International community greets news of former London mayor’s big appointment with a mixture of fear, bemusement and panic
The Guardian
Thursday 14 July 2016
Bonnie Malkin, Philip Oltermann in Berlin and Tom Phillips in Beijing
Photograph: Lauren Hurley/PA
The world of politics, diplomacy and celebrity has reacted with a mixture of amusement and horror to the news that Boris Johnson has been appointed Britain’s new foreign secretary.
Johnson himself said he was “excited” to take up the new role , which will involve travelling the globe, meeting foreign leaders and representing Britain on the international stage.
However, his track record when it comes to interacting with other cultures is patchy to say the least, and politicians around the world will no doubt be intrigued by the prospect of working with a man who once wrote a poem about the Turkish president having sex with a goat.
In the US, the official reaction was one of carefully restrained laughter.
Published June 17, 2016 by Katherine Cowdrey – The Bookseller
The Dead Good Reader Awards shortlists have been announced, featuring Val McDermid, Lee Child and Peter James along with Robert Galbraith, C L Taylor and Stuart MacBride.
The six awards, created in collaboration with the Dead Good community to celebrate “unique elements” in crime writing, are nominated and voted for by readers that will be presented at the Theakstons Old Peculiar Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate in July.
Up for The Dead Good Recommends Award for Most Recommended Book is Career of Evil (Little, Brown), the third novel by J K Rowling’s pseudonym “Robert Galbraith”; Die of Shame (Little, Brown) by Mark Billingham, also a recent finalist for the Crime Writers’ Association Dagger in the Library; psychological thriller In Her Wake (Orenda) by Amanda Jennings; The Missing (Avon) by C L Taylor, described by Fiona Barton to have “an agonising twist”; Tastes Like Fear (Headline) by former bookseller Sarah Hilary who won Theakstons Crime Novel of the Year 2015; and debut Untouchable Things (Legend Press) by Tara Guha, which was authored on the 2014 Luke Bitmead Bursary.
The Tess Gerritsen Award for Best Series shortlists the Jack Reacher series by Lee Child, who recently confirmed he would be continuing the series under a new contract with Transworld to fans’ delight, and the Roy Grace series by Peter James, who is on his 11th novel in the series Want You Dead (Macmillan). Also shortlisted are Sarah Hilary’s Marnie Rome (Headline), Stuart MacBride’s Logan McRae (HarperCollins), Elly Griffiths’ Ruth Galloway (Quercus) and Marnie Riches’ George Mackenzie (Maze) series.
BLOODY Scotland book festival aims to punch above its weight, writes Bob McDevitt.
Now in its fifth year, Bloody Scotland was the brainchild of a group of Scottish crime writers (and one literary agent) who felt that there was room in the festival calendar in Scotland for one dedicated to crime writing. They were certainly right, as the audience reaction has been overwhelmingly positive and the festival has grown every year.
the audience reaction has been overwhelmingly positive…
Scotland definitely punches above its weight in terms of the number of world-class crime writers it has produced, with names like Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, Chris Brookmyre, Denise Mina and the godfather of them all, William McIlvanney. The 2016 festival will be the first to take place since his death, and in addition to dedicating the festival to his memory, the Scottish Crime Book of the Year will be renamed The McIlvanney Prize from this year on.
