Revue of Reviewers: 5-6-25

Critiquing some of the most interesting recent crime, mystery, and thriller releases. Click on the individual covers to read more.

Bernie Gunther, TV Detective?

I’ve been a shameless devotee of Philip Kerr’s Bernie Gunther private-eye series ever since 1989, when I picked up a hardcover copy of March Violets, the first of those 14 novels. Much later, I was privileged to interview him for both The Rap Sheet and Kirkus Reviews, and I finally met and spoke with him briefly in 2016 during a book signing in Seattle. When Kerr passed away in 2018, aged 62, I wrote that, although the author himself was “gone from the community of crime-fiction writers, … I still have his books. For that, I’ll be forever grateful.”

So you can imagine how chuffed I was to read this in Deadline:

Apple TV+ has greenlit a long-gestating TV adaptation of the late Philip Kerr’s popular Berlin Noir books from Oscar-winning Conclave writer Peter Straughan, Doctor Who producer Bad Wolf, and Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman’s Playtone.

The untitled drama is based on Kerr’s final book Metropolis, which told the iconic detective’s origin story. Set in 1928, Metropolis follows newly promoted police officer Gunther in the intimidating elite Berlin Murder Squad, investigating what seems to be a serial killer targeting victims on the fringes of society. Gunther’s Berlin is described as a “city of unprecedented freedom and dizzying turbulence, the Nazis a distant nightmare waiting in the wings.”

We are told Apple is kicking off with Gunther’s origin story but there is scope to adapt more Berlin Noir books via the studio’s option. Gunther was made famous by Kerr’s Berlin Noir trilogy comprising March Violets, The Pale Criminal and A German Requiem, all of which were published around the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Kerr penned a further 11 Gunther books, which sold in droves worldwide, finishing with Metropolis before he died in 2018. Metropolis was published posthumously a year later.

Bernie Gunther is a captivating character, pessimistic, persistent, and crafty, with what Kerr’s Web site accurately describes as “a rough sense of humor and a rougher sense of right and wrong.” I have long thought that he’d make a splendid TV protagonist, but remain skeptical that the complicated, sometimes incongruous aspects of his personality could be satisfyingly portrayed on the screen. It may help that Kerr’s widow, the novelist Jane Thynne, owns the copyright in the Gunther novels, and might have some say in their TV adaptations.

Bullet Points: Tariffs-Free Edition

• Who should be the next cinematic Bond? With Daniel Craig having departed the role of James Bond following 2021’s No Time to Die, speculation on which actor might next play Ian Fleming’s famous British superspy has revolved at various times around Henry Cavill, Tom Hardy, Idris Elba, Jack Lowden, and even 21-year-old Louis Partridge. CrimeReads’ Olivia Rutigliano has her own suggestion: “Joshua Bowman, the charming English actor who played Krasko on Doctor Who, and Daniel Grayson on ABC’s Revenge.” While I’m not yet on board with Bowman as Agent 007, I heartily endorse her idea that the next movie should be set in the 1950s, pre-Sean Connery. Remember that the ending of No Time to Die makes it pretty ridiculous to resurrect that protagonist for further feats in the 2020s. So why not return Bond to his roots, at the height of the Cold War? “It could be an origination story of the character,” writes Rutigliano, “rather like how Craig’s era rebooted the franchise with Casino Royale and used the Vesper Lynd love story as a consistent anchor for Bond’s choices, across multiple films. This could do something like that, with a nostalgic temporal re-contextualization that could stand out in a franchise that has historically insisted on contemporaneity.” Hey, everyone over at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Amazon (which now owns the intellectual property rights to Bond), are you listening?

• Meanwhile, The Spy Command’s Bill Koenig notes that “This year marks the 60th anniversary of Thunderball, the fourth Bond film and the apex of the 1960s spy craze.” He also alerts us to a Bond fan event, Gatherall at Goldeneye, set to take place in Jamaica this coming fall, and mentions that a new, expanded edition of Joseph Darlington’s 2013 book, Being James Bond: Volume One, is coming in August—though there’s not yet an Amazon “pre-order” link to share.

• Do you know the retro film and TV Web site Modcinema? I’ve ordered low-cost, made-on-demand DVD copies of forgotten small-screen features from that enterprise before, but its latest newsletter alerts me to a wealth of new offerings. Among them: the 1972 teleflick Assignment: Munich, which spawned Robert Conrad’s short-lived show Assignment: Vienna; a three-disc set containing all five episodes of the 1978 series Richie Brockelman, Private Eye starring Dennis Dugan; three episodes (including the pilot) of Cool Million, the James Farentino series that was one spoke of the NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie “wheel series” (two additional eps can be found in this set); and Fame Is the Name of the Game, the 1966 made-for-television picture starring Tony Franciosa, which “served as the pilot episode of the subsequent series The Name of the Game.”

• As a longtime follower of Peter Falk’s NBC Mystery Movie series, I’m surprised this February release didn’t hit my radar before now: Columbo Explains the Seventies: A TV Cop’s Pop Culture Journey, by Glenn Stewart (Bonaventure Press).

• My suspicion is there aren’t many people around these days boasting solid memories of the 1980 ABC-TV action series B.A.D. Cats. As Wikipedia recalls, that Douglas S. Cramer/Aaron Spelling production starred Asher Brauner and Steve Hanks as “two former race car drivers who joined the Los Angeles Police Department as part of the ‘B.A.D. C.A.T.’ Squad (a double acronym for ‘Burglary Auto Detail–Commercial Auto Theft’).” Then 21-year-old Michelle Pfeiffer appeared on the program too, playing Officer Samantha “Sunshine” Jensen, who “would occasionally lend a hand when a more feminine approach was called for.” B.A.D. Cats didn’t last long; it was cancelled in February 1980 after a pilot (which you can view here) and five other episodes had been broadcast. But as Vintage Everyday observes, the show was an important stepping stone on Pfeiffer’s path to Hollywood renown. A few days ago, that blog posted almost four dozen promotional photos of her from B.A.D. Cats, which it says demonstrated “Pfeiffer’s youthful charm and emerging star quality.” The actress would go on to play a different breed of bad cat in Batman Returns (1992).

