mystery
When Contemporary Fiction Ages Into the Historical
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I find myself reflecting on my own teen years as I tackle Frankenstein-author Mary Shelley and her step-sister at age sixteen years for my new series, which begins with Death and the Sisters. Mary and her kaleidoscope of siblings gathered opinions and values from the books they read in their highly literary household. With both…
Five Novels About War That Bear Re/Reading
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A crime as large as a war may exceed the definition of crime in the usual sense. Crime is bad enough when it’s one or a few victims and one or a few perpetrators. That kind of crime, though reprehensible, one can get arms around while often cringing in horror or disbelief. But how does…
Spenser at 50: The Evolution of Robert B. Parker’s Iconic Character
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From where he sits and writes in his Long Island home – in longhand, 10 pages a day – Mike Lupica can see a framed photograph of Robert B. Parker, the prolific author of the Spenser mystery novels. Parker wears a grin on his face and a Pittsburgh Pirates cap on his head. Also easily…
The Art of Writing Mysteries Featuring Real-Life Figures
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My objective is to list the six best mysteries that feature real people. Quite a challenge given all the published stories meeting this criterion. There are, for example, several series that portray famous personages as detectives. Some, like Nicola Upson’s Josephine Tey Mystery Series, are excellent; others such as Blue Suede Clues by Daniel Klein…
The Albatross of Smartphones in Young Adult Mysteries
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There’s a joke among millennials that our favorite childhood television shows would have sucked if the characters had owned smartphones. Videos of Buffy fighting vampires would have been uploaded to TikTok in a second; Joey would have spent her evenings texting Dawson instead of sneaking through his window; and Mulder and Scully could have tracked…
Bloodstock Sales: The Biggest Gambles in Horseracing
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Horse racing and gambling are intertwined – always have been, and always will be. But the biggest gambles in racing are not made at the races or with a bookmaker, they occur in the sale rings, where vast sums are staked on untested, unridden and as yet unnamed one-year-old Thoroughbred colts in the hope they…
Shop Talk: Nina Simon Tells the Incredible Story Behind Her Breakout Debut Novel
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I met Nina Simon shortly after I read her beautiful, heartfelt debut, Mother Daughter Murder Night. If there were ever an author whose persona perfectly captures the verve of her work, it’s Nina. Nina’s all natural, almost crunchy in a Santa Cruz kind of way. She speaks from the gut and doesn’t pull any punches.…
How Subplots and Plot Filaments Lend Texture and Depth to Any Novel
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More than any other variant included under the umbrella of “crime fiction,” mystery novels embody a straightforward setup of the conflict-and-resolution components of storytelling. The conflict is murder. The resolution is naming whodunit. Everything in between—the rising and falling action, the crises and complications, the revelations and setbacks—all of that can be summed up as…