Music Review: AMERICA by Thirty Seconds to Mars (Polydor)

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30SecondsToMars-America“Your ears start bleeding” when one cranks modern music up to 11, Thirty Seconds to Mars frontman Jared Leto observed to Rolling Stone‘s Brian Hiatt. He has a point — modern music production methods tend to lean towards loud, busy and highly-compressed recording. “It used to be pleasurable to crank up Zeppelin or Nirvana to 12 in your car,” he continued. “Now everyone would complain — it’s so piercing, so bright.”

This observation struck me as a little odd coming from Leto: Thirty Seconds to Mars is one of the most melodramatic, cinematic rock bands working today: pretty much the whole of their This Is War album, for example, is operatic and bombastic. The concern about modern production, and the “brightness” of contemporary songs is popular among ‘purists’ and classic rock fans — it’s common to see comparisons of sounds wave graphs (which I admit is extremely nerdy) of Beatles recordings with those of recent singles. This concern seems to have informed Thirty Seconds to Mars’s America throughout. Continue reading →

Review: THE SHAKESPEARE REQUIREMENT by Julie Schumacher (Doubleday)

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SchumacherJ-JF2-ShakespeareRequirementUSA fantastic follow-up to Dear Committee Members

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune keep hitting beleaguered English professor Jason Fitger right between the eyes in this hilarious and eagerly awaited sequel to the cult classic of anhedonic academe, the Thurber Prize-winning Dear Committee Members. Once more into the breach…

Now is the fall of his discontent, as Jason Fitger, newly appointed chair of the English Department of Payne University, takes arms against a sea of troubles, personal and institutional. His ex-wife is sleeping with the dean who must approve whatever modest initiatives he undertakes. The fearsome department secretary Fran clearly runs the show (when not taking in rescue parrots and dogs) and holds plenty of secrets she’s not sharing. The lavishly funded Econ Department keeps siphoning off English’s meager resources and has taken aim at its remaining office space. And Fitger’s attempt to get a mossbacked and antediluvian Shakespeare scholar to retire backfires spectacularly when the press concludes that the Bard is being kicked to the curricular curb.

Lord, what fools these mortals be! Julie Schumacher proves the point and makes the most of it in this delicious romp of satire.

Julie Schumacher’s previous novel, Dear Committee Members was one of my favourite novels of 2014: it was funny, warm-hearted, extremely well-written, and populated by familiar and endearing (albeit hapless) characters. In The Shakespeare Requirement, the author reunites readers with characters at Payne University. Written in a slightly different style, it is no less engaging, amusing and sharply observed. Another excellent novel. Continue reading →

Interview with DAVID RICCIARDI

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RicciardiD-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is David Ricciardi?

I’m a thriller addict and an outdoor enthusiast who always thought I had a book inside me and finally decided to take a shot at it.

Your debut novel, Warning Light, will be published by Berkley in next week (April 17th). I’m lucky enough to have already read it, and I really enjoyed it. How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

Thanks! I’m glad you liked it. I’d tell potential readers that it’s a story of survival and self-reliance. It begins with a young CIA analyst who volunteers for a mission in the field and soon finds himself fighting for his life. It’s man against man and man against nature as the hero is chased across the globe by Iranian counterintelligence agents. Continue reading →

Quick Review: SHINING CITY by Tom Rosenstiel (Ecco)

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RosenstielT-1-ShiningCityUSPolitical intrigue and machinations surrounding a SCOTUS nomination. And a killer looking for revenge…

Peter Rena is a “fixer.” He and his partner, Randi Brooks, earn their living making the problems of the powerful disappear. They get their biggest job yet when the White House hires them to vet the president’s nominee for the Supreme Court. Judge Roland Madison is a legal giant, but he’s a political maverick, with views that might make the already tricky confirmation process even more difficult. Rena and his team go full-bore to cover every inch of the judge’s past, while the competing factions of Washington D.C. mobilize with frightening intensity: ambitious senators, garrulous journalists, and wily power players on both sides of the aisle.

