Eclectic crime fiction & informed, irreverent non-fiction from Asia & beyond
Detective Maier Is Back Soon To Investigate The Politics Of Murder The third Detective Maier mystery is a taut and crazy spy thriller for our disturbing times. When award-winning German conflict photographer Martin Ritter disappears in a boating accident in Thailand, the nation mourns the loss of a cultural icon. But a few weeks later, […]
Continue ReadingPatrick French reports on Drifters, Conspirators, and Noir in Cambodia’s Capital City for Crime Reads and writes… “Hard-boiled and noir is pretty much the only option on the menu when it comes to Phnom Penh crime writing. Tom Vater, a Bangkok-based writer and publisher, wrote The Cambodian Book of the Dead (2013) which sees German […]
Continue ReadingThe Man with the Golden Mind gets a great review at Literary Fits. “I am again impressed with a Crime Wave Press offering, this one being a Cold War aftermath spy thriller set in a country about which I knew very little: Laos. Tom Vater sets up an intricate and complicated plot which I found […]
Continue Reading“The Man with the Golden Mind brings postwar Viet Nam back on the grid. As you walk along with Cultural Attache Rendel and his mysterious spy cohort, code named Weldmeister, you can almost smell the damp smell from the muddy river.” The […]
Continue Reading“Quintessentially this exhilarating read incorporates everything from lies and deception through to sex, betrayal and death, offering the reader an exercise in edge of your seat action combined with strong storytelling and believable characterisation.” The Man with the Golden Mind, the second […]
Continue ReadingCrime writer Paul Brazill interviews me about my current crime fiction projects including the republication of my 1960s CIA thriller The Man with the Golden Mind, featuring former war correspondent turned Detective Maier. The second Maier mystery is currently published by Crime Wave Press in ebook format. Julia Rendel asks Maier to investigate the twenty-five […]
Continue ReadingCrime Wave Press, my publishing venture with Hans Kemp, and Asia’s only English language crime fiction imprint, has been producing quality crime fiction for four years now. We have 28 titles under our belt, one of our books, The Curious Corpse by Nick Wilgus, has just been optioned for a movie by De Warenne […]
Continue ReadingGreat review of my second Detective Maier novel The Man with the Golden Mind at Looking for a Good Book, from 2014. Writers often hear the mantra “show, don’t tell,” but author Vater brings this to a new level. Rather than showing us what is happening, he brings us in to the environment and lets […]
Continue ReadingTHE CAMBODIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD is featured in this week’s writer’s round-up at Paul Brazill‘s this week: What Goes On? Vater, Bird, Tomlinson, Miles. I share Paul’s virtual stage with Nigel Bird, Katherine Tomlinson and Maritetta Miles. Here’s what I had to say…. I’ve just republished THE CAMBODIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD, the first in […]
Continue ReadingI am very pleased that The Cambodian Book of the Dead, the first Detective Maier novel, originally published by the now defunct Exhibit A, is out in a new Kindle edition, with a brand new cover, with Crime Wave Press. The second Maier Mystery, The Man with the Golden Mind, may well follow suit in […]
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