• While I greatly enjoyed Netflix’s first two Enola Holmes movies (in 2020 and 2022), based on the middle-reader mysteries by Nancy Springer, I forgot there was to be another. Variety brings the news that its production is already well underway. “The third instalment,” that publication explains, “sees adventure chase Enola Holmes to Malta, where, according to the description, ‘personal and professional dreams collide on a case more tangled and treacherous than any she has faced before.’” As in the previous pictures, Millie Bobby Brown will play Sherlock Holmes’ teenage sister. There’s no release date yet.

• This item comes from In Reference to Murder:

Wallander, the globally acclaimed Swedish detective drama, is getting “a modernized and reimagined reboot” with Gustaf Skarsgård (Oppenheimer, Vikings) playing the iconic role. The first season of the new Swedish-language adaptation will comprise three 90-minute films and will see Kurt Wallander, now 42, recently separated, after two decades of marriage, and estranged from his daughter. On the edge as his life seemingly unravels, Wallander drinks too much, sleeps too little, and carries the weight of every unsolved case.

Penned by bestselling author Henning Mankell, the Wallander novels have sold over 40 million copies and been translated into more than 40 languages. The original Swedish series and film adaptations, which aired between 1994 and 2013, garnered wide international success and were followed by a British mini-series adaptation starring Kenneth Branagh that earned him a BAFTA for his portrayal of the detective.

• Sunday, June 15, will bring the return of Grantchester to PBS-TV’s Masterpiece Mystery! timeslot. Mystery Fanfare has the trailer for Season 10 of that historical whodunit.

• As Saturday Evening Post columnist Bob Sassone writes, “Dragnet’s Officer Bill Gannon (Harry Morgan) was known for the food he ate, which often confused and worried his partner Joe Friday (Jack Webb). Barry Enderwick of the terrific Sandwiches of History decided to try it, at the suggestion of many of his fans.” Watch the video here.

• The small-screen period crime drama Peaky Blinders is coming back! So are the rebooted Bergerac and the Death in Paradise spin-off Return to Paradise (even though I haven’t seen either of their opening seasons yet). And Acorn TV has scheduled the two-episode premiere, on Monday, June 9, of Art Detectives, which “revolves around the Heritage Crime Unit, a [UK] police department hired to solve murders connected to the world of art and antiques.”

• I was a huge fan of Leverage, the 2008-2012 TNT-TV crime caper series starring Timothy Hutton, Gina Bellman, Aldis Hodge, Christian Kane, and Beth Riesgraf. I must have watched every episode four times or more! Yet when that show was revived in 2021 as Leverage: Redemption, with Noah Wyle replacing Hutton, I hesitated tuning in, partly because I wasn’t sure I could believe the “gang” being a decade older and still as active. I think I’ve seen only two episodes of Redemption, and I completely missed the news that it had been renewed for a third season. The first three of 10 new installments aired on April 17, with more to come every Thursday through June 5. I guess it’s time I started catching up! See the trailer below.



• The Web site Geek Girl Authority (yeah, I’d never heard of it until today either) features a review of Leverage: Redemption, Season 3, plus this tribute to my favorite Leverage team member, Riesgraf’s prodigiously eccentric Parker, “truly the world’s greatest thief.”

• Speaking of TV trailers, CrimeReads has posted one for Season 2 of Poker Face, the crime comedy-drama starring Natasha Lyonne as Charlie Cale, “a casino worker on the run who entangles herself into several mysterious deaths of strangers along the way.” That show will return to the streaming service Peacock on Thursday, May 8, with 12 new episodes (two more than were broadcast in 2023).

• And while you are at CrimeReads, enjoy these three other posts that went up there recently: Patrick Sauer’s salute to Tony Rome, the South Florida gumshoe introduced in 1960’s Miami Mayhem by Marvin H. Albert, and a character Frank Sinatra played in a couple of “groovy” films; Christopher Chambers’ case for reading F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (which celebrated its 100th anniversary earlier this month) as noir; and Scott Montgomery’s look back at the first quarter-century of Stark House Press’ efforts to return to print many hard-boiled authors and novels from the 1950s and ’60s.

• Thomas Pynchon has a new private-eye novel coming in October!

• National Public Radio weekend host Scott Simon interviews film historian Jason Bailey about his brand-new biography, Gandolfini: Jim, Tony and the Life of a Legend (Abrams Press). That book is being promoted as “a detailed and nuanced appraisal of an enduring artist,” Jim Gandolfini, who was apparently quite different from the New Jersey Mafia boss he played on HBO’s The Sopranos.

• Why can’t the United States have nice things like this? The British Writers’ Association and the Reading Agency, a UK charity, have jointly organized National Crime Reading Month (NCRM) in June. “This year,” says a press release, “it opens with an exclusive online panel, The Lives of Crime, featuring bestselling crime authors. On 4 June at 6 p.m., the CWA chair and bestselling author, Vaseem Khan, will host authors Fiona Cummins, Adele Parks, and Penny Batchelor in the free online panel event.” They’ll be talking about “the genre’s universal appeal—from psychological thrillers to cozy mysteries—and how it creates accessible pathways to reading for audiences who might otherwise never discover the joy of books.” (Click here to register.) Beyond that presentation, NCRM will offer “over a hundred local author events and talks that run throughout June across the UK and Ireland, which take place in libraries, theatres, bookshops and online.” A page devoted to keeping track of NCRM events is available at this link.

• I am way behind in reading Paperback Warrior’s occasional “primers” on vintage crime novelists and pulp-fiction characters. The latest entry in that series recalls Kendell Foster Crossen (1910-1981), who “wrote crime-fiction novels under the name of M.E. Chaber, a pseudonym he used to construct the wildly successful Milo March series from the mid-1950s through the 1970s.” Fun stuff! UPDATE: Another such primer has just “gone live,” this one relating the background of Charles Williams, who “authored 22 books and was one of the best-selling writers in the Fawcett Gold Medal stable.”

