The Rap Sheet, spun off in May 2006 from the literary Web site January Magazine, and edited by J. Kingston Pierce, is a terrific news and feature resource for crime-fiction fans.
"[I]n anticipation of The Rap Sheet’s first birthday on May 22, [Pierce] e-mailed invitations to more than 100 crime novelists, book critics, and bloggers from all over the English-speaking world, asking them to choose the one crime/mystery/thriller novel they thought had been 'most unjustly overlooked, criminally forgotten, or underappreciated over the years.'” The response was outstanding, both in terms of quantity and quality.
I started adding titles to my To Be Read list as soon as Pierce published them, then decided to save the energy and simply earmark the posts listing the titles along with the contributors' supporting remarks.
Now Pierce has "compile[d] a master list of all the 'unjustly overlooked' books.... The titles are arranged alphabetically, according to the book’s name. [He has] boldfaced those five titles that received more than one vote. In addition, for anyone who didn’t catch The Rap Sheet’s 'one book' series the first time through ... and is hoping to read all 10 parts in the order they were posted, [Pierce] set up a separate archive blog site, containing all of the text and book covers. You can find that here."
Bravo!
--Marshal Zeringue
Posts
