Sunday, 01 April 2012

madmen_jonhamm

Are you mad about Mad Men? I know I am. Although it has been off the air for 18 months, the AMC drama about a Madison Avenue advertising firm has hit the ground running. It airs at 10 p.m. Sundays on AMC.

Don Draper, you've been quite busy this past year and a half, haven't you?

Mad Men has now moved into 1966 and the series has renewed interest in the fashions, food, drink (lots of drinks, mind you) of the late 1950's through the mid 1960s. This past week I have seen several newspaper and magazine stories on the retro interests that have sprung up because of Mad Men, which stars Jon Hamm, at left, as the maddest man of all, Don Draper.

My question, of course, is what did they read?

And since Mad Men looks back at these eras with a bit of cynicism and a gimlet eye (a lot of gimlet eyes, if you ask me), let's look at what contemporary mystery writers have to say about that time frame.

Mystery Scene would love to hear from readers about their favorite mysteries from the 1950s-1960s or contemporary authors who set their stories during those years.

Meanwhile, here's a few to get you started:

James W. Hall: Magic City offers one of the best depictions of 1960s Miami. Although Magic City is part of Hall's series about Thorn, a reluctant detective who lives in the Keys, this novel is heavily rooted the Miami of 1964. In Magic City, Hall chronicles the beginnings of contemporary Miami. In 1964, “the tropical air is sugary with innocence and hope. Anything can happen. It is Magic City.” In 1964, Miami saw the Cassius Clay-Sonny Liston heavyweight-championship fight; the influx of Cuban refugees, and visits from the Beatles, famous actors and politicians who made the city “the center of the universe.” Hall richly delves into all of this.

grafton_isforundertowaudioSue Grafton: The Kinsey Millhone series is set firmly in the 1980s and, as the alphabet winds down has been moving toward 1990. So it's natural that some of the private detective's cases would originate in the 1950s and 1960s.

After all, the past's influence on the present is a reoccuring theme in mystery fiction. And we are talking about a character who, in the early books, drove a 1968 Volkswagen A few of Grafton's novels with roots in the '50s and '60s are "F" is for Fugitive; "Q" is for Quarry; "S" is for Silence; and "U" is for Undertow. For trivia buffs, Kinsey Millhone was born May 5, 1950. (Grafton was the subject of a Mystery Scene profile in issue No. 92, in 2005.)

Kris Nelscott: Her intriguing series about African-American P.I. Smokey Dalton is set in 1960s Memphis and Chicago. After too long an absence, Smokey returns in the series' seventh novel The Day After, scheduled to be published in 2012. Nelscott also writes at Kristine Kathryn Rusch, her real name.

Walter Mosley: The Easy Rawlins series began in post WWII Los Angeles and moved steadily through the 1950s and 1960s, including Cinnamon Kiss, Little Scarlet, Black Betty, and Bad Boy Brawley Brown. Mosley's series about mild-mannered bookseller Paris Minton and World War II hero Fearless Jones started in the mid 1950s: Fearless Jones, Fear Itself, and Fear of the Dark.

Megan Abbott: In an email, Abbott said that Queenpin is definitely early 1960s, although she never specifies the date.

And if you are interested in another view of the 1960s, check out Magic City on the Starz network. Magic City, which has no relationship to Hall's novel, is set in 1959 at a luxury hotel in Miami Beach. The rich, the mob, local criminals and the locals come to the hotel. I also am enjoying seeing on screen a number of area actors including Todd Allan Durkin, Ricky Waugh and Gregg Weiner.

Photo: Jon Hamm as Don Draper in Mad Men. AMC photo

Reading in the Era of Mad Men
Oline Cogdill
reading-in-the-era-of-mad-men

madmen_jonhamm

Are you mad about Mad Men? I know I am. Although it has been off the air for 18 months, the AMC drama about a Madison Avenue advertising firm has hit the ground running. It airs at 10 p.m. Sundays on AMC.

Don Draper, you've been quite busy this past year and a half, haven't you?

Mad Men has now moved into 1966 and the series has renewed interest in the fashions, food, drink (lots of drinks, mind you) of the late 1950's through the mid 1960s. This past week I have seen several newspaper and magazine stories on the retro interests that have sprung up because of Mad Men, which stars Jon Hamm, at left, as the maddest man of all, Don Draper.

