Mystery writer Charlaine Harris already has one television series based on her characters on the air (HBO's True Blood); now CBS may be adding another.
Variety is reporting that the broadcast network is interested in Harris's Harper Connelly series, the first book of which, Grave Sight, will also serve as the series title. Brothers Ridley Scott and Tony Scott will co-executive produce.
Set in the Deep South, Harper Connelly has what you might call a strange job: she finds dead people. The way Harper sees it, she's providing a service to the dead while bringing some closure to the living -- but she's used to most people treating her like a blood-sucking leech. Traveling with her stepbrother Tolliver as her manager and sometime-bodyguard, she's become an expert at getting in, getting paid, and getting out fast. Because for the living it's always urgent -- even if the dead can wait forever.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Charlaine Harris's Harper Connelly Mysteries to be Adapted for Television by CBS
Inside Out by Barry Eisler (Book Review)
Inside Out by Barry Eisler. Non-series. Ballantine Hardcover, June 2010.
After a collection of sensitive videotapes are stolen from the US government, and held for ransom -- $100,000,000 in diamonds else they're posted online -- undercover operative Ben Treven is assigned to retrieve them in Barry Eisler's political thriller Inside Out.
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: Inside Out by Barry Eisler.
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Mysterious Reviews is your source for the latest mystery, suspense, thriller, and crime novel reviews, edited by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books.
Film Adaptation of Video Game Uncharted: Drake's Fortune Planned
The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that a film adaptation of the popular video game Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, will be scripted and directed by David O. Russell (Three Kings, I Heart Huckabees).
An action adventure suspense game released in 2007 and available exclusively for the Playstation 3, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune features Nathan Drake, a descendent of Sir Francis Drake, who is seeking the lost treasure of El Dorado. Other characters include journalist Elena Fisher and Drake's side-kick Victor "Sully" Sullivan. A sequel to the game, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, was released in 2009.
An early trailer for the game can be seen below. Seems awfully similar to the Indiana Jones films -- and maybe that's intentional. What do you think about this adaptation?
Lionsgate Acquires Puppet/Human Film Project Happytime Murders
The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision blog is reporting that Lionsgate has acquired a murder mystery comedy project from the Jim Henson Co. The twist: it's not a kid's film.
Titled Happytime Murders, the cast features both puppets and humans. When a puppet who works on a children's show is murdered, a private investigator -- a puppet with a drinking problem and a former LAPD cop -- takes on the case with his former partner, a human.
Brian Henson, Jim Henson's son, is set to direct. Production may start as early as January 2011.
Help Becky Brogan Investigate the Disappearance of a Nurse in The Institute, New at BFG
Games of Mystery is pleased to announce the availability of a new mystery casual game from Big Fish Games released today and available to BFG Club members. You can find out more about these games by visiting our Mystery Games: Big Fish Download Games page or by clicking on the links provided below.
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A nurse at a troubled youth facility has mysteriously disappeared. When Becky Brogan -- a college student studying investigative journalism -- starts digging around at the Institute, she learns more about Dr. Benjamin Gentle, a psychiatrist with a sordid past and interesting treatment methods. The disappearance of Nurse Ursa casts suspicion on a number of patients, and it’s up to Becky to decipher the clues left behind in each room of the institute to discover what really happened.
See also the first game in this series, The Mystery of Meane Manor.
Becky Brogan: The Institute may be downloaded and purchased for $6.99 with a Big Fish Game Club membership. A demonstration version (115.02 MB) may be downloaded and played for free for one hour.
Watch a preview video below:
Get any standard game for $6.99 with a Big Fish Game Club membership. Other benefits include the $2.99 Daily Deal, Tomorrow's Game Today, and special member rewards. And if you purchase any 6 games within a single month, you earn a free game with the Big Fish Game Club Monthly Punch Card! (Collector's Editions earn 3 punches each, half-way towards your free game!)
Read Ms. Terri's reviews of the adventure and casual mystery games featured on this site, including Midnight Mysteries: The Edgar Allan Poe Conspiracy, Nancy Drew Dossier: Lights, Camera, Curses!, Enlightenus, and many more!
Big Fish Games: Bestsellers
Big Fish Games: New releases
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Games of Mystery is your source for mystery-themed video, electronic, and board games, parties for kids and adults, and murder mystery weekends and mystery getaway vacations!
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
New Trailer for Second Season of Justified Released by FX Networks
The second season of Justified doesn't premiere until next February, but FX Networks has just released a trailer for it; you can watch it below.
Based on a character created by crime novelist Elmore Leonard, Justified stars Timothy Olyphant as Deputy US Marshal Raylan Givens, a true-blue hero and something of a throwback, given to wearing a Stetson and cowboy boots, carrying his sidearm in a hip holster –- a weapon he only draws when he has to, and when he does, he shoots to kill, because, as he sees it, that’s the purpose of a gun.
Robert De Niro and Richard Price Sell Crime Drama Concept to CBS
The Hollywood Reporter's Live Feed blog is reporting that actor Robert De Niro and mystery author Richard Price have sold a script for a new crime drama to CBS.
Titled Rookies, the storyline involves a team of six new cops who are sent into high-crime areas.
Price is no stranger to film or television. Two of his novels, Clockers and Freedomland, have previously been adapted for film (he also wrote the screenplay for the latter), and his television credits include writing five episodes of the series The Wire.
