckily all of our UK related purchases are being made via The Book Depository . Is there any more magical collision of words than, 'Free Shipping'? Yes, there is 'Free Shipping Worldwide'. In any case, the latest additions to the THD library have been R.J Ellory's A Simple Act of Violence , and Tom Cain's The Survivor . THD wo...

I recently finished Fred Vargas's book Have Mercy On Us All. A book I enjoyed greatly by the way. I don't know what prompted me, but I checked over at IMDB to see if any of her work had been translated to the screen. As luck would have it Have Mercy On Us All has been translated to the big screen. Another, Wash This Blood Clean From My Hands , seemingly made it to the small screen. With the very successful art-house run of the Harlan Coben novel, Tell No One , I am crossing my fingers that this film will at the very least make an appearance on DVD. Warning there are no English subtitles.... and maybe a quick flash of nudity. Which is either an enticement or reason to report this blog. Enjoy.

Lifeless - Mark Billingham Mark's books have always been pretty good reads. I am having trouble deciding if Tom Thorne is the London Harry Bosch or if Harry Bosch is the Los Angeles Tom Thorne. There is precedent in Connelly's case, but I think I have enjoyed Billingham's last few more than Connelly's. The fifth in this series covers the homeless, the first Gulf War and the darkness that lurks in the heart of all good men. The downward spiral that started at the tail end of The Burning Girl continues for our weary hero. Confined to a desk Thorne asks to go undercover to discovery who is kick London's homeless people to death. As usual Billingham does wonderful job of communicating Thorne's despair over his current state. It is a dark world out there and it only seems to be getting darker. I don't want this to sound like a negative, but Lifeless worked better as social commentary then as a crime novel. The who-done-it, and even the why-done-it, take back s...

There has been some tension around The Hungry Detective Offices. Our Domestic Desk has bristled due to the creation of our new Foreign Desk. After a brief flirtation with placing the office in Crime Fiction's current hot bed, Sweden, I decided to keep us one big happy family here in Rochester, New York. The reason for the creation of a Foreign Desk was due to the recent discovery that the crime fiction community is obsessed with all things Swedish... and in general Nordic. I expressed some concern that this Swedish Invasion happened virtually unnoticed by anyone here at THD. The Domestic Desk said it was not their fault. I agreed that it was not their fault and quicker than you can get yourself to IKEA I created the Foreign Desk. The midnight oil (actual illumination...not the strange Australian band) has been seen burning from the window as I leave the offices in my Mazada Miata, so I expect a first report soon.