Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: The Gravedigger's Ball by Solomon Jones.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
The Mystery Bookshelf: Frozen Assets by Quentin Bates, a Gunnhildur Gísladóttir Mystery
The Mystery Bookshelf, where you can discover a world of mystery and suspense, is pleased to feature a new crime novel we recently received from the publisher.
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Frozen Assets by Quentin Bates
A Gunnhildur Gísladóttir Mystery (1st in series)
Soho Crime (Trade Paperback)
Publication Date: January 2012
ISBN-13: 978-1-61695-056-9
About Frozen Assets (from the publisher): A body is found floating in the harbor of a rural Icelandic fishing village. Was it an accident, or something more sinister? It’s up to Officer Gunnhildur, a sardonic female cop, to find out. Her investigation uncovers a web of corruption connected to Iceland’s business and banking communities. Meanwhile, a rookie crime journalist latches onto her, looking for a scoop, and an anonymous blogger is stirring up trouble. The complications increase, as do the stakes, when a second murder is committed.
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About the author: Quentin Bates lived in Iceland for 10 years. In 1990, he returned to the UK, where he became a full-time journalist at a commercial fishing magazine. He and his wife frequently return to Iceland, where they have many friends … including several in the Reykjavík police.
Purchase Options for Frozen Assets:
Mulholland Books has an Excerpt from the Graphic Novel Mystery Men
The graphic novel Mystery Men — which collects the five separate issues of the comic published last year — is released this week and the folks at Mulholland Books have an excerpt.
Written by David Liss and illustrated by Patrick Zircher, Mystery Men introduces all-new, never-before-seen heroes of the 1930s. With a new evil washing over an unsuspecting New York City, the Operative, the Aviatrix, the Surgeon, the Revenant and Achilles blast through dangers from blood-soaked mob warehouses to monster-infested mansions, and fight to blow the lid off a conspiracy that could bring the nation itself to its knees.
David Liss is the author of several stand-alone crime novels in addition to his series featuring private investigator Benjamin Weaver. The first book in that series, A Conspiracy of Paper, published in 2000, was the winner of multiple awards, including the Edgar Award for Best First Novel and the Macavity Award for Best First Novel.
Patrick Zircher has illustrated a number of series including Iron Man, New Warriors, Thunderbolts, X-Men and X-Men 2.
(Related article: Mulholland Books.)
Summer People by Aaron Stander is Today's Fourth Featured Free MystereBook
MystereBooks is pleased to feature Summer People by Aaron Stander as today's fourth free mystery ebook. We don't know how long it will be offered at this special price (typically for a limited time only or until a certain number of downloads have been completed), so we urge you to download it while it is still available for free.
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Summer People by Aaron Stander
A Ray Elkins Mystery
Publisher: Writers & Editors
Northwest lower Michigan sheriff Ray Elkins is introduced in the first of five (to date) mysteries in this series.
About Summer People (from the publisher): It is late June in Michigan's gold coast vacation area. The summer residents are settling in for the season and the tourists are beginning to flood the highways, beaches, and resorts. But the idyllic vision of a summer by the lake is suddenly shattered by a gangland-style slaying of one of the old money cottagers. This murder is quickly followed by the deaths of three more summer residents, each taking place under suspicious circumstances.
At times hindered by local politics and the proverbial tension between the summer people and the natives, Sheriff Ray Elkins searches for the possible links between the four victims. As he probes into their tangled lives and dark histories, he finds both the motive and the possible murderer.
Important Note: Prices can and do change without prior notice, so please confirm the price of the book before completing your purchase.
Download Link(s):
For more free mystery ebooks, visit our Free MystereBooks page.
The Gauntlet Assassin by L. J. Sellers is Today's Third Featured Free MystereBook
MystereBooks is pleased to feature The Gauntlet Assassin by L. J. Sellers as today's third free mystery ebook. We don't know how long it will be offered at this special price (typically for a limited time only or until a certain number of downloads have been completed), so we urge you to download it while it is still available for free.
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The Gauntlet Assassin by L. J. Sellers
Non-Series
Publisher: Spellbinder Press
This stand-alone futuristic thriller, originally published as The Arranger, is by the author of the Wade Jackson mysteries.
About The Gauntlet Assassin (from the publisher): The year is 2023 and ex-detective Lara Evans is working as a freelance paramedic in a bleak new world. She responds to an emergency call and is nearly killed when a shooter flees the home. Inside she finds the federal employment commissioner wounded, but she’s able to save his life. The next day Lara leaves for the Gauntlet—a national competition of intense physical and mental challenges with high stakes for her home state. She spots the assailant lurking at the arena and soon after, she lands in deep trouble. Who is the mysterious killer and what is motivating him? Can Lara stop him, stay alive, and win the Gauntlet?