All of that becomes background when a string of seemingly random killings overlaps with Rena’s investigation, with Judge Madison a possible target. Racing against the clock to keep his nominee safe, the President satisfied, and the political wolves at bay, Rena learns just how dangerous Washington’s obsession with power — how to get it and how to keep it — can be.

This is a very fine debut novel. It is the story of a judicial confirmation, the personal and political aspects of such a fight, colliding with a quest for vengeance. If you’re looking for an intelligent political drama, then Shining City is for you. One of my favourite reads of the year so far. Continue reading →

Interview with LEO CAREW

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CarewL-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Leo Carew?

I am a 26-year-old from London. I studied biological anthropology at university, which played a huge role in The Wolf. Outside of writing, I’m training to be an army doctor and am love exploration, particularly in the Arctic.

Your debut novel, The Wolf, will be published this month by Orbit (US) and Wildfire (UK). It looks interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader? Is it part of a series?

It’s the first in a trilogy which imagines that more than one species of human survived the Ice Age. It follows a protagonist from an alternate race of people (the Anakim) after his father is killed in battle and he attempts to inherit the throne. At the same time he has to resist an invasion from another race of humans, forcing him to gather allies as fast as possible, and turn to some people he’d rather not… Continue reading →

Review: BEST SERVED COLD by Joe Abercrombie (Gollancz/Orbit)

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Abercrombie-BestServedColdUKAbercrombie expands the World of the First Law

Springtime in Styria. And that means war. Springtime in Styria. And that means revenge.

There have been nineteen years of blood. The ruthless Grand Duke Orso is locked in a vicious struggle with the squabbling League of Eight, and between them they have bled the land white. While armies march, heads roll and cities burn, behind the scenes bankers, priests and older, darker powers play a deadly game to choose who will be king.

War may be hell but for Monza Murcatto, the Snake of Talins, the most feared and famous mercenary in Duke Orso’s employ, it’s a damn good way of making money too. Her victories have made her popular — a shade too popular for her employer’s taste. Betrayed, thrown down a mountain and left for dead, Murcatto’s reward is a broken body and a burning hunger for vengeance. Whatever the cost, seven men must die.

Her allies include Styria’s least reliable drunkard, Styria’s most treacherous poisoner, a mass-murderer obsessed with numbers and a Northman who just wants to do the right thing. Her enemies number the better half of the nation. And that’s all before the most dangerous man in the world is dispatched to hunt her down and finish the job Duke Orso started…

Springtime in Styria. And that means revenge.

Joe Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy is one of my favourites: a great story, fantastic characters, superb prose. For some reason, it took me a while to get around to reading Best Served Cold (originally published in 2008). I finally read it after taking a glance at the first pages, and being quickly drawn in by not only the author’s great prose, but also his gift for characterization. Unfortunately, though, I finished the novel with a very different feeling to that I had after finishing Last Argument of Kings… Continue reading →

Review: WARNING LIGHT by David Ricciardi (Berkley)

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RicciardiD-WarningLightUSA fast-paced, gripping debut thriller

No one knows what CIA desk jockey Zac Miller is capable of — including himself — when a routine surveillance job becomes a do-or-die mission in the Middle East.

When a commercial flight violates restricted airspace to make an emergency landing at a closed airport in Iran, the passengers are just happy to be alive and ready to transfer to a functional plane. All of them except one…

The American technology consultant in business class is not who he says he is. Zac Miller is a CIA analyst. And after an agent’s cover gets blown, Zac — though never trained to be a field operative — volunteers to take his place, to keep a surveillance mission from being scrubbed.

