Author R&R with Joscelyn Godwin

Educated at Cambridge and Cornell, Joscelyn Godwin, Ph.D., is the author, editor, and translator of more than 30 books, including The Greater and Lesser Worlds of Robert Fludd, and was a professor of music at Colgate University for more than 40 years until his retirement in 2016. In addition to being a composer, musicologist, and translator, he's also known for his work on ancient music, paganism and music in the occult.

In this edition of Author R&R (Research and Reference) for In Reference to Murder, Joscelyn Godwin, co-author of Forbidden Fruits, discusses the inspiration behind writing this "occult novel": a murder mystery with themes of European high life, enthogenic drugs, and ancient archaeology. 

WRITING THE FORBIDDEN FRUITS    

Guido Mina di Sospiro and I started writing Forbidden Fruits while our first collaborative novel, The Forbidden Book was appearing in seven languages, but before it came out in English (Disinformation Books/RedWheel Weiser, 2013). As before, we plotted the novel in long phone conversations, after which each would write a section—anything from a paragraph to a chapter— then send it to the other for criticism and improvement. We did spend a few momentous days together in the DC area, during which we brainstormed with abandon and, among other things, decided to incorporate two engravings from Johann Georg Gichtel’s 1682 edition of the works of Jacob Böhme, which can be found in the book itself. The plot, of course, changed as we went and brought us some surprises as we got to know the characters better. Over a year the pieces were assembled, smoothed over, and given a unified voice. Then, under the aegis of a literary agent in London, the whole thing was cut down by a third. One lesson I have learned is that if I especially admire something I’ve just written, it should be instantly ditched, like that luscious dessert one really shouldn’t have eaten.

Guido has written many novels as well as what the French call belles lettres: articles, opinion pieces, and the unclassifiable The Metaphysics of Ping Pong, a work of narrative non-fiction. His oeuvre leans toward fantastic realism and contrarian philosophy, which appeal to me too. I have mostly written the lighter sort of academic book, on subjects like Renaissance paganism, the Harmony of the Spheres, the myths of Atlantis, eccentric religious and spiritual movements. My job seems to be to digest difficult but fascinating materials, often in foreign languages, for the benefit of curious readers with less time on their hands.

The occult themes in both novels draw on this experience. For instance, in this book the Maltese “Society of Harmony” that experiments with child mediums (cringe!) has parallels in real occult orders. The “Golden Pomegranate” (one of the “forbidden fruits”) is inspired by the current revisioning of prehistory. And the characters’ use of entheogenic fungi re-enacts rituals of the ancient alchemists and esoteric religious groups.

Together with a very unexpected murder, and the dual setting in Malta and Rome, this makes for what we hope is an alluring mix. But hovering over it, or as we might say the book’s moral backbone, is a truly serious matter: the immigration crisis, as people flee from poor and war-torn countries in the hope of a better life. How all this is woven together remains for the reader to discover.

 

You can learn more about the author's writings and other work via this link. Forbidden Fruits is available from Simon & Schuster and via all major booksellers.

Mystery Melange

 

As many of you may already know, Mary Higgins Clark, the "Queen Of Suspense," passed away this past weekend. Simon & Schuster President and CEO Carolyn K. Reidy said that "Beginning in 1975 with the publication of Where Are The Children?, each of her 56 books has been a bestseller...[and] there are more than 100 million copies of her books in print in the United States." Higgins Clark didn't began publishing in her late 40s, but her formula of "placing her characters into perilous situations and often triumphing," proved to be a winner with her legions of fans. Higgins Clark was 92.

Northern Virginia Noir at the Bar returns February 16 at Busboys and Poets in Shirlington, co-sponsored by Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Sisters in Crime Chessie Chapter, and Level Best Books Day. There will be readings and signings from Kathleen Barber, Karen Cantwell, Shawn Cosby, Patrick Hyde, Ellen Clair Lamb, Ken Lawrence, Shawn Simmons, and Art Taylor. Josh Pachter will also be on hand to serve as host of the proceedings.

Join a panel discussion Saturday, February 22 at Clean Prose, London's first co-working space for writers. Lucy Foley (The Hunting Party), Andrew Wilson (A Talent for Murder) and Mia Emilie (The Watchers Trilogy), will be in discussion with J C Bernthal and Brittain Bright to explore how crime and detective novels are constructed and what makes the perfect ending.

On Saturday, February 29th, at the Paisley Book Festival in the UK, the Fun Lovin' Crime Writers (composed of Mark Billingham, Stuart Neville, Val McDermid, Christopher Brookmyre, Luca Veste, and Doug Johnstone) will "murder songs for fun hither and yon" as well as sign books.

