Smatterings

The Telegraph is chock-a-block with mystery-related reviews today. There’s Susanna Yager’s regular column, featuring new releases by John Connor, Paul Adam, C.J. Sansom, Michael Crichton, Massimo Carlotto, Louis Sanders, Qiu Xiaolong, Karin Slaughter, Mark Timlin and Janet Evanovich. Toby Clements gives good notices to Olen Steinhauer’s THE CONFESSION and two foreign releases by Bernard Schlink and Luis Alfredo Garcia-Roza. Peter Hobbs enthuses about the latest by French noiriste Fred Vargas, and Sam Leith is underwhelmed by the Crichton juggernaut.

Diana Althill edited luminaries like Philip Roth and Norman Mailer–but now, in her late 80s, she’s switched to the other side, as she tells the Guardian.

Remember Linda Bloodworth Thomason? She of DESIGNING WOMEN and Clinton friendship fame? Now she’s written a novel, and Ellen Gray of the Philadelphia Daily News judges if it’s any good or not.

‘Tis the season–for Christmas books, and Guardian columnist Guy Browning offers his top ten yuletide offerings.

Going to the London Book Fair and need tips on how to get published or other industry matters? Then check out the masterclasses, which will be led by the likes of Jonny Geller, Rose Tremain and Barbara Trapido.

In case you’re not yet sick of anything related to THE DA VINCI CODE, here’s the full filing of Lewis Perdue’s lawsuit against Dan Brown for infringement. Though the side-by-side comparisons are telling, I would have liked to see word-for-word comparisons to bolster the case…(link from Lee Goldberg)

And finally, the Beeb polled some kiddie Potter fans to see what they think will happen in Book Six. All I know is that it’s highly unlikely that it’ll be subtitled “the Secret Doings of Slytherin House” and suddenly pitched to the (very) adult market…