While Sian and her wonderful new daughter Penelope have been visiting, Sian introduced me to a British quiz show called Pointless. Don’t ask me what the app is that gets this because, honestly, I have no idea (editors note: it’s called Filmon Television). I mention Pointless because last week’s celebrity round featured some mystery writers, Mark Billingham, Val McDermid and Tony Parsons. This gave me a hook for this month’s piece.
Mark Billingham was wearing a very country and western outfit and it seems that he is part of a country and western group, as well as being a standup comic in his spare time. His main series is the Tom Thorne series, the 14th title in the series Love Like Blood (trade paper $22.99) will be in the store on August 15th. We also have a spin off from the main series, featuring D.I. Tanner, Die of Shame, (trade paper $15.99).
Val McDermid is a major force in the British crime fiction scene, in addition to her own writing she was the founder of the Harrogate Mystery Conference, which has become one of the pre-eminent conferences in the United Kingdom. The conference has a number of awards including the Theakstons Old Peculiar Crime Novel of the Year Award. The winner receives £3000 and a small hand-carved oak beer cask carved by one of Britain's last surviving coopers. Old Peculiar is Theakstons most popular beer. McDermid’s next new title to be published in Canada is Insidious Intent, the 10th Carol Jordan and Tony Hill title which the will be published in December in hard cover. December also sees the publication of the trade paper of the 4th Karen Pirie title Out of Bounds ($24.95) She does have two anthologies coming this fall, Bloody Scotland, is a collection of stories by major Scotish crime writers; the stories are set between the Iron Age and the present day. Murder on Christmas Eve, is a collection of Christmas stories by writers from the United Kingdom. Unfortunately, we have not yet found a North American distributor for either of these titles but we are working on it.
Tony Parsons writes the Max Wolfe series this is a newer much shorter series. The main character Max Wolfe is a London police detective and as a single father adds a different dimension to the stories. The first novel in the series was The Murder Bag, published in 2014. The fourth title Die Last is arriving imminently. It is based on a relevant topic of people smuggling.
A few other new books which are good summer reads, Connie Willis, Crosstalk, (tp $24), M.C. Beaton’s latest Agatha Raisin, Pushing Up Daisies (mm $10.99) Liane Moriarty’s Big Little Lies (mm$12.99) which was recently a TV series starring Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman, we also have Moriarty’s newest title The Husband’s Secret (mm$12.99). This is also a good time to check out our used section as we have some great used titles at the moment. A good way of finding a new author or filling in gaps in existing series. Feel free to ask for recommendations based on what we have in stock.