All hail Allan Guthrie

First I received a note from that crown prince of Northern Ireland crime, Gerard Brennan of Crime Scene NI, that the first chapter of his novel Piranhas is available online. My only complaint is that the selection makes me want to call Belfast, reach through the phone lines, grab Gerard by his Carlsberg-swilling gullet, and throttle him until he reveals what happens when Liam and Wee Danny face off.

Then I browsed the site that hosts Gerard's excerpt, Allan Guthrie's Noir Originals. Guthrie's an author. Guthrie's an agent. And now I find that Guthrie is an ingenious promoter of good, tough, hard-edged crime fiction. The site offers news, excerpts, interviews and profiles featuring all kinds of authors I know and like (Scott Phillips, Christa Faust, Sandra Ruttan, Vicki Hendricks, Adrian McKinty) and, more to the the point, with those I think I might like just because I trust the company they keep on Guthrie's site.

And then the topper of all toppers: Ken Bruen's 2004 interview, in which he tells Ray Banks that:

"I abandoned British crime years ago except for Bill James, who I love. His 1988 novel Protection just won the European Crime Novel of 2004 in France. His Iles and Harpur series is magnificent."

Oh, man, does that Bruen have good taste in crime fiction. Readers of this blog may know that my admiration for James' dark, funny, gorgeous writing knows no bounds, that I consider him perhaps the best prose stylist ever to have written crime fiction in English. Mr. Bruen, you have made my day.

(Click here for another link between Allan Guthrie and your humble blog keeper.)

© Peter Rozovsky 2008