My question, of course, is what did they read?

And since Mad Men looks back at these eras with a bit of cynicism and a gimlet eye (a lot of gimlet eyes, if you ask me), let's look at what contemporary mystery writers have to say about that time frame.

Mystery Scene would love to hear from readers about their favorite mysteries from the 1950s-1960s or contemporary authors who set their stories during those years.

Meanwhile, here's a few to get you started:

James W. Hall: Magic City offers one of the best depictions of 1960s Miami. Although Magic City is part of Hall's series about Thorn, a reluctant detective who lives in the Keys, this novel is heavily rooted the Miami of 1964. In Magic City, Hall chronicles the beginnings of contemporary Miami. In 1964, “the tropical air is sugary with innocence and hope. Anything can happen. It is Magic City.” In 1964, Miami saw the Cassius Clay-Sonny Liston heavyweight-championship fight; the influx of Cuban refugees, and visits from the Beatles, famous actors and politicians who made the city “the center of the universe.” Hall richly delves into all of this.

grafton_isforundertowaudioSue Grafton: The Kinsey Millhone series is set firmly in the 1980s and, as the alphabet winds down has been moving toward 1990. So it's natural that some of the private detective's cases would originate in the 1950s and 1960s.

After all, the past's influence on the present is a reoccuring theme in mystery fiction. And we are talking about a character who, in the early books, drove a 1968 Volkswagen A few of Grafton's novels with roots in the '50s and '60s are "F" is for Fugitive; "Q" is for Quarry; "S" is for Silence; and "U" is for Undertow. For trivia buffs, Kinsey Millhone was born May 5, 1950. (Grafton was the subject of a Mystery Scene profile in issue No. 92, in 2005.)

Kris Nelscott: Her intriguing series about African-American P.I. Smokey Dalton is set in 1960s Memphis and Chicago. After too long an absence, Smokey returns in the series' seventh novel The Day After, scheduled to be published in 2012. Nelscott also writes at Kristine Kathryn Rusch, her real name.

Walter Mosley: The Easy Rawlins series began in post WWII Los Angeles and moved steadily through the 1950s and 1960s, including Cinnamon Kiss, Little Scarlet, Black Betty, and Bad Boy Brawley Brown. Mosley's series about mild-mannered bookseller Paris Minton and World War II hero Fearless Jones started in the mid 1950s: Fearless Jones, Fear Itself, and Fear of the Dark.

Megan Abbott: In an email, Abbott said that Queenpin is definitely early 1960s, although she never specifies the date.

And if you are interested in another view of the 1960s, check out Magic City on the Starz network. Magic City, which has no relationship to Hall's novel, is set in 1959 at a luxury hotel in Miami Beach. The rich, the mob, local criminals and the locals come to the hotel. I also am enjoying seeing on screen a number of area actors including Todd Allan Durkin, Ricky Waugh and Gregg Weiner.

Photo: Jon Hamm as Don Draper in Mad Men. AMC photo

Wednesday, 28 March 2012

internationalmysteriesfestival_logo

Owensboro, Kentucky, will be the place to be June 14-17 for the fourth International Mystery Writers’ Festival. This year's theme is “Discovering New Mysteries."

Unlike the vast number of mystery fiction conferences this is indeed a festival. The International Mystery Writers’ Festival takes a unique approach by including authors and TV writers and producers as well as playwrights.

The International Mystery Writers’ Festival is considered the place to launch new mystery plays. And at least two plays discovered at the festival have been awarded the Edgar Award: Joseph Goodrich's Panic in 2008 and Ifa Bayeza's The Ballad of Emmett Till in 2009.

This year's festival again will showcase mystery plays. Three works have been selected to debut during the four-day festival, which will include two live radio theatre productions and one full-length stage play. These productions will use professional directors and actors.

The festival also will showcase film and television mysteries, along with their creators, in the “Writers Reel” program.

