Foiled

I love having writer friends.

Ring, ring, goes my cell phone. This so seldom happens it took me a moment to realise it was mine. My bag is a cavernous affair full of junk, so it took a while to find it.

"Hi, Vanda. I'm sorry to disturb you, but I've got a quick question for you."

"That's OK, I'm in the supermarket with the kids."

"Cool. You're a fencer. What do you call it when you swing your sword down at someone when you're fighting them, is there a proper name?"

"Well, that depends." I am putting capsicum and carrots on the checkout conveyor. "If you are attacking, you could be lunging, which is an aggressive forwards movement to stab your opponent, or are we talking about broad swords here, and you're going at them with an edge, not a point." The check out guy is giving me a very strange look. I put the mince meat on the conveyor.

You can imagine the rest of the conversation.

The friend in question is Tania Roxborogh, aka TK Roxborogh who is in the final throes of writing a sequel to MacBeth called Banquo's Son. Check out her blog here where Tania lays down the trials and tribulations of frantically writing a novel in a very short period of time. Her work rate has been astonishing! It sounds like there's a bit of blood and guts and a few battle scenes for good measure. Excellent.

Usually these kinds of conversations take place in more appropriate places, like around the dinner table, so it was quite a novelty to be discussing the cut and thrust of sword play at the check out. It certainly spiced up the grocery shopping.

A poultry crime

I've heard of some strange tools used in the execution of a crime before but this one took the cake, or the chook, as it turned out.

Check out the story here, and let it be a warning to all, don't count your frozen chickens before they smash.

Chicken chucker charged over bizarre crime.

He must have been desperate for a coffee.

Got it Covered

I love old book covers, in fact one of the big pleasures of my Ngaio Marsh Challenge has been tracking down the titles in second hand book stores and checking out the cover art. Some are twee, some are average and some fantastic. The worst ones are the BBC TV tie in covers with boring photographs of equally boring looking actors...yawn.

When I was looking through the Carnival of the Criminal Minds archives the other day I found a reference to this blog called Judge a Book by its Cover, and in particular the Carnival host, The Rap Sheet pointed us to this post on Robert Kyle's Kill Now, Pay Later. It's a pearler, and you have to read the back cover blurb. Talk about audacious!




I know Donald Kerr at the Otago University Library Special Collections purchased a large collection of pulp fiction a few years back. I must go visit and have a giggle at the titles and the covers. I believe the Design School students have a great time with them.

Here's a few covers of the Ngaio Marsh titles I've recently acquired:

Artists in Crime (1967 ed) The Fontana covers were edgy and colourful.





















Death in Ecstasy (1968 ed) Another edgy Fontana. (They haven't acknowledged the artist though)





















Vintage Murder (1977 ed) This later Fontana cover by Justin Todd is more conservative, but still intriguing.





















And yes, I do have two copies of some of her books because I liked the different cover versions. Sometimes a girl just can't be forced to choose.

Carnival of the Criminal Minds #31

Each month the Carnival of the Criminal Minds is hosted by a crime fiction related blog. This week it's over the ditch by Helen at It's Criminal. She has taken the beach carnival theme, so we get to look at some pictures of, as she puts it, buff Aussie males. (Has anyone else noticed that buff Aussie males are great until they open their mouths?!)

Helen takes us on a tour of her favourite blogs and also plugs us towards Crimewav.com which has podcasts of authors reaing from their short stories to download.

Bloggers who host the carnival get to point others in the direction of websites, blogs and wee gems they've found out there in cyberspace that have intrigued, tickled, or made them laugh. The brainchild of Barbara Fister you can visit her Carnival of the Criminal Minds page to look at archives of former Carnivals. They're great fun and travel the world.

The rise and rise of Scandinavian Crime Writers

I discovered the talents of Scandinavian crime writers some years ago, and have felt very grateful these authors have been translated into English for our consumption and pleasure. It started with Peter Hoeg's Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow - I will confess now to seeking out the book because I enjoyed the movie, then finding I enjoyed the book even more than the movie.

A quick look through my bookshelf shows other Scandinavian crime writers I've grown attached to including Henning Mankell, Karin Fossum, Arnaldur Indridason, and the most recent addition, which I've only just started on, Steig Larrson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

John Crace at Guardian.co.uk has written a very good article on the Scandinavians, you can read here.

While on the topic of translated fiction, I'll also toss in another favourite author, French this time, Fred Vargas. She was one of the first I discovered with Have Mercy on us All.

Peter, over at Detectives Beyond Borders has had a flurry of posts recently on the topic of translators, who seem to be turning into literary stars in their own right. See Andrea Camilleri's translator speaks and Another translator speaks.

Having had Overkill translated into German, we are at the mercy of our translators to do a good job and not lose the idiosyncracies of idiom and vernacular. Heaven knows Overkill is full of Kiwi-isms! So to Andrea and Gabriele - thanks, and good on ya, mate.

Dumb and dumber

Normally I wait till the weekend before popping the bizarre or stupid crimes onto the blog, but this morning's news efforts and a 'you must look at this video' from a friend proved too good to wait that long.

Caught Short:

One dumb French thief's aim was a bit off.

Lost thief holes up in french Lavatory.


Not the brightest

These guys managed to escape from custody, but did something any kid who has ever been in a three legged race knows not to do!

Random thoughts

Thought number 1:

The kids go back to school tomorrow - imagine big grin on this mother's face.

Thought number 2:

It's February. Can someone please tell me what happened to January?

Thought number 3:

Rachael King over at The Sound of Butterflies has a lovely post on whether writers are putter-inners or taker-outers. Do you write screeds and screeds in your first draft then brutally prune, or do you get down the nuts and bolts, and then fill in the detail, description and bits you glossed over?

I'm definitely in the putter-inner category. I liken it to creating a human being from the skeleton out - I start with the bones, then add the vital organs and muscle to give it strength and life, then add a bit of padding, because no one likes their stories too skinny, but no one likes them overblown either, then polish it all up with a nice tan, not fake though. There's usually some last minute depilation necessary to get it all looking seemly, then voila, something hopefully fit to be seen in public.

Thought number 4:

I love Naseby.

Thought number 5:

If the kids are back at school tomorrow, that means they'll bring home their stationery list tomorrow, which will mean a trip into town to the stationery supply shops. Oh dear, how sad...