I love libraries. I think most readers and authors also love libraries.
I love the stacks of books, organized so well. Libraries are full of possibilities, of worlds not explored, of words waiting to be read.
As a child, I spent many wonderful hours in my hometown library, the Mississippi County Library in Charleston, Missouri.
When I went there it was a small, two-room building. But now, thanks to a generous donor, the renamed Clara Drinkwater Newnam Library is a large beautiful building.
It was in that tiny library that I expanded my love of mysteries, finding new, well, new to me, authors.
That hometown library is where I also first learned about the New York Public Library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street at Bryant Park.
A library that big—unfathomable to me.
And the two lions out front—nicknamed “Patience” and “Fortitude”—were beyond comprehension to me. A couple of years ago, I was invited to attend Sue Grafton’s memorial service held at the library in a beautiful room not always open to the public. Sue Grafton would approve.
Thank to Con Lehane’s excellent series, I can continue to discover new aspects of the New York Public Library.
Lehane’s latest Murder Off the Page (Minotaur) continues the story of librarian sleuth Raymond Ambler.
In Murder Off the Page, Raymond begins an investigation after getting a note from his friend, bartender Brian McNulty. The stakes increase when a second murder also is linked to Brian in this third installment of his library series.
Lehane’s series takes us into the corners of the library and also spots in New York City many don’t know about.
His library series grew out of another series Lehane wrote about bartender Brian McNulty. When that series ended, his editor suggested he write a new series set at the 42nd Street Library.
“[His editor] liked how I wrote about New York City and thought setting a mystery at one of the city’s iconic institutions would allow me to write about the city—and about books and librarians,” Lehane said in an email.
The library setting seems tailor made for Lehane, who has worked as a college professor, a union organizer, a labor journalist, and has tended bar at two dozen or so drinking establishments.
“I’ve loved libraries and frequented them (not quite as much as I’ve frequented bars) all my life,” he continued in the email. “I remember vividly the first time I visited a library as a first-grader.”
But despite his love of libraries, he said he didn’t feel comfortable trying to create a librarian character because “I don’t know librarianship, so I created a curator—a subject-area specialist.”
So like a good librarian would, Lehane dug into research to create his new series hero.
“First, Raymond Ambler was a historian; then, I changed his occupation to crime fiction specialist. I’d been interested in the idea of doing research in special collections for a while.”
His interest in special collections led to a pilgrimage or so.
“A decade or more ago, after reading Tom Nolan’s biography of Ross Macdonald and meeting and talking with Tom, I made a couple of visits to the Ross Macdonald/Kenneth Millar—actually the Margaret Millar—collection at the University of California Irvine and browsed through Ross Macdonald’s notebooks, so this might have been in the back of my mind also.”
By the way, here’s a bit of trivia about those lions guarding the New York Library.
The lions’ original names were Leo Astor and Leo Lenox, which was in honor of the library's founders. Then they were called Lord Astor and Lady Lenox. That doesn’t really work since both lions are supposed to be male.
The names Patience and Fortitude came during the in the 1930s from by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia. The legend is he chose the chose the names because he felt New Yorkers needed those qualities to endure the Great Depression.
Art Basel has become one of the most popular—and talked about—events in Miami Beach with its mission to sell works of established and emerging artists.
The for-profit, privately owned and managed, international art fair also is held annually in Basel, Switzerland, and Hong Kong.
But the Miami Beach version seems to have garnered the most publicity. Especially this year when a so-called artist stuck a banana to wall using duct tape and put a price tag of $125,000 on it.
And then another so-called performance artist came along and ate the banana. He left the duct tape.
I say so-called artists because this all seemed just silly to me. Don’t try to tell me this is art.
It’s publicity and silliness, and yes, I am being judgmental about it.
I appreciate art that pushes the boundaries and makes us think.
But come on, a banana?
This art stunt got me to thinking about mysteries that revolve around the art world. And there are many. One of my favorites is Jonathan Santlofer’s debut novel The Death Artist and his fourth novel Anatomy of Fear.
One of the newest novels to explore the art world is Fake Like Me by Barbara Bourland.
Read my review online here.
Sirens wail as Kate Moore drops her two children off at their international school in the chic Paris neighborhood of St. Germain, exchanging air-kisses with the other mothers on a seemingly ordinary fall day. She and her husband Dexter spend their days in much the same way as the other well-to-do expats in their social set. Kate is planning a dinner party that evening; Dexter is a day trader. Except that Kate’s part-time “consulting” work is cover for a clandestine intelligence operation that she runs—while fearing that it may be shut down any day, since her immediate boss has disappeared.
Meanwhile, a suicide bomber enters the courtyard of the Louvre. There are bomb threats at the major train stations. Dexter plans to win big with a risky bet on an insider tip. And Dexter’s former boss, multinational CEO Hunter Forsyth, is about to announce a major acquisition—until his day takes a sudden dramatic turn for the worse.
Quick-cutting among multiple characters, points of view, and settings, The Paris Diversion plunges the reader into a complicated web of action and suspense from the very first page. Over the course of a single day in the City of Light, a dozen lives will be drastically altered—or ended; multimilllion-dollar fortunes will be made and lost. As Kate races to figure out who is behind the terror threats, and why, she must untangle a complex web of relationships and confront shadowy figures from her past.
It’s not necessary to have read Chris Pavone’s award-winning The Expats to follow and enjoy The Paris Diversion. If you have, you surely won’t be disappointed in this tightly plotted sequel, and if you haven’t, you may want to go back to it after reading this second installment.
