Category: Books

Another Hard Case Crime series novel, and it’s a brash and trashy as the rest of them. Swede is big and big-hearted sailor, fresh off the boat with a pocket full of cash after three years at sea. He’s planning on finding himself a wife and setting up a farm in the mid-west where he…

I’d not read any of Kate Atkinson’s books before, although I’ve seen them riding high in the bestsellers for a while. So I didn’t really know what to expect when I started Case Histories. What we have is something akin to one of those Barbara Vine or Minnette Walters crime things you see on TV…

I’ve only read a handful of McEwan’s previous books. Amsterdam won the Booker a few years back, and I’ve never quite understood why, since it has no really likeable characters. Enduring Love and Atonement are far superior – pleasurable books. So along comes Saturday, which had vast swathes of press devoted it to it back…

Jose Carlos Somoza is the talented Spanish (or maybe Argentinian) author of The Athenian Murders, a very clever mystery set in both present day Spain and ancient Athens. His latest (well, I say latest, but I’m not completely sure of the original Spanish publication dates) is set in the art world. Well I say, art…

In Spain, the fictional character, Captain Alatriste, has appeared on stamps. And now, the biggest budget film ever produced by Spain is being made about the man, starring Viggo Mortensen (of Lord of the Rings fame). So who is this man? He’s the creation of Arturo Perez-Reverte, the Spanish writer, some of who’s books I’ve…

Nick Hornby’s latest actually took me a little while to get through, and I really couldn’t put my finger on why that was. But, much as I always seek out the latest Hornby fiction (must admit to giving 31 Songs a miss), I’m not enjoying his books as much as I did when he was…

Top Of The Heap is another in the Hard Case Crime series. This time it’s by Erle Stanley Gardner and details a complicated investigation involving seedy motels, mob leaders, shady companies, strippers, and illegal gambling dens. All the ingredients to make a good noir thriller then. I’ll admit that I didn’t find it quite as…

When I saw the film I mentioned that I hadn’t read any of the comics, so recently I picked up this first volume. Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez used this and a couple of other stories as the basis of the film and it’s quite remarkable how closely they kept to the comic. Indeed I…

The other day, I mentioned this piece about the writing of a book called The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists. Well, on Monday evening I paid a trip to Waterstones to try to find it. First stop was the large 3 for 2 tables that most people seemingly don’t get past. No luck. None…

If you’ve ever fancied writing a book (I have), then this is definitely worth reading. It’s the story of how a book called Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists which sounds like a fun read. All the more so since it was conceived in a pub round the corner from work.

This is the first of the Hard Case Crime books that started being published in the States last year. They feature fantastic period-style covers and are a combination of newly published works and re-published older pieces. In this case, it’s a 1961 vintage book that was originally titled Mona. Block, of course, continues to be…

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