CrimeFest 2020 announced that Lynda La Plante, Laura Lippman, and Robert Goddard will be among the authors headlining the crime fiction convention this summer. Up to 150 authors will descend on Bristol appearing in over 50 panels delving into diverse topics from politics to historical crime, the golden age of crime fiction to police procedurals, serial killers to cozy crime. There will also be a panel on crime fiction reviewers, honoring the late Marcel Berlins, and a "Ghost of Honour" remembering Dick Francis. Other authors on the bill for CrimeFest's 11th year include Dreda Say Mitchell, Sarah Pinborough, Yrsa Sigurðardóttir, Lynne Truss and Zoë Sharp. Sponsored by Specsavers, CrimeFest will take place from June 4th to 7th at the Mercure Bristol Grand Hotel.

Think your book has a knock-'em-dead opening sentence? If so, you can submit it to the ThrillerFest Best First Sentence Contest. To qualify to enter, you must be an ITW member or registered for ThrillerFest XV (2020). Winners will be announced on Wednesday, July 8, 2020 at the CraftFest luncheon.

Otto Penzler has taken sole ownership of the Mysterious Press and added it to his publishing company, Penzler Publishers. Penzler founded Mysterious Press in 1975 but it has been an imprint at Grove Atlantic for the past nine years (which will bring out 10 titles this year). Beginning in 2021, the Mysterious Press will be distributed by Norton, which also distributes two other imprints of Penzler Publishers: American Mystery Classics, which is issuing hardcover and trade paperbacks of Golden Age detective novels; and Scarlet, which will release its first list of psychological and domestic suspense titles in the fall. (HT to Shelf Awareness)

It's no secret I adore libraries and librarians (thanks, Mom!). Even the humble bookmobile has a fascinating history.

It's getting harder for crime writers to keep up with all the latest technology for their books. Case in point, a new proof-of-concept study used a highly sensitive mass spectrometry method to date fingerprints. If the techniques works, crime lab scientists will be able to pin down the exact time the fingerprint was left.

This week's crime poem at the 5-2 is "Hugh Chaffin" by David Cranmer.

In the Q&A roundup, The Guardian spoke with Nora Roberts, a/k/a JD Robb, about her writing routine and how she's managed to publish 220 novels in two different genres; The Telegraph of India featured an interview with Ann Cleves about her writing and the "recipe for creating the perfect sleuth"; and C.J. Tudor chatted with Crime by the Book about The Other People, her inventive new thriller following a father on the hunt for his missing daughter.

Author R&R with Alex Marwood

Since both her grandmothers were successful novelists (Margaret Kennedy and Leonora Starr/Dorothy Rivers), it's only natural that Alex Marwood would eventually turn her hand to the genre after an initial career as a journalist across the British press. Her first novel, The Wicked Girls, was shortlisted for the ITW, Anthony, and Macavity awards, included in Stephen King’s Ten Best Books of the Year list, and won the Edgar Award for Best Paperback Original. The Killer Next Door, her second novel, won the coveted Macavity Award for Best Mystery Novel and was nominated for the Anthony and Barry. 

Her latest is The Poison Garden, a novel about cults and cult thinking. When divorcee Sarah Byrne agrees to foster a teenage niece and nephew she never knew she had, she quickly finds that the challenges of parenthood are greatly multiplied when the children have grown up in a cult. Eerie, blonde children who finish each other’s sentences and, though fascinated by the outside world have no interest in adopting its values, they politely block her attempts to bond, fail to make friends, and quickly attract the attention of bullies at school. Soon, Sarah is wondering if she has made a terrible mistake.

Meanwhile their adult half-sister Romy is placed in a hard-to-let flat by Heathrow airport, alone and searching for her siblings in a world filled with mysteries and dangers. Romy, pregnant with a child that she believes to be the future savior of humanity, is looking for a way back to what remains of her former community. And the only way she will be allowed back into the fold is to rid the world of pretenders to her baby’s crown. Pretenders who include her own fifteen-year-old sister…

Alex explains more about writing the novel:

When I started writing this book, I fully intended to make it as straightforward as it could be, coming off the back off The Darkest Secret, which was quite a headache to write. But the more research I did, the more complex the whole thing became, because cults, in the end, are all about how we relate to the world, the assumptions we make and our desire to get along, and the fact that all of those elements of the human character are more easily manipulated and exploited than we like to believe. So it’s about power—the taking and seceding of it—about family, about the wish to belong and the wish to do the right thing, and how those drives can be turned against you. It’s about the power of ideas and how becoming too rigid in your beliefs will make you a prisoner. It’s about the human ability to fight literally to the death against ideas that challenge the ones we hold dear.