Stephanie Maddox is a crackerjack FBI agent with a stellar record, rock solid integrity—and a long-held, traumatic secret. A single mother, she’s worked her way up to a senior position leading the internal affairs team at FBI headquarters in Washington, DC. Her single-minded dedication to her work has meant huge personal sacrifices, especially lost time with her teenage son Zachary, a computer whiz. She’s missed school events, left him with babysitters late into the night, and with his departure for college just a few months away, she wonders if it’s too late to regain the closeness they once shared. Then she finds a loaded gun in his closet and fears he may be keeping secrets of his own—secrets that have attracted the attention of the FBI’s domestic terrorism squad. Will Stephanie be able to uncover the truth before Zachary gets into serious trouble?
Stephanie’s solo investigation becomes increasingly risky as she comes close to exposing wrongdoing at the highest levels in law enforcement and the federal government, stirring up dangerous enemies who repeatedly threaten her and her closest loved ones. Stephanie peels back layer upon layer of deception, following a trail that twists again and again, forcing her to question almost everything and everyone she holds dear, including her own past choices and cherished principles. Combining relatable family drama with escalating suspense, Keep You Close races headlong to a shocking conclusion.
When Sam unexpectedly inherits a charming country cottage next to a nature reserve from his Swedish step-grandmother, it seems like the perfect opportunity to start over. A former professor of anthropology, Sam intends to try his hand at documentary filmmaking while his wife, Merry, plays the devoted homemaker, gardening, decorating, cooking, and caring for their darling infant son Conor in the fairy-tale Swedish countryside. But when Merry’s closest childhood friend Frank, on sabbatical from her high-flying corporate career, comes for an extended summer visit, the idyllic family scene begins to unravel.
At first, Frank seems to revel in joining Merry and Sam’s cozy domesticity, but she soon begins to notice troubling hints that the happy picture may be an illusion. Merry and Frank have a complicated history, with a deep, unspoken rivalry that belies their sisterly closeness. All three main characters come from dysfunctional family backgrounds. All three, also, are keeping secrets from the others. When tragedy strikes, Sam, Merry, and Frank each react in their own idiosyncratic and self-destructive ways as summer fades into fall.
Told vividly in sharp, clear prose, with the distinct first-person voices of each of the three in alternating chapters, You Were Made for This examines the menacing shadows that lurk just beneath the surface of the seemingly ordinary. Almost nothing is what it seems to be in this disturbing psychological exploration of the complex dynamics and shifting boundaries of friendship, family, marriage, and parenthood. The mystery builds slowly at first, then accelerates until its chilling conclusion.
In her enthralling follow up to 2018’s Liar’s Paradox, the first Jack and Jill Thriller, author Stevens follows her lethal twin protagonists on their first adventure in a “post Broker” world, one where all the rules and relationships in the world of espionage and assassination have dramatically changed. In this strange, “What happens now?” type environment, the siblings, who have heretofore only known the macabre ministrations of their manipulative mother, receive a message from someone claiming to be their long-lost father, and so embark on a long journey to finally meet him face to face. It’s a perilous odyssey, fraught with danger, as they are pursued by multiple intelligence agencies, who seek to enlist their specialized services, or see them dead.
Liar’s Legacy is a rewarding, tense and exhausting read, heavy on action, suspense, paranoia, and tradecraft, but also careful to explore the psyches, perspectives, and intricate relationships among its large and varied cast. It’s a book that requires your strict attention, as there are many moving parts (so many, in fact, that a character pauses about a third of the way through to do a mental recap of the events up to that point, just to make sure he’s covering all his bases). It would help to have read Liar’s Paradox, as that would cast light on certain key relationships; there is also the unspoken promise of sequels, making this a transitional work. That said, it is still an effective standalone thriller, always surprising, always engaging, a visit to a treacherous world of sudden death, ever shifting alliances, and uneasy personal relationships.
The award season continues with nominations for the 2020 Agatha Awards, which will be awarded during the Malice Domestic conference (May 1-3, 2020), and which is celebrating its 32nd year.
The nominated works are books published in 2019.
The Agatha ballots will be included in registration bags at Malice Domestic and will be chosen by those attending the conference.
Malice Domestic is a fun conference and I highly recommend it.
Mystery Scene congratulates all the nominees.
