Always Trust A Greek Bearing Gifts

Yep, it’s CRIME ALWAYS PAYS at Crime Always Pays - and before you ask, no, crime doesn’t pay. Or crime writing, at least, for me, doesn’t pay. But it is fun.
  Anyway, as all Three Regular Readers will be aware, I published CRIME ALWAYS PAYS - a comedy crime caper set in the Greek islands - as an ebook a couple of years ago, just when things went a little screwy around here, time-wise (new baby, writing a novel, day job, etc.). Which meant that I didn’t get any time to promote it, which was a shame, because I’m of the not-very-humble opinion that CAP is the best book I’ve written to date.
  I have a little more time on my hands these days (baby is all grown up, turning four next week, and currently learning to cook, clean, vacuum and take out the trash), so I’m rebooting CRIME ALWAYS PAYS with a brand spanking new cover, and planning to spend a bit more time promoting it.
  First, the blurb elves:

“You never get away. You’re always getting away ...”

When a kidnap scam goes south, Karen and Ray head for the Greek islands to lay low for a while. Trouble there is, Anna - their Siberian wolf - ripped off Rossi's ear, Rossi being Karen's ex who believes he's owed half the kidnap score. Then there's Doyle, the cop Ray was making gooey eyes at; Sleeps the narcoleptic getaway driver who wants to go back inside for some soft time; and Melody, who’s in the market for a decent story she can turn into a movie. All of which is just Chapter One ...

A trans-Europe screwball noir, CRIME ALWAYS PAYS features a cast of cops and robbers, losers and hopers, villains, saints and a homicidal Siberian wolf. You’ll never see the Greek islands in quite the same light again …

Praise for Declan Burke:

“Among the most memorable books of the year, of any genre, was Declan Burke’s ABSOLUTE ZERO COOL … Burke splices insights into the creative process into a fiendishly dark thriller that evokes the best of Flann O’Brien and Bret Easton Ellis.” - Sunday Times, ‘Best Books of the Year 2011’

“Imagine Donald Westlake and his alter ego Richard Stark moving to Ireland and collaborating on a screwball noir and you have some idea of Burke’s accomplishment with THE BIG O.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“I have seen the future of Irish crime fiction and its name is Declan Burke.” - Ken Bruen on EIGHTBALL BOOGIE

  In the interests of promoting said tome, by the way, I’m more than happy to email on a review copy (i.e., e-friendly copy) to anyone who thinks they might like to review it. Or, for that matter, to anyone who thinks they might like to read it with no strings attached. If you do, drop me a line at dbrodb[@]gmail.com. Hell, drop me a line anyway, just to say hello, let me know what you think of the new cover …
  CRIME ALWAYS PAYS did receive a couple of very nice reviews on its first pass around, by the way, the first from the inimitable Glenn Harper over at International Noir:

“CRIME ALWAYS PAYS is part road movie and part farce, reminding me sometimes of Elmore Leonard, sometimes of Allan Guthrie, sometimes of Donald Westlake and sometimes of the Coen Brothers - sometimes all at once.” - Glenn Harper, International Noir

  Meanwhile, the lovely folks at the New Mystery Reader declared that the novel was “ … a little like what might be expected if Elmore Leonard wrote from an outline by Carl Hiaasen ... It’s as close to watching an action movie as a reading experience can be.” Which is nice …
  Finally, here’s a little taster, aka how the novel kicks off, with the less-than-intrepid duo Rossi and Sleeps taking a visit to a veterinarian:

