Back to South Africa in James McClure's shorts
So I was especially excited to hear from the good folks at Crime Beat (South Africa), about God It Was Fun, a collection of McClure's short stories and scripts. These include the screenplay for a film adaptation of his novel The Steam Pig, a production "halted in circumstances that remain a mystery to this day," according to a short, informative biographical introduction by McClure's children.
It has been a while since I've read South African crime fiction, a body of work I've called second only to Ireland's in international crime writing, and it's good to be back.
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Want to join me in exploring South African crime fiction? Here's a Crime Beat list of twenty top South African crime novels. I might have chosen different books by Mike Nicol and Roger Smith, but it's an exciting list, including a few authors new to me, one of whose novels I have just bought. © Peter Rozovsky 2014
Labels: Africa, James McClure, South Africa
posted by Peter Rozovsky at 7:10 PM
8 Comments:
I'm glad you mentioned The Steam Pig, a book that has been on my TBR list for years, and I needed the reminder.
Thanks for the heads-up, I'm a great fan of McClure as well. God It Was Fun is available on Kindle and I just downloaded a copy.
I am please to note that I've read 7 of the top 10 and 5 of the next 10 and obviously need to fill in the rest immediately.
R.T., it's worth reading. So is The Song Dog.
Mack, you've probably read more than I have, so I have incentive to catch up.
Have you resumed your blog? If so, let me know, and I'll link to it again.
Peter, I've been mostly reading and mostly reading South African fiction. I was feeling the need to re-start my blog and I think your post might just have done that. :)
Well, now, that is good news. Keep me posted.
I bought the McClure collection and Counting the Coffins, and I am looking forward to reading both.
I read THE STEAM PIG because it's on the Haycraft-Queen list, though it was so long ago that I only have the vaguest recollection of it. The short stuff might be fun to track down as a re-introduction.
My favorite McClure novel is The Gooseberry Fool. Then there is the last of the eight Kramer and Zondi novels, published in 1881 and set in 1962, which included one character's dismissive reference to some young lawyer named Nelson Mandela.
McClure was one of the best, and he deserves reading.
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