Zac thinks it will be easy to photograph the earthquake-ravaged airport that is located near a hidden top secret nuclear facility. But when everything that can go wrong does, he finds himself on the run from the Islamic Revolutionary Guards and abandoned by his own teammates, who think he has gone rogue. Embarking on a harrowing journey through the mountains of Iran to the Persian Gulf and across Europe, Zac can only rely on himself. But even if he makes it out alive, the life he once had may be lost to him forever…

Ricciardi’s debut thriller is one hell of a fast-paced story. It’s a high-concept espionage and action tale, one in which an analyst is thrown into the field — a world of which he has no experience — and must overcome staggering odds to make it back home. This is a really entertaining, globe-trotting novel. Continue reading →

Interview with PETER SWANSON

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SwansonP-AuthorPicLet’s start with an introduction: Who is Peter Swanson?

At this particular moment I’m a lump on a couch getting over a spring cold and looking forward to the start of the baseball season. I aspire to a dull life while at the same time concoct very un-dull lives for my characters.

Prior to being a full time writer I was a bookseller, a teacher, a bartender, a bookseller, and a blogger. And through it all I’ve been an avid reader, primarily of mystery and crime novels. I like to think that I am now living my ideal life.

Your latest novel, All the Beautiful Lies, will be published by William Morrow in April. It looks really interesting: How would you introduce it to a potential reader?

I like to think of it as two stories that converge into one. In the first story a recent college graduate named Harry Ackerson moves in with his stepmother after his father’s death, and discovers that his father led a secret life. In the other story we follow his stepmother, Alice Moss, going back to when she was a teenage girl, and the events that turned her into the adult she becomes. Continue reading →

New Books (February-March)

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NewBooks-20180327

Featuring: Aimee Agresti, E.M. Brown, Jack Carr, Sebastien de Castell, Ruthanna Emmys, Raymond E. Feist, Christopher Fowler, Jason Fry, Louisa Hall, Michael Harvey, Ken Jennings, Richard Kadrey, Barbara Kingsolver, Nancy Kress, Mark Lawrence, Roger Levy, Laura Lippman, K.M. McKinley, Sean Parnell, Charlton Pettus, Josh Reynolds, David Ricciardi, Karl Schroeder, Ricki Schultz, Julie Schumacher, J. Todd Scott, Michael Farris Smith, Wallace Stroby, Stuart Turton, Raymond A. Villareal, Martha Wells, JY Yang

Continue reading →

Upcoming: TRIGGER by David Swinson (Mulholland)

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SwinsonD-FM3-TriggerUSI read David Swinson‘s The Second Girl and Crime Song back-to-back last year, and I absolutely loved them. The first book made Swinson one of my must-read novelists, and the sequel only confirmed it. Ever since, I’ve been eagerly awaiting news of a third book in the series (or a stand-alone, I’m not too picky). In a recently-uploaded catalog on Edelweiss, I found information about Trigger, the third novel featuring troubled private investigator Frank Marr. Unfortunately, it’s not due to be published until February 2019 (by Mulholland Books), which is so far away!

Frank Marr was a good cop, until his burgeoning addictions to alcohol and cocaine forced him into retirement from the D.C. Metro police. Now, he’s barely eking out a living as a private investigator for a defense attorney — also Frank’s ex-girlfriend.

Ostracized by his family after a botched case that led to the death of his baby cousin, Jeffrey, Frank was on a collision course with rock bottom. Now clean and clinging hard to sobriety, Frank passes the time — and tests himself — by robbing the houses of local dealers, taking their cash and flushing their drugs down the toilet. When an old friend from his police days needs Frank’s help to prove he didn’t shoot an unarmed civilian, Frank is drawn back into the world of dirty cops and suspicious drug busts, running in the same circles that enabled his addiction those years ago.

Never one to play by the rules, Frank recruits a young man he nearly executed years before. Together — a good man trying not to go bad and a bad man trying to do good — detective and criminal charge headfirst into the D.C. drug wars. Neither may make it out.

Trigger is one of my most-anticipated novels, and I can’t wait to read it. David Swinson’s novels are published by Mulholland Books in North America and in the UK.

Also on CR: Reviews of The Second Girl and Crime Song

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