Sleeps

It was bad enough Rossi raving how genius isn’t supposed to be perfect, it’s not that kind of gig, but then the vet started carping about Sleeps’ pride and joy, the .22, nickel-plated, pearl grip, enough to stop a man and put him down but not your actual lethal unless you were unlucky. And right now, empty.
  Sleeps waggled it in the vet’s general direction. ‘Less talk,’ he said, ‘more angel of mercy. How’s that ear coming?’
  Not good and not fast, Rossi ducking around like Sugar Ray in a bouncy castle. Still in shock, bofto on the wowee pills, with these delusions of grandeur – he was Tony Montana or maybe Tony Manero, Sleeps couldn’t say for sure.
  It didn’t help there was no actual ear. The wolf had tore it clean off, along with enough skin to top a sizeable tom-tom. Plus the vet was using catgut and what looked to Sleeps like a needle he’d last seen on the Discovery Channel stuck horizontal through a cannibal’s nose.
  In the end Sleeps stepped in and stuck his forefinger in the wound, stirred it around. Rossi screeched once, high-pitched, then keeled over.
  ‘I’ll be wanting,’ Sleeps said, wiping his finger on Rossi’s pants, ‘a bag of horse tranks. And whatever gun you use for putting down the animals.’
  The vet shook his head. ‘We don’t use those anymore, they’re not humane.’
  ‘Humane? You’re a vet, man.’
  ‘We treat them like children,’ the vet said, ‘not animals.’
  ‘Nice theory.’ Sleeps scratched the cattle-prod off his mental list, gestured at Rossi with the .22. ‘But what if they’re a little of both?’

  So there you have it. CRIME ALWAYS PAYS. In comedy crime capers, at least. If you have the time, the energy and the inclination, I’d be very much obliged if you’d spread the good word …

And So To The Oscars …

Time for some badly needed glitz and glam here at grimy CAP Towers, and some crystal ball gazing in lieu of all that depressing crime fiction malarkey. Yup, it’s the Oscar nominations, and Crime Always Pays’ rather wonky take on same. To wit:

Best Actor
Javier Bardem “Biutiful”
Jeff Bridges “True Grit”
Jesse Eisenberg “The Social Network”
Colin Firth “The King’s Speech”
James Franco “127 Hours”

Javier Bardem was brilliant in the haunting ‘Biutiful’, as he generally is, but the chances of the Best Actor gong going to a foreign film are slim. Jeff Bridges was hilarious in ‘True Grit’, but the role lacks poignancy, and Bridges, along with Bardem, may well be too recent a winner to reward again. James Franco did a terrific job of sustaining audience empathy in what was essentially a one-man show in ‘127 Hours’, and Jesse Eisenberg was a revelation as Mark Zuckerberg in ‘The Social Network’, but both may be too young to get the nod. Which leaves us with Colin Firth’s superb performance in ‘The King’s Speech’. Firth has always been a likeable actor, but he moved up a couple of gears with ‘A Single Man’ (2009), and his turn as the stuttering king in waiting should be good enough to land him the Oscar.


Best Actress
Annette Bening “The Kids Are All Right”
Nicole Kidman “Rabbit Hole”
Jennifer Lawrence “Winter’s Bone”
Natalie Portman “Black Swan”
Michelle Williams “Blue Valentine”

I just wasn’t convinced by Natalie Portman in ‘Black Swan’. Playing the part of a ballerina struggling to get to grips with her role, she looked to me like an actress struggling to get to grips with her role. Annette Bening’s performance in ‘The Kids Are All Right’ was solid, but Julianne Moore’s was the eye-catching turn there, and Bening’s selection makes no sense. The perennially stiff and frosty Nicole Kidman was perfectly cast as the grieving mother in ‘Rabbit Hole’, and deserves her nomination, and Michelle Williams confirmed that she’s a brilliant actress in ‘Blue Valentine’ (odd that the superb Ryan Gosling didn’t get a nod for his role there). Head and shoulders over them all, however, was Jennifer Lawrence’s eye-poppingly brilliant turn in ‘Winter’s Bone’.


Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale “The Fighter”
John Hawkes “Winter’s Bone”
Jeremy Renner “The Town”
Mark Ruffalo “The Kids Are All Right”
Geoffrey Rush “The King’s Speech”

A tough one to call. The fact that the excellent heist movie ‘The Town’ got largely shut out means you’d like to see Jeremy Renner get the nod, but John Hawkes was superbly sinister in ‘Winter’s Bone’. Meanwhile, Mark Ruffalo was the best thing about ‘The Kids Are All Right’. In reality, it’ll come down to Christian Bale’s “squirrelly as fuck” turn as Dickie Ekland in ‘The Fighter’ and Geoffrey Rush’s laconic subversion in ‘The King’s Speech’. My heart says Bale, especially as the character of Dickie is the most fascinating aspect of ‘The Fighter’, but my head says Rush.


Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams “The Fighter”
Helena Bonham Carter “The King’s Speech”
Melissa Leo “The Fighter”
Hailee Steinfeld “True Grit”
Jacki Weaver “Animal Kingdom”

It’s entirely probable that Amy Adams and Melissa Leo will split the vote for ‘The Fighter’; and I haven’t seen ‘Animal Kingdom’ yet, so I have no opinion on Jacki Weaver. That leaves us with Hailee Steinfeld in ‘True Grit’, which is an odd nomination, given that she is in fact playing the lead role in the movie; that she’s terrific as the heart and soul of the movie, though, is beyond argument. Too much, too young? Probably. I’ve never really warmed to Helena Bonham Carter as an actress, but she mutes the shrill button as Bertie’s supportive wife in ‘The King’s Speech’, and may well be due an Oscar for services rendered to the industry.


Animated Film
“How to Train Your Dragon”
“The Illusionist”
“Toy Story 3”

Only two things to be said here. One, it’s a crying shame that both ‘Megamind’ and ‘Tangled’ didn’t make the list. Two, ‘Toy Story 3’ is a locked-down, cast-iron plunger for the Oscar.


Best Director
Darren Aronofsky “Black Swan”
David O. Russell “The Fighter”
Tom Hooper “The King’s Speech”
David Fincher “The Social Network”
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen “True Grit”

Firstly, it’s a crying shame that Debra Granik isn’t here for ‘Winter’s Bone’. Otherwise, it’s terrific, as always, to see the Coen brothers up for another Best Director gong, but ‘True Grit’, marvellous fun though it was, just didn’t deliver the truly great movie I was expecting. Darren Aronofsky’s ‘Black Swan’ can’t be faulted for lack of ambition, but I still can’t decide whether Aronofsky deliberately allowed the film to mutate into an overblown gothic melodrama for the last half-hour in order to reflect Nina’s disturbed mental state, or if he simply bit off more than he could chew and let it all run away from him. David O. Russell’s ‘The Fighter’ is a solid and hugely enjoyable boxing flick made in the image of its hero, slugger Micky Ward, but it would have been a far more interesting film had Micky’s brother, crack addict and failed contender Dickie, been the focus. David Fincher’s ‘The Social Network’ is superbly executed, and a far more entertaining film than any movie about Facebook has any right to be, but Tom Hooper’s ‘The King’s Speech’ has an emotional resonance that should play well with the Academy.


Best Picture
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King’s Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter’s Bone

Extending the Best Picture category to accommodate ten nominations is a farce, and takes a lot of the tension out this particular choice. The hype surrounding ‘Black Swan’ threatens to take it all the way to the podium, but it’s proving divisive with critics and audiences alike, and will probably stumble. ‘True Grit’ isn’t strong enough to make it worth the Academy’s while rewarding the Coen brothers again, and so soon after ‘No Country for Old Men (2007). ‘The King’s Speech’ and ‘The Social Network’ are both strong contenders, and there’s a very good chance that the buzz surrounding ‘The King’s Speech’ will peak at the right time. For me, the two best movies of the year were ‘Toy Story 3’ and ‘Winter’s Bone’, and I’d be equally happy to see either win, not least because it’d suggest the Academy was finally starting to think outside the box; and if I had to choose one over the other, I’d plump for ‘Winter’s Bone’.

Finally, congratulations to Ireland’s own Michael Creagh, who was nominated in the Short Film category for ‘The Crush’. Nice one, squire.

