Chasing the three-headed protagonist: Your chance to win a book

Posting may be sketchy for the next couple of weeks thanks to a pair of looming deadlines. Fortunately, a thoughtful author has stepped in to help.

Sandra Ruttan's new novel, Lullaby for the Namless, like its predecessors, The Frailty of Flesh and What Burns Within, has three police-officer protagonists: Nolan, Hart and Tain. Ruttan recognizes the increased dramatic possibilities multiple protagonists offer, and she says she's surprised that publishers are not more open to this format. We may never have another Ed McBain, she laments.

Is Ruttan right? Is there a prejudice against books with three (or more) lead characters? If so, why? What are your favorite such stories?

Best answer wins a copy of Lullaby for the Nameless signed by the author. And stay tuned for more Ruttan book competitions.

© Peter Rozovsky 2009

How series change over time: Montalbano and performance

Conversation during and after yesterday's Sandra Ruttan-Jeff VanderMeer reading in Baltimore turned to the joys and frustrations of writing a crime-fiction series and the changes authors make from book to book. Ruttan's new novel, Lullaby for the Nameless, jumps back and forth between plot lines in the present and in the past. And VanderMeer makes changes in narrative form and even, to some extent, in genre from City of Saints and Madmen to Shriek: An Afterword to his new novel, Finch.

Talk of these radical formal and stylistic changes within a series struck me all the more because of the subtle changes within the series I'm currently reading, Andrea Camilleri's Inspector Montalbano novels. Early in the series, Camilleri exploited his theater background for metaphors and similes. This tendency is especially notable in Excursion to Tindari, the fifth book, published in 2000 and translated into English five years later.

That novel includes an admonition to "Calm down, you look like a character in a puppet theatre." A few pages later, "As if following a script, Montalbano first wrung his hands ... " and, my favorite of the bunch: "`The stakes are extremely high.' He felt disgusted by the words coming out of his mouth. ... He wondered how much longer he could keep up the charade."

Elsewhere, Montalbano impersonates Jacques Tati's Monsieur Hulot and, as if to underline the motifs of performance, toward the end of the novel Montalbano reflects on the town of Tindari, destination of the couple whose murder triggers the story: "What Montalbano remembered of Tindari was the small mysterious Greek theater." And that's not Camilleri's only invocation of Athenian drama. Several novels in the series feature family dynamics unmistakably redolent of Greek plays and epics.

That's why there's a decided edge of humorous introspection to an exchange in August Heat (Italian publication 2006/English translation 2009) between Montalbano and his junior colleague Fazio as the two speculate over the case of man whose stepson has been found dead"

Montalbano: "In short, you don't see Speciale as a
murderer?"

Fazio: "No way."

M: "But you know, in Greek tragedy—"

F: "We're in Vigàta, Chief, not Greece."

M: "Tell me the truth: Do you like the story or don't you?"

F: "It seems okay for TV."

(Click here for more on how series change over time.)

© Peter Rozovsky 2009

Crossing borders in Baltimore

Attended a reading and signing tonight with Jeff VanderMeer and Sandra Ruttan in Baltimore. VanderMeer is author or co-author of titles that include Why Should I Cut Your Throat? and The Kosher Guide to Imaginary Animals, so you know his imagination ranges widely.

His talk and, more important, his fiction, including his current Finch, bring in fantasy, noir and hard-boiled, and why not? The man's all about crossing borders. In Finch, a non-human force has stepped in to occupy the city of Ambergris, rent asunder by civil war between competing merchant families.

Finch, a human, is "asked by the occupiers to solve a difficult double murder" amid the city's seedy underbelly, and if that reminds crime-fiction readers of Philip Kerr, John Lawton, Rebecca Cantrell, J. Robert Janes, David Peace and so on, great. VanderMeer could well get this crime-fiction readers reading fantasy, just as Brian Lindenmuth got me reading comics. Furthermore, VanderMeer cited John Burdett, Colin Cotterill and Derek Raymond among his favorite crime authors, and that prepares me for a richly detailed setting and a dark story for when I read Finch.

VanderMeer also said: "I don't really see any difference between the setting and the character," which endeared him to your humble blogkeeper.

Ruttan's Lullaby for the Nameless has just been released, the third novel in her Nolan, Hart and Tain series, and the triple protagonists are one indication of what she does differently. No surprise, then, that she expresses a certain nostalgia for Ed McBain and the large cast of his 87th Precinct novels. Oh, and the opening of Lullaby for the Nameless focuses as harrowingly and unsparingly on the victim as does any Scandinavian crime writer you'd care to name.

And here's a tantalizing hint of what she may be up to in the future: "I think I'm becoming a little more interested in the subtle crimes we tolerate day to day," italics mine.

