Crime Fiction Lover

Quant is back! It’s been nearly 15 years since Russell Quant, the private detective created by Canadian author Anthony Bidulka last appeared on the page. That was in Dos Equis, which had an Oceans 11 vibe to it, though Russell was still catching criminals, not…

It’s fascinating how some novels come into being. The Whitby Protocol by Bernadette Bernson is a case in point. Writing crime fiction in English for the first time, the German author arrived in Whitby for a sojourn and was so taken by the personality of…

Translated by Sally-Ann Spencer — When the English-language edition of Sebastian Fitzek’s debut Therapy came out in translation 12 years ago, we predicted he would be a big deal, and the author has become one of the leading German crime writers, highly popular for his…

They say that older men like nothing better than to potter in their sheds. But what about older women? Well, hopefully their shed activities are a lot less… um… visceral than those of Brenda, the antihero at centre stage in Warm Bodies, the new novella…

We’ll get things going this week with a little bit of amateur sleuth fun – it’s Grace & Jo Have Never Solved a Murder. To be fair, neither have I, although I did figure out which tropical fish in my tank was eliminating the others….

Ian Fleming famously created James Bond in 1953 with Casino Royale, and the modern super spy appeared in 14 books before the author’s death in 1964. In the 60-plus years since there have been numerous writers contributing to the Bond continuation novels covering the original…