Rum Punch Drunk: Yep, It’s Another Elmore Leonard Comparison

Those precious few among you who have read CRIME ALWAYS PAYS - how few! how precious! - will be aware that it is an ebook release, and a sequel-of-sorts to THE BIG O. The reasons why it’s an ebook release are so complicated, pathetic and boring that even I’m sick to the back teeth of them; suffice to say, even if you don’t own an e-reader, the novel is now available to download straight to your desktop computer. So far it’s garnered very little by way of review, mostly because I don’t have the time to go promoting it the way I should, but those that have come in have been very gratifying. The latest is from Sean Patrick Reardon, a relatively recent addition to the ranks of readers of this blog, and the gist of his review runneth thusly:

“CRIME ALWAYS PAYS is a continuation of the cleverly written, fast paced, and gut-busting romp, THE BIG O …
  “The story is not so much a sequel as it is a continuation of the lives of the awesome cast of characters, how their lives intersect, and all of the resulting action, mishaps, and follies that result. There is enough ‘flashback dialogue’ to get the gist of what happened in THE BIG O, so reading it is not mandatory, but I highly recommend doing so for the sheer enjoyment, and it does help when reading this instalment.
  “Mr. Burke has a unique talent for creating characters and dialogue, and coupled with the solid story, CRIME ALWAYS PAYS delivered on every expectation I had before I started.
  “The comparisons to Elmore Leonard’s style are warranted and deserved, but Mr. Burke has managed to put his own unique spin on it. As an avid reader of Mr. Leonard, I can honestly say that I have never laughed out loud as much when reading his novels as I did when reading both of Mr. Burkes. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty of suspense throughout the story, but it is so damn funny at times.
  “For anyone looking for some escapism, a great read, and a lot of fun, CRIME ALWAYS PAYS is for you. The style of narration, dialogue, characters, and the situations and how they play out in the story, are to me reminiscent of Guy Ritchie’s crime capers.”

  I thank you kindly, Mr Reardon.
  Meanwhile, if you glance to your left, you’ll see that the venerable Glenn Harper of International Noir had this to say:

“CRIME ALWAYS PAYS is part road movie and part farce, reminding me sometimes of Elmore Leonard, sometimes of Allan Guthrie, sometimes of Donald Westlake and sometimes of the Coen Brothers – sometimes all at once.”

  And if you scroll down a little further, you’ll see that the equally venerable Colin Bateman recently had this to say over at the Guardian blogs:

“If you want to find something new and challenging, comic crime fiction is now the place to go … Declan Burke [is] at the vanguard of a new wave of young writers kicking against the clichés and producing ambitious, challenging, genre-bending works.”

  So: if you’re intrigued by new, fresh, smart and subversive writing, clickety-click here for a free sample.
  If you’re not, fuck away off somewhere else and stop clogging up my bandwidth.
  And have a nice weekend y’all, y’hear?

“Ya Wanna Do It Here Or Down The Station, Punk?”: Gene Kerrigan

Yep, it’s rubber-hose time, folks: a rapid-fire Q&A for those shifty-looking usual suspects ...

What crime novel would you most like to have written?
NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. And I know Cormac McCarthy has been called America’s greatest living writer, but I’d still have the impertinence to fix the ending.

What fictional character would you most like to have been?
God.

Who do you read for guilty pleasures?
Every now and then I buy the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine – in the hope it’ll be as good as it was when I was a teenager. It never is.

Most satisfying writing moment?
When the book is done and it’s time to cut, re-write and fix it up.

The best Irish crime novel is …?
HAVOC, IN ITS THIRD YEAR by Ronan Bennett. I know it’s set in seventeenth century England, and features an English coroner/detective – but Bennett is Irish and the accused is an Irish peasant, Katherine Shay, so it qualifies. It works as a crime mystery, it works as history and as a parable about the dangers of a New World Order. The tension is relentless and it’s superbly written.

What Irish crime novel would make a great movie?
HAVOC, IN ITS THIRD YEAR – hasn’t anyone sent a copy to the Coen Brothers yet?

Worst/best thing about being a writer?
There is no worst. Best – the moment you go back to the top of the page and start reading, and you find something worked better than you thought it did.

The pitch for your next book is …?
As the Celtic Tiger begins to crumble, two men walk into a Dublin pub, carrying guns. An everyday tale of entrepreneurial gangsters and revenge.

