Features

CIS: A Raymond Chandler primer

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Raymond Chandler was 44 years old when he lost his job as an oil company executive in 1932. This is one job loss we can cheer for, since it’s the reason Chandler began writing. His very first short story was printed in Black Mask, a…
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Features

CIS: Jonathan Santlofer on crime writing

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Classics in September — Today we’re honoured to present a guest column by one of the most respected names in crime fiction – Jonathan Santlofer. The author of numerous bestsellers in the genre, including The Death Artist, Color Blind, The Killing Art, Anatomy of Fear…
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Features

CIS: Interview with Charles Ardai

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Classics in September — We couldn’t do a month of classic crime fiction without mentioning Hard Case Crime, could we? We’ve said it here on the site and we’ve tweeted about it – this publishing house is putting out some great throwback hardboiled and noir…
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Features

CIS: The top five women of noir

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Classics in September — Several months ago we discussed five of the best American novelists currently writing in the hardboiled tradition. All of the writers featured in that piece are top-notch crime authors – but they also had something else in common: they were all…
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News

Welcome to Classics in September

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Summer is just about gone, the kids are going back to school and students are returning to college or university. As the leaves will soon turn to yellow, like the pages in a favourite old novel, isn’t it the perfect time to get back to…
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Features

CIS: Roseanna revisited

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Classics in September – Originally published in 1965, Roseanna was the first of 10 police procedural novels featuring Detective Martin Beck of Sweden’s National Murder Squad. It launched a writing partnership between Maj Sjӧwall and Per Wahlӧӧ that would last until the latter’s premature death…
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