The featured films will include writer/director Lee Goldberg’s Bumsickle, the sequel to his short film Remaindered, both of which were produced in Owensboro using local talent in front of, and behind, the camera. Goldberg is a two-time Edgar Award nominee whose many TV writing and/or producing credits include Diagnosis Murder, Hunter, Monk, and The Glades. He is also the author of the Diagnosis Murder and Monk series of original mystery novels

Novelists also will be featured during workshops, panel discussions, and retrospectives of their work.

Guest authors, playwrights, etc., soon will be announced.

The International Mystery Writers' Festival has been a festival that I have wanted to attend. My husband is a theater critic and we both applaud the nurturing and development of new plays.

International Mystery Writers' Festival
international-mystery-writers-festival

internationalmysteriesfestival_logo

Owensboro, Kentucky, will be the place to be June 14-17 for the fourth International Mystery Writers’ Festival. This year's theme is “Discovering New Mysteries."

Unlike the vast number of mystery fiction conferences this is indeed a festival. The International Mystery Writers’ Festival takes a unique approach by including authors and TV writers and producers as well as playwrights.

The International Mystery Writers’ Festival is considered the place to launch new mystery plays. And at least two plays discovered at the festival have been awarded the Edgar Award: Joseph Goodrich's Panic in 2008 and Ifa Bayeza's The Ballad of Emmett Till in 2009.

This year's festival again will showcase mystery plays. Three works have been selected to debut during the four-day festival, which will include two live radio theatre productions and one full-length stage play. These productions will use professional directors and actors.

The festival also will showcase film and television mysteries, along with their creators, in the “Writers Reel” program.

The featured films will include writer/director Lee Goldberg’s Bumsickle, the sequel to his short film Remaindered, both of which were produced in Owensboro using local talent in front of, and behind, the camera. Goldberg is a two-time Edgar Award nominee whose many TV writing and/or producing credits include Diagnosis Murder, Hunter, Monk, and The Glades. He is also the author of the Diagnosis Murder and Monk series of original mystery novels

Novelists also will be featured during workshops, panel discussions, and retrospectives of their work.

Guest authors, playwrights, etc., soon will be announced.

The International Mystery Writers' Festival has been a festival that I have wanted to attend. My husband is a theater critic and we both applaud the nurturing and development of new plays.

Sunday, 25 March 2012

laukkanen_professionals

A recurring theme in mystery fiction is greed. Follow the money and likely you will find the motive and the villain lurking behind the dollars.

Lately, plain old greed has evolved. Financial thrillers seem to be the mystery category du jour.

Blame it on the economy. Or rather, credit the economy for lending some gripping plots.

On the surface, the economic downturn might not seem to be fodder for a page-turning thriller. But what could create better grounds for crime than no money, a bleak job market and an uncertain future?

The inability to feed your family, the loss of status or just the ability to take care of basic needs drives people to desperate acts.

Dennis Lehane got the ball rolling with his 2010 novel Moonlight Mile, which marked the return of Boston private detectives Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro after a 12-year absence.

In Moonlight Mile, Patrick and Angie are now married, the parents of an adorable 4-year-old girl and faced with a mountain of bills. To support his family, Patrick has been working freelance for a security firm, but his actions on some cases have caused irreparable harm.

Lehane's recurring themes of moral ambiguity and the loss of innocence receive a thorough workout in Moonlight Mile as the author looked at what happens when one’s conscience conflicts with financial need.

Lehane wasn't the first to tap into the economic downturn, and the stories keep coming.

Owen Laukkanen mixes the recession and a bleak job market in his excellent debut The Professionals. Here, four out-of-work, newly graduated college friends turn to kidnapping.

The Professionals vividly illustrates contemporary economics while exploring how a sense of entitlement and selfishness can shade people’s logic. Laukkanen's characters still think of themselves as good people, even when things go terribly wrong.

The gang specialize in demanding a low ransom—from $60,000 to $100,000—from wealthy businessmen. The low ransoms keep them off the radar and at those prices, the kidnapping is “an inconvenience. . .not a crime,” they reason.

Laukkanen's The Professionals is one of the best debuts of this year.

Mike Cooper’s Clawback features Silas Cade, a former black ops soldier who now works as a consultant, forcing sleazy investment managers to give back millions to managers who are somewhat less sleazy.

Silas has his own definition of clawback—“a term of art, referring to the mandatory return of compensation paid on a deal that later goes bad. Sometimes the claw is literal.”