• Historical mystery novelist Jeri Westerson used to produce a blog called Getting Medieval, offering interviews and articles—only to suddenly delete that journal from the Web, leaving links at other sites broken. She says now that “it was too much work and social media was rising.” Recently, though, Westerson decided to return to blogging. She has subsequently posted several author exchanges of interest. Gary Phillips, James R. Benn, and Rebecca Cantrell have all fielded questions from her. I hesitate slightly to link to these conversations, leery of their also disappearing someday, but transience is unfortunately a Web foible.

• Is this creative or creepy? From The Hollywood Reporter:

BBC Studios, the commercial arm of British broadcaster BBC, and the Agatha Christie estate have teamed up to launch a writing course on education-focused streaming service BBC Maestro taught by Christie herself. Well, to be precise, it is taught by the queen of crime, brought to life by actress Vivien Keene and AI, using the author’s own words.

“In a world first, Agatha Christie—best-selling novelist of all time—will be offering aspiring writers an unparalleled opportunity to learn the secrets behind her writing, in her own words,’ the partners said. ‘Using meticulously restored archival interviews, private letters and writings researched by a team of Christie experts, this pioneering course reconstructs Christie’s own voice and insights, guiding you through the art of suspense, plot twists and unforgettable characters.”

James Prichard, Christie’s great-grandson and the CEO of Agatha Christie Limited, is quoted in The Guardian as saying that the educators and researchers behind this subscription-based video series “extracted from a number of her writings an extraordinary array of her views and opinions on how to write. Through this course, you truly will receive a lesson in crafting a masterful mystery, in Agatha’s very own words.” OK, maybe it’s creative, after all.

• I have given precisely zero thought to what might be the “best crime novels of 2025 … so far.” However, both The Times of London and The Week have already shared their favorites.

• Over at my Killer Covers blog, I’ve written a great deal about the American artist Robert McGinnis this year, both prior to his demise in March (at age 99!), and after. But author Max Allan Collins had his own memories to share, in this post that talks about how he scored an unusual number of McGinnis’ paintings for use on his novels about the hired killer known only as Quarry.

• Can we ever get enough of Belgian author Georges Simenon’s Jules Maigret mysteries? Penguin Books has been publishing paperback versions of them over the last decade, and has brand-new editions set to become available beginning in July. And now the U.S. imprint Picador is joining in the game, launching its own Maigret lineup this month. Over the next three years, Picador says, it too will reissue all 75 Maigrets, plus “thirty of his darker standalone ‘romans durs’ beginning March 2026.” Pietr the Latvian will reach stores on May 6, together with The Late Monsieur Gallet and The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien, all of which originally saw print back in 1931. It may be time to clear some space on your bookshelves!

• This is a terrible loss—at least from my perspective. The annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which celebrated appallingly bad initial sentences to (fortunately) never-to-be-completed books, is no more. Scott Rice, who, as an English professor at California’s San Jose State University, founded the competition in 1982, says he finds it “becoming increasingly burdensome and [I] would like to put myself out to pasture while I still have some vim and vigor!” The Rap Sheet has posted many of the winners over time, and we’re sorry not to be able to keep up that tradition for decades more to come.

• California author J. Sydney Jones produced half a dozen books in his Viennese Mysteries series, beginning with The Empty Mirror (2008) and ending—it was presumed—with The Third Place (2015). They were complicated and propulsive stories of crime in the Austrian capital that took place during the very early 20th century, had as their leads lawyer Karl Werthen and real-life criminologist Doktor Hanns Gross, and seemed to fare well in the marketplace. However, Jones writes in his blog, “The original series stopped after book six. I had originally planned it for another three to four installments. But other projects came up, other publishers.” The author nonetheless returned to that series during the COVID-19 pandemic, penning a “capstone” titled Lilacs of the Dead Land, which he published in February of this year—a novel that somehow managed to avoid my radar. He calls it “a stirring historical thriller set in Austria shortly after the German annexation, or Anschluss, of March 1938.” As one who very much appreciated his Viennese Mysteries, I’ll want to find a copy soon.

• It should be mentioned that one of those “other projects” Jones embarked upon was a new crime series, set on California’s central coast during World War II and adopting as its protagonist a wounded former New York City police detective, Max Byrns. The second Byrns book, Play It in Between (Werthen Press), debuted in April.

• April 17 brought the presentation, at New York City’s New School, of the 37th annual Publishing Triangle Awards celebrating “LGBTQ+ literary excellence.” During that event, Massachusetts author and creative writing professor Margot Douaihy was given the Joseph Hansen Award for LGBTQ+ Crime Writing for her second Sister Holiday novel, 2024’s Blessed Water (Zando/Gillian Flynn Books). Hansen, you will remember, penned a dozen novels in the late 20th century starring gay death claims investigator Dave Brandstetter.

• Just as “authors hitting the best seller list are approaching gender equality for the first time,” a new independent press in Great Britain proposes to center its business on male writers. Reporting on this development, Lit Hub’s James Folta acknowledges that “female authorship is on the rise, especially recently,” but he adds, “to conclude that men therefore need an urgent champion seems naïve and near-sighted. To look at this trend or, perhaps more accurately, to feel the vibes and conclude that male authors are in danger is pushing it. Male authors going from 80% to 50% of the market is far from a crisis in need of another intervening corrective.”

• And here’s one more instance of a blog rising from the dead. The Stiletto Gumshoe debuted back in November 2018, focusing on crime and mystery fiction and the artwork associated with same. But it went dormant just two years later, with its author, C.J. Thomas, apologizing that “some troubling ‘real-life’ issues need to be wrestled with right now, so there’ll be a break from blogging here for a while. Hope to be back soon …” Soon was not soon at all. When The Stiletto Gumshoe finally disappeared altogether from the Internet (forcing me to substitute links to its posts from The Wayback Machine), I struck it from this page’s lengthy blogroll, too. Then, just as abruptly as it was gone, Thomas’ creation returned! This last April 23, Thomas put up a tribute to Sergeant DeeDee McCall, the role Stepfanie Kramer played in the 1980s TV crime drama Hunter. He has followed that with posts about the 1950 film noir Where Danger Lives, J. Robert Lennon’s new Buzz Kill, French 1980s print ads from DIM Paris, and much more. Welcome back, C.J., I hope you can stick around this time.