Who are you reading right now?
I read the first two Omar Yussef novels by Matt Rees last year, and I’m into the third at the moment. On one level it’s the old amateur sleuth gig, but set in the modern day Middle East. A decent old Palestinian tries to uphold the eternal values amid the gunmen – whether Palestinian or Israeli – who cheapen life.

God appears and says you can only write OR read. Which would it be?
I couldn’t live without reading. I couldn’t make a living without writing. I’d tell him to go find something constructive to do. And there’s no shortage of things need doing, God knows.

The three best words to describe your own writing are …?
Tense, unpredictable, plausible. At least, that’s the general intention.

Gene Kerrigan’s DARK TIMES IN THE CITY is published by Harvill Secker

The Embiggened O # 2,309: Yep, It’s Self-Aggrandizing Saturday

The ever-radiant Angela Wilson over at Book Addict at Pop Syndicate was kind enough to interview your humble host about THE BIG O and sundry other matters, said chat opening up thusly:

Declan, tell us about your latest, THE BIG O.

  “Well, it’s set a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, and it’s about this evil empire … Oh, hold on – that’s what I’m working on now. THE BIG O is a heist-gone-wrong story, heavily influenced by some of my favourite writers and movie-makers: Elmore Leonard and the Coen Brothers (although, naturally, I make no claims for its quality being up to their standard). Basically, it’s a crime caper about ordinary decent criminals, and how things always tend to go wrong despite the best laid plans of mice, men, women and one-eyed wolves. Especially when the plans laid are quite poor to begin with …”

  For the rest, clickety-click here …

For Whom The Bell’s Palsy Tolls

It’s been a busy-busy-busy week for your genial host (right), folks, what with everyday life cranking up a couple of notches, the Electric Picnic gig to prepare for, and Princess Lilyput’s christening to come on Sunday, so apologies for the go-slow on ye olde blogging in the last few days. I’ve also been feeling exhausted, which I put down to the frantic schedule and burning the candle at both ends, but it appears there’s a more sinister reason.
  For lo! I toddled along to the doctor yesterday complaining that my devastating blend of windswept, rugged handsomeness and winsome boyish charm were being undermined a tad by the fact that, during the week, I’d developed a smile akin to that of The Joker. The diagnosis? Bell’s Palsy.
  Now, I don’t know about you, but the word ‘palsy’ gives me the shivering fits. According to the Doc, it’s a relatively common condition caused by the inflammation of a facial nerve, which results in semi-paralysis of the facial muscles. It’s an ‘idiopathic’ condition, meaning that they have no idea why it flares up, and it’s generally a temporary one, providing you diagnose and treat it early enough. So that’s me on a course of steroids for the next week or so, and I’ll probably have to get some physiotherapy on the affected muscles too.
  Bummer, huh? Still, at least it’s not a mini-stroke, which was my first reaction when I caught myself yawning in the mirror. And I’m in good company. Ever wonder where George Clooney’s cute sloppy smile comes from? Yep, it’s Bell’s Palsy. Now all I have to do is get myself properly handsome, steal some talent, become a multi-millionaire and squire half the world’s starlets around the planet, and George and I can hang out on set swapping ‘palsy pals’ gags while the Coen Brothers rush about trying to make THE BIG O as good as George and I deserve.
  It’s only a matter of time, people. You have been warned …

