But my confidence was cosmetic. Neither I nor anyone I knew in Deaf Smith had any influence over Vernon Smothers. He believed intransigence was a virtue, a laconic and mean-spirited demeanor was strength, reason was a tool the rich used to keep the poor satisfied with their lot, and education amounted to reading books full…
The earth above us shuddered and the pale lights flickered, plunging us into a dark so absolute that our silently held breath seemed to echo our fear. A heartbeat later and we were revealed to one another again. “Cuppa tea, ducky? Probably need one after all that galloping around.” The woman from number twenty-five…
Penny for Your Secrets by Anna Lee Huber is the third book in the Verity Kent series based in post-WWI England. In the Fall of 1919, former intelligence agent Verity Kent is dismayed to see her friend Ada openly clashing with her lordly husband, Rockham, at a dinner party. Dismay quickly turns to shock when…
Film is a medium of two senses: sight and sound. We can’t touch the people or objects depicted, we can’t smell or taste them. But horror? Horror involves all the senses.
Ever read a book and think, “Wow, I wish there was a movie of this”?
Strangers at the Gate by Catriona McPherson is a twisty, fascinating mystery that asks the question: Who do you turn to when everyone’s a stranger and you’ve stopped believing your own eyes? Finn and Paddy Lamb know they’ve hit the jackpot when they each—he a lawyer, she a deacon—get plumb job offers in the prosperous Scottish village…
A Cruel Deception by Charles Todd is the 11th Bess Crawford Mystery, where nurse Bess Crawford attempts to save a troubled former soldier from a mysterious killer in the aftermath of World War I. The First World War has been over for months, but there’s still plenty of suffering to ease—and the Paris peace talks…
Over nearly a decade as a bookseller at Barnes & Noble, I came to know the big names in every genre. Even if I’d never read one of their books myself, I could recommend them to customers based on the author’s reputation and the reader’s interests. Margaret Maron was one of those big names. I…
A House of Ghosts by W. C. Ryan is an unrelenting, gripping mystery set during World War I that seamlessly mixes genres and is packed with twists and turns and a kindling of romance. In the winter of 1917, as the First World War rages on, a most unusual house party converges on Blackwater Abbey…
Perusing the list of Edgar winners, trying to decide which I wanted to tackle for this retrospective, New Orleans Mourning jumped out almost immediately thanks to its utterly gonzo synopsis: It’s Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and civic leader and socialite Chauncey St. Amant has been crowned Rex, King of Carnival. But his day of…
