Not Quite the Weekend Update

My review of Ruth Rendell’s THE WATER’S LOVELY ran in the Philadelphia Inquirer yesterday. And after this, I think I shall stop reading her work because I’ll just end up saying the same things about her in reviews in the future. Unless she decides to incorporate zombies. That would be some kind of awesome.

Rendell also figures prominently in Ed Siegel’s take on psychological thrillers by women, though counting Zoe Heller as a crime novelist isn’t completely true.

And jumping ahead to Rendell’s new Wexford novel, Natasha Cooper calls for the inspector’s retirement.

I couldn’t make it to Harrogate this year (someday I shall return!) But Chris Wiegand has been blogging about it for the Guardian, and reports are coming in from Steve Mosby, Ben Hunt, and Donna Moore, with many more to come.

The Times follows Martin Cruz Smith to Moscow and interviews him about Arkady Renko’s latest tale, STALIN’S GHOST.

And is the spy thriller well and truly coming back? Joan Smith seems to think so.

I was going to read Gail Pool’s treatise on book reviewing, but Steve Weinberg’s critique pretty much has me sold.

The weekend crime fiction review front: Marilyn Stasio, Margaret Cannon, Gerard Kaufman and Matthew Lewin on Deon Meyer’s new thriller.   

Patrick Anderson applauds James Lee Burke for tackling the Katrina aftermath, but rightfully complains “that Burke’s crime story isn’t equal to the larger horror that surrounds it.” Janet Maslin, however, feels more favorably towards THE TIN ROOF BLOWDOWN. 

Regis Behe chats with Lee Vance, author of the finance thriller RESTITUTION.

Tom Maxwell meets Lin Anderson, whose latest Rhona Macleod crime novel is DARK FLIGHT.

Ed Champion invokes William Gass and Virginia Woolf in a piece about confessional writing for the Los Angeles Times.

Also in the Times, Richard Rayner has a fascinating piece on how repackaging backlist can make a literary writer like Philip Roth a brand name.

Another “Joe Hill is Stephen King’s son” profile, this courtesy the Sydney Morning Herald.

Publishers find out, yet again, that books for boys should be an easy sell but is not.