transcending the genre

There's a nice interview with Ian Rankin in today's paper. The Guardian's Lynn Barber is always good at this type of feature, although I find it slightly odd that she chooses to end her article with a reminder that Rankin is "a very good crime novelist, but he's not Dickens". A slightly sour note that surprised me. That apart, it's well worth a read. Here's an extract, an interesting insight into how he views his books.

Which does he consider his best novel? 'Black and Blue was the breakthrough; that was the first time I felt I knew the guy and I could do more with the crime novel than just solve a mystery. Then last year's The Naming of the Dead about the 2005 G8 summit; I reread it recently and I thought, "There's nothing in there I would want to change." And it got these fantastic reviews, you know - "Almost transcends the genre" - and sold very well, so I'm truly happy with that book. Exit Music is much quieter, more elegiac and was quite hard to write in some ways because of that.'

Here's the full article.