Skorpio

 Here is a reminder to myself and others among you who love crime fiction: South African  Deon Meyer's latest novel Skorpio should be released translated at some point this year. I saw this new cover (paperback?) on social media. A great cover, giving some idea of African heat and merciless light. It's sober, simple, but it says so much. There's just something about a vehicle driving fast on a dusty road. I have been eager to get back to the world of Meyer's novels. I cannot wait to buy the translation, hopefully soon. I encourage you to do the same.

Skorpio for Noirvember

I have the perfect book to read for this year's #Noirvember: South African crime writer Deon Meyer's latest novel Skorpio. It's being released this month, for all I know it might be out already. The only problem is that it's in Afrikaans. So I will have to wait until it's translated. But hey, if there are any Afrikaans readers among my readers (you never know), buy it, lucky you, and enjoy it. Thankfully I have a big TBR list (well of course I do), so it's not like I have nothing to read at the moment. But there's just something about Meyer that just fits Noirvember perfectly.

Skorpio, the South African Scorpion

Great news for me, who loves crime fiction and who really enjoys the work of South African crime writer Deon Meyer: there is more news about his new novel: it will be released in Afrikaans in November 2025, then translated at some point in 2026. It will feature Benny Griessel and Vaugh Cupido. Furthermore, from what I understand of this cover, explosives will be part of the plot. Its original title will be Skorpio, which I guess will be Scorpion. Although with a k and wihtout the n, it sounds more menacing. I'm excited.

Benny Griessel will be back

For the crime fiction afficionados among you, I received some good news from South African crime writer Deon Meyer's Newsletter: he is writing another Benny novel. The tenth one featuring Griessel and the ninth one festuring his partner, Cape Coloured detective Vaugh Cupido. It should be released in Afrikaans in November 2025 and in English at some point in 2026. I don't know much more about it, but check or subscribe to his Newsletter. The working title is Scorpio. So scorpions might be featured in one way or another. I hope they keep this title, or at least the word scorpion in the title. It sounds both devious and menacing.

Sinister Swamps

I am starting this post by a question: is it only me, or are swamps particularly sinister? I always thought so anyway. It is full of mold, wet, neither land nor water, with ghostly trees and all sorts of creepy critters. As far as I remember, I always found swamps scary, even before I read Scorpion Swamp, my very first Fighting Fantasy Gamebook. The book only confirmed my sinister fascination with eerie swamps. Maybe it is because of this, even more than the fact that it was my first gamebook, that I am so fond of it. It is supposed to be full of flaws, but I always found it full of atmosphere and in a great setting, where monsters abond. Scorpions, normal sized or giant ones, of course, but also giant spiders, giant toads, "normal" giants and that thing on the cover, Malevolent humans too, some thieves but especially wizards who made the Scorpion Swamp their home. But mainly, I love it for the swamp.

My brothers and I played of course plenty of make-belief games set in swamps, or indeed set in Scorpion Swamp or nearby (the town of Willowbend for instance). Years later, when we started playing Dungeons & Dragons, swamps became maybe the second most important wilderness setting after the forest. We had plenty of monsters in them, but not the same ones as in Scorpion Swamp: there were far more lizard men and hydras than scorpions. All the same, the book certainly influenced us. And it reminds me that swamps are, well, you know, beautifully eerie and deliciously sinister.