henning mankell | henning mankell
Jan.02.2012
Photo: Original Swedish book cover, from its Wikipedia page
I suppose you already know the sordid background of the author: how he died climbing up seven floors because his lift wasn't working; because he'd been at least a three to four pack a day smoker for a long time. You...
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Dec.29.2011
Photo: Rooney Mara, from her Wikipedia page. She and Lisbeth Salander couldn't look more different. I mean that in a good way, for both.
The blog for the book will come soon. Just finished it.
But first the movie.
The movie was a must-see on many levels: the...
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Aug.04.2011
When I worked as a journalist at a major US magazine, it was clear that readers didn’t respond to hard news. They wanted features. Not fluffy features. Serious features. But they'd had enough of news stories about what happened that week.
What did the editors do? They ordered correspondents to...
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Jun.23.2011
I’ve seen two things in the last week that allowed me to compare something of the way crime writers used to appear in public and their present avatars. It only made me wish for the good old days even more than I used to.
The comparison is between: a delightful radio chat on the BBC in 1958 between...
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Feb.24.2011
Crime fiction may not be the first thing on the minds of the protesters taking to the streets for democracy across the Arab world. But one of the offshoots of the downfall of Arab dictators is sure to be an explosion of thrillers and mysteries.Until now there has been almost no crime fiction...
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Feb.06.2011
Mankell is a writer of Swedish noir; he inspired Stieg Larsson, and, perhaps, me. I've been purposely trying to learn as I read these days. Not in an academic way--at least until I take my next Masters class--but in a way that I understand writing better so that my writing is also better. I...
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Dec.09.2010
There are many theories as to why Scandinavian crime writers prosper in the bestseller lists. But I know why it is. Ikea.
I just bought a new set of Ikea shelves for my office. I’ll get into exactly how that has altered the configuration of my workspace, but at this point let me just note that it...
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Oct.06.2010
[SPOILER ALERT!]
As some TV mystery fans may know, PBS Masterpiece Mystery is now running a second series of Wallander starring Kenneth Branagh, the fine British actor, playing Kurt Wallander, a Swedish police detective. For those unacquainted with Swedish television--a subset that likely...
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Sep.09.2010
The “Golden Age” of the detective story was the 1920s and 1930s. It was a turbulent period. In Britain, the General Strike. In the U.S., the Depression. Civil war in Spain, and in Germany the rise of the Nazis. Red scares everywhere, fascists too.But the detective story was a solace to those who...
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May.13.2010
“Exotic” crime fiction has taken off in the last decade. People want to read about detectives in far-off places, even if they don’t want to wade through learned histories of those distant lands.Many of the biggest selling novels of the last decade have been “exotic crime.” You’ll find a detective...
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