[The inspiration is] so many things. It’s a subject that’s always interested me. The world as it is at the moment is full of them—they seem to be coming from every side, from anti-vaxxers to flat earthers to Trumpites and Antifa in the States and Corbynites and both sides of the Brexit debate in the UK, Extinction Rebellion everywhere. And, of course, the twisting of belief that led to Al Quaeda and, later, ISIL. Cults are literally everywhere, right down to the microcosmic cultism you see in the eyes of your average narcissist in the full flow of an ego-protecting tantrum. This book’s been a long time coming, honestly.

I’m very slow, because I always think I’m going to plot ahead of time and always lose endless time to going up the blind alleyways before I accept that I’m not that sort of writer.

So once I really start, it’ll be from character. I’ll have the setup—in this case, the mass suicide at Plas Golau and the stories of the ones who survived, and some loose idea—happy or tragic outcome, not much more than that—of where I’m going to go with it, but then I just have to write thousands and thousands of words exploring the people and their world before I finally know them and hit the place where the book itself begins. Things often reshape and reshape as I’m going along. A couple of times I’ve literally not seen a huge twist coming until I was in the middle of writing it, though when I go back I’ll see that I’ve completely set things up to lead to that point, subconsciously.

It’s very wasteful and I’ll never manage to be a book-a-year writer as a result, but it’s the only way I know how to write. I’m also an obsessive editor as I go along. I’ve been writing a TV script of The Darkest Secret with a wonderful, patient American collaborator, and I’ve been driving him half-mad with my “God, can we go back and redraw those last three episodes before we go on please?” ways—but I think he’s actually starting to accept my approach, up to a point. I am really envious of people who can do a vomit draft and then rework it into something readable, but I just can’t. Carrying on writing when I know that something isn’t right yet fills me with a paralyzing existential dread.

You can learn more about Alex Marwood and her books via her website and follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. The Poison Garden is now available via all major online and brick-and-mortar booksellers.

February 3, 2020

It's the start of a new week, and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

AWARDS

The British Academy of Film and Television handed their BAFTA Awards last night, the British version of the Oscars. There were a few honors for crime dramas, including Joaquin Phoenix winning Best Actor for Joker and Brad Pitt winning Best Supporting Actor for Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood. Composer Hildur Guđnadóttir also continued her string of accolades this year with a Best Original Score nod for Joker.

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

Jodie Foster has come on board to direct an untitled drama about the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa. Bill Wheeler is writing the screenplay, based on the book, The Day They Stole the Mona Lisa, by Seymour Reit. The robbery, which took place at the Louvre in Paris, was perpetrated by Louvre employee Vincenzo Peruggia, who believed Leonardo da Vinci’s painting should have been displayed in Italy. Peruggia kept the painting for two years and was caught when he attempted to sell it to the director of the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.

Paramount Pictures has set Ron Howard to direct The Fixer, based on a Tyler Hisel script. It tells the true story of a disgraced FBI agent who's tapped by the CIA during the height of the Cold War to lead a ragtag team of CIA operatives and Chicago mobsters on an unlikely mission to try to assassinate Fidel Castro.

Lethal Weapon 5 has had trouble getting off the ground (the last installment coming 22 years ago). However, director Richard Donner and producer Dan Lin recently revealed that Lethal Weapon 5 is on track to eventually being made. Lin said, "We’re trying to make the last Lethal Weapon movie. And Dick Donner’s coming back. The original cast is coming back. And it’s just amazing. The story itself is very personal to him. Mel and Danny are ready to go, so it’s about the script."

An official trailer dropped for The Burnt Orange Heresy. Art critic James Figueras (Claes Bang) and his lover, fellow American Berenice Hollis (Elizabeth Debicki), travel to the estate of powerful art collector Cassidy (Mick Jagger), who asks James to steal a masterpiece from the studio of a famous artist (Donald Sutherland).

TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES

NBC has given a formal pilot order to Langdon, a drama based on Dan Brown’s best-selling thriller novel The Lost Symbol. Langdon is conceived as a prequel and follows the early adventures of famed Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon, who must solve a series of deadly puzzles to save his kidnapped mentor and thwart a chilling global conspiracy.