The 2019 Agatha Award Nominees
Best Contemporary Novel
Fatal Cajun Festival, by Ellen Byron (Crooked Lane Books)
The Long Call, by Ann Cleeves (Minotaur)
Fair Game, by Annette Dashofy (Henery Press)
The Missing Ones, by Edwin Hill (Kensington)
A Better Man, by Louise Penny (Minotaur)
The Murder List, by Hank Philippi Ryan (Forge)
Best First Mystery Novel
A Dream of Death, by Connie Berry (Crooked Lane Books)
One Night Gone, by Tara Laskowski (Graydon House, a division of Harlequin)
Murder Once Removed, by S. C. Perkins (Minotaur)
When It’s Time for Leaving, by Ang Pompano (Encircle Publications)
Staging for Murder, by Grace Topping (Henery Press)
Best Historical Mystery
Love and Death Among the Cheetahs, by Rhys Bowen (Penquin)
Murder Knocks Twice, by Susanna Calkins (Minotaur)
The Pearl Dagger, by L. A. Chandlar (Kensington)
Charity’s Burden, by Edith Maxwell (Midnight Ink)
The Naming Game, by Gabriel Valjan (Winter Goose Publishing)
Best Nonfiction
Frederic Dannay, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and the Art of the Detective Short Story, by Laird R. Blackwell (McFarland)
Blonde Rattlesnake: Burmah Adams, Tom White, and the 1933 Crime Spree that Terrified Los Angeles, by Julia Bricklin (Lyons Press)
Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee, by Casey Cep (Knopf)
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women, by Mo Moulton (Basic Books)
The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper, by Hallie Rubenhold (Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt)
Best Children/Young Adult
Kazu Jones and the Denver Dognappers, by Shauna Holyoak (Disney Hyperion)
Two Can Keep a Secret, by Karen MacManus (Delacorte Press)
The Last Crystal ,by Frances Schoonmaker (Auctus Press)
Top Marks for Murder (A Most Unladylike Mystery), by Robin Stevens (Puffin)
Jada Sly, Artist and Spy, by Sherri Winston (Little Brown Books for Young Readers)
Best Short Story
"Grist for the Mill," by Kaye George in A Murder of Crows (Darkhouse Books)
"Alex’s Choice," by Barb Goffman in Crime Travel (Wildside Press)
"The Blue Ribbon," by Cynthia Kuhn in Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible (Wildside Press)
"The Last Word," by Shawn Reilly Simmons, Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible (Wildside Press)
"Better Days," by Art Taylor in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine
The nominees for the coveted Edgar Allan Poe Awards are announced as close to Poe’s birth as possible, and the announcement always falls on a Wednesday. (Trivia experts know that Poe was born on Jan. 19 and this year marks the 211th anniversary of his birthday.)
Here are the nominees for the 2020 Edgar Allan Poe Awards, honoring the best in mystery fiction, non-fiction and television published or produced in 2019.
The Edgar® Awards will be presented to the winners at the 75th Gala Banquet, April 30, 2020 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, New York City.
Mystery Scene congratulates all the nominees.
BEST NOVEL
Fake Like Me, by Barbara Bourland (Hachette Book Group – Grand Central Publishing)
The Stranger Diaries, by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
The River, by Peter Heller (Penguin Random House – Alfred A. Knopf)
Smoke and Ashes, by Abir Mukherjee (Pegasus Books)
Good Girl, Bad Girl, by Michael Robotham (Simon & Schuster – Scribner)
BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR
My Lovely Wife, by Samantha Downing (Penguin Random House – Berkley)
Miracle Creek, by Angie Kim (Farrar Straus and Giroux)
The Good Detective, by John McMahon (Penguin Random House – G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
The Secrets We Kept, by Lara Prescott (Penguin Random House – Alfred A. Knopf)
Three-Fifths, by John Vercher (Polis Books – Agora Books)
American Spy, by Lauren Wilkinson (Penguin Random House – Random House)
BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL
Dread of Winter, by Susan Alice Bickford (Kensington Publishing)
Freedom Road, by William Lashner (Amazon Publishing – Thomas & Mercer)
Blood Relations, by Jonathan Moore (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt – Mariner Books)
February’s Son, by Alan Parks (Europa Editions – World Noir)
The Hotel Neversink, by Adam O’Fallon Price (Tin House Books)
The Bird Boys, by Lisa Sandlin (Cinco Puntos Press)
BEST FACT CRIME
The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who Pursued Him, and the Murder that Shocked Jazz-Age America, by Karen Abbott (Penguin Random House - Crown)
The Less People Know About Us: A Mystery of Betrayal, Family Secrets, and Stolen Identity, by Axton Betz-Hamilton (Hachette Book Group – Grand Central Publishing)
American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century, by Maureen Callahan (Penguin Random House - Viking)
Norco '80: The True Story of the Most Spectacular Bank Robbery in American History, by Peter Houlahan (Counterpoint Press)
Indecent Advances: A Hidden History of True Crime and Prejudice Before Stonewall, by James Polchin (Counterpoint Press)
BEST CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL
Hitchcock and the Censors, by John Billheimer (University Press of Kentucky)
Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps: A Life of John Buchan, by Ursula Buchan (Bloomsbury Publishing)
The Hooded Gunman: An Illustrated History of Collins Crime Club ,by John Curran (Collins Crime Club)
Medieval Crime Fiction: A Critical Overview, by Anne McKendry (McFarland)
The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women, by Mo Moulton (Hachette Book Group – Basic Books)
BEST SHORT STORY
“Turistas," from Paque Tu Lo Sepas, by Hector Acosta (Down & Out Books)
“One of These Nights," from Cutting Edge: New Stories of Mystery and Crime by Women Writers, by Livia Llewellyn (Akashic Books)
“The Passenger," from Sydney Noir, by Kirsten Tranter (Akashic Books)
