The Crimesquad.com Top Ten for 2011 is now online! It was a bumper year for crime fiction in 2011 - and amazingly enough it appears to be even better in 2012. Check out our 2011 Top Ten - and before anyone starts arguing about placements in the Top Ten - I will tell you now that no.1 doesn't mean no.1! All ten books stand together on the same level. They are simply our favourite ten books of 2011 (and with such a high standard it wasn't easy to choose) - and they are all fantastic reads. Enjoy!
**ANNOUNCEMENT 13-01-12** It is with great sadness that I announce the passing of the great crime fiction writer, Reginald Hill who wrote the storming series featuring Dalziel and Pascoe. With great wit and intelligence he wrote some of the finest novels in the past few decades as well as creating one of the most memorable characters in the form of Andy Dalziel. A bright light in crime fiction has been extinguished today - but he left an amazing legacy for us all to enjoy.
Happy New Year! I know I speak on behalf of the great team of reviewers here at Crimesquad Towers when I say we have had a bumper year for crime fiction in 2011. And to get your juices going – I can tell you now that from what we have seen so far of the books scheduled for release in the early months of 2012 – unbelievably, it looks as though it is about to get a whole lot better. How do they do it? Maybe we’ll never know – but the calibre of writing from established and debut writers is astonishing. And all of us (Joe Public) just can’t get enough. Year on year crime sales are escalating exponentially outstripping all other genres. Why? Does any body know or care? Not really. All we care about on this website is bringing you the best and most exciting titles every month. We have done that to our best abilities for the past six years – and according to you – we do it very well indeed. So I raise a glass of bubbly to you all, our dedicated readers of CrimeSquad and crime fiction and wish you all the best in 2012. It looks like we are going to be thrilled and delighted (where crime fiction is concerned, anyway) in the coming year.
And as promised, we start with a cracking couple of writers in January. Our ‘Author of the Month’ is John Harvey is better known for his Charlie Resnick novels, but this one is headed by Karen Shields who last appeared in ‘Cold In Hand’. This is writing from a master of his art and I know that this will be cause for celebration throughout his legion of fans as well as collecting a lot of new ones. If you haven’t tried John Harvey before, ‘Good Bait’ is an excellent novel to climb onboard.
Fresh Blood does not get any better than our candidate for January. Tom Benn is young, witty and can tell one cracking story. ‘The Doll Princess’ will tick so many boxes for a lot of people. If you don’t want to miss out on the brand new literary face on the block – then I urge you to pick up a copy of his debut novel. Read it, enjoy and watch a major literary talent blossom before your very eyes!
As always with Christmas we have book tokens burning a hole in our pockets and wallets. And despite being bought the titles we requested – it still seems there are a thousand and one books we still want to buy! And which ones to buy with your gift card!!! In our Reviews section hopefully we will help you some way to making a decision on what book to buy and settle down with during the long nights to come. You may notice that some titles have been around for a while as I have been clearing out the proverbial virtual closet of reviews. But they wouldn’t go on this site if they weren’t worthy or bloody good reads in their own right – so maybe you may find something to your liking that you missed. Most probably we’ll just add to your ever expanding reading list! Don’t worry – you are not alone on that one!
Classic Crime stays with Patricia Wentworth but we have some excellent authors lined up for the coming months. I am hopeful that with the advent of the e-reader that more of these out of print authors who were celebrated in their day and yet forgotten now will slowly find there way back in ‘print’ so that they can again be enjoyed by the masses.
Plus, we will be unveiling the CrimeSquad Top Ten next week and letting you see what we thought were the best of 2011!
If you have any comments or have a particular author you
would like to see highlighted on this website please e-mail
me at chrissimmons@crimesquad.com.
