The Unleavened Weekend Update

Obligatory Passover-related comment: I will be quite content if I never see turkey, smoked turkey, mashed potato kugel, matzah and passover desserts for a long, long time.

NYTBR: Marilyn Stasio’s crime column has a distinctly across-the-Atlantic feel as she revlews new offerings from Ian Rankin, Declan Hughes, Ken Bruen and Adrian McKinty; Liesl Schillinger gets giddy about Clive James’ compendium of cultural reference; Charles Taylor wishes Max Phillips would leave pastiche behind and go literary again; Lizzie Skurnick authors the Fiction Chronicle; and Gary Marmorstein’s chronicle of Columbia Records is necessarily exhausting, finds John Rockwell.

WaPo Book World: A new book explores the sordid history of racial cleansing in America; Melvin Jules Bukiet is fascinated by Tova Reich’s fury over the commercialization of the Holocaust; Michael Dirda dubs a new tome of New York’s battle with Prohibiton “exceptionally interesting”; and Ron Charles is shaken by James Robertson’s exploration of how faith dissolves in spectacular fashion.

LA Times: Meghan Daum has critical words for T Jefferson Parker’s latest crime novel; Susan Salter Reynolds talks with Susanna Moore about her latest dark tale, THE BIG GIRLS; Tara Ison convinces me further to get a copy of MY HOLOCAUST; and ITW and the rise of thrillers is written up by Kathleen Sharp, though I really wish the whole faux-competitive thing with MWA would be laid to rest.

G&M: New books commemorate the 90th anniversary of Vimy Ridge; Dave Bidini considers Canada’s national pastime in prose; Michael Redhill has his say about ON CHESIL BEACH; and Margaret Cannon reviews new crime offerings by Peter Temple, Laura Lippman, Jonathan Kellerman, Linda Hall, Ken Bruen, Joel Rose & Mobashar Qureshi

Guardian Review: John Lanchester has his say on the possible effects of Google Book Search; Lucasta Miller considers the varied career of philospher Julia Kristeva; Ursula LeGuin finds AL Kennedy’s immersion in a WWII-based soldier is not her cuppa, but may well be many others’; and Lionel Shriver concludes Nora Ephron’s essay collection is the perfect Mother’s Day gift.

Observer: Peter Conrad finds Richard Flanagan’s novel to be genuinely thrilling; Adam Mars-Jones feels about the opposite about Graham Swift’s new work; and Alex Clark delves into the paranoia within.

The Times: Alice Fordham wonders what’s up with all those collaborations on bestselling thrillers; Philip Olterman ponders why so many are so fascinated with chess; Wilbur Smith accepts his bestselling fate; and Marcel Berlins pays tribute to Michael Dibdin and his singular creation, Aurelio Zen.

The Scotsman: Michael Pye thinks Mick Brown’s biography of Phil Spector “cries out for a second edition”; Alan Massie wishes more crime fiction fans would read Frederic Lindsay; Mark Sanderson has his say on the latest Dalziel and Pascoe adventure; Rupert Thomson explains how writing about Myra Hindley ended up spooking him; and Stuart Kelly mourns the loss of Michael Dibdin.

The Rest:

Oline Cogdill enjoys Peter Spiegelman’s latest John March outing, but is less keen on William Landay’s THE STRANGLER.

Adam Woog’s Seattle Times column features reviews of new releases by Laura Lippman, Robert Crais, Ashna Graves, Gregg Olsen and Ian Rankin.

The Toronto Star’s Jack Batten evaluates the latest in long-running series by Robert Crais and Reginald Hill.

Robin Vidimos thrills to the car chases and shootouts but especially digs what MIchael Gruber does with a tale of old books. Alsoin the Denver Post, Mia Geiger talks with Mary Higgins Clark about writing a book for adults and one for children.

JC Patterson at the Jackson Clarion-Ledger is a big fan of NEW ORLEANS NOIR.

Asahi Shimbun seems surprised that middle-aged Japanese women are flocking to thriller and horror writing, but why shouldn’t they?

The International Herald Tribune interviews Qiu Xiaolong on writing of his native China in English and the current state of his home country.

Ed Champion wishes Jonathan Lethem had accessed his cultural geek more readily in YOU DON’T LOVE ME YET.

50 years after the fact, Sarah Schweitzer celebrates the publication and subsequent impact of PEYTON PLACE upon society.

John Freeman serves up his list of 25 great reads for a global trip he’d like to take someday.

The Houston Chronicle’s Fritz Lanham spends time with the mother-daughter Desais, Anita and Kiran.