Reading Lists
The Best Hotels – and Hotel Bars – in Espionage Fiction
.
Bars in grand hotels figure prominently in the canon of spy literature. One of the pleasures I get from reading the novels of Joseph Kanon, Graham Greene and other masters of the spy genre, is that the anonymous guests in the grand hotels come alive with a backstory and confidential business discussed over martinis is…
Nine Crime Novels Featuring Found Families
.
My historical novel published in 2021, Death at Greenway, used research on the real people who had lived on the estate of Agatha Christie’s holiday home in the English Riviera during World War II. Faced with the universe of facts I could lay my hands on, I had to be selective about which details were…
Crime and the City: Hamburg
.
I think it’s fair to say that, in general, Hamburg is a rather underrated German city. Berlin and Munich get the crowds, Frankfurt the money, and Hamburg gets a bit overlooked. But not by crime fans as Hamburg has a long history of being, shall we say, a bit sleazy? It’s a port city (always…
A Brief History of Circus in Fiction
.
The history of travelling carnivals, or circuses, is complex. The form is steeped in tradition, but the people who live and make their living in modern circuses are a diverse bunch, hailing from everywhere in the world. Often they live a nomadic life, travelling internationally with different circuses each season. There are circus families that…
6 Creepy Novels Featuring Murder Houses
.
There’s something beautiful about ugliness. We all have it simmering under the surface. But we make damn sure not to show it. Why? In my debut, The Stranger Upstairs, Sarah Slade is a popular influencer who struggles with a dark side. Her marriage is falling apart and her career is on a knife’s edge. She…
Five Novels About War That Bear Re/Reading
.
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…
A Reading List of Badass Covens
.
I’ve always been enamored with witches. Be it Roald Dahl’s child-hating witches, the Wicked Witch of the West, or Bony Legs with her iron teeth, the ferocity and power of witches always captured my attention. To witness a woman who was magical and powerful and not only knew it but unapologetically embraced it felt revolutionary….
The Art of Writing Mysteries Featuring Real-Life Figures
.
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…