Minor Key

by John Harvey

A collection which includes five previously uncollected short stories, four of them featuring Charlie Resnick, six mostly jazz-related poems and an introduction, Resnick, Nottingham and All That Jazz.

Genres: Short Stories, Crime

Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

aka Jon Barton, William S. Brady (with Angus Wells), L.J. Coburn (with Laurence James), J.B. Dancer (with Angus Wells), John B. Harvey, William M. James (with Terry Harknett and Laurence James), Terry Lennox, John J. McLaglen (with Laurence James), James Mann, Thom Ryder, J.D. Sandon (with Angus Wells), Jon Hart

John Harvey (born 21 December 1938 in London) is a British author of crime fiction most famous for his series of jazz-influenced Charlie Resnick novels, based in the City of Nottingham. Harvey has also published over 90 books under various names, and has worked on scripts for TV and radio. He also ran Slow Dancer Press from 1977 to 1999 publishing poetry. The first Resnick novel, Lonely Hearts, was published in 1989, and was named by The Times as one of the 100 Greatest Crime Novels of the Century. Harvey brought the series to an end in 1998 with Last Rites, though Resnick has since made peripheral appearances in Harvey's new Frank Elder series. The protagonist Elder is a retired detective who now lives, as Harvey briefly did, in Cornwall. The first novel in this series, Flesh and Blood, won Harvey the Crime Writers' Association Silver Dagger in 2004, an accolade many crime fiction critics thought long overdue. In 2007 he was awarded the Diamond Dagger for a Lifetime's Contribution to the genre. On 14th July 2009 he received an honorary degree (Doctor of Letters) from the University of Nottingham in recognition of his literary eminence and his associations with both the University and Nottingham (particularly in the Charlie Resnick novels). He is also a big Notts County fan.

Reviews

[Colin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a limited edition (of 500) produced by the Nottingham publisher Five Leaves and contains five short stories (four of them featuring Charlie Resnick), six poems and an introductory essay entitled Resnick, Nottingham and All That Jazz. The poems didn't do a great deal for me, the stories are very readable, told in Harvey's usual sympathetic way, but I've never been entirely convinced that short stories work well in the crime genre. There's not enough scope to really examine the motivations of the characters and that seems to me to be the main reason for reading crime fiction. The most interesting piece in the collection to my mind is the introduction, which looks at the origins of Harvey's writing career and of his most well-known character.

[Rog Harrison · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a thin book published in 2009 containing a brief introduction, five short stories (four of which feature Resnick) and six poems. It seemed very familiar and I think all the short stories must have also been included in the collection "A darker shade of blue" which I have definitely read.