Spring Yarns Are Still Rolling Out

There’s only a month more to go now before I’m supposed to post another seasonal round-up of forthcoming crime, mystery, and thriller books, this one focused on summer releases.

Good grief! It seems as if I just published The Rap Sheet’s spring books recommendations … but in fact that was back in March. Since that time, I’ve added a number of titles to the list—due out on both sides of the Atlantic—bringing its total count to well upwards of 380. If you get the chance, you might want to take a glance back at the spring catalogue, to ensure you’ve not missed anything of value.

The Edgars Take Centerstage

During a special ceremony held last evening at the New York Marriott Marquis Times Square, the Mystery Writers of America organization presented its 79th annual Edgar Allan Poe Awards to what it says were the best crime- and mystery-related works of fiction, non-fiction, and television produced in 2024.

Best Novel:
The In Crowd, by Charlotte Vassell (Doubleday)

Also nominated: The Tainted Cup, by Robert Jackson Bennett (Del Rey); Rough Trade, by Katrina Carrasco (MCD); Things Don’t Break on Their Own, by Sarah Easter Collins (Crown); My Favorite Scar, by Nicolás Ferraro (Soho Crime); The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead); and Listen for the Lie, by Amy Tintera (Celadon)

Best First Novel by an American Author:
Holy City, by Henry Wise (Atlantic Monthly Press)

Also nominated: Twice the Trouble, by Ash Clifton (Crooked Lane); Cold to the Touch, by Kerri Hakoda (Crooked Lane); The Mechanics of Memory, by Audrey Lee (CamCat); A Jewel in the Crown, by David Lewis (John Scognamiglio); and The President’s Lawyer, by Lawrence Robbins (Atria)

Best Paperback Original:
The Paris Widow, by Kimberly Belle (Park Row)

Also nominated: The Vacancy in Room 10, by Seraphina Nova Glass (Graydon House); Shell Games, by Bonnie Kistler (Harper Paperbacks); A Forgotten Kill, by Isabella Maldonado (Thomas & Mercer); and The Road to Heaven, by Alexis Stefanovich-Thomson (Dundurn Press)

Best Fact Crime:
The Infernal Machine: A True Story of Dynamite, Terror, and the Rise of the Modern Detective, by Steven Johnson (Crown)

Also nominated: Long Haul: Hunting the Highway Serial Killers, by Frank Figliuzzi (Mariner); A Devil Went Down to Georgia: Race, Power, Privilege, and the Murder of Lita McClinton, by Deb Miller Landau (Pegasus Crime); The Amish Wife: Unraveling the Lies, Secrets, and Conspiracy that Let a Killer Go Free, by Gregg Olsen (Thomas & Mercer); Hell Put to Shame: The 1921 Murder Farm Massacre and the Horror of America's Second Slavery, by Earl Swift (Mariner); and The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age, by Michael Wolraich (Union Square)

Best Critical/Biographical:
James Sallis: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction, by Nathan
Ashman (McFarland)

Also nominated: American Noir Film: From The Maltese Falcon to Gone Girl, by M. Keith Booker (Rowman & Littlefield); Organized Crime on Page and Screen: Portrayals in Hit Novels, Films, and Television Shows, by David Geherin (McFarland); On Edge: Gender and Genre in the Work of Shirley Jackson, Patricia Highsmith, and Leigh Brackett, by Ashley Lawson (Ohio State University Press); and Ian Fleming; The Complete Man, by Nicholas Shakespeare (Harper)

Best Short Story:
“Eat My Moose,” by Erika Krouse (from Conjunctions, Spring 2024 “Works and Days” issue; Bard College)

Also nominated: “Cut and Thirst,” by Margaret Atwood (Amazon Original Stories); “Everywhere You Look,” by Liv Constantine (Amazon Original Stories); “Barriers to Entry,” by Ariel Lawhon (Amazon Original Stories); and “The Art of Cruel Embroidery,” by Steven Sheil (Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, July-August 2024)

Best Juvenile: Mysteries of Trash and Treasure: The Stolen Key, by Margaret Peterson Haddix (Quill Tree)

Also nominated: The Beanstalk Murder, by P.G. Bell (Feiwel & Friends); Mystery of Mystic Mountain, by Janet Fox (BFYR); The Spindle of Fate, by Aimee Lim (Feiwel & Friends); and Find Her, by Ginger Reno (Holiday House)

Best Young Adult:
49 Miles Alone, by Natalie D. Richards (Sourcebooks Fire)

Also nominated: Looking for Smoke, by K.A. Cobell (Heartdrum); The Bitter End, by Alexa Donne (Random House Books for Young Readers); A Crane Among Wolves, by June Hur (Feiwel & Friends); and Death at Morning House, by Maureen Johnson (Harper Teen)

Best Television Episode Teleplay:
“Episode One,” Monsieur Spade, written by Tom Fontana and
Scott Frank (AMC)

Also nominated: “Episode Five,” Rebus, written by Gregory Burke (Viaplay); “Episode One,” Moonflower Murders, written by Anthony Horowitz (Masterpiece PBS); “Mirror,” Murderesses, written by Wiktor Piatkowski, Joanna Kozłowska, and Katarzyna Kaczmarek (Viaplay); and “Episode Two,” The Marlow Murder Club, written by Robert Thorogood (Masterpiece PBS)

* * *

The MWA also gives out several additional yearly prizes, with the winners of those being announced last evening, as well.