“Home at Last," from Die Behind the Wheel: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Music of Steely Dan, by Sam Wiebe (Down & Out Books)
“Brother’s Keeper," from Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, by Dave Zeltserman (Dell Magazine)
BEST JUVENILE
The Collected Works of Gretchen Oyster, by Cary Fagan (Penguin Random House Canada – Tundra Books
Eventown, by Corey Ann Haydu (HarperCollins Children’s Books – Katherine Tegen Books)
The Whispers by Greg Howard (Penguin Young Readers – G.P. Putnam’s Sons BFYR)
All the Greys on Greene Street, by Laura Tucker (Penguin Young Readers – Viking BFYR)
Me and Sam-Sam Handle the Apocalypse, by Susan Vaught (Simon & Schuster Children’s Books – Paula Wiseman Books)
BEST YOUNG ADULT
Catfishing on CatNet, by Naomi Kritzer (Tom Doherty Associates – Tor Teen)
Killing November, by Adriana Mather (Random House Children’s Books – Alfred A. Knopf BFYR)
Patron Saints of Nothing, by Randy Ribay (Penguin Young Readers - Kokila)
The Deceivers, by Kristen Simmons (Tom Doherty Associates – Tor Teen)
Wild and Crooked, by Leah Thomas (Bloomsbury Publishing)
BEST TELEVISION EPISODE TELEPLAY
“Season 5, Episode 3” – Line of Duty, Teleplay by Jed Mercurio (Acorn TV)
“Season 5, Episode 4” – Line of Duty, Teleplay by Jed Mercurio (Acorn TV)
“Episode 1” – Dublin Murders, Teleplay by Sarah Phelps (STARZ)
“Episode 1” – Manhunt, Teleplay by Ed Whitmore (Acorn TV)
“Episode 1” – The Wisting, Teleplay by Katherine Valen Zeiner & Trygve Allister Diesen (Sundance Now)
ROBERT L. FISH MEMORIAL AWARD
“There’s a Riot Goin’ On," from Milwaukee Noir, by Derrick Harriell (Akashic Books)
THE SIMON & SCHUSTER MARY HIGGINS CLARK AWARD
The Night Visitors, by Carol Goodman (HarperCollins – William Morrow)
One Night Gone, by Tara Laskowski (Harlequin – Graydon House)
Strangers at the Gate, by Catriona McPherson (Minotaur Books)
Where the Missing Go, by Emma Rowley (Kensington Publishing)
The Murder List, by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Tom Doherty Associates – Forge Books)
THE G.P. PUTNAM’S SONS SUE GRAFTON MEMORIAL AWARD
Shamed, by Linda Castillo (Minotaur Books)
Borrowed Time, by Tracy Clark (Kensington Publishing)
The Missing Ones, by Edwin Hill (Kensington Publishing)
The Satapur Moonstone, by Sujata Massey (Soho Crime)
The Alchemist’s Illusion, by Gigi Pandian (Midnight Ink)
Girl Gone Missing, by Marcie R. Rendon (Cincos Puntos Press)
I love Sherlock Holmes as do many others. In fact, I’d say my love of Sherlock Holmes is one of the reasons I write mysteries.
My author bio reads, "While others girls dreamed of dating Brad Pitt, Duffy Brown longed to take Sherlock Holmes to the prom. My license plate is 'Shrlok 1' and the frame around it reads 'Come Watson come the game as afoot.'"
My daughter-in-law once felt the need to remind me that Sherlock Holmes was indeed a fictional character and not a real person... How dare she! And then there was wanting to get my VW Beetle shrink-wrapped in hunter-cap tweed complete with earflaps—that was a bit of an obsession.
Then, I bought a bear. Not just any bear, but a seven-foot Sherlock bear and I take him everywhere. He just fits in the back of my SUV if I lay the seats down and wedge him kittywampus. And, I had to buy him his own cart to wheel him around.
Then I needed to tie him to the cart so he wouldn’t flip over. At times Sherlock Bears looks a bit like Sherlock in bondage but some things can’t be helped. I added to Sherlock Bear’s already dapper attire by buying him his very own bright yellow crime scene tape scarf that reads "Crime Scene Do Not Cross." He looks so dashing!
Sherlock Bear serves many purposes. My BFF draws a ton of attention. Pushing Sherlock Bear across the skywalk in downtown Cincinnati had cars stopping on 6th Street and people pointing.
Sherlock does tend to steal the show! Crowds gather, selfies are taken, lots of chatter about the love of Sherlock, favorite Sherlock mystery, and who best portrayed Sherlock in film. (Personally, I do love Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock, but all Sherlocks are amazing. Hands down Martin Freeman has to be the best Watson ever.)
One of the most exciting places I’ve taken Sherlock Bear is on a riverboat. A paddle wheeler, no less. He accompanied me on a reader-writer Two Dames Mystery Weekend that I do annually with Tonya Kappes and 75 readers. Getting Sherlock onboard the boat was a real challenge; he almost didn’t fit down the gangplank!!
I know this is a lot of Sherlockmania but there is a reason for my great love of the guy. He’s smart, he’s handsome, and he solves mysteries in unique ways that I just love. And now I have him wherever I go. My only regret is that Sherlock Bear’s legs don’t bend, so I can’t have him ride shotgun in my VW convertible!
So here’s to all things Sherlock Holmes and those of us who think he is best detective ever. I wish you a Sherlock Bear of your own someday or at the very least a selfie with him. Happy reading and always remember... Life’s a mystery. Enjoy!
Duffy Brown loves anything with a mystery. While others girls dreamed of dating Brad Pitt, Duffy longed to take Sherlock Holmes to the prom. She has two cats, Spooky and Dr. Watson, her license plate is Sherlok and she conjures up whodunnit stories of her very own for Berkley Prime Crime. Duffy's national bestselling Consignment Shop Mystery series is set in Savannah and the Cycle Path Mysteries are set on Mackinac Island.
This "Writers on Reading" essay was originally published in "At the Scene" enews February 2020 as a first-look exclusive to our enewsletter subscribers. For more special content available first to our enewsletter subscribers, sign up here.
Back in the '70s, Ralph Dennis (1931–88) cranked out 12 books featuring Atlanta private eye Jim Hardman, and his go-to guy and drinking buddy, Hump Evans. They came, rode the paperback waves for a while, and then disappeared.
