Collider is reporting that D. J. Caruso (I Am Number Four, Eagle Eye, Disturbia) will direct a film adaptation of Josh Bazell's darkly comic suspense novel Beat the Reaper. Leonardo DiCaprio acquired the rights to the book some time ago, and may also star.
In the book, Dr. Peter Brown is an intern at Manhattan's worst hospital, with a talent for medicine, a shift from hell, and a past he'd prefer to keep hidden. Whether it's a blocked circumflex artery or a plan to land a massive malpractice suit, he knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.
Pietro "Bearclaw" Brnwna is a hitman for the mob, with a genius for violence, a well-earned fear of sharks, and an overly close relationship with the Federal Witness Relocation Program. More likely to leave a trail of dead gangsters than a molecule of evidence, he's the last person you want to see in your hospital room.
Nicholas LoBrutto, aka Eddy Squillante, is Dr. Brown's new patient, with three months to live and a very strange idea: that Peter Brown and Pietro Brnwa might -- just might -- be the same person ...
Now, with the mob, the government, and death itself descending on the hospital, Peter has to buy time and do whatever it takes to keep his patients, himself, and his last shot at redemption alive. To get through the next eight hours -- and somehow beat the reaper.
You can read the first chapter(s) of Beat the Reaper below. Use the Aa settings button to adjust text size, line spacing, and word density.
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
Film Adaptation of Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell Moving Forward with New Director
Dreamworks Acquires Original Screenplay Featuring Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini
Sherlock Holmes creator Arthur Conan Doyle and master magician Harry Houdini shared a friendship -- some might say an uneasy one, given Doyle's belief in Spiritualism and Houdini's vehement opposition to it -- during the 1920s. This real-life fact has been the inspiration for a number of fictional stories; see, for example, Gabriel Brownstein's 2005 suspense novel The Man from Beyond.
Now, The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that Dreamworks has purchased Voices from the Dead, an original screenplay from J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5, Jeremiah, numerous episodes of Murder, She Wrote and Jake and the Fatman) in which the two men work together with a psychic to solve a series of murders in 1920s New York City.
Cinemax Orders Strike Back, Inspired by the Thriller by Chris Ryan
Inside TV is reporting that Cinemax has ordered Strike Back, a 10-part drama series "inspired" by both the thriller Strike Back, written by the pseudonymous Chris Ryan, a former British Special Forces operative, and the 6-episode UK mini-series adapted from the book.
Production will begin this month with filming in Hungary and South Africa, and feature new characters in a globe-spanning setting.
The book features two soldiers, one a celebrated military hero and the other a broken veteran living in the gutters of London. Their paths last crossed nearly twenty years ago. Now, amidst a hostage crisis in the Middle East, their lives are about to collide again.
While the book is not generally available in the US (the cover above is for a UK re-issue scheduled for publication later this year), the mini-series Chris Ryan's Strike Back (Blu-ray disc) is available. Watch a trailer below.
The Bones Companion App for iPad
If you're a fan of Bones and if you have an iPad, then Fox has an app for you!
The network released a free iPad app last week that lets you get additional information with key scenes and events in the episode as they happen on TV.
Keep your iPad on your lap while you watch Bones and participate with the live show helping to solve cases, decipher forensic speak, listen to and purchase the songs played on the show, comment with fellow fans, and more.
The Bones companion is live with the show and new every week for the rest of the season.
Ding Dong the Diva's Dead by Cat Melodia (Mystery Book Review)
Ding Dong the Diva's Dead by Cat Melodia. A Deborah de Lille Mystery. Camel Press Hardcover, February 2011.
The operatic elements in this very busy debut are presented in an entertaining manner, and some readers will no doubt delight in the madcap adventure amateur sleuth and mezzo soprano Debbie de Lille seems to be on, but the lack of focus on the matter at hand, the whodunit, if you will, probably makes the book somewhat less satisfactory for those seeking a well-developed mystery story.
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: Ding Dong the Diva's Dead by Cat Melodia.
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Read the first chapter(s) of Ding Dong the Diva's Dead below. Use the Aa settings button to adjust text size, line spacing, and word density.
The CW Orders Pilot Adapted from The Secret Circle by L. J. Smith
The CW has ordered a pilot for The Secret Circle, adapted from the trilogy of young adult thrillers by L. J. Smith. The creative team behind The Vampire Diaries (also adapted from another of Smith's series) will executive produce.
