Mystery Melange

This weekend, from September 4-6, St. Hilda's Mystery & Crime Conference returns to Oxford, England. The 33rd Crime Fiction Weekend explores "Bad Apples," the dark core of these characters, and discusses why we love them – or love to hate them – so much. The Guest of Honor is Andrew Taylor, winner of the CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger (for lifelong excellence in the genre), whose works include The American Boy, the Roth Trilogy (filmed for TV as Fallen Angel), and the Lydmouth detective series set in the 1950s. Other speakers scheduled to appear include Jo Callaghan, Ajay Chowdhury, Abigail Dean, Vaseem Khan, Remi Kone, Simon Mason, Ayo Onatade, Hallie Rubenhold, Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Sarah Vaughan, and Martyn Waites. The full program is available via this link.


On Thursday, September 10, the Mechanics’ Institute in San Francisco, California, is hosting a panel of historical fiction mystery authors featuring Cara Black (the Aimée Leduc series), Rob Osler (Harriet Morrow series), and Naomi Hiraha (Mas Arai mystery series), moderated by Gigi Pandian (Jaya Jones Treasure Hunt Mysteries). The event kicks off with a murder mystery themed cocktail hour at 5:30, followed by the panel at 6:30 pm. For registration, follow this link.


Murder & Mayhem is sponsoring a giveaway where three lucky winners will receive a set of all nine of Mick Herron’s novels in his Slough House Series, which inspired the Apple TV series Slow Horses. Enter with email address by September 7, 2026, at 11:59:59 pm ET. (The Sweepstakes is open to all legal residents of the 50 United States and Washington, DC, who are 18 years of age or older.)


When Dolly Parton passed away last week, her family asked for donations to Parton's Imagination Library rather than flowers in her memory. Parton founded the Imagination Library in 1995 to encourage a love for reading and learning among the children of Sevier County, Tennessee, where she was raised. But between its founding and her death, it grew into something much bigger, giving away over 330 million books through five different countries. The Dollywood Foundation said in a statement that her legacy will continue "when a child opens a book addressed especially to them; when a parent and child read a favorite story together; and when a young person begins to imagine a future bigger than the circumstances into which they were born." For more information and to donate, you can visit the official website.


Bookshop.org has officially surpassed $50 million in donations to independent bookstores. The site was founded in January 2020 with the goal of bolstering independent bookselling as many stores struggled to stay afloat, and when the pandemic hit two months later it became a lifeline, with 80 percent of its profit margin going to independent bookstores. “We’re so excited to announce that we’ve officially raised $50 million for independent bookstores, supporting their ability to thrive, grow, and keep their doors open for the communities that love them,” the site said in a statement. “We know that bookstores don’t just sell books: They take care of their neighbors, provide a safe space for anyone who needs it, and cultivate a sense of curiosity and a love of reading within their doors. We can’t thank you all enough for supporting bookstores over billionaires.”


This coming Monday is Labor Day in the U.S., and Janet Rudolph has a list of mysteries set on or around that holiday, as well as some crime fiction with a labor union theme.


Art Taylor's "The First Two Pages" blog featured Pat Remick with an essay on her story, "Screaming Jenny," from the new anthology, Hooked on Urban Legends—And Murder!, edited by Donna Andrews, Barb Goffman, and Marcia Talley.


Kevin Tipple's Thursday Treats blog has news of new short crime fiction via The Yard, Pistol Jim Press, the anthology, Mystery, Crime and Spring Break, and much more.


This week's crime poem up at the 5-2 Crime Poetry Weekly is "The People - The Unnamed Ex-Con" by J.H. Johns.


In the Q&A roundup, Author Interviews welcomed Kate Westbury to talk about her new novel, The Oxford Guide to Scandal and Lies; James R. Benn. author of the Billy Boyle World War II spy novels, applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, The Ninth Circle, the twenty-first installment of the Boyle series; ALLi's Howard Lovy spoke with David Barbur, a former law enforcement officer who now writes wilderness mysteries inspired by his interests in hiking, tracking, survival skills, and the natural world; and Deborah Kalb chatted with Hank Phillippi Ryan about her new psychological thriller, Mother Daughter Sister Stranger.