Crime Fiction in the news and on the 'Net: Weekly Round-up

There's been some more great crime fiction stories on the Web this past week - from newspapers, magazines, and fellow bloggers. Hopefully you will all like finding an interesting article or two linked here, that you enjoy reading.

Before we dive into it however, I thought I'd just quickly mention again that this week I republished, here on Crime Watch, a great article by Philip Matthews of The Press on the recent growth of Kiwi crime fiction. Philip and Fairfax Magazines were kind enough to let me republish the full 2000-wd article here - and it's the only place you can read it on the Internet. So if you haven't already, please go here and read it, and leave a comment so Philip gets some feedback about the article.

Onto the round-up.

Crime Watch Weekly Round-Up: In the News and on the 'Net

• It was the 120th anniversary of the birth of Dame Agatha Christie on Wednesday (15 September), an occasion marked in many different ways all around the world (understandable really, since she is the biggest-selling novelist of all time, with more than a billion books in print - AND THEN THERE WERE NONE, originally entitled TEN LITTLE NIGGERS, has reportedly sold more than 100 million copies by itself). The Guardian had a story on how Google, that ubiquitious company, marked the occasion with a special detective-themed graphic on the day.
• A decade after being told that writing a novel with a lesbian theme would be 'commercial suicide', Val McDermid talks to The Independent about a cultural shift and the recent progress of lesbian fiction.
• The Miami Herald takes a look at whether the next wave in the ongoing crime fiction tsunami might come from books set in Stalinist Russia.
• John Sullivan of the Winnipeg Free Press takes a look at the latest offering from cool Canadian crime writer Giles Blunt's 'John Cardinal' series, which is set in a fictional small Ontario city.
• The Houston Press pays tribute to Murder By The Book's David Thompson, who tragically passed away very suddenly this week, leaving a true void in the crime fiction world.

What do you think of the round-up? Which articles do you find interesting? Did you do anything special to mark Agatha Christie's birthday? Which is your favourite Christie novel? Do you think we are now more accepting of lesbian themes and characters in 'mainstream' fiction? Have you read any Russian set mystery tales? Please share your thoughts. I'd love to read what you think.