Too bad—Dennis was a fine writer, a master of believable action and surprising heart, with characters who could dish out the tough guy banter with the best of them. And, at a time when the PI genre was still awakening from the Big Sleep of the Tighty-Whiteys, the idea of a black-and-white team of PIs was fresh, bold, and maybe even revolutionary. Oh, sure, Bob Parker had Spenser and Hawk, but by the time Hawk showed up in the series, Dennis had already cranked out seven or so books featuring Jim and Hump.
Unfortunately, the Hardman books were published (and packaged) as Men’s Adventures—those numbered paperback odes to sex, violence, and front-of-the-brain thinking that were all the rage, churned out by a cadre of writers often hiding behind corporate pen names. Fans of the genre, however, generally weren’t looking for what Dennis was dishing out, and mystery readers who might have appreciated them weren’t even aware of their existence. Those few who were aware—or were turned on to them years later—loved them for what they were: smart, compassionate private eye novels that could easily go 15 rounds with any of their contemporaries.
Which is why it was such a blast when crime writer (and Hardman fan) Lee Goldberg nailed the rights, and brought the original dirty dozen back into print under his own Brash Books imprint a few years ago, with introductions by Joe Lansdale, another huge fan of the series.
But even more amazing? Brash has just unleashed the thirteenth and final entry in the series, based on The Polish Wife, an unpublished manuscript by Dennis. There’s an interesting afterword by Goldberg on how he found it and transformed it into All Kinds of Ugly, a far more Hardman-like title.
Ugly’s a beauty, though; a pure distillation of grade A, hardboiled pulp that dares to reaches for more. Jim’s not getting any younger, and his long-term girlfriend Marcy has finally dumped him. Heartbroken, he accepts a case from a wealthy, elderly industrialist, Harrison Gault, that takes him to London on the trail of the old man’s missing grandson, Harrison Gault III, but it’s a bust—the man is dead. Instead, Jim brings his attractive young widow, Anna Piroski, back to Atlanta. She’s pregnant. With Harrison Gault IV.
The old man insists on welcoming her into the fold, and Jim figures that’s that. But the trouble-prone Anna has gotten under his skin. Despite his best efforts, he's reluctantly drawn back into her messy life, a noirish (and very seventies-ish) swirl of bad choices, bad drugs… and violence.
But underneath it all floats the enduring friendship of Jim and Hump, the foundation upon which the series is built, as the two hard-drinking middle-aged losers (Jim’s an ex-cop, Hump’s a former pro football player) try to deal with a hard and confusing world, trying to take control of their own lives.
It’s a fitting conclusion to a series that coulda/shoulda been a contender.
Hi Everyone,
Nick Petrie began meeting military veterans while working as a home inspector. Those conversations in basements, attics, and front yards with men and women returning from their tours of duty gave Petrie an insight into their struggles with civilian life. The result is Petrie’s Peter Ash, a veteran struggling with PTSD, and one of thriller fiction’s new stars. Oline Cogdill talks to the author in this issue.
Not all writers are content to stay behind the keyboard. Plenty of them, including many mystery authors, have stepped into the spotlight in various movies, TV shows, and commercials. Michael Mallory gives us a cast list in “Ready for a Close-up: Crime Writers Caught on Camera.”
One of my favorite features is our “Fave Raves of the Year” chosen annually by Mystery Scene critics. I’m sure to find overlooked gems in these recommendations—and the variety of takes is always refreshing. While I enjoy seeing the Edgar Award nominations each year, it seems to me they can’t really begin to cover the “best” in such a diverse field. Our six pages of “Fave Raves” is a step in the right direction!
Brian and I are really enjoying the new ABC TV series Stumptown. Based on Greg Rucka’s prickly Portland PI Dex Parios, it’s got a terrific cast, good writing, and a lot of energy. Kevin Burton Smith likes Stumptown, too, and has high hopes for its future.
A free promotion of a Nora Roberts book from the drugstore eventually led Erica Spindler to her criminous career. But it’s her art training that she credits for her very visual writing style. “After all, writing is just painting pictures with words,” says Spindler, who earned an MFA from the University of New Orleans. John Valeri talks to Spindler in this issue.
Our legal fiction expert, Jon L. Breen, gathers together his most recent selection of notable courtroom thrillers for your entertainment in this issue.
As he tells John Valeri, Phillip Margolin’s legal career was inspired by fiction: “I tore through Erle Stanley Gardner’s Perry Mason novels and the Ellery Queen mysteries,” he says. “By the seventh grade, I had decided that the only thing I wanted to do was try murder cases.” And, once he had successfully done that, Margolin circled around to writing legal thrillers himself!
Now in its 21st season, Midsomer Murders continues to enchant fans of British mystery TV. Pat H. Broeske talks to producers and writers, including Anthony Horowitz who helped create Midsomer Murders, about the cozy phenomenon. “I think particularly now, with so many difficulties surrounding politics and the media, people look back very nostalgically on an England that consisted of smaller, quieter communities where everyone knew everyone and life was simpler,” Horowitz says.
Also in this issue, we have interesting My Book essays contributed by Claudia Riess, Nancy Bilyeau, and Art Taylor.
Enjoy!
Kate Stine
Editor-in-chief
Features
Nick Petrie
His Peter Ash thrillers about a war veteran with PTSD offer full-throttled, kinetic action, irresistible plots, and a hero that is damaged yet decent, and, as the occasion demands, dangerous.
by Oline H. Cogdill
Ready for a Close-Up: Crime Writers Caught on Camera
These authors moved from behind a desk to in front of a camera.
by Michael Mallory
Fave Raves
Our contributors choose their favorite entertainments of 2019.