Clawback mixes high-octane action with the arcane details of banking and money management for a solid plot.

barclay_theaccidentJames Grippando's Need You Now shows how the plague of Ponzi schemes has affected mobsters. After all, criminals also need a place to park their money and, unlike most Ponzi victims, they tend to be bit more vengeful.

Grippando's character-rich story also offers an astute look at these schemes. Investigators of real Ponzi schemes should take a look at Grippando's thoughtful solutions Need You Now.

Grippando also looked at money woes in his earlier novel Money to Burn.

The recession—and how families cope with it—makes an intriguing and quite timely background for The Accident, Linwood Barclay’s ninth novel released in 2011.

The Accident
is a cautionary tale, showing the angst of those whose self-esteem is wrapped up in money when it disappears and how the strain of money woes can infect an entire community.

It all begins with a neighborhood network of counterfeit handbags, a seemingly mild transgression that begins several characters' slide down a slippery slope.

Follow the Money With Lehane, Laukkanen, Grippando
Oline Cogdill
follow-the-money-with-lehane-laukkanen-grippando

laukkanen_professionals

A recurring theme in mystery fiction is greed. Follow the money and likely you will find the motive and the villain lurking behind the dollars.

Lately, plain old greed has evolved. Financial thrillers seem to be the mystery category du jour.

Blame it on the economy. Or rather, credit the economy for lending some gripping plots.

On the surface, the economic downturn might not seem to be fodder for a page-turning thriller. But what could create better grounds for crime than no money, a bleak job market and an uncertain future?

The inability to feed your family, the loss of status or just the ability to take care of basic needs drives people to desperate acts.

Dennis Lehane got the ball rolling with his 2010 novel Moonlight Mile, which marked the return of Boston private detectives Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro after a 12-year absence.

In Moonlight Mile, Patrick and Angie are now married, the parents of an adorable 4-year-old girl and faced with a mountain of bills. To support his family, Patrick has been working freelance for a security firm, but his actions on some cases have caused irreparable harm.

Lehane's recurring themes of moral ambiguity and the loss of innocence receive a thorough workout in Moonlight Mile as the author looked at what happens when one’s conscience conflicts with financial need.

Lehane wasn't the first to tap into the economic downturn, and the stories keep coming.

Owen Laukkanen mixes the recession and a bleak job market in his excellent debut The Professionals. Here, four out-of-work, newly graduated college friends turn to kidnapping.

The Professionals vividly illustrates contemporary economics while exploring how a sense of entitlement and selfishness can shade people’s logic. Laukkanen's characters still think of themselves as good people, even when things go terribly wrong.

The gang specialize in demanding a low ransom—from $60,000 to $100,000—from wealthy businessmen. The low ransoms keep them off the radar and at those prices, the kidnapping is “an inconvenience. . .not a crime,” they reason.

Laukkanen's The Professionals is one of the best debuts of this year.

Mike Cooper’s Clawback features Silas Cade, a former black ops soldier who now works as a consultant, forcing sleazy investment managers to give back millions to managers who are somewhat less sleazy.

Silas has his own definition of clawback—“a term of art, referring to the mandatory return of compensation paid on a deal that later goes bad. Sometimes the claw is literal.”

Clawback mixes high-octane action with the arcane details of banking and money management for a solid plot.

barclay_theaccidentJames Grippando's Need You Now shows how the plague of Ponzi schemes has affected mobsters. After all, criminals also need a place to park their money and, unlike most Ponzi victims, they tend to be bit more vengeful.

Grippando's character-rich story also offers an astute look at these schemes. Investigators of real Ponzi schemes should take a look at Grippando's thoughtful solutions Need You Now.

Grippando also looked at money woes in his earlier novel Money to Burn.

The recession—and how families cope with it—makes an intriguing and quite timely background for The Accident, Linwood Barclay’s ninth novel released in 2011.

The Accident
is a cautionary tale, showing the angst of those whose self-esteem is wrapped up in money when it disappears and how the strain of money woes can infect an entire community.

It all begins with a neighborhood network of counterfeit handbags, a seemingly mild transgression that begins several characters' slide down a slippery slope.