Robert L. Fish Memorial Award:
“The Jews on Elm Street,” by Anna Stolley Persky (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine [EQMM], September-October 2024)

Also nominated: “The Legend of Penny and the Luck of the Draw Casino,” by Pat Gaudet (EQMM, May-June 2024); “Head Start,” by Kai Lovelace (EQMM, September-October 2024); “Murder Under Sedation,” by Lawrence Ong (EQMM, March-April 2024); and “Sparrow Maker,” by Jake Stein (EQMM, November-December 2024)

The Simon & Schuster Mary Higgins Clark Award:
The Mystery Writer, by Sulari Gentill (Poisoned Pen Press)

Also nominated: The Rose Arbor, by Rhys Bowen (Lake Union); The Serial Killer Guide to San Francisco, by Michelle Chouinard (Minotaur); Return to Wyldcliffe Heights, by Carol Goodman (Morrow Paperbacks); and Death in the Details, by Katie Tietjen (Crooked Lane)

The G.P. Putnam’s Sons Sue Grafton Memorial Award:
The Comfort of Ghosts, by Jacqueline Winspear (Soho Crime)

Also nominated: Disturbing the Dead, by Kelley Armstrong (Minotaur); A Game of Lies, by Clare Mackintosh (Sourcebooks Landmark); Proof, by Beverly McLachlin (Simon & Schuster Canada); A World of Hurt, by Mindy Mejia (Atlantic Monthly Press); and All the Way Gone, by Joanna Schaffhausen (Minotaur)

The Lilian Jackson Braun Memorial Award:
The Murders in Great Diddling, by Katarina Bivald (Poisoned Pen Press)

Also nominated: Death and Fromage, by Ian Moore (Poisoned Pen Press); Booked for Murder, by P.J. Nelson (Minotaur); Murder on Devil’s Pond, by Ayla Rose (Crooked Lane); and The Treasure Hunters Club, by Tom Ryan (Atlantic Monthly Press)

Laura Lippman and John Sandford (aka John Roswell Camp) were previously named as this year’s MWA Grand Masters, while the 2025 Raven Award will go to Face in a Book Bookstore & Gifts, in El Dorado Hills, California. Peter Wolverton, executive editor and vice president of St. Martin’s Press, has picked up the 2025 Ellery Award.

PaperBack: “Second-Hand Nude”

Part of a series honoring the late author and blogger Bill Crider.



Second-Hand Nude, by Bruno Fischer (Gold Medal, 1959). This is one of the more salaciously-titled works from reporter-turned-novelist Fischer, who may be best-remembered for his series about New York City private eye Ben Helm. Cover illustration by Ted CoConis.

Derringer Designations

A mere 30 days after publicizing its lists of finalists for the 2025 Derringer Awards, America’s Short Mystery Fiction Society brings us the winners of that competition, in five divisions.

Best Flash Story (up to 1,000 words): “Kargin the Necromancer,” by Mike McHone (Mystery Tribune, December 15, 2024)

Best Short Story (1,001-4,000 words): “The Wind Phone,” by Josh Pachter (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, September/October 2024)

Best Long Story (4,001-8,000 words): “Heart of Darkness,” by Tammy Euliano (from Scattered, Smothered, Covered & Chunked: Crime Fiction Inspired by Waffle House, edited by Michael Bracken and Stacy Woodson; Down & Out)

Best Novelette (8,001-20,000 words): “The Cadillac Job,” by Stacy Woodson (Chop Shop, Episode 1, edited by Michael Bracken;
Down & Out)

Best Anthology: Murder, Neat: A SleuthSayers Anthology, edited by Michael Bracken and Barb Goffman (Level Short)

On top of all these, the SMFS will present its Silver Derringer for Editorial Excellence to Janet Hutchings, who recently left as the editor in chief of Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Its Edward D. Hoch Memorial Golden Derringer for Lifetime Achievement is going to short-story writer and English professor Art Taylor. And the society’s 2025 Hall of Fame designee is O. Henry (aka William Sydney Porter).

One Last Bristol Batch of Prizes

In advance of the 16th and final CrimeFest kicking off on May 15 in Bristol, England, organizers of that four-day event have released the shortlists of contenders for seven annual awards. Winners are to be announced during a celebratory dinner on Saturday, May 17.

Specsavers Debut Crime Novel Award:
• Paper Cage, by Tom Baragwanath (Baskerville)
• Love Letters to a Serial Killer, by Tasha Coryell (Orion Fiction)
• The Antique Hunter’s Guide to Murder, by C.L. Miller
(Pan Macmillan)
• The Night of Baba Yaga, by Akira Otani (Faber & Faber)
• Nightwatching, by Tracy Sierra (Viking)
• Five by Five, by Claire Wilson (Michael Joseph)

eDunnit Award (for the best crime fiction ebook first published in both hardcopy and in electronic format):
• Hemlock Bay, by Martin Edwards (Head of Zeus)
• The Lantern’s Dance, by Laurie R. King (Allison & Busby)
• The Sequel, by Jean Hanff Korelitz (Faber & Faber)
• What A Way to Go, by Bella Mackie (Borough Press)
• The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Borough Press)
• A Talent for Murder, by Peter Swanson (Faber & Faber)

H.R.F. Keating Award (for the best biographical or critical book related to crime fiction):
• Agatha Christie’s Marple: Expert on Wickedness, by Mark
Aldridge (HarperCollins)
• Allusion in Detective Fiction, by Jem Bloomfield (Palgrave Macmillan)
• Female Detectives in Early Crime Fiction, 1841-1920, by Ashley Bowden (Fabula Mysterium Press)
• Writing the Murder: Essays on Crafting Crime Fiction, by Dan Coxon and Richard V. Hirst (Dead Ink)
• The Mysterious Case of the Victorian Female Detective, by Sara Lodge (Yale University Press)
• Getting Away With Murder: My Unexpected Life on Page, Stage and Screen, by Lynda La Plante (Zaffre)

Last Laugh Award (for the best humorous crime novel):
• The Case of the Secretive Secretary, by Cathy Ace (Four Tails)
• The Light and Shade of Ellen Swithin, by D.G. Coutinho
(Harvill Secker)
• What A Way to Go, by Bella Mackie (Borough Press)
• Knife Skills for Beginners, by Orlando Murrin (Transworld)
• Mr. Campion’s Christmas, by Mike Ripley (Severn House)
• The Burning Stones, by Antti Tuomainen (Orenda)

