Reading Lists
Five Books With Righteous Female Rage
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I didn’t intend to write a book about an angry woman. After all, furious, embittered characters—despite much progress—often remained the province of men. To write an angry woman was to risk her becoming Unlikeable, a nebulous state of being still somehow able to deliver the killing blow to reader enjoyment. This character, however, emerged with…
5 New Books Coming Out This Week
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Another week, another batch of books for your TBR pile. Happy reading, folks. * Femi Kayode, Gaslight (Mulholland) “Kayode delivers another ensnaring, vividly realized, suspenseful, and witty tale of a reluctant yet gifted investigator who susses out the truth about people trapped within entrenched criminality and injustice.” –Booklist Nalini Singh, There Should Have Been Eight…
Cozy Mysteries to Add to Your Christmas Stocking
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I don’t know about you, but a fresh set of fleece pajamas and a brand-new novel on Christmas Eve is one of my favorite holiday traditions. Throw in a roaring fireplace, a mug of cocoa loaded with whip cream and a candy cane stir, and trust me, I’m up long after Santa flies overhead. I…
Romance and Love Triangles in Cozy Mysteries
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When it comes to romance in cozy mysteries, readers range in their preferences from, “I’m more about the mystery,” to “Gimme all the romance.” While writing my cozy mystery, A Nutcracker Nightmare, I toyed with how much romance to include. In the end, I kept it on the lighter side for twin sister sleuths, Alex…
A List of Jewish Crime Thrillers
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My novel The Great Gimmelmans is about a family of Jewish bank robbers who lose all their money in the Stock Market Crash of 1987 and start robbing banks, kids and all, out of the only thing that hasn’t been repossessed: their gas-guzzling RV. The Gimmelmans begin as a secular, reform Jewish family, but by…
Difficult Women In Historical Fiction: A Reading List
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I try to be good but fail every day. My natural state is lazy, self-indulgent, resentful, and dangerously avoidant. The damage I’ve done in life has mainly come from not-getting-around-to something I ought to do. If you’re still waiting for my thank you card or RSVP or post-retirement letter of recommendation or final portfolio grade,…
The Many Poisons of Crime Fiction
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For all of recorded history, poisons have been a means of death, both deliberate and accidental. Greek philosophers, kings, emperors, actresses, scientists, mathematicians, and more were felled by lethal doses of chemicals. Arsenic, cyanide and strychnine were popular instruments of death due to ease of access. Arsenic earned the nickname of “heir powder,” as it…