The Popcorn Interlude: NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN

Cormac McCarthy, a quality crime yarn and the Coen Brothers: NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN should have been a perfect storm. It’s a marvellous movie, there’s no doubt about that, and that it’s not entirely wonderful is due in part to the curse of high expectations, and at least two, and possibly three, rather convoluted leaps of logic the filmmakers ask the audience to make – one is plenty, two is pushing it and three is just sloppy, which is not an adjective often used in the same paragraph as ‘the Coen Brothers’. In saying that, it will certainly reward a second viewing and it will deservedly be in most critics’ Top Ten come the end of the year. But here’s another way of getting at what we were trying to say here: the fact that NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN is a crime story will in no way influence the way its critics and its audience view the film. It will be judged on its production values, its direction and acting, how plausible and engaging its story is, how well it achieves its implicit ambition. If its narrative genre is mentioned at all it will be in a positive context, given the Coens’ superb understanding and execution of what makes crime a global obsession; the Coen Brothers are among the best in the business because they work in the crime genre, not despite it. The same could be said for Raymond Chandler, Elmore Leonard, James Ellroy, W.R. Burnett. It helps, of course, that the Coens work in what is still a relatively new form, one that doesn’t concern itself with high or low art but good or bad movies. To paraphrase Raymond Chandler: “There’s only two kinds of writing, good and bad.” The Coens understand that there’s only two kinds of stories, essential or not. It’s still too early to decide if NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN is essential in the way FARGO and THE BIG LEBOWSKI are, but for the moment it is almost a perfect storm.- Declan Burke

Blood Is Never Simple

Ever since the news started filtering back from Cannes that the Coen Brothers were not only back on form, but with an adaptation of a Cormac McCarthy novel, the elves have been fairly salivating at the prospect of No Country For Old Men. Due early next year, it’s a classic Coen set-up: guy finds a heap of money in desert, psychotic killer turns up to claim it, chaos ensues. The cast includes Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin and Woody Harrelson, but don’t expect the skewed black comedy of Fargo or The Big Lebowski: taking its cue from the pessimistic WB Yeats title, this baby’s dark, dark, dark, and very much a return to Blood Simple territory. McCarthy, the Coens, and a neo-noir classic-in-the-making? Truly our cup runneth over.

This ‘Funky Friday’s Free-For-All’ Malarkey: It’s Just Another Name For An Interweb Mash-Up Baloohaha Thingy, Isn’t It?

Erm, yes. Moving swiftly on … the RTE Guide was less kind than it might have been to Val McDermid’s The Grave Tattoo, claiming that, “the basic premise is good … but there are too many loose ends and sub-plots that never quite get off the ground.” Still, the Raith Rovers fan will always have the Portico Prize AND the Theakston's Old Perculier Crime Novel of the Year award she won for The Grave Tattoo to sustain her … Unsurprisingly, Brian McGilloway’s Borderlands gets the 21-gun salute from Shotsmag: “Borderlands is a highly tense, taut debut novel with the same intensity one has come to expect from established authors.” Which is nice … Staying with Shotsmag, they’re getting to know Ken Bruen (left) quite well, apparently: “Bruen’s writing has a beguiling quality, written in very intimate first person … If you like your crime thrillers to challenge the way you think, then Bruen’s your man.” And staying with all things Bruen, Murderati has his ‘essay’ A Tale of Two Childhoods, which contains the deliciously downbeat kiss-off to the rich ‘n’ famous, “If you want to know what God thinks of money, look who he gave it to.” Ooooh, get him … John Connolly has had his prints taken over at Rap Sheet, where they’re asking a host of writers what crime novel they think has been most unjustly ignored over the years. Ross Macdonald’s The Chill, says John: “At the risk of being heretical, Macdonald was a much better novelist than Chandler, who was a flashier writer … read The Chill not only for its exquisite plotting and elegant, measured prose, but for the empathy, humanity and sheer generosity of spirit that infuses every page.” Couldn’t agree more … Finally, we got information, man, new shit has, uh, come to light … yep, it’s a double-whammy for Coen Brothers fans: not only did Ethan (right) and Joel's (righter) movie of Cormac McCarthy’s No Country For Old Men get les reviews raves at Cannes and finally blot out the blight that was The Ladykillers, but the Guardian brings news of a Coen Brothers-Working Title tie-in, Burn After Reading, Working Title being the company who worked on Fargo and The Big Lebowski (“Smokey, this is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules.”). Joy untrammelled, eh? Finally-finally, here's aspiring author Bernard Black / Dylan Moran of Black Books (below), not really coming to terms with his latest rejection letter. Altogether now: "Piss-midget!" And that’s all for another week, folks: have a good weekend and y’all come back now, y’hear?