Best Crime Fiction Award for Children (aged 8-12):
• Rosie Raja: Undercover Codebreaker, by Sufiya Ahmed
(Bloomsbury Education)
• The Secret of Golden Island, by Natasha Farrant (Faber & Faber)
• Mysteries at Sea: The Hollywood Kidnap Case, by A.M.
Howell (Usborne)
• The Twitchers: Feather, by M.G. Leonard (Walker)
• The Swifts: A Gallery of Rogues, by Beth Lincoln (Penguin Random House Children’s UK)
• The Floating Witch Mystery, by Nicki Thornton (Faber & Faber)

Best Crime Fiction Award for Young Adults (aged 12-16):
• A Cruel Twist of Fate, by H.F. Askwith (Penguin Random House Children’s UK)
• It All Started With a Lie, by Denise Brown (Hashtag Press)
• Lie or Die, by A.J. Clack (Firefly Press)
• All the Hidden Monsters, by Amie Jordan (Chicken House)
• Heist Royale, by Kayvion Lewis (Simon & Schuster Children’s Books)
• Such Charming Liars, by Karen M. McManus (Penguin Random
House Children’s UK)

Thalia Proctor Memorial Award for Best Adapted TV Crime Drama:
• Bad Monkey, based on the book by Carl Hiaasen (Apple TV+)
• Dalgliesh (series 3), based on the Inspector Dalgliesh books by P.D. James (Channel 5)
• Lady in the Lake, based on the book by Laura Lippman (Apple TV+)
• Moonflower Murders, based on the book by Anthony Horowitz (BBC)
• Slow Horses (series 4), based on the Slough House books by Mick Herron (Apple TV+)
• The Turkish Detective, based on the Inspector Ikmen books by Barbara Nadel (BBC)

Congratulations to all of this year’s nominees!

Nods from the North

Crime Writers of Canada has released its shortlists of nominees for the 2025 CWA Awards of Excellence in Canadian Crime Writing.

The Miller-Martin Award for Best Crime Novel:
• Wild Houses, by Colin Barrett (McClelland & Stewart)
• The Specimen, by Jaima Fixsen (Poisoned Pen Press)
• Prairie Edge, by Conor Kerr
(Strange Light)
• Mr. Good-Evening, by John MacLachlan Gray (Douglas & McIntyre)
• The Grey Wolf, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)

Best Crime First Novel:
• The Burden of Truth, by Suzan Denoncourt (Suzan Denoncourt)
• The Roaring Game Murders, by Peter Holloway (Bonspiel)
• Altered Boy, by Jim McDonald (Amalit)
• We Were the Bullfighters, by Marianne K. Miller (Dundurn Press)
• Twenty-Seven Minutes, by Ashley Tate (Doubleday Canada)

Best Crime Novel Set in Canada:
• Fatal Harvest, by Brenda Chapman (Ivy Bay Press)
• The War Machine, by Barry W. Levy (Double Dagger)
• As We Forgive Others, by Shane Peacock (Cormorant)
• Who by Fire, by Greg Rhyno (Cormorant)
• The Call, by Kerry Wilkinson (Bookouture)

The Whodunit Award for Best Traditional Mystery:
• The Corpse with the Pearly Smile, by Cathy Ace (Four Tails)
• The Dead Shall Inherit, by Raye Anderson (Signature Editions)
• A Meditation on Murder, by Susan Juby (HarperCollins)
• Black Ice, by Thomas King (HarperCollins)
• Concert Hall Killer, by Jonathan Whitelaw (HarperNorth)

Best Crime Novella:
• “Chuck Berry Is Missing,” by Marcelle Dubé (Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, July/August 2024)
• “Mrs. Claus and the Candy Corn Caper,” by Liz Ireland (Kensington)
• “The Windmill Mystery,” by Pamela Jones (Austin Macauley)
• “A Rock,” by A.J. McCarthy
(Black Rose Writing)
• “Aim,” by Twist Phelan (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, March/April 2024)

Best Crime Short Story:
• “Farmer Knudson,” by Catherine Astolfo (from Auntie Beers: A Book of Connected Short Stories, by Catherine Astolfo; Carrick)
• “Hatcheck Bingo,” by Therese Greenwood (from The 13th Letter, Mesdames and Messieurs of Mayhem; Carrick)
• “Houdini Act,” by Billie Livingston (Saturday Evening Post,
July 26, 2024)
• “The Electrician,” Linda Sanche (from Crime Wave3: Dangerous Games; Canada West)
• “The Longest Night of the Year,” Melissa Yi (Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November/December 2024)

Best French Language Crime Book:
• La femme papillon, by J.L. Blanchard (Fides)
• Le crime du garçon exquis, by R. Lavallée (Fides)
• L’Affaire des montants, by Jean Lemieux (Québec Amérique)
• Une mémoire de lion, by Guillaume Morrissette (Saint-Jean)
• Fracture, by Johanne Seymour (Libre Expression)

Best Juvenile/YA Crime Book:
• Shock Wave, by Sigmund Brouwer (Orca)
• The Time Keeper, by Meagan Mahoney (DCB Young Readers)
• Snowed, by Twist Phelan (Bronzeville)
• The Dark Won’t Wait, by David A. Poulsen (Red Deer Press)
• The Red Rock Killer, by Melissa Yi (Windtree Press)

The Brass Knuckles Award for Best Non-fiction Crime Book:
• Out of Darkness: Rumana Monzur's Journey Through Betrayal, Tyranny and Abuse, by Denise Chong (Random House Canada)
• Atrocity on the Atlantic: Attack on a Hospital Ship During the Great War, by Nate Hendley (Dundurn Press)
• The Rest of the [True Crime] Story, by John L. Hill (AOS)
• A Gentleman and a Thief: The Daring Jewel Heists of a Jazz Age Rogue, by Dean Jobb (HarperCollins)
• The Knowing, by Tanya Talaga (HarperCollins)

Best Unpublished Crime Novel (manuscript written by an unpublished author):
• The Man in the Black Hat, by Robert Bowerman
• Govern Yourself Accordingly, by Luke Devlin
• Dark Waters, by Delee Fromm
• A Trail’s Tears, by Lorrie Potvin
• Predators in the Shadows, by William Watt

Winners will be announced on Friday, May 30.

