Mystery Melange

Submissions are now open for Sisters in Crime's Eleanor Taylor Bland Crime Fiction Writers of Color Award, an annual grant of $2,000 for an emerging writer of color. The grant is intended to support the recipient in crime fiction writing and career development activities. The grantee may choose to use the grant for activities that include workshops, seminars, conferences, retreats, online courses, and research activities required for completion of the work. Applicants do not have to be members of Sisters in Crime, but they can't have published two novels (or more) or ten or more short stories. For more details about submission materials and requirements, follow this link.


Applications are now open for the Jane Gregory Bursaries, offering three under-represented writers a unique opportunity to attend the Creative Thursday writing day at the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in the UK, taking place in Harrogate on July 23-26 , 2026. Led by bestselling crime writers A.A. Dhand, Becca Day, G.R. Halliday, L C Winter, and Edel Coffey, with industry experts including Julie Mae Cohen and N J Cooper, the program also includes a chance to pitch to publishing insiders in The Dragon's Pen, hosted by Mark Billingham. The Jane Gregory Bursaries welcome applications from aspiring writers from underrepresented backgrounds, including, but not limited to, individuals from the global majority, those with disabilities, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and those from lower socio-economic backgrounds. Applications close Sunday, March 22, 2026, with successful applicants contacted at the end of April.


There's still time to register for the inaugural Newberry Crime Writing Workshop, an intensive, in-person, four-week workshop focused on the fundamentals particular to the writing of crime, mystery, and suspense fiction, to be held July 6–31, 2026, on the campus of Newberry College. Each week’s session will be led by an established crime fiction author, including Joe R. Lansdale, Cheryl Head, Warren Moore, and Michael Bracken. Workshop participants (limited to fifteen) will be selected from applicants who demonstrate potential for successful writing careers, based on writing samples accompanying applications. Though the workshop is targeted at writers in the early to middle stages of their writing careers, more advanced writers are also welcome. The deadline for applications is March 15.

 
Partners in Crime, a bookstore specializing in romance and mystery novels, is opening in Chicago on February 21. (This is not be confused with Partners & Crime in New York's Greenwich Village, which closed down in 2012.) Owners Amanda and Jeff Morse got the idea for their bookshop after the 2024 closure of suburban Forest Park’s Centuries & Sleuths, which specialized in carrying mystery genre titles. The Morses plan on holding author events and will also carry titles for middle school-aged kids, since they are located near a school.  


The Penguin Classics Crime and Espionage series is re-releasing new editions of several iconic and landmark works of fiction in 2026. Highlights include Robert van Gulik’s Judge Dee mystery, The Chinese Nail Murders; Dorothy B. Hughes’s noir classic, Ride the Pink Horse; Robert Littell’s Cold War thriller, The Amateur; Mai Jia’s international bestseller. Decoded; Giorgio Scerbanenco’s Italian noir, Traitors to All; and Rear Window and Other Stories, a newly curated Penguin Classics selection of suspense stories by Cornell Woolrich, originally published in the 1930s and 1940s. (Hat to Ayo Onatade at the Shots Magazine blog)


Janet Rudolph updated her list on the Mystery Fanfare blog of Mardi Gras-themed mysteries, mostly set in New Orleans, but with a few other countries and cities, as well; and she also posted mysteries set around the Chinese New Year, which fell on February 17 this year.


This week's crime poem up at the 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly is "Saturday at the Beach" by Craig Kirchner.


In the Q&A roundup, Laura Jensen Walker, the Agatha and Lefty-nominated author of more than 20 books, applied the Page 69 Test to her new novel, The Alphabet Sleuths; Crime Fiction Lover interviewed Algerian writer Saïd Khatibi, author of The End of the Sahara and the winner of the Sheikh Sayed Book Award for Young Authors in 2023; and James Lee Burke (of the Dave Robicheaux and Clete Purcel series) continued a long-running conversation with David Masciotra for Crime Reads, as they discussed Chaucer, violence, and the state of America.