BFP author news!

David Handler (The Man Who Died Laughing) has just placed a new thriller with Severn House. In Click to Play (due this fall), a dying child star from television's golden age reaches out to a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist with an explosive revelation: The real truth behind the most famous murder spree in Hollywood history. A secret so shocking that it will absolutely destroy the beloved U.S. Senator who is poised to become America's next president. Handler has had a bit of success in thriller writing: He co-authored the international bestselling thriller Gideon under the pseudonym Russell Andrews. Visit David's website for more information on Click to Play, upcoming signing events, and his other titles (including his BFP-published Hoagy & Lulu mysteries!).

Zoë Sharp has been nominated for the 2009 CWA Short Story Dagger for "Served Cold," a story that was published first in BFP's 2007 female noir anthology A Hell of a Woman (edited by Megan Abbott; hardback, $26, 978-0-9792709-9-4; paperback, $18, 978-0-9767157-3-3) and was published in the U.K. for the first time in The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime (edited by Maxim Jakubowski; Constable & Robinson). That makes the fifth nomination/award for A Hell of a Woman (see the right-hand column for a list of the others). This is particularly nice as Busted Flush will be publishing Zoë's first three Charlie Fox thrillers (and the fifth) in the U.S. next year (and "Served Cold" features Charlie Fox in a cameo appearance)!

More early praise for Tower (by Ken Bruen & Reed Farrel Coleman; paperback original; $15; 978-1-935415-07-7)...

“[A] small, intimate book with a limited cast and compact, explosive plot—and it is seamless… gritty, with sharply drawn characters and an unstoppable pace.”—Linda Brown, The Mystery Bookstore (Los Angeles, CA)

“Tower is the crime fiction equivalent of Joe Strummer and Lou Reed collaborating on a concept album and going way past the concept. In fact, the story wouldn’t carry the emotional gravity of the two protagonists if only one writer was telling both their stories. It’s difficult to picture any other two craftsmen, besides Bruen and Coleman, doing this and balancing the book’s lyrical mood and crisp pace. I couldn’t wait to get a copy to read. Now that I have read it, I’m even more impatient to get copies to sell to the fans of both authors and to introduce them to a whole new audience.”—Scott Montgomery, BookPeople (Austin, TX)

"This book has everything going for it, and I think it's going to be a big seller. Grab it in September and see if you agree."—Bill Crider, Edgar Award-nominated author of Murder in Four Parts (read his entire review here)