Weekly Geeks # 19: Top 10 books published in 2008

The challenge in Weekly Geeks #19 is to, before October 25,

1. Compile your list of favorites. Please be sure that books you choose actually were published in 2008, or at the very earliest in the winter holiday season of 2007. Sometimes books that come out then are left out.

2. Come back and sign Mr Linky with the url to your top books of 2008 post.

3. If you happen to see any non-WG bloggers making similar lists, please grab the url and come put it in Mr Linky for them. Let them know you’re doing that, please, in case they have some sort of objection; if they do, they can ask me to remove their link. I’ve already seen a couple favorites of 2008 posts, which is another reason I wanted to get started early.

4. Feel free to make changes to your list if you read something new in the next few weeks. After about October 25, I can’t guarantee your changes will be reflected in the master list. We’ll probably start compiling lists around then.

5. Please consider whether you’d like to help me compile lists.

If you follow my blog, then you'll know that creating such a list is no problem for me.
You can see my ranked list for all the books I have read in 2008 at Smik's Reviews (all my reviews)

Here are my top 10, chosen from books published in 2008

SHATTER, Michael Robotham
A CURE FOR ALL DISEASES, Reginald Hill
NEMESIS, Jo Nesbo
FAN MAIL, PD Martin
CARELESS IN RED, Elizabeth George
VOODOO DOLL, Leah Giarratano
WHERE WILL THERE BE GOOD NEWS?, Kate Atkinson
A KILLING FROST, R.D. Wingfield
DEAD MAN'S FOOTSTEPS, Peter James
NO TIME FOR GOODBYE, Linwood Barclay

There don't seem to be all that many crime fiction readers amongst my fellow weekly geekers, so my choices probably won't poll all that well, unless fellow crime fiction bloggers decide to chime in. There are some Australian authors in my list too - Michael Robotham, PD Martin, and Leah Giarratano - and they probably won't poll particularly well overall either.

Also, in our genre we have so much choice, so the choices could be wide ranging rather than concentrated. Much will depend on people sticking to the published in 2008 rule. Of course what it doesn't take into account that some books are published in some countries earlier than in others. We often find that books published in Australia are not available in the UK or the US until later, or vice versa. There are always flaws in any rule.

Meanwhile, you've read my list. Are any of mine in your top 10? What crime fiction have I left out that you would put in your top 10? Please feel free to list your top 10 in your comment, but only those published in 2008. I might work up a "local" poll for us in a couple of weeks time.

REVIEW: A KILLING FROST, R. D. Wingfield

Bantam Press, 2008, 400 pages. ISBN 978-0-593-0647-6

It's late at night in Denton, dark with rain, and a man walking in Denton Woods is horrified when his dog retrieves a chopped-off human foot. As usual D.I. Jack Frost has far too many cases to cover - fifteen year old Sally Marsden attacked and raped near a multi-storey carpark; the reported abduction of a two year old from his cot;two missing teenagers; a blackmailer who has poisoned baby food in a local supermarket and is demanding money; and then on top of it all, the arrival of a new D. C. I. whose sole mission in life is to rid Denton police station of scruffy, irregular, and unconventional Jack Frost.

Published posthumously by the estate of R. D. Wingfield, after a long gap in the six book series, it seemed to me as I said in my progress report earlier this week, that the early incidents in A KILLING FROST owed their existence to some of the episodes in the very popular television series. In all there have been 42 episodes in 13 series, made, "based on the characters created by R. D. Wingfield". A KILLING FROST seemed to me to contain a compilation of some of these episodes.

His very continuance as part of the Denton police force under threat because of scheming by the new D. C. I. and Superintendent Mullett, to get him to volunteer to transfer to another station, overburdened with an enormous workload, continually under-resourced, Frost continues to show as he connects the dots in the puzzles, why he is among the best.
If I had to compare him to another fictional detective then I think it would be Fred Vargas' Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg. Like Adamsberg Frost is able to connect the seemingly unconnected. Nor does Frost do things by the book. If he doesn't get a search warrant then he is devious enough to do without. His mind continues to gnaw at problems, trying make sense of what he knows he has seen.

I liked A TOUCH OF FROST more as the central story of missing teenagers surged on. Frost complains at the amount of work piled on his plate, but he never shirks, and he always shoulders the blame when it is his.

As the threat of having to leave Denton looms, Frost is haunted by thoughts of his dead wife. They were not close in the final years of their marriage, constantly driven apart by the demands of his job, and the fact that he really is a workaholic. That strand inserts an element of pathos into the story. But it's easy to see how the job separated them.

So this book is Wingfield's last. It is sad to think there will be no more.
If you haven't read any at all, do start from the beginning.
Here's the list to look for
1. Frost at Christmas (1984)
2. A Touch of Frost (1987)
3. Night Frost (1992)
4. Hard Frost (1995)
5. Winter Frost (1999)
6. A Killing Frost (2008)

My rating: 4.7

A KILLING FROST, Progress Report

This week I'm in Denton, in particular Denton Woods, in A KILLING FROST by R. D. Wingfield.
This was his last novel, published posthumously.
Unfortunately it feels a bit like I've read bits of it before- and not all of it in a Wingfield novel.

Bits of foot and leg have turned up - was there a newspaper case last year that had this happen?
I've certainly met this idea in a couple of other plots recently, although they might not have been recently written books.
There's the hand in the truffles case in Ruth Rendell's NOT IN THE FLESH. But I could have sworn there were others. Help me out if you can.

We are back in Denton Woods with a rape case - that doesn't feel new. Nor does the case of a missing teenage girl. But is it connected to the rape case?
And we are hanging around an ATM waiting for somebody who is blackmailing a supermarket to collect money that has been paid into his account. Predictably he manages to get money out of one where we are not waiting.

Mullett has brought in a new DI to get rid of Frost. He's going to make him toe the line - as if that will ever happen!

I think perhaps some of the ideas have been explored by script writers in the TV series which I have been an assiduous watcher of. Perhaps that is what happened- it's been a long time between printed books. As you can see the signature is that the word FROST always appeared in the title.

1. FROST AT CHRISTMAS (1984)
2. A TOUCH OF FROST (1987)
3. NIGHT FROST (1992)
4. HARD FROST(1995)
5. WINTER FROST (1999)
6. A KILLING FROST (2008)

I've read criticism that the TV version of Jack Frost, David Jason, is much nicer than actual book version. I'm testing that idea out too, and not finding much validity in it either.
I'm surprised to find that I haven't mentioned Wingfield before in my blog, so I'm correcting that now.

FROST AT CHRISTMAS, My rating 4.7
Ten days to Christmas. 8 year old Tracey Uphill disappears on her way home from Sunday School. D.I. Jack Frost has been assigned a new helper, the Chief Constable's nephew, D.C. Clive Barnard. As Christmas approaches, Frost is typically behind with his paper work and the trail to Tracey seems cold. His investigations unearth information about the vicar, about a teacher who regularly visits Tracey's prostitute mother, and about a robbery that was committed a long time ago.

TOUCH OF FROST (Audio CD), My rating 4.8
This book (unabridged on this 13.5 hr CD set) could just have easily be titled FROST's WEEK. Tuesday night brings with it the discovery of the body of a junkie in a public toilet, a rape in Denton Woods, a farewell party at Denton police station for a retiree, a hit and run death at a retirement village, a robbery at the town's strip joint, a missing school girl, and the crime stats are due. This CD reading gives you to time to wallow in Wingfield's excellent writing. But if you can't get the CD and haven't got 13.5 hours to spare (no long trips coming up), then get the book. The Frost series are worth the trouble. If you can't find the books, look for the TV series with David Jason.