Crime fiction is making headlines

The long-running debate over how much violence in any sort of media affects its consumers doesn’t appear to be petering out anytime soon.

Last week, several crime novelists pushed at the founders of a prize for books without violence against women.

Specifically, they’re upset that the Staunch Book Prize — for thrillers in which no woman is beaten, stalked, sexually exploited, raped, or murdered — argues that jurors may be comparing real-life defendants to fictional criminals, leading to unfair acquittals.

You can read recent rebuttals from such writers as Julia Crouch and Sarah Hilary — and initial reactions to the prize's creation — in the Guardian. 

Another writer making public statements on the intersection of fiction and crime: Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl.

The lawyer of a man whose wife has been missing for over a month told the media that he’s investigating the possibility that the woman is faking her disappearance, specifically comparing it to Flynn’s bestselling novel.

In a statement, Flynn said: “It absolutely sickens me that a work of fiction written by me would be used by Fotis Dulos’s lawyer as a defense, and as a hypothetical, sensationalized motive behind Jennifer’s very real and very tragic disappearance.”