Fictional characters haunt us. Like trusted friends, some speak to us so powerfully that we continue to hear them beyond their stories. That simple idea—the capacity of a character to come alive off the page—lies at the heart of our Haunted Bookshop Mysteries, an amateur sleuth series that my husband… Read more
It’s fall, also known as beer season. As crisp leaves turn golden yellow, this is the time of year to pour yourself a gorgeous hoppy pint as you cheer on your favorite football team or pull on your lederhosen and hit Oktoberfest for a selection of the best craft beer… Read more
Always Running Luis J. Rodriguez This book is L.A. canon as far as I’m concerned. A thrilling, moving, poetic, and ultimately human memoir of redemption from a young gang member growing up in East L.A. In fact, this was actually one of the books recommended to me by a former… Read more
“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.” —Groucho Marx As anyone who’s ever had a dog can tell you, dogs are great characters—in life and in mysteries. In my debut mystery, A Borrowing of Bones, I write about… Read more
Can you love someone to death? Some would say Becky Gerard is a devoted mother and would do anything for her only child. Others claim she’s obsessed and can’t stop the vicious circle of finding a cure at her daughter’s expense. Saving Meghan is a riveting new thriller full of… Read more
Southland Nina Revoyr I’m a big fan of stories driven by unexpected detectives: characters drafted in from other walks of life who happen to have a particular emotional or familial stake in figuring out who is to blame for a crime. Jackie Ishida, law student, is one such character. Very… Read more
We’ve all seen it: The heroin takes a bullet in her shoulder area, where the chest muscle meets the shoulder bone. She falls back, winces in pain for a few beats, and then musters just enough strength to outsmart the bad guy and win the day—and has the wherewithal to… Read more
I know what you’re thinking. There’s absolutely no way in the world anyone in their right mind could consider historic Westerns to be crime fiction. Modern tales set in the West are okay—such as the consistently fine work turned in by the likes of Craig Johnson, C.J. Box, Tony Hillerman,… Read more
At 80 million copies sold and counting, Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code is poised to surpass the current bestselling mystery of all time, Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. Clearly, Brown hit on something with his fourth novel: readers love to crack a code. Mix in a little… Read more
The first mysteries I read were those set in small towns, which convinced me this was the perfect location for a murder. The apparent disadvantages of this setting turn out to be advantages in storytelling—a known geographical area, a limited set of suspects, and a protagonist of any profession or… Read more
