Mystery Melange

The Wolfe Pack, the Official Nero Wolfe Literary Society, announced that Agony Hill by Sarah Stewart Taylor (Minotaur Books) has won the annual Nero Award, which honors "the best American mystery written in the tradition of Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe stories." At the same awards banquet, "The Troubling Mr. Truelove" by Pete Barnstrom (to be published in the July 2026 issue of Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine) was revealed to have won the Black Orchid Novella Award, sponsored by the Wolfe Pack and AHMM to celebrate the novella format popularized by Stout. Black Orchid Novella honorable mentions were Paul A. Barra's "Beauty and Buford," Craig H. Bowlsby's "Last Train to Medicine Hat," Libby Cudmore's "Piano Man," Tom Larsen's "The Sheriff of Alabama Street," Josh Pachter's "Melancholia," and Daniel Peyton's "A Noir Satyr: Follow That MacGuffin."


Noir at the Bar:Holiday Edition heads to Yonder: Southern Cocktails & Brew in Hillsborough, North Carolina, this evening,  December 11, at 7pm. Join host Tracey Reynolds for free books, specialty cocktails, and short readings from Eryk Pruitt, Jill McCorkle, SA Cosby, Meagan Lucas, Richard Dansky, Scott Blackburn, Katy Munger, and Edward Di Gangi.


There will also be a Noir at the Bar event Saturday, December 13, in Augusta, Georgia, at Le Chat Noir. Authors scheduled to read from their works include Brian Panowich, Peter Farris, Meagan Lucas, Christopher Swann, Karen Heid, Jason Sheffield, Samantha Jayne Allen, and Jon Lindstrom. The event is co-sponsored by The Book Tavern bookstore.


Mystery Writers of America University is featuring "Comfort and Crime: The Art of Writing Cozies" on Wednesday, December 17th at 8 EST / 7 CST / 6 MST / 5 PST. Panelists will include Valerie Burns (Mystery Bookshop, Dog Club, and RJ Franklin Mystery series); Ellen Byron (Cajun Country Mysteries, Vintage Cookbook Mysteries, Catering Hall Mysteries, and Golden Motel Mysteries); Jessie Chandler (Shay O’Hanlon Caper Series); and Rob Osler (Harriet Morrow Investigates series). This online event is free for MWA members and $20 for nonmembers.

When Down & Out Books recently announced they were shutting their doors and declaring bankruptcy, many in the crime fiction community were sad at the loss of a publisher that had released works by Patti Abbott, J.L. Abramo, Mark Coggins, Jack Getze, Les Roberts, Linda Sands, Art Taylor, Vincent Zandri and more, as well as several crime fiction anthologies. This week, one of the publisher's former authors, Joe Ricker, announced he had purchased the company and publishing operations would begin on January 1st. There is still some confusion as to missing payments still owed authors from the previous company, and time will tell if those issues are suitably resolved.


The International Crime Fiction Association announced a call for papers for its thirteenth Captivating Criminality conference, to be held from Thursday, June 25 to Saturday, June 27, 2026 in Bamberg, Germany. The theme is "Crime Fiction, Conflict, and Representation." Abstracts dealing with crime fiction past and present, true crime narratives, television and film studies, and other forms of new media such as blogs, computer games, websites and podcasts are welcome, as are papers adopting a range of theoretical, sociological and historical approaches. The deadline for submissions is January 15, 2026.


In honor of #ReadingAfrica Week, an annual celebration of African literature founded by Catalyst Press, Crime Reads put together a panel of African mystery and thriller writers, including Leye Adenle, Ciku Kimani-Mwaniki, Iris Mwanza, Mike Nikol, and Michael Sears, for a roundtable discussion online. The focus centered on what is special about African crime novels, how local and international readers react to it, the societal impact, and its past, present, and future.


Janet Rudolph compiled a list of mystery titles on a Hanukah theme, in honor of the annual Jewish celebration, also known as the "Festival of Lights," which in 2025 begins at sundown on December 14 and runs through December 22.


Over at the Mystery Lovers Kitchen blog, Leslie Karst shared her recipe for Braised Brisket, a dish traditionally served at Jewish feasts such as Passover and Hanukah.


This week's crime poem up at the 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly is "I Only Went to the Store" by Cithara Patra.


In the Q&A roundup, Jo Nesbø, author of Nordic noir titles and the Harry Hole detective novels, spoke with Publishers Weekly about his new standalone thriller, Wolf Hour, which is his first book set in the U.S.; P.J. Nelson (the pseudonym of an award-winning actor, dramatist, professor, and novelist), applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, All My Bones, an Old Juniper Bookshop Mystery; and Tracy Clark, author of the Cass Raines Chicago Mystery and Detective Harriet Foster series, also applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, Edge.