Important Note: Prices can and do change without prior notice, so please confirm the price of the book before completing your purchase.
Download Link(s):
For more free mystery ebooks, visit our Free MystereBooks page.
Blown Away by Shane Gericke is Today's Second Featured Free MystereBook
MystereBooks is pleased to feature Blown Away by Shane Gericke as today's second free mystery ebook. We don't know how long it will be offered at this special price (typically for a limited time only or until a certain number of downloads have been completed), so we urge you to download it while it is still available for free.
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Blown Away by Shane Gericke
An Emily Thompson Mystery
Publisher: Pinnacle
Suburban Chicago police detective Emily Thompson is introduced in this mystery, the first of three in the series.
About Blown Away (from the publisher): A serial killer is playing a deadly game. There are no rules except one: The killer always wins. The loser always dies.
Since joining the force, rookie cop Emily Thompson has had one ambition: to work homicide. Now she’s got her chance. A twisted sociopath is turning her safe Chicago suburb into a brutal killing field, and every single one of his grisly clues leads directly to Emily. In 72 hours, on her fortieth birthday, he intends to make her his greatest trophy. If she doesn’t stop him before then, Emily’s first case will be her last.
In a city gripped by terror, and with little more to go on than her instincts, Emily must match wits with a madman bent on chilling revenge. It is an investigation that will lead her into a nightmare world of unimaginable crimes, the dark secrets of her own past—and to a final shocking discovery …
Read our review of Blown Away by Shane Gericke.
Important Note: Prices can and do change without prior notice, so please confirm the price of the book before completing your purchase.
Download Link(s):
For more free mystery ebooks, visit our Free MystereBooks page.
All For One by Ryne Douglas Pearson is Today's Featured Free MystereBook
MystereBooks is pleased to feature All For One by Ryne Douglas Pearson as today's free mystery ebook. We don't know how long it will be offered at this special price (typically for a limited time only or until a certain number of downloads have been completed), so we urge you to download it while it is still available for free.
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All For One by Ryne Douglas Pearson
Non-Series
Publisher: Schmuck & Underwood
About All For One (from the publisher): Mary Austin is the kind of teacher that parents adore and children wish for. Firm and compassionate, a guiding light in their lives, she would do anything to protect her students.
But that loyalty is tested when the school's sadistic bully is found dead on campus, and suspicion falls on six children in her class. None willing to talk. To point the finger.
To reveal the killer.
Faced with this, Mary finds herself confronted with dark memories from her own childhood. Fragmentary flashes from the past that test the bounds of her reality, the onslaught worsening when a tenacious detective is brought in to close the case.
On loan from the Seattle Police Department, Detective Dooley Ashe is plagued by his own demons, but focuses on breaking through the wall of silence the children have erected. Up against a town indifferent toward the crime and suspects virtually untouchable by the law, Dooley turns to Mary as an avenue to the truth.
As an unlikely closeness develops between Dooley and Mary, the suspected children close ranks, worried that one of their own is ready to break and give the detective what he wants.
But when unseen adversaries push back, with both damaging and deadly results, Dooley and Mary are forced to face their personal limits as they each discover the unthinkable identity of the real killer.
Important Note: Prices can and do change without prior notice, so please confirm the price of the book before completing your purchase.
Download Link(s):
For more free mystery ebooks, visit our Free MystereBooks page.
Zoo Station by David Downing is Today's Barnes&Noble Nook Daily Find
MystereBooks is pleased to feature Zoo Station by David Downing as today's Barnes&Noble Daily Find. The deal price of $3.60 is valid only for today, Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Note: Amazon.com is matching the price of this ebook for today only.
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Zoo Station by David Downing
A John Russell Mystery
Soho Crime
This title introduces American journalist John Russell, living in pre-World War II Berlin. There are currently four books in the series, and we've had the pleasure of reading and reviewing all of them, intricately crafted fictional mysteries within the context of an all-too-real historical period.
About Zoo Station (from the publisher): By 1939, Anglo-American journalist John Russell has spent over a decade in Berlin, where his son lives with his mother. He writes human-interest pieces for British and American papers, avoiding the investigative journalism that could get him deported. But as World War II approaches, he faces having to leave his son as well as his girlfriend of several years, a beautiful German starlet.
When an acquaintance from his old communist days approaches him to do some work for the Soviets, Russell is reluctant, but he is unable to resist the offer. He becomes involved in other dangerous activities, helping a Jewish family and a determined young American reporter. When the British and the Nazis notice his involvement with the Soviets, Russell is dragged into the murky world of warring intelligence services.
Read our review of Zoo Station by David Downing.
Important Note: Prices can and do change without prior notice, so please confirm the price of the book before completing your purchase.
Download Link(s):
Monday, January 09, 2012
Warner Bros. Hires Screenwriter for Adaptation of A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness
Last July we reported that Warner Bros. had optioned the film rights to A Discovery of Witches, the debut supernatural suspense novel by Deborah Harness.