In addition, Canadian novelist, activist, and criminal lawyer William H. Deverell has been selected to receive the 2025 Derrick Murdoch Award, honoring “individuals who have made significant contributions to developing crime writing in Canada.”

Bring on the Agatha Bouquets

The organizers of Maryland’s annual Malice Domestic Conference this weekend announced the winners of their annual Agatha Awards, celebrating traditional mysteries (of the Agatha Christie variety). There were six categories of recipients.

Best Contemporary Novel:
A Midnight Puzzle, by Gigi Pandian

Also nominated: A Collection of Lies, by Connie Berry; A Very Woodsy Murder, by Ellen Byron; Fondue or Die, by Korina Moss; and The Dark Wives, by Ann Cleeves

Best Historical Novel:
To Slip the Bonds of Earth, by Amanda Flower

Also nominated: Hall of Mirrors, by John Copenhaver; The Last Hope, by Susan Elia MacNeal; The Paris Mistress, by Mally Becker; and The Wharton Plot, by Mariah Fredericks

Best First Novel:
You Know What You Did, by K.T. Nguyen

Also nominated: A Deadly Endeavor, by Jenny Adams; Ghosts of Waikīkī, by Jennifer K. Morita; Hounds of the Hollywood Baskervilles, by Elizabeth Crowens; and Threads of Deception, by Elle Jauffret

Best Short Story:
“The Postman Always Flirts Twice,” by Barb Goffman (from Agatha and Derringer Get Cozy, edited by Gay Toltl Kinman and Andrew McAleer)

Also nominated: “Reynisfjara,” by Kristopher Zgorski (from Mystery Most International, edited by Rita Owen, Verena Rose, and Shawn Reilly Simmons); “Satan’s Spit,” by Gabriel Valjan (from Tales of Music, Murder and Mayhem: Bouchercon 2024, edited by Heather Graham); “Sins of the Father,” by Kerry Hammond (from Mystery Most International); and “A Matter of Trust,” by Barb Goffman (from Three Strikes—You’re Dead, edited by Donna Andrews, Barb Goffman, and Marcia Talley)

Best Non-fiction: Writing the Cozy Mystery: Authors’ Perspectives on Their Craft, edited by Phyllis M. Betz

Also nominated: Abingdon’s Boardinghouse Murder, by Greg Lilly; Agatha Christie, Marple: Expert on Wickedness, by Mark Aldridge; Some of My Best Friends Are Murderers: Critiquing the Columbo Killers, by Chris Chan; and The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore, by Evan Friss

Best Children’s/YA Mystery:
Sasquatch of Harriman Lake, by K.B. Jackson

Also nominated: First Week Free at the Roomy Toilet, by Josh Pachter; Sid Johnson and the Well-Intended Conspiracy, by Frances Schoonmaker; The Big Grey Man of Ben Macdhui, by K.B. Jackson; and The Sherlock Society, by James Ponti

Congratulations to all of this year’s nominees!

(Note: It is my preference to include the names of publishers when listing books that are in contention for prizes. But the Malice Domestic folks failed to provide that information, and there are simply too many titles here for me to look up each one in a timely fashion.)

Built for Speed

By Peter Handel
Killer Potential (Morrow), a striking debut novel by Hannah Deitch, is at once a blistering satire of contemporary society and a road-trip story, with two very different young women protagonists. Set initially in the lush upper-crust environs of Los Angeles, the action bleeds (sometimes literally) across the country.

Evie Gordon, our narrator here, is a 29-year-old disaffected former star student who now cobbles together a living as an SAT tutor of bored rich girls who couldn’t care less about academic advancement. She arrives one day at the home of one of her regulars, Serena Victor, whose father, Peter, is a man with a secret and whose mom, Dinah, was once an actress.

The house is unnaturally quiet. As Evie walks through looking for Serena, she begins to hear various noises—a running faucet, a thump. “I went back to the main hallway,” says Evie. “Sunlight begged to enter, dripped beneath a crack of shutters, scattering coins of light on the scarred hardwoods.”

She wanders further, out into the backyard. Along with a pool and vegetable garden, “there were Lovecraftian cacti and succulents, with thick spiked tongues furred with spiderwebs. Smooth plant flesh in alien colors, purples and mints and tangerines. Rows and rows of teeth.” Evie’s sense of foreboding increases, and soon—sure enough—she finds Peter in the koi pond, dead, and nearby, ditto for Dinah, whose pretty face has been erased by a large rock.

She goes back to the house and hears a faint cry of “help me.” In a room secreted beneath a staircase, she discovers a woman tied up, looking “like a boy in a seventies punk band, living off heroin and cigarettes and whatever she could scrummage out of dumpsters. She wore black combat boots, black jeans so thin they clung to her matchstick legs like tissue paper. … Her chest, which was flat as a boy’s, heaved with effort. She didn’t move.”

Evie frees this mystery woman, but as they are preparing to flee, teenaged Serena shows up, melts down at the gory scene, and calls 911. Evie seeks to calm her, but when she tries to take away Serena’s phone, the girl whacks her upside the head with a heavy lamp. Evie defends herself, throwing a vase at Serena’s head. It connects. Evie assumes she’s killed her, and as she and the woman from under the stairs scamper—afraid they’ll be accused of three murders—Serena’s boyfriend, Lukas, arrives at the house. The pair make their getaway in Evie’s car, while he’s distracted with Serena’s body.

Before long, questions abound: who is the previously captive woman? Why and how was she there in the first place? What is her connection to the Victor family? Unfortunately for the reader, the answers are a long way off. Too long, because when a couple of strangers set off on the run together, the reader can’t help but wonder, what is this character’s backstory, and why doesn’t Evie just ask her? Wonder we do—for almost the entire book.