True Detective creator, Nic Pizzolatto, and one of the show's original stars, Matthew McConaughey, are reuniting for Redeemer, a drama series which landed a script-to-series commitment at FX. Created by Pizzolatto and inspired by Patrick Coleman’s debut novel The Churchgoer, Redeemer stars McConaughey as a minister-turned-dissolute security guard "whose search for a missing woman in Texas leads him through a corruption-steeped criminal conspiracy, as his past and present impact and entwine around a mystery of escalating violence and deceit."

Twelve years after The Practice and Boston Legal ended their runs on ABC, David E. Kelley is returning to the broadcast network with the drama The Big Sky. Based on The Highway, the first book in C.J. Box’s Cassie Dewell series of novels, the procedural thriller follows private detective Cassie Dewell, who partners with ex-cop Jenny Hoyt on a search for two sisters who have been kidnapped by a truck driver on a remote highway in Montana.

CBS has given a pilot green light to The Equalizer, a reimagining of the classic series with Queen Latifah starring and executive producing. This new take is based on the character played by Edward Woodward on the original series and by Denzel Washington in the movie franchise, a retired intelligence agent with a mysterious past who uses the skills from a former career to exact justice on behalf of innocent people who are trapped in dangerous circumstances.

Author Andy McDermott’s spy thriller, The Persona Protocol, has been optioned by Universal TV, while Headline has picked up another two books by the author. The Persona Protocol follows Adam Gray—an agent implanted with experimental technology that lets him temporarily take on the memories and personality of others—as he hunts down a global terrorist conspiracy. The two more thrillers acquired by Headline for a potential series are based on McDermott's novels featuring globe-trotting archaeologist Nina Wilde and ex-SAS soldier Eddie Chase.

The CW has given a pilot order to Kung Fu, a reimagining with a female lead of the 1970s David Carradine-starring TV series. In the reimagined version, a young Chinese-American woman drops out of college and goes on a life-changing journey to an isolated monastery in China. But when she returns to find her hometown overrun with crime and corruption, she uses her martial arts skills and Shaolin values to protect her community and bring criminals to justice…all while searching for the assassin who killed her Shaolin mentor and is now targeting her.

Epix’s noir drama series Perpetual Grace, LTD will wrap with a limited-run conclusion instead of a second season. While received very well by critics and fans, the series didn't find a wide enough audience. The show premiered in June 2019 and stars Jimmi Simpson as the young grifter, James, as he attempts to prey upon Pastor Byron Brown (Ben Kingsley), who turns out to be far more dangerous than James suspects—Byron and his wife Lillian (Jacki Weaver), known as Pa and Ma, have used religion to bilk hundreds of innocent people out of their life savings.

Margarita Levieva is set to star in the international spy thriller, In From the Cold, which has received an eight-episode series order by Netflix. During a European vacation with her daughter, an American single mother’s life is turned upside down when the CIA forces her to confront her long-buried past as a Russian spy who was also the product of a highly classified KGB experiment granting her special abilities.

Deadline reported that Paget Brewster (Criminal Minds) has been tapped for a recurring role in the second season of CBS’s summer action-adventure series Blood & Treasure. The show stars Matt Barr and Sofia Pernas in a globe-trotting action-adventure drama about a brilliant antiquities expert and a cunning art thief who team up to catch a ruthless terrorist who funds his attacks through stolen treasure. In the same Deadline report, Sarah Minnich (Better Call Saul) is set to recur opposite Rosario Dawson in USA Network’s new crime anthology series Briarpatch, which follows Allegra Dill (Dawson), a dogged investigator returning to her border-town Texas home after her sister is murdered.

A trailer was released for Quibi's upcoming series The Fugitive, a reboot of the Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones movie (and the 1960s TV series that inspired it). The project stars Boyd Holbrook and Kiefer Sutherland playing all-new characters engaged in a similar game of cat-and-mouse...with a 21st century twist.

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO

Read or Dead hosts Katie McClean Horner and Rincey Abraham talked about the Edgar Award nominees and some genre-crossing SFF mysteries.

Speaking of Mysteries welcomed Chad Dunas to chat about his new mystery, The Blaze.

Bestselling author Joseph Finder joined Suspense Radio's Beyond the Cover to discuss his latest book, House on Fire, featuring private investigator Nick Heller.

A new Mysteryrat's Maze podcast is up featuring the mystery short story "Bark Simpson and the Scent of Death" by Alan Orloff, read by actor Sean Hopper.

Wrong Place, Write Crime host, Frank Zafiro, welcomed Nick Feldman to talk about his Mina Davis series.