© Peter Rozovsky 2009

Detectives Beyond Borders is a winner

The people have spoken. Your humble blogkeeper has won a Spinetingler Award for special services to the industry, in a tie with the worthy J. Kingston Pierce of the worthy Rap Sheet.

I like these awards because the categories reflect serious thought about and great care for crime fiction. They recognize a wide range of authors, for instance, and they include graphic novels.

Both the ballot forms and the winners list include links to the nominated short stories, another sign that the Spinetinglers want to spread the news about writers and artists who might not otherwise get the recognition that they deserve. So thanks to all who voted, and I hope you'll join me in spraying some champagne on Sandra Ruttan and all the good folks at Spinetingler.

© Peter Rozovsky 2009

Noir at the Bar VI: Sandra Ruttan (and a chance to win free books)

(Brian Lindenmuth, Sandra Ruttan)

Sandra Ruttan, author of What Burns Within, The Frailty of Flesh, Suspicious Circumstances and the forthcoming Lullaby For The Nameless, drove up from Maryland for last night's sixth Noir at the Bar reading.

I enjoyed the reading and discussion so much that I realized toward its end I'd neglected to take notes. That's a testament to the intelligence and seriousness with which Ruttan discusses her matter and her craft. I urge all bookstores and event promoters to give her more chances to do so.

It's a testament to her intelligence, too, and that of the attendees that talk ranged over: gender differences in fiction, native peoples in Canada and the United States, cross-border crime, and the frustrating perception that Canada is safe, benign and a bad home for crime fiction with a hard edge. Ruttan also discussed a subject that I had not mentioned in my earlier posts about her work: the potential for conflict offered by an area of sometimes clashing police jurisdictions.

Now it's time to win some books. I'll send signed copies of What Burns Within and The Frailty of Flesh to the first reader who answers this question correctly: Ruttan sets her novels in the Lower Mainland region of which Canadian province?

***

And the winner is ... Congratulations to Marco in Italy, who was the first with the correct answer: British Columbia.

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Noir at the Bar VI: Sandra Ruttan

Noir at the Bar is proud to present Sandra Ruttan, author of What Burns Within, The Frailty of Flesh and Suspicious Circumstances.

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“The Frailty of Flesh tore me asunder. Rarely has a novel of such art and skill reduced me to a wreck. It moved me in ways I didn’t even know I felt. It’s a kick in the head that is underwrit with sheer compassion.”

– Ken Bruen

"[Ruttan] is talented in the way that a natural musician is talented, making all the notes seem effortless. Characters that feel very real, and a wonderful sense of timing, Ruttan brings it all and leaves it on the page."

– Jon Jordan, Crime Spree Magazine

"The next stage in ensemble procedurals is here, and Sandra Ruttan is in its vanguard."

– Peter Rozovsky, Detectives Beyond Borders

======================================

Where: Tritone
1508 South Street
Philadelphia, PA
215–545–0475

http://www.tritonebar.com/

When: Sunday, Dec.7, 6:00 p.m.

"Noir at the Bar: A Philadelphia Tradition Since 2008"

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Sandra Ruttan's effective use of an obnoxious expression

My half-cocked theorizing about evolution crowded out at least one other thing I wanted to say yesterday about What Burns Within, so here it is now:

Author Sandra Ruttan makes effective use of one of the most grating locutions in recent English: "You don't get it." That expression embodies many pernicious qualities and practices: snobbery, condescension, sloganeering, infuriating obstinacy, pig-headed stupidity, substitution of put-down for argument, and often sneering political correctness as well.

The character whom Ruttan has utter the expression is a panicked, driven, victimized, vindictive. scheming, manipulative, dangerous sort, just the kind who would shake her head and say, "You don't get it." And she says it at her most panicked, dangerous and manipulative moment. The expression captures the essence of the character, and the character captures the essence of the expression. Ruttan gets it.

What other authors make effective use of grating expressions in this way?

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Evolution (Sandra Ruttan)

Odds are that many people reading this post nourish a lingering fondness for Hill Street Blues, Ed McBain's 87th Precinct novels or both. McBain's novels and, later, Steven Bochco's TV series pioneered the ensemble approach to the police procedural, with liberal doses of the characters' personal lives thrown into the mix on an unprecedented scale.

But be honest. As momentous as both are in the history of crime fiction, don't they feel a bit if not dated, then at least like products of times different from today? Don't the domestic vignettes, as memorable as they are (Steve Carella's tender relationship with his deaf wife, Teddy, in the books; Furillo and Davenport's pillow talk on the show) seem somewhat grafted onto rather than organically integrated into the stories?