In the first book of The Secret Circle Trilogy, The Initiation, Cassie longs for her old life after being forced to move from sunny California to gloomy New England. Even so, she feels a strange kinship to a terrifying group of teens who seem to rule her school. Initiated into the coven of witches that's controlled New Salem for hundreds of years, she's drawn into the Secret Circle, a thrill that's both intoxicating and deadly. But when she falls for the mysterious and intriguing Adam, Cassie must choose whether to resist temptation or risk dark forces to get what she wants—even if it means that one wrong move could ultimately destroy her.
The two sequels are The Captive and The Power. All three books were originally published in 1992, and reissued as a two-volume set in 2008.
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
Second Season of Justified Premieres Wednesday, February 9th on FX Networks
Tomorrow, Wednesday February 9th, the second season of Justified premieres on FX Networks (10 PM ET/PT).
Timothy Olyphant stars as Deputy US Marshal Raylan Givens, who returns to his home town in Eastern Kentucky, bringing his own brand of justice to bear on local criminals. The character is based on one created in a series of short stories by crime novelist Elmore Leonard.
Fresh off the epic gun battle that concluded the first season, this season opens with Bo Crowder dead, and the Crowder criminal grip on Harlan County broken. Givens must now face off against the criminal organizations that are moving to fill the void, and finds himself entangled once again with the mercurial Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins).
Watch a preview for Justified below:
The Fourth Assassin by Matt Beynon Rees, An Omar Yussef Mystery
The Mystery Bookshelf, where you can discover a library of new mysteries, is pleased to feature a new mystery series title we recently received from the publisher.
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The Fourth Assassin by Matt Beynon Rees
An Omar Yussef Mystery (4th in series)
Soho Crime (Trade Paperback)
Publication Date: February 2011
ISBN-13: 978-1-56947-885-1
About The Fourth Assassin (from the publisher): When Omar Yussef travels to New York for a UN Conference, he's eager to visit his youngest son Ala, who lives in Bay Ridge, a Brooklyn neighborhood with a large Palestinian community. He arrives at Ala's apartment to find the door ajar and a headless body in one of the beds. He's initially terrified that the dead man is his son, but soon Ala arrives and identifies the body as that of one of his roommates. He's convinced that his other roommate is the killer. But when the cops show up Ala refuses to give an alibi and is arrested.
Desperate to prove his son's innocence, Omar Yussef investigates. The murderer has left clues that refer to the Assassins, a medieval Shiite sect. When they were teenagers, Ala and his roommates had a club by that name. What's the connection? As Omar Yussef delves deeper, he uncovers a deadly international conspiracy.
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About Matt Beynon Rees: Born in South Wales, he has covered the Middle East as a journalist for over a decade and was Time magazine's Jerusalem bureau chief from 2000 to 2006. The first book in this series, The Collaborator of Jerusalem, won the CWA New Blood Dagger. He lives in Jerusalem. Visit his website at MattBeynonRees.com.
Read the first chapter(s) of The Fourth Assassin below. Use the Aa settings button to adjust text size, line spacing, and word density.
Random House Acquires Trilogy of YA Thrillers by Mark Frost
In a press release today, Random House Children's Books announced the publisher had acquired Will West: The Epic, a trilogy of thrillers for young adults written by Mark Frost. The first book in the series, The Paladin Protocol, will be published in Fall 2012.
Will West "combines a sophisticated mystery with furiously-paced action and a twist of the paranormal. In the novel, the title character has spent his entire life trying to avoid any attention at the request of his parents. Then by sheer accident, Will scores off the charts on a nationwide exam and is recruited by an exclusive and somewhat mysterious prep school, the best school no one's ever heard of, with technology the likes of which no one's ever seen. At the same time, coincidentally—or not so—Will realizes he's being followed by men in dark hats, driving black sedans who pose a terrifying threat to his family. What follows is a series of events and revelations that places Will smack in the middle of a millennia old struggle between titanic forces."
Mark Frost is a novelist and television screewriter, whose credits include The Six Million Dollar Man, Hill Street Blues, and Twin Peaks. He published his first novel, The List of Seven featuring a young Arthur Conan Doyle, in 1993.
The Illuminated Vineyard by Jean Moynahan (Mystery Book Review)
The Illuminated Vineyard by Jean Moynahan. Non-series. Five Star Hardcover, February 2011.
The author crafts an interesting environment for her characters in this novel of suspense, creating a sense of near-constant apprehension for the reader. The murder investigation and whodunit aspect is nicely handled, but is clearly secondary to the overall story arc of a recently widowed woman and her uneasy relationship with a mysterious young man.
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: The Illuminated Vineyard by Jean Moynahan.
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