Killer Potential embraces all of the pop-culture tropes Los Angeles has to offer—there are references to Leo, Kim, Paris, Keanu, and one extraneous product after another. But author Deitch has a facile approach to the culture that goes creatively way past such intentionally banal, superficial exposition. For instance, as Evie is recounting to the reader her inability to find meaningful work post-academia, she bolsters herself with genuine insight into life today:

I looked. I kept looking for two years. There were still possibilities. There are always possibilities. The rags-to-riches fantasy is so deeply engraved into the American consciousness that it’s cellular, the invisible strand in the helix of our DNA. A doe-eyed chimney sweep works hard and catches the eye of a Wall Street Prince Charming. Bootstrapping stories have kept the capitalists’ dicks hard since the Gilded Age.

Evie’s fellow fugitive remains close-lipped as the two begin an uneasy partnership based on mutual need. They are fleeing capture, but don’t know where they’re going. News reports emerge as the bodies are found at the Victor home, and Lukas is blabbing about what he saw. The elder Victors are past tense, but is Serena actually dead? Evie sure as hell hopes not—her account of the episode could go a long way toward vindication for both Evie and the woman she rescued.

It isn’t until they hole up to rest in a cheap motel, that the other woman offers her name, Jae, and the ice floe between the two begins to dissipate. Evie and Jae begin crisscrossing the country, eventually hatching a plan to reach Canada via Washington state. Background on each of them is shared. Predictably, things between the two get very cozy, as they steal cars and a boat, and hide out in a deserted furniture store, all the while staying some steps ahead of a nationwide manhunt and sensational stories painting them as vicious killers, or “Manson-like.”

They have some close calls, though, including a confrontation with some idiotic men who can expose them, and who are dispatched with knife-play. A Glock pistol the women have snagged along their journey also comes in handy.

Deitch, who earned a Master’s in English from the University of California, Irvine, studying contemporary pop culture and Marxist theory, clearly revels in taking (often hilarious) aim at our current state of ever-increasing economic inequality. One wishes she would have done it more often.

In the final third of this propulsive yarn, Evie, still very much on the lam, reacts to comments by an editorial writer who makes fun of her situation—$90K school loan debt, lame job. She muses:

I was a failure, taking out my resentment on good, hardworking people. To prove it, he listed all the folksy millionaires who’d come before me. Men who’d come from nothing, who lifted themselves up by their bootstraps and made capitalism their bitch. An army of cowboys trudging uphill through the snow, planting their flag on Wall Street. I was the face of the editorial’s mockery, but I was only a symptom of a larger malignancy. These gaping wounds walk among us, he warned—the debtors, the renters, the generations at the end of the alphabet, born for the end of the world.

As a tale of two outlaws (and eventual lovers) driving seemingly endless miles across America, staying one crucial step in front of the law, Killer Potential hits all its marks. Deitch vividly describes the lives of two sort-of-criminals who must cope with extraordinary pressures, knowing that at any moment the party could end, maybe with their deaths. Although Evie’s quasi-philosophizing about life in the early 2020s occasionally rambles on a bit long, the author mostly hones her perspective to a crystalline—and often hilarious—point. Jae is harder to pin down, but that is very likely the purpose of her distinct alienation.

Killer Potential is a crime novel with originality to burn. And Hannah Deitch is a talent to watch.

Trussoni Triumphant in L.A.

Last evening brought announcements of which books and authors have won the 45th Los Angeles Times Book Prizes. There were 12 competitive categories, plus three special awards given out. The full list of recipients can be found here.

Of likely greatest interest to Rap Sheet readers, though, is that Danielle Trussoni won in the Mystery/Thriller bracket with her 2024 novel, The Puzzle Box (Random House). Competing in that same division were Havoc, by Christopher Bollen (Harper); The Waiting, by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown); Guide Me Home, by Attica Locke (Mulholland); and The God of the Woods, by Liz Moore (Riverhead).

Congratulations to all of this year’s nominees!

Reaching for Theakston Renown

Eighteen. That’s how many UK books have been longlisted for the 2025 Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. Choosing the best of this bunch won’t be easy in the slightest:

• The Cracked Mirror, by Chris Brookmyre (Sphere)
• Our Holiday, by Louise Candlish (HQ)
• A Stranger in the Family, by Jane Casey (Hemlock Press)
• The Mercy Chair, by M.W. Craven (Constable)
• The Wrong Sister, by Claire Douglas (Michael Joseph)
• The Last Word, by Elly Griffiths (Quercus)
• Estella’s Revenge, by Barbara Havelocke (Hera)
• Redemption, by Jack Jordan (Simon & Schuster UK)
• The Final Act of Juliette Willoughby, by Ellery Lloyd (Pan)
• Finding Sophie, by Imran Mahmood (Raven)
• The Woman on the Ledge, by Ruth Mancini (Century)
• The Kill List, by Nadine Matheson (HQ)
• Hunted, by Abir Mukherjee (Harvill Secker)
• Blood Like Mine, by Stuart Neville (Simon & Schuster UK)
• To Die in June, by Alan Parks (Canongate)
• Deadly Animals, by Marie Tierney (Zaffre)
• The Last Murder at the End of the World, by Stuart Turton (Raven)
• All the Colours of the Dark, by Chris Whitaker (Orion)

Now in its 21st year, this prize is presented by Harrogate International Festivals and sponsored by the brewery T&R Theakston, in partnership with Waterstones and the Daily Express. Readers are invited to help develop a shortlist of nominees by going here to cast ballots for their half-dozen favorites from among the original 18 works. Voting is set to close on Thursday, May 15, with the winner to be announced on Thursday, July 17—the opening night of this year’s Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate, England.

(Hat tip to Crimespree Magazine.)

Revue of Reviewers: 4-22-25

Critiquing some of the most interesting recent crime, mystery, and thriller releases. Click on the individual covers to read more.