* Tuesday, June 22nd, 6.30 p.m.: signing at Murder by the Book, Houston* Wednesday, June 23rd, 1:30-2:00 p.m.: signing at Clues Unlimited, Tucson
* Thursday, June 24th, 2:00p.m.: Velma Teague Public Library, Glendale
* Thursday, June 24th, evening: Poisoned Pen Conference, The Poisoned Pen, Scottsdale
* Tuesday, June 29th, 6:30-8:00 p.m.: signing with Lee Child at The Mysterious Bookshop, NYC
Please contact these stores to order signed or inscribed copies of Killer Instinct!
Need help tracking down copies of Zoë's books, feel free to e-mail David here.
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Crime writer Reed Farrel Coleman has long been a fan of Daniel Woodrell, an author he considers a "genius." We asked Reed, who saw the new film adaptation of Woodrell's 1996 novel, Winter's Bone, this past weekend, to offer up a review of the movie.
"Life is tough to begin with for Ree Dolly, a teenage girl living in a dirt poor part of the Ozarks where everybody in the area’s got a hand in the meth trade and everyone around is related to one degree or another. But when Ree, already responsible for raising her two younger siblings and caring for her infirmed mother, finds out that her father’s put the family homestead up as bail collateral and that he has fallen off the face of the earth, she goes on a quest to find her dad and save their land. Her odyssey is as harrowing as anything Dante could have dreamed up and as fraught with peril as anything Ulysses ever had to face. Ree faces it, for the most part, alone. Winter’s Bone, written by the Shakespeare of the Ozarks, Daniel Woodrell, is a masterpiece. So too is the movie adapted from the novel.
"The film, directed by Debra Granik [right], is the most faithful adaption in deed, spirit, and tone I have ever encountered. Talk about someone who understood the source material. She understood the dirt beneath its fingernails. But making a film is about making choices and the choices Ms. Granik makes are the right ones. There are things that in the novel—Teardrop’s nub of an ear and burnt face, Ree’s romantic involvement with her closest girlfriend, the brutality of the beatings—that Ms. Granik has wisely played down for fear those details would call too much attention to themselves and detract from the overall impact of the film. And the little additions she makes, particularly a scene involving Ree’s discussion with an Army recruiter, are brilliant.
"Still, the movie, as faithful as it is, isn’t the novel. The movie doesn’t quite have the mythic quality of the book and necessarily has a sharper focus on the crime aspects of the story. However, the film does shine a particularly strong light on the culture of the women in this part of the Ozarks. It’s the women who insulate the men from Ree when she comes calling. It’s the women who do the dirty work, who enforce the codes of behavior, who deliver the beatings. Yet as powerful as these women are made to seem, you just know that they are trapped in this world with no hope of escape. It is that sense of hopelessness and my yearning for Ree to move beyond it that will stay with me forever. Read this book. See this movie. If Jennifer Lawrence, who plays Ree, and John Hawkes [left], who plays Teardrop, and Ms. Granik don’t receive baskets full of nominations for their performances, the world really is flat."Reed Farrel Coleman is the 3-time Shamus Award-winning author of Walking the Perfect Square, Redemption Street, The James Deans, Soul Patch, Empty Ever After, and the forthcoming Innocent Monster.
Go here to find out when Winter's Bone will be showing in your area!
--------------------------Speaking of Daniel Woodrell, he & Winter's Bone director Debra Granik were interviewed yesterday on NPR's Fresh Air. Catch the audio & transcript here.
Busted Flush Press will reprint Woodrell's 1998 masterpiece, Tomato Red, in the next month. Listen to him discussing the book on NPR back in '99.
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