Mystery Melange

 

The Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, Maine, will become a crime scene for murder, mayhem and more at the third annual “Murder by the Book” mystery festival October 27-28. Tess Gerritsen (the Rizzoli & Isles series) will be the keynote speaker, joined by fellow authors Brenda Buchanan, Dorothy Cannell, Richard Cass, Sarah Graves, Vaughn Hardacker, Maureen Milliken, Katherine Nichols, Stephen Pickering, and Lynne Raimondo.

The 2017 Ngaio Marsh Awards will be followed by the first-ever Great Lit Quiz at Scorpio Books this Saturday, October 28. To celebrate NZ Bookshop Day, a team of book-enthusiasts will join together for an entertaining quiz of crime novels and other genres, and ticket holders will also be able to participate in the invitation-only Ngaio Marsh Awards cocktail party, where the finalists will be celebrated and the winners announced.

On October 29 from 8-11pm, Writerspace will be holding an online 2017 Halloween Mash with chances to win great prizes such as a Kindle, autographed advance copies plus special treats like gift cards and more. Plus, dozens of mystery and suspense authors will be dropping in to chat all during the evening.

The Mystery and Crime features coming up at the Texas Book Festival November 4-5 include Meg Gardiner and Jan Reid talking about "The Long Reach of Crime"; Attica Locke and Adam Sternbergh discussing "Small Towns, Simmering Tensions and Modern Western Crime"; Jeff Abbott and Bradley Spinelli on the "Accidental Detective"; and Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich and Ben Blum chatting about "True Crime Close to Home."

November and December will bring two Mystery Author Extravaganzas hosted by the Chesapeake Chapter of Sisters in Crime. At each meeting—one in Maryland, one in Virginia—authors from SinC’s Chessie Chapter will talk about their publications in 2017, and Mystery Loves Company Booksellers will have copies of these titles on hand. The first of these events takes place Saturday, November 4 at the Howard County Public Library’s Miller Branch in Ellicott City, Maryland, with participating authors to include Donna Andrews, Maya Corrigan, Barb Goffman, Sherry Harris, Mary Ellen Hughes, Tara Laskowski, Alan Orloff, Kathryn O’Sullivan, Josh Pachter, Penny Clover Petersen, Susan Reiss, KM Rockwood, Verena Rose, Laura Ellen Scott, Harriette Sackler, Shawn Reilly Simmons, and Art Taylor.

 

The city of Kingston upon Hull in the UK will host Hull Noir 2017 from November 17-19, celebrating crime fiction from far and wide, including both local and international authors. Brit Lit author Ted Lewis is to be a key focus of the event, and Catherine Turnbull has a sneak peak of the author's legacy via a new biography of Lewis' pioneering writing and short and self destructive life.

Spinetingler Magazine announced it will begin regular publication of a print magazine with the first issue due November 2017 by Down & Out Books. "As is true in life, the events of the past have a tendency to influence our actions in the future," said Sandra Ruttan, co-editor of Spinetingler. "It is the support of our readers that has enabled us to return with this print edition. With their continued support we hope to be able to continue to bring exceptional short fiction and features to you for years to come." The Fall 2017 edition will feature original stories by Tracy Falenwolfe, Karen Montin, Jennifer Soosar, Nick Kolakowski, David Rachels, and BV Lawson. There are also author snapshots of Con Lehane, Rusty Barnes, Mindy Tarquini, as well as book features and reviews.

Berkeley's Bancroft Library has a very impressive California Detective Fiction Collection, numbering about 3,000 mystery novels set in the Golden State or written by California authors. For curator Randal Brandt, it's not hard to enjoy his work when he's surrounded by a first-edition copy of Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon, Anthony Boucher’s first novel, 1937’s The Case of the Seven of Calvary, and much more.

Just in time for Halloween, Mystery Fanfare has a listing of spooky crime fiction titles that are themed around All Hallows' Eve.

With Kenneth Brannagh's new film adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express due in theaters November 10 in the U.S. (November 3 in the UK), journalist Caroline Frost stopped by the Crime Fiction Lover blog to point out some of the spots in Agatha Christie's native Devon where fans can spot the many clues to her books found around every corner of this deceptively tranquil spot on the English Riviera.

The long-running (33 years!) BBC show Crimewatch has been brutally dispatched and forensic television criticism suggests that several issues combined to end the life of the veteran franchise.

Although arsenic is often the poison of choice in popular whodunits from Sherlock Holmes to Agatha Christie, scientists are finding that in ultra-low dosage, and in the right form, this naturally occurring chemical element can be a potent force against cancer.

This week's crime poem at the 5-2 is "Mars Night" by Robert Arellano.

In the Q&A roundup, Celeste Ng spoke with the South China Morning Post about her follow-up book to her critically-acclaimed debut suspense novel Everything I Never Told You, which won an Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature; and Marcie Rendon, author of Murder on the Red River, chatted with the Stiletto Gang about switching from children's books to mysteries.