The next stage in ensemble procedurals is here, and Sandra Ruttan is in its vanguard. What Burns Within offers three protagonists and a host of significant secondary characters. These characters' personal problems, while not extravagantly and theatrically complicated, are intense, and they are present at all times, whether the officers are investigating arsons, murders or a string of child abductions, or dealing with vicious office politics. Equally, the cases are on the characters' minds even in those moments that Bochco or McBain might have reserved for homely domestic vignettes.

The strands of investigation – into child abductions, rapes, arsons and murders – intersect and overlap while somehow managing to pick up speed toward a violent climax. The density and complexity build when one of the officers becomes a victim. And Ruttan manages to keep the suspense going even during the denouement, when things are supposed to be winding down.

There's a lot going on in this novel, and I may post more about it later. For now, I'll say that the book takes up at least two especially sensitive crimes, rape and child abduction, and deals with each in ways that are surprising and that subvert easy judgments. And I'll add that I can think of no other crime novel so dense with incident and yet so fast-moving. Highly recommended.

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Be a character; chow down with two authors

Sandra Ruttan, one of that long list of folks I was pleased to meet at Bouchercon 2008, holds forth at her publisher's Web site on the process and occasional difficulty of naming characters and choosing titles for her novels.

You can help her with the first of those difficulties. Sandra and her publisher, Dorchester, are running a contest, and if you win, Sandra will name a character in her next book for you. Details at the publisher's link above, and good luck to you in the contest if I don't win.

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Meet authors Cordelia Frances Biddle and Dave Zeltserman this Sunday, Nov. 9 at 1 p.m. for the Robin’s Book Store Crime Fiction Book Club's Sunday brunch. It happens at Les Bons Temps, 114 S. 12th Street, Philadelphia.

My favorite blurb details for the two authors: "Cordelia Frances Biddle is a member of one of Philadelphia's oldest families, and this series uses many of her actual ancestors as characters."

and, for Zeltserman's Small Crimes:

"Crooked cop Joe Denton gets out of prison early after disfiguring the local district attorney, which doesn't help his popularity."

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Carnival of the Criminal Minds, No. 16

The sixteenth edition of Carnival of the Criminal Minds promises a thrill-filled ride through the world of crime fiction from a woman who actually writes the stuff: Sandra Ruttan.

She writes novels. She writes stories. She edits Spinetingler Magazine. She doesn't mince her punches or pull her words, and she likes authors, bloggers and commentators who do the same.

I don't quite know where to start, so I'll just tell you that her carnival offers a heady mix of controversy, thrills, exotica and fun that looks worth several visits. I shall see you there. And when you're done, visit past Carnivals at the archive maintained by the founder, Barbara Fister.

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

Non-traditional book distribution and other non-fictional news

Via Crime Scraps comes the news that a truckload of the Spanish edition of Jo Nesbø's The Redbreast was hijacked in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Here on the North American landmass, Sandra Ruttan was happy to report receiving author's copies of her novel What Burns Within even though the box containing them had been ripped open and one of the books "liberated along the way."

Here's hoping that the hijackers and liberators enjoy their books and that the authors get the royalties they deserve.

Back in South America, Brazil's government wants to fine all foreigners who visit the Amazon wilderness without government permission. Under a bill the government plans to send to the country's Congress, those caught in the Amazon without a permit from military and justice authorities could be fined $60,000, according to the Associated Press.

"We want the world to visit the region. But we want them to tell us when they’re coming and what they’re going to do,” said National Justice Secretary Romeu Tuma Jr., who added that the government was looking at Brazilian organizations in the Amazon for possible illegal activities.

According to the AP, "The bill reflects suspicions among conservative politicians and the military that foreign nongovernmental organizations working to help Indians and save the rain forest are actually attempting to wrest the Amazon and its riches away from Brazil."

“We have information that some international groups disguised as NGOs have come to carry out bioprospecting and have entered public and indigenous lands to try and influence their cultures,” Tuma is quoted as having said. “There is piracy and the theft of (traditional) knowledge in the region.”

Sounds to me like a story idea for Leighton Gage.

© Peter Rozovsky 2008

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Jo Nesbo
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More on music

Sandra Ruttan posts a detailed, thought-provoking reply to yesterday's post about Ian Rankin, rock and roll and crime fiction. She jumps all over the Telegraph article that criticized Rankin's radio show about music and crime fiction, and she makes a persuasive case that the article's author did not do his or her homework.

Sandra is a bigger Rankin fan than I am. She also uses music in her own fiction, so her words carry extra weight. "To me, anyway," she writes, "music is natural atmosphere." She's right, of course. The question is whether fiction — an artificial creation, after all — has a natural atmosphere.

© Peter Rozovsky 2007

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