Michael J. McCann's Blog: Open Investigations, page 17

Adapting to Technological Changes

The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is an international body representing the interests of library and information services. In their 2013 Trend Report, the organization identified five key trends that will shape the global information environment. They are as follows:

TREND 1: New technologies will both expand and limit who has access to information.

TREND 2: Online education will democratize and disrupt global learning.

TREND 3: The boundaries of privacy and data protection will be redefined.

TREND 4: Hyper-connected societies will listen to and empower new voices and groups.

TREND 5: The global information environment will be transformed by new technologies.

These various trends will form the basis for discussion at the IFLA annual conference to be held in Lyon, France, on August 16 - August 22, 2014. This year's theme is "Libraries, Citizens, Societies: Confluence for Knowledge".

For more information, including the text of the Trend Report, please visit the IFLA website at http://www.ifla.org/.

A New Generation Can Now Appreciate Maigret

Penguin is re-publishing the seventy-five Maigret novels of Belgian author Georges Simenon with new translations and cover art. This will be the first time that the Maigret novels are published in the UK under a single publisher. The prolific Simenon wrote a novel a month, and Penguin is releasing a new Maigret novel each month. The first novel Pietr the Latvian was released in November 2013, followed by The Late Monsieur Gallet in December 2013, and The Hanged Man of Saint-Pholien in January 2014.

As a fan of the Maigret novels, I wrote an earlier post for this blog on Georges Simenon. If you're interested in reading it, please visit https://www.goodreads.com/author_blog....

This is a great time to (re) discover one of the greatest fictional detectives of all times.

Holiday Reading

The Crime Fiction Lover has a list of newly- or about-to-be released novels that you might like to bookmark for reading on a cold winter's night. If you're a lover of police procedurals, there are a number included in this list.

The books showcased include the newest Alex Cross mystery, as well as crime fiction by Kathy Bennett and Kendra Elliot. Lawrence Block has also published his first new book in a decade featuring the bookseller turned bandit Bernie Rhodenbarr.

The Brits are represented by Malcolm MacKay, publishing the last book in his trilogy based on Glasgow criminal gangs; Peter James, who introduces a new protagonist in his Brighton tales; and Kate Ellis in her latest novel featuring DI Wesley Peterson. These books will be available in January 2014.

Also included is Dominique Silva's The Dark Angel. Silva is a French journalist and crime fiction writer who lives in Japan.

For the full text of the article, please see http://www.crimefictionlover.com/2013....

To everyone, thanks for sharing my blog and best wishes for a safe and happy holiday.

Best Books of 2013

The New York Times has released its list of the top ten books of the year, a Christmas tradition that started in 1968. The fiction choices include Americanah, the third novel of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, which takes a tragicomic look at American race relations through the eyes of a young Nigerian immigrant, and The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kusner, a story of how the social forces of the 1970s affect a young woman who moves to New York to become an artist.

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt; Life after Life by Kate Atkinson; and Tenth of December, a series of short stories by George Sanders, are also included in the list.

For the non-fiction category, it is interesting to see that none of the numerous books written on the Kennedy administration and his assassination made the list. The selected books touch on topics from World War I to the Bush-Cheney administration, the 2008 financial meltdown, and the ravages of Hurricane Katrina and the 2004 tsunami.

For the full text of the article (including an animated short video), please see
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/boo....

Now Available at Your Local Library

If you're looking for some activities to share with your family this holiday season, you might want to check out your local library. There are many family-oriented activities, as well as programs geared to all ages from young readers to seniors. A quick search on the Internet shows a variety of special activities for children for Christmas, including the following:

- Christmas pajama parties for young readers;

- puppet shows;

- arts and crafts, including Christmas trees made from discarded paperbacks;

- gingerbread house contests;

- traditional tree lighting; and

- book and teddy bear exchanges.

These are just a few that I found. You might also want to check out the following Pinterest site, which has some really interesting pins on library programs for all seasons: https://www.pinterest.com/dawnkrause/....

Finding Crime Fiction that Suits Your Taste

There is an interesting guest post in Digital Book Today that talks about the various sub-genres of crime fiction. The post is written by author Libby Fischer Hellmann and is reprinted from her blog. She identifies the following types of crime novels:

- Cozies: for those who prefer the unraveling of the mystery and also like to shun the violence of some crime fiction.

- Traditional mysteries which follow the conventions of the crime novel (commission of offence, investigation, identification of suspects, etc.)

- Hard boiled thrillers which are "tense, tough and cynical" and the heroes tend to be anti-heroes.