Dex Parios
The Portland ’tec in ABC’s new Stumptown could be the best PI to grace the small screen in years.
by Kevin Burton Smith
Erica Spindler
The author traded paintbrush for pen and found her true calling.
by John B. Valeri
Legal Briefs
Current courtroom thrillers.
by Jon L. Breen
Phillip Margolin
Mystery fiction turned him into a lawyer, then into a writer himself.
by John B. Valeri
My Book: False Light
An art history mystery, with an emphasis on history.
by Claudia Riess
My Book: Dreamland
Coney Island intrigue at the turn of the last century.
by Nancy Bilyeau
My Book: The Boy Detective & The Summer of ’74
Stories of the complex, conflict-ridden social and cultural history of the South.
by Art Taylor
Midsomer Murders
A survey of two decades of British cozy TV entertainment.
by Pat H. Broeske
The Hook
First lines that caught our attention.
“The Chicago Way” Crossword
by Verna Suit
Departments
At the Scene
by Kate Stine
Mystery Miscellany
by Louis Phillips
Hints & Allegations
Reviews
Small Press Reviews: Covering the Independents
by Katrina Niidas Holm
Very Original: Paperback Originals Reviewed
by Hank Wagner and Robin Agnew
Sounds of Suspense: Audiobooks Reviewed
by Dick Lochte
What About Murder? Reference Books Reviewed
by Jon L. Breen
Short and Sweet: Short Stories Considered
by Ben Boulden
Mystery Scene Reviews
Miscellaneous
The Docket
Letters
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Riku Onda’s The Aosawa Murders is one of the best books in any genre I’ve read all year. Set in a fictional Japanese city, it follows the aftermath of a mass poisoning that totaled 17 deaths, nearly wiping out the entire Aosawa family. The police believe they have their killer when a young deliveryman commits suicide, leaving behind a mysterious note that appears to confess to the slaying. The note does not, however, reveal his motive. Eleven years later, Makiko Saiga, who had been one of the children who discovered the bodies of the slain Aosawas, has written The Forgotten Festival. She has always believed that her friends and playmates were killed by someone else, not the deliveryman, and her book is her attempt to bring about true justice. When The Forgotten Festival becomes a bestseller, people who had known the wealthy Aosawas (the physician father ran a medical clinic attached to the residence), start opening up to the young author, sharing their memories of that horrifying day. Among them is beautiful and blind Hisako, the sole Aosawa to survive the massacre. To a certain extent, Makiko suspects Hisako, but can’t figure out how the blind girl could have pulled off such a horrendous crime unaided. And besides, Hisako seems eager enough to tell of her own memories of the event, and they are heart-wrenching.
There are many different voices in this extraordinary book. There are Makiko’s and her brother Junji’s recollections, both as children and later as adults; the voice of Detective Teru, who has his own doubts about the deliveryman’s guilt; the tobacconist, who believes a woman had to have been behind the crime; and even the daughter of the housekeeper who was originally blamed for the deaths. In the end, everyone has a theory, but which theory comes closest to the truth? At one point, the frustrated Makiko muses, “Truth is nothing more than a subject seen from a certain perspective.” In other words, “truth” is entirely subjective. But there are 17 dead Aosawas, and death is not simply a perspective—it is real. The Aosawa Murders won the Mystery Writers of Japan Award for Fiction, and was hailed as a masterpiece. I agree. Although there are many different characters in this book, and it slides from voice to voice, from the murky past to the vivid present, from the fog-draped countryside to the crowded city, there is an organic whole here which is breathtaking. Author Onda’s masterpiece is so filled with observations on the human condition that smitten readers might be tempted to tear out and frame certain pages—or at least copy them down. My favorite was “There are two different kinds of people in this world, I believe, those who frequent bookshops and those who do not.”
Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Untamed Shore is an engrossing book set in 1979, in a seaside Baja California town known for its shark fishing. Seventeen-year-old Viridiana is a fan of the old film noirs she watches on her mother’s ancient TV set, and she fantasizes about the glamorous lives of Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Cliff. But her real life is dull until three Americans arrive in town and hire her to be their interpreter (she speaks four languages, going on five). The wealthy Ambrose is short-tempered, his new and much-younger wife Daisy is manipulative, and Daisy’s brother Gregory is movie-star handsome. The innocent Viridiana immediately falls for Gregory. But Viridiana’s saving grace is that she is as intelligent as she is innocent. When Ambrose dies falling down the stairs, Viridiana suspects it might not have been an accident. She soon finds herself drawn into a plot that mirrors the noirs she so loves. The town’s police are crooked, and Viridiana’s bitter mother is too wrapped up in her own misery to notice what her daughter is going through. Viridiana’s fantasies about getting out of the ugly little town increase. “Men could leave. Her father had left. But a woman couldn’t leave. Especially if she had a kid. A woman was chained.” Untamed Shore takes us through Viridiana’s loss of innocence, then into her heightened sense of awareness, and finally into a plan for a better life. The only problem is, to get away she might have to leave town arm in arm with a murderer. Viridiana’s love of noirs provides the backdrop for her predicament. “She hadn’t known what movie she was in, hadn’t known the ending, or the sort of music that would play over the credits.” By the ending of Untamed Shore, a 17-year-old girl makes a decision that is astounding in both its maturity and its cynicism.