Now we're learning that the studio has hired Pulitzer Prize-winning, Tony Award-winning playwright David Auburn (Proof, The Lake House) to write the screenplay.
A Discovery of Witches — the first in an expected trilogy — introduces Diana Bishop, a young scholar and the descendant of witches, who discovers a long-lost and enchanted alchemical manuscript deep in Oxford's Bodleian Library. Its reappearance summons a fantastical underworld, which she navigates with her leading man, vampire geneticist Matthew Clairmont.
It's no secret that what with the Harry Potter film series complete, Warner Bros. is looking for new material from which to build a franchise. This adaptation would seem to us to be a solid start.
(Related article: The Hollywood Reporter.)
Review: The Burning Soul by John Connolly
Read the full text of our review at Mysterious Reviews: The Burning Soul by John Connolly.
TNT Orders Pilot for Crime Drama L.A. Noir
TNT announced today (via a press release) that the cable network has ordered a pilot for L.A. Noir, based on John Buntin's 2009 book L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America's Most Seductive City, which chronicles the epic battle between Los Angeles Police Chief William Parker and mobster Mickey Cohen, a one-time boxer who rose to the top of L.A.'s criminal world.
The series — if subsequently ordered — is expected to be a fast-paced crime drama set in Los Angeles during the 1940s and '50s. It's a world of glamorous movie stars, powerful studio heads, returning war heroes, a powerful and corrupt police force and an even more dangerous criminal network determined to make L.A. its West Coast base.
Frank Darabont (The Walking Dead, The Shawshank Redemption) will executive produce the pilot and direct his own adapted screenplay.
Mr. E. Reviews Cowboys & Aliens
Purchase/Rental Option(s)
This adaptation of the graphic novel of the same title doesn't develop its potential much beyond what is minimally necessary. Indeed, rather than create something new and exciting, the director seems content to simply string together a sequence of recreations of previously filmed scenes from other, better, films and television shows.
Read the full text of our review at Mr. E. Reviews Cowboys & Aliens.
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Mr. E. Reviews is your source for mystery, suspense, thriller, and crime drama reviews of television and film.
The World of the Hunger Games
In a little over two months, The Hunger Games — adapted from the bestselling young adult novel by Suzanne Collins — opens in theaters in the US. In advance of the film's release, Scholastic has announced plans to produce a number of books linked to the movie. We have previously written about two of these — The Hunger Games Tribute Guide and The Hunger Games: Official Illustrated Movie Companion — and now we have the artwork for the cover of another: The World of The Hunger Games (right). The image used is also the same from the puzzle poster contest from last month.
The World of The Hunger Games is a richly illustrated, full-color guide to all the districts of Panem, all the participants in the Hunger Games, and the life and home of Katniss Everdeen. It is available to pre-order; the official publication date is March 23rd, 2012, the same day the film opens. (Note: Amazon.com lists the publication date as February 7th, the same day as the other books published by Scholastic, but we believe this to be incorrect.)
Mystery and Suspense Films, New This Week on DVD (120110)
Checking through our list of films currently scheduled for release this week on DVD and/or Blu-ray disc, shown below are those that fall into the mystery, suspense, thriller and adventure categories.
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Purchase/Rental Options
Killer Elite (2011)
Film Synopsis (from the studio): Jason Statham, Clive Owen, and Robert De Niro star in this adaptation of Ranulph Fiennes 1991 bestselling true story-based novel The Feather Men.
Two of the world's most elite operatives, Danny (Jason Statham) and his mentor Hunter (Robert De Niro) go up against the cunning leader of a secret military society (Clive Owen). Covering the globe from Australia to Paris, London and the Middle East, Danny and Hunter are plunged into a highly dangerous game of cat and mouse — where the predators become the prey.
Rated R. 116 minutes.
Watch a trailer for the film below:
Hulu Acquires Canadian Crime Drama Endgame
Hulu has acquired the Canadian crime drama Endgame, which it has begun streaming today. The first two episodes — "Opening Moves" and "Turkish Hold Em" — are currently available to watch; we've embedded "Opening Moves" below … but suspect it won't be available to watch for free for very long.
Endgame stars Shawn Doyle as brilliant chess master Arkady Balagan. Traumatized by the murder of his fiancée, Balagan has become a prisoner in his luxury Vancouver hotel, terrified to step outside. To pay his bill, Balagan starts solving mysteries — using an unlikely band of hotel employees and chess fanatics to do his legwork. He imagines events, interviews the living and the dead, and runs conflicting scenarios — all in his head, solving crimes that baffle the police.
Endgame premiered in March 2011 on Showcase in Canada, running 13 episodes. It has not been renewed for a second season … yet.
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