- Police procedurals which follow the investigation of crime through the eyes of the police.

- Noir fiction: Similar to hard-boiled but the protagonist may also be the victim.

- Thrillers: can include mystery thrillers and spy novels in which suspense is a key element.

- Historical crime: crime novels set in the past and involving "meticulous research" to identify the wrongdoer.


As you have probably already noticed, it's difficult to make complete distinctions with regard to each sub-genre. For example, many people equate cozies with "traditional" mysteries, and many police procedurals owe much to the hard-boiled tradition.

To read the full text, please see http://digitalbooktoday.com/2013/10/2....

New Stats on Self-Publishing

The Guardian reports that newly-released figures for 2012 show a 59 per cent increase in the number of self-published books. Here are some of the facts reported in the article:

- 391,000 books were self-published in the US in 2012 (this includes only books published with an ISBN so the figure is understated);

- this increase has been mirrored by a growing professionalism among self-published authors;

- romance and literary fiction are the top genres;

- 71 per cent of these books are purchased by women;

- more than 80 per cent of self-published ISBNs came through just eight self-publishing houses;

- Amazon's CreateSpace had the biggest year-on-year increase, followed by Smashwords, Lulu, and the Random House imprint Author Solutions.

For the full text of the article, please see http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013....

Spotlight on The Rainy Day Killer

I recently completed a "spotlight" focusing on my latest crime fiction novel, The Rainy Day Killer. For those who might be interested in reading this novel, here is an excerpt from the spotlight.


Tell us about your latest book:

The Rainy Day Killer is the fourth novel in the Donaghue-Stainer Crime Novel series set in Maryland and Virginia. A man in a business suit offers the protection of his umbrella to an unsuspecting woman, and several days later she turns up dead on a river bank, raped and strangled. The terrifying serial killer known in the press as the Rainy Day Killer is now hunting new victims in the city of Glendale ... whenever it rains.

Homicide Lieutenant Hank Donaghue leads the investigation as the killer begins to communicate directly to him through phone calls and grisly packages containing body parts of his victims. Assisted by FBI profiler Ed Griffin, Donaghue and Detective Karen Stainer pursue an elusive predator who leaves no physical evidence behind.

The timing couldn't be worse, however, as Karen Stainer's attention is divided between the investigation and preparations for her upcoming wedding. Distracted and uncertain about her future, Stainer is furious when she learns that the Rainy Day Killer has followed her to Virginia, where the wedding will take place, and that he intends to make her his next victim.


What inspired you to write the book?

I wanted to use the serial homicide theme as a means of focusing on victimology rather than focusing, as many serial homicide books do, on the killer himself, his background and motivation.

I also wanted to introduce Karen Stainer's family so readers would have a better understanding of what motivates her.


What do you hope your readers come away with after reading your book?

I'm hoping readers will have a better understanding of the background, motivation, and character of Karen Stainer, as well as recognizing how serial homicide impacts victims and their loved ones. The perceptive reader will recognize that the violence described in the novel is not gratuitous: it highlights the dehumanization of the victim.

In the novel, I've also stressed what a difficult task homicide investigators and police agencies face, especially in light of ongoing budget cutbacks. This is a very serious issue facing law enforcement agencies across the United States, as well as in other countries.

The Best in Crime Fiction

In my blog of October 21, 2013, I noted that the UK-based Crime Writers' Association was conducting a poll among its members to vote on the best in crime fiction.The results were released on November 5 with Agatha Christie named the best-ever crime writer. Her 1926 novel The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, featuring Hercule Poirot, was named the best-ever crime novel, and the Sherlock Holmes series by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was named the best-ever crime series. The lists from which members selected the winners included a preponderance of UK writers with a nod to the American hard-boiled tradition in Hammett and Chandler. There were few contemporary American writers and no Scandinavian or Canadian writers included in the lists. For the results, please see http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/bo....

At least one long-standing member of the CWA expressed his disappointment with the results, saying that they were "safe" choices, but, with all due respect to Agatha Christie, crime fiction "has moved on": see http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013....

How Sherlock Changed the World

For those who are fans of Sherlock Holmes and his crime-solving methods, you'll want to catch a new two-hour PBS special airing this month. It's entitled How Sherlock Changed the World and has as its premise that Holmes was not only the most famous of all fictional detectives, but also had a lasting impact on real-world criminal investigations.

The program discusses real-life crimes solved by the equipment, forensic techniques, and methods of detection employed by the fictional detective.

How Sherlock Changed the World is scheduled to air on PBS on Tuesdays, November 19 and 26, 9:00-10:00 p.m. ET.