Monday, December 07, 2009

Telegraph: best crime books of the year

At the Telegraph (U.K.), Jake Kerridge pronounces on the best crime books of the year.

An excerpt:
One can only assume that Megan Abbott’s house is haunted by the ghost of Raymond Chandler, who is whispering the secrets of his prose style to her. The Song Is You (Pocket Books, £6.99), which has fictional characters caught up in the real-life disappearance of the Hollywood starlet Jean Spangler in 1949, goes beyond homage and pastiche to become an original work of art.
Read about another book to earn Kerridge's favor.

"Once I started writing The Song Is You, a fictional 'what if' based on the disappearance of actress Jean Spangler in 1949 Los Angeles, the narrative took on this momentum for me that led in a specific direction and...." So begins a 2007 post by Abbott at The Rap Sheet: [read on].

Learn more about the book and author at Megan Abbott's website. Her latest novel is Bury Me Deep.

--Marshal Zeringue