Mystery Melange

The Ireland AM Crime Novel of the Year was handed out to After the Fire by Jane Casey. For the other shortlisted titles, visit the Irish Book Awards official website.

Also just announced were the Goodreads Readers' Choice Awards, with The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins winning in the Mystery/Thriller category. For a listing of all of the finalists, check out the official Goodreads awards page.

The "Best of the Year" lists have begun, with the Washington Post throwing its hat into the ring by announcing its choices for "Best mystery books and thrillers of 2015." J. Kingston Pierce also picked his Best of the Best for Kirkus Reviews with a list of "10 of the Most Arresting Crime Novels of 2015."

Seattle will host an upcoming Noir at the Bar event on December 9 in The Alibi Room. Featured authors schedule to appear and read from their works include Robert Dugoni, Ingrid Thoft, Brian Thornton, Sarah Chen, Danny Gardner, Frank Zafiro, and Michael Pool.

The Autumn edition of Mysterical-E features ten new original short tales of crime fiction, plus Gerald So's column on crime dramas on TV and film, an article on holiday mysteries by C.A. Verstraete, interviews with Mars Preston and Virgil Alexander, and the usual assortment of book reviews.

In an article for The Atlantic, Marshall Jon Fisher profiled Charles Willeford, "The Unlikely Father of Miami Crime Fiction," and how he sparked the modern South Florida mystery craze including such authors as Carl Hiaasen and James W. Hall.

Did you know you can take a tour of the CIA museum? Well, online, at least. The website exhibit includes declassified artifacts associated with the CIA's predecessor, the Office of Strategic Services, as well as foreign intelligence organizations, and the CIA itself.

Now that the Christmas shopping season is in full swing, the Chicago Tribune's Lloyd Sachs compiled a listing of "Crime fiction to give as gifts."

Writing for The Guardian, Andrew Miller showcased his "Top 10 of the best dialogue in crime fiction," from Agatha Christie to Raymond Chandler.

Although this isn't particularly crime fiction-related, it is a bit of interesting literary-related news: archaeologists digging up Shakespeare's home in Stratford-upon-Avon, uncovered the playwright's kitchen, including a hearth and cold storage pit.

The new crime poem at the 5-2 this week is "Melodrama at the Biograph" by Sharon Israel.

In the Q&A roundup this week, author John Benedict stopped by Omnimystery News to talk about the latest installment of his medical thrillers, Fatal Complications; Scott Butki interviewed Belgian author Bavo Dhooge, whose first book to be translated into English, Styx, was just published, for The Mystery People; and author David Morrell spoke with fellow author and crime fiction legend Lawrence Block about his latest work, The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes.