Mystery Melange

The Hollywood Creative Alliance, a professional organization composed of critics, journalists, creators, and industry professionals dedicated to celebrating excellence in film, television, podcasts, and emerging storytelling mediums, announced the winners of their inaugural Astra Book Awards. Dear Debbie by Freida McFadden was the winner in the Mystery/Thriller category, besting other shortlisted finalists My Husband's Wife by Alice Feeney; Not Quite Dead Yet by Holly Jackson; and Strange Buildings by Uketsu. The Best Debut category also included one crime-related title, One Fall by Joe Maldonado (author) and Alien Buddha (contributor).


Minotaur Books and the Mystery Writers of America introduced the winner of their First Crime Novel Competition at the recent 80th annual Edgar® Awards Banquet. The competition winner, Sharon Roth, is a Maryland attorney who also writes as Shannon Taft. Roth has written over twenty published short stories, including a Derringer Award-finalist and a story that appeared in Best American Mystery and Suspense. Her debut novel, Ghost of a Clue, is a cozy mystery featuring a protagonist named Lexi, who as a child witnessed the killing of her mother and sister. As a result of the attack, Lexi hears her sister's voice in her head. Now an adult, Lexi is trying to put the past behind her and buy a B&B in the Poconos. But when the true crime journalist intent on bringing all of Lexi's secrets into the open is murdered, Lexi is the prime suspect. Ghost of a Clue is tentatively scheduled for publication in fall of 2027. (HT to Shots Magazine)


You can enter for a chance to win a two-night stay for two adults at The Cottages at Cabot Cove in Kennebunkport, ME (Cabot Cove was the name of the fictional city of Jessica Fletcher in the Murder, She Wrote series). The Grand Prize winner will also receive a daily bakery bag delivery, complimentary bikes, rowboats, and kayaks, a copy of Murder, She Wrote: Murder Most Trivial by Jessica Fletcher and Barbara Early, a selection of digital recipes, and a Cabot Cove tote bag. The Sweepstakes is open to residents of the fifty United States and the District of Columbia, who are 18 years of age or older at time of entry, with one entry per person. Deadline for entries is May 30, 2026. (The full rules are here.)


This is a fun idea I'd like to see more of:  a new digital book club is being launched across Berkshire in the U.K. Dubbed "Coffee and Crime," the group is run by cafe chain Lounges in partnership with publisher Simon & Schuster’s Likely Suspects crime-reading community. It will feature a monthly crime fiction title through the Lounges’ website, social media, and email channels, and will include author Q&As, giveaways, and links to support independent bookshops.


Art Taylor's "The First Two Pages" blog featured Joseph S. Walker’s essay about his story “Haven” from Crime Scenes, the first collection of the award-winning author's short stories.


This week's crime poem up at the 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly is "no. 9 [state of affairs, america]" by Diane Sahms.


In the Q&A roundup, Catriona McPherson applied the Page 69 Test to her new contemporary psychothriller standalone,The Dead Room; Lauren Nicole Henley, an assistant professor in the Jepson School of Leadership Studies at the University of Richmond applied the Page 99 Test (from the same Campaign for the American Reader site that sponsors the Page 69 Test) to her new book, Inquisition for Blood: The Making of a Black Female Serial Killer in the Jim Crow South; and Crime Fiction Lover chatted with Canadian author Louise Penny, known for her police detective Armand Gamache series, and journalist Mellissa Fung, who together have co-written the thriller, The Last Mandarin.