I laughed my way through the sardonic pages of Howard Mittelmark’s Written Out, wherein our hero Roger Olivetti proceeds to shoot himself in the foot again and again and again. A onetime high-flying novelist and editor at a New York publishing house, poor old Roger loses his job, his Manhattan apartment, his marriage, and ends up crashing in his mother’s much-hated basement on Long Island. And it’s all his fault. He has big plans, though, such as finally sitting down to writing that breakthrough novel he knows he’s capable of. But first, he decides to get drunk. Bad decision. He winds up having sex with a mobster’s ex-wife. The mobster, being of a kindly nature, only breaks a few of Roger’s toes, leaving his fingers free to type out his self-proclaimed masterpiece. Enter writer’s block. Limping only slightly, he turns his back on his stalled novel and sets off to find a new job in publishing. But, oops! He finds himself blackballed because he slept with his own agent’s wife. Roger’s penchant for making bad decisions eventually leads him to a job in a vastly different industry—that of hit man. Gritting his teeth, he duly knocks off an elderly woman who belongs to his mother’s book group, and after that, another old lady. Hey, a man’s gotta work, right? But being a hit man turns out not to be as much fun as it is in the movies, so when his own ex-wife’s new boyfriend, a big-time Hollywood star, offers Roger the job of ghostwriting his memoir, he jumps at the chance. Again, there’s a problem. The star doesn’t want a standard memoir—he wants it written from the point of view of his enormous penis. Thus Roger’s woes continue, almost all of them caused by his utter idiocy. In a way, Written Out is a modern twist on Voltaire’s Candide, and it offers many snarkily amusing insights about today’s publishing industry. In one hilarious passage about a famous female novelist, Roger muses, “Famous novelists weren’t actually famous, they were just famous to other novelists who aspired to being famous novelists, and to readers, who still only aspired to being novelists. The only novelists that were genuinely famous were famous for being rich novelists, not for having written novels.”
We leave the world as we know it for the engrossing anthology Crime Travel, edited by Barb Goffman, forward by Donna Andrews. Here we encounter a wonderful blending of crime and sci-fi, which ranges all the way from Anna Castle’s wry “The Sneeze,” wherein a woman’s sneeze propels her backwards to the Elizabethan era, to Adam Meyer’s “The Fourteenth Floor,” where a security guard in a skyscraper gets a glimpse of a foreboding future. The wide array of tales so ably put together by Goffman are enormous fun, and now and then, genuinely touching. I was particularly drawn to Korina Moss’ empathetic “On the Boardwalk,” and Goffman’s own “Alex’s Choice,” which at first looks like a heartbreaker, but turns out not to be. If I had to pick one of these stories as a favorite—and they’re all good—it would have to be “The Sneeze.” There’s just something truly fine in reading about a Diet Coke-slugging modern broad pretending to be an Elizabethan slattern while hunting down a playwright who may—or may not—have collaborated with William Shakespeare.
Clea Simon’s An Incantation of Cats: A Witch Cats of Cambridge Mystery is an otherworldly fun trip, in which the cat sisters—seal point Laurel, creamsicle Harriet, and calico Clara—have joined forces to help Becca, a witch detective and their “person,” solve Wiccan-related mysteries. They also try to rejuvenate Becca’s fading love life after she’s been dumped by her boyfriend. The cats are great fun, especially pushy Laurel, who thinks she knows everything. But it’s Clara who is actually the brains of the litter, partially because she has no trouble deciphering the websites Becca keeps logging on to for information. True, Clara can’t exactly read, but she’s a whiz at putting together the meanings of graphics and photos. Together, the three cats and their Wiccan person make a nifty team of Holmes-style detectives, although Becca isn’t always cognizant of the help she’s getting from her feline friends. This time out, a woman suspects an employee might be stealing from her, and a man may have been “helped” to die of a heart attack. Both cases turn out to be more complicated than they first appear, but the cats—led by the youngest but wisest Clara—eventually figure it out. As for me, I couldn’t figure out which group provided the most fun: the clueless humans or the ever-so-sly cats.
Beginning Sherry Harris’ Garage Sale series with installment eight, Sell Low, Sweet Harriet, I was instantly comfortable with former military spouse Sarah Winston, a divorcée who lives near the base, volunteers at the base thrift shop, and runs garage and estate sales for a living. While the further I read, the more I wanted to know the story of Sarah’s divorce, I was still comfortable with her current situation. She lives alone, has a serious romantic relationship, and enough of an association with the local police that they ask her to “listen” when she’s out and about after a military wife is found dead during an ice storm in very suspicious circumstances.
The dead woman appears to have been well loved, and her husband is cleared of suspicion early on—for an ingenious reason I’ve never encountered before in a mystery novel. Sarah keeps her ears open as the gossip flows among the military wives in the victim’s social group, and it’s soon clear who the mean girls and alphas are, but she tries to keep her preconceptions aside as she searches for the killer.
Sarah’s estate sale business is one of the stronger elements of this novel. She is asked to run a sale for two former CIA agents whose children need their house cleared. Because of their professions, there are many interesting items, and Harris ramps up the suspense with an early, unexpected break-in. She also adds the character of Harriet, who is so fully realized, interesting, and enigmatic that I wanted to see more of her, a wish that I hope comes true in future installments.
Harris ably ties all the elements of her story together, seamlessly stitching the estate sale, the boyfriend, the landlady, and the mystery of the dead spouse into an engaging and clever whole. Sarah is a wonderful character, apparently inspired by Kinsey Millhone, and she certainly has her kick-ass moments, though her wardrobe is much, much more extensive than Kinsey’s. This was an incredibly enjoyable book.
In Buried to the Brim Jenn McKinlay appears to be wrapping up her Hat Shop mystery series, although she adds “for now” in an opening note. If it is indeed the last in the series, it’s a fitting coda to Scarlett Parker's adventures in the millinery trade. She’s engaged to the dishy Harrison (Harry to you), and happily managing her busy London hat shop with cousin Viv, who makes the fascinators they sell.
In this outing Scarlett must step in for Harry’s Aunt Betty, who is showing her corgi Freddy at the Pet and Wellness Society’s charity dog show. While the Pet and Wellness Society is very much a real organization, the event here is an amalgam of an agility and obedience show with a bit of a standard conformation show thrown in at the end for good measure. Despite the dog show details being a bit sketchy (I was a dog show brat, so I noticed while most readers probably won’t) this book is a blue ribbon ton of fun. And of course, the dog in question has to have a hat fashioned by Viv.
Because Aunt Viv is feuding with the show’s sponsor, she’s barred from entry, and Scarlett must sub. While McKinlay may not have the show details exactly right, she nails the backstage gossip that goes on at these events. When the murdered body of the sponsor is discovered—by Freddy, no less—things quite naturally get dicey. I appreciated the light tone and wit of this novel, as well as the crisply drawn characters, and I loved the hat shop business.
Things seem to conclude well for Scarlett, with a happy engagement to Harry, and a satisfying, clever resolution to the mystery. This book unfolds so easily and enjoyably that I almost finished it in one sitting. If you find yourself missing the hat shop when you’re done, go back to the beginning, as I plan to. Luckily for readers, McKinlay writes several other series.
Elizabeth Penney’s Hems & Homicide is first in a new series set in tiny Blueberry Cove, Maine. Central character Iris Buckley lives with the person who raised her, her Grammie, and is planning to open a store selling vintage textiles and handmade aprons with a vintage feel.
Because this is the first in a series, Penney spends time introducing Iris’ friend group, setting the stage of the town and the relationships between the various characters, and explaining (to a degree) Iris’ “origin story,” though, like every good mystery novelist, she isn’t revealing everything about her heroine in the first book.
This story has two threads, one in the past, involving a skull Iris stumbles over in the basement of her as-yet-unrenovated store, and one concerning a fresher corpse that also turns up there. Because the dead woman—recognized by Grammie as “Star Moonshine,” a wandering hippie girl from the tail end of the ’60s—had ties to many of Blueberry Cove’s older citizens, there’s a nice suspect pool for the police and Iris, who both believe the two crimes are connected.
The parts that involve the vintage fabrics and textiles Iris finds around the county were the most captivating and original of the whole novel, setting it apart from similar cozies. I’m looking forward to where Penney goes with her next outing—and hoping she might take a page from Barbara Michaels’ classic Shattered Silk (1986) and make the materials themselves more of a focal point.
Ralph Dennis’ All Kinds of Ugly is the much-fabled “lost” Hardman novel. Discovered amongst a cache of the author’s effects by Brash Books publisher (and crackerjack writer in his own right) Lee Goldberg, in 2019, it’s a book that began life as the 13th Hardman novel, but morphed into a non-series book called The Polish Wife. Recognizing just what he had uncovered, Goldberg reworked the story back to its original form, sending Hardman to London, seeking the missing heir of a wealthy Georgia industrialist. What he finds there haunts him for the next year or so, as he becomes involved with the heir’s widow, to whom he’s instinctually attracted, despite her questionable background. The book earns its evocative title—it’s quintessential Hardman, a worthy denouement to the legendary series.
The riveting Red Specter is the fifth Tier One thriller penned by Brian Andrews and Jeffrey Wilson. Here the covert team of battle-hardened US operatives reacts to the attacks of the Russian counterpart to their highly secret operation, whose chief mission is the utter destruction of their American doppelgangers. When the crew attempts to turn the tables on their nemeses, mayhem ensues. A winning mix of action, drama, and tradecraft, this novel evokes positive aspects of the work of both John le Carré and Tom Clancy. You will definitely want to seek out past, and future, installments in this series.
The Twisted Book of Shadows, edited by Christopher Golden and James A. Moore, is an anthology of weird tales with a decidedly different point of view. Seeking new voices, and new ideas, the editors instituted a blind screening process, reviewing several hundred submissions with no inkling of who they were reading. The result is a winning mix of 19 stories, with nary a King, Koontz, Barker, or other brand name in the mix, a solid tribute to the legendary editor who inspired it, Charles L. Grant of Shadows fame. Read it one tale per sitting, so as to savor its contents.
Errick Nunnally’s action-packed Lightning Wears a Red Cape is a welcome addition to the literary superhero genre, as the author builds a world peopled by a diverse assortment of superpowered beings with a variety of agendas, both good and evil. These supers are all too human, more often than not suffering from incidents from their past, and their emotions, which make them all the more relatable. Still, that doesn’t stop them from being caught up in grim, gritty, larger-than-life experiences and adventures, which is what comic book storytelling is all about. An obvious labor of love from Nunnally, this very well-crafted, very human novel leaves the reader wanting more.
Clowns vs. Spiders by Jeff Strand effectively exploits the best of two syndromes, coulrophobia (fear of clowns) and arachnophobia (fear of spiders) in one very scary, but also very funny, package. It tells the tale of a down-on-its-luck clown troupe whose situation suddenly grows even worse when it is confronted with the silent, lethal, and relentless menace of a decidedly creepy community of massive super-spiders. In the tradition of the great Robert Bloch, Strand delivers wry humor and gut-wrenching horror and tension with equal effectiveness, seamlessly evoking fear and laughs, often within the very same sentence.
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