The Violet Hour by Daniel Judson
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 Violet Hour by Daniel Judson
Non-series
Minotaur Books (Trade Paperback)
Publication Date: October 2010
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-38358-9
About The Violet Hour (from the publisher): Bridgehampton mechanic Caleb Rakowski gets paid under the table at his friend Eric Carver’s auto repair shop and lives in an apartment above it. He’s good at his job and he’s making a decent living, but right now he’s sheltering a pregnant friend who’ll do anything to keep her abusive husband away from her. Cal has sworn to protect her. Little does he know, though, the trouble destined to come down over the course of three days—Mischief Night, Halloween, and the Day of the Dead—when he learns the truth about his friend and boss Eric Carver and what he’s been hiding all these years.
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About Daniel Judson: A Shamus Award winner for The Poisoned Rose and a three-time finalist, he attended Southampton College, and his time in the Hamptons (particularly the parts that don’t make the society pages) was the inspiration for the setting and characters in The Violet Hour. He now lives in Connecticut.
Read the first chapters of The Violet Hour below.
And Then There Was One by Patricia Gussin (Book Review)
And Then There Was One by Patricia Gussin. Non-series. Oceanview Publishing Hardcover, October 2010.
Patricia Gussin explores what happens to a family's dynamics when two of their three children, identical triplets, disappear without a trace, in And Then There Was One, the author's fourth novel of suspense.
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: And Then There Was One by Patricia Gussin.
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Mysterious Reviews is your source for the latest mystery, suspense, thriller, and crime novel reviews, edited by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books.
Monday, October 11, 2010
ABC's Body of Proof Delayed until Mid-Season
When we were reporting on new Prime Time Crime series for this television season, we noted that ABC had not scheduled its series Body of Proof starring Dana Delany. Although several sources were speculating that the network would debut the series in late October, Variety is now reporting that its premiere date has been delayed until "mid-season", when it can be given a better time slot by the network.
Body of Proof features Dr. Megan Hunt (Delany), a brilliant neurosurgeon at the top of her game, whose world is turned upside down when a devastating car accident puts an end to her time in the operating room. Megan resumes her career as a medical examiner determined to solve the puzzle of who or what killed the victims of crime.
Bloody Twist by Carolina Garcia-Aguilera (Book Review)
Bloody Twist by Carolina Garcia-Aguilera. A Lupe Solano Mystery. Miramar Publishing Trade Paperback, June 2010.
Miami private investigator Guadalupe "Lupe" Solano is hired to do a background check on a client of defense attorney Tommy McDonald, who has retained him in the event she's charged with the murder of two men she knew, in Bloody Twist, the seventh mystery in this series by Carolina Garcia-Aguilera.
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: Bloody Twist by Carolina Garcia-Aguilera.
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Mysterious Reviews is your source for the latest mystery, suspense, thriller, and crime novel reviews, edited by the Hidden Staircase Mystery Books.
TNT Orders Pilot for Raymond Chandler-style Series
The Hollywood Reporter's Live Feed blog is reporting that TNT has ordered a pilot for Hollywood and Vine, a Raymond Chandler-style mystery series in which the lead character, a private eye, is described as "possessing stoic charm and an uncompromising set of personal values that will let nothing deter him in his search for the truth -– even if it means taking on the upper echelons of power in a city balanced precariously between the glamour of Hollywood and Beverly Hills and the dual threat of organized crime and a corrupt police department."
Daniel Pyne (The Sum of All Fears, The Manchurian Candidate) will write the screenplay and executive produce.
Greg Rucka to Write New Series of Thrillers for Mulholland Books
Mulholland Books, the new crime imprint of Little, Brown, announced today that Greg Rucka will write a new series of three thrillers for the publisher, a "reverse Bourne Identity" scenario involving a former Delta Force operator who discovers that his allies are pursuing a dark agenda far different than his own.
The announcement was made at the end of a highly entertaining post by Rucka, in which he talks about some of the things he's done in the name of research for his books. "I love doing research. It's like cheating, but with permission."
Inspector Lewis, New This Week on DVD
Telemystery, your source for one of the most comprehensive selections of detective, amateur sleuth, private investigator, and suspense television mystery series, mini-series and made-for-television movies, now available or coming soon to DVD or Blu-ray disc, is profiling one series being released this week.
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Kevin Whately returns as Inspector Lewis in a third season of the popular detective series. In five new episodes, Lewis and his young partner, Detective Sergeant Hathaway (Laurence Fox), continue solving cases in the seemingly perfect academic haven of Oxford.
Inspector Lewis is a spin-off of the long-running Inspector Morse series, and features characters created by crime novelist Colin Dexter, who is a consultant on the series.
The Inspector Lewis: Series Three DVD set of 3 discs contain the five episodes that originally aired on Masterpiece Mystery! during August and September 2010.
A fourth season of the series (called Series 5 in the UK) has been confirmed and is expected to air during 2011.
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Visit the Telemystery website to discover more television mystery series currently available on DVD and Blu-ray disc.
Drawn: The Painted Tower is BFG's Catch of the Week
From Monday, October 11th, through Sunday, October 17th, the Big Fish Games Catch of the Week is Drawn: The Painted Tower. Use the coupon code CATCH299 at checkout to purchase the game for just $2.99.
Enter the world of Drawn and unravel the secrets of the Painted Tower while overcoming challenging puzzles on your quest to save Iris.
A curse has locked each floor of the tower, and only the most creative adventurer can find a way through. Enter lush painted worlds and meet fantastic characters who will help you … and sometimes try to stop you, on your quest through this mysterious dream world.
Beware as darkness approaches the tower. Can you save her in time?
Find more (regularly priced) mystery games to download on our BFG Adventure Games and BFG Hidden Object Games pages.
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Games of Mystery is your source for mystery-themed video, electronic, and board games, parties for kids and adults, and murder mystery weekends and mystery getaway vacations!