The Writer's Detective Bureau podcast, hosted by veteran Police Detective Adam Richardson, took up the topics of isolation and quarantine orders by Public Health, how jurisdiction usually works for narcotics cases, and using Search and Rescue teams in searching for a missing child.

It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club chatted with Eugenia Lovett West about her latest novel, Firewall.

The latest podcast from Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine features a story by one of crime fiction's most celebrated critics, Francis M. Nevins, a former law professor who has also authored a number of well-received novels and short stories. Nevins reads his story "Night of Silken Snow" (which first appeared in the November 1994 issue of EQMM) with Christine Gilsinan.

Audio Accolades

 

The Audio Publishers Association announced this year's finalists for the annual Audio awards in twenty-four categories. Stephen King will receive a lifetime achievement award at the gala, to be held March 2 in New York City. Here are the nods for best Mystery and Thriller/Suspense:

Mystery

• Along Came a Spider (25 anniversary edition) by James Patterson, narrated by Taye Diggs, published by Hachette Audio
• The Boy by Tami Hoag, narrated by Hillary Huber, published by Brilliance Publishing
• The Chestnut Man by Soren Sveistrup, narrated by Peter Noble, published by HarperAudio
• The Lost Man by Jane Harper, narrated by Stephen Shanahan, published by Macmillan Audio
• The New Iberia Blues by James Lee Burke, narrated by Will Patton, published by Simon & Schuster Audio

Thriller/Suspense

• Blood in the Water by Jack Flynn, narrated by Dion Graham, published by Recorded Books
• Freefall by Jessica Barry, narrated by Hillary Huber, Karissa Vacker, and MacLeod Andrews, published by HarperAudio
• The Institute by Stephen King, narrated by Santino Fontana, published by Simon & Schuster Audio
• Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman, narrated by Susan Bennett, published by HarperAudio
• Winter Dark by Alex Callister, narrated by Ell Potter, published by Audible Originals
  

Some crime fiction titles were also included among the finalists for best narrator:

 Best Female Narrator

• All the Lost Things by Michelle Sacks, narrated by Cassandra Morris, published by Hachette Audio
• The Boy by Tami Hoag, narrated by Hillary Huber, published by Brilliance Publishing
• Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson, narrated by Marin Ireland, published by HarperAudio
• Prime Suspect by Lynda La Plante, narrated by Rachel Atkins, published by Zaffle
• The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow, narrated by January LaVoy, published by Hachette Audio

Best Male Narrator

• The Dutch House by Ann Patchett, narrated by Tom Hanks, published by HarperAudio
• Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathon Safran Foer, narrated by Robert Petkoff, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
• Kingdom of the Blind by Louise Penny, narrated by Robert Bathurst, published by Macmillan Audio
• The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead, narrated by JD Jackson, published by Penguin Random House Audio
• Watership Down by Richard Adams, narrated by Peter Capaldi, published by Blackstone Publishing

Bang-Up Barrys

The team at Deadly Pleasures Mystery Magazine have announced the 2020 Barry Award nominations. Congrats and good luck to all!

Best Novel

The Lost Man, Jane Harper
If She Wakes, Michael Koryta
Metropolis, Philip Kerr
The Border, Don Winslow
Your House Will Pay, Steph Cha
Thirteen, Steve Cavanagh

Best First Novel

The Chestnut Man, Soren Sveistrup
The Silent Patient, Alex Michaelides
American Spy, Lauren Wilkinson
Save Me From Dangerous Men, S. A. Lelchuk
Scrublands, Chris Hammer
To The Lions, Holly Watt

Best Paperback Original

The Godmother, Hannelore Cayre
Winner Kills All, R. J. Bailey
Killing Quarry, Max Allan Collins
Fate, Ian Hamilton
Missing Daughter, Rick Mofina
No Good Deed, James Swain

Best Thriller

Mission Critical, Mark Greaney
Backlash, Brad Thor
The Chain, Adrian McKinty
The Burglar, Thomas Perry
True Believer, Jack Carr
White Hot Silence, Henry Porter

Best Mystery/Crime Novel of the Decade

Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn
November Road, Lou Berney
Suspect, Robert Crais
The Dry, Jane Harper
The Black House, Peter May
Cartel, Don Winslow

Mystery Melange

 

Registration is now open for the International Thriller Writer's Seventh Annual Online Thriller School. The eight-week program begins March 23, 2020, where the craft of thriller writing will be front and center. Each instructor will teach an aspect of craft though a Facebook Live video, written materials that include further reading and study suggestions, and an entire week of on-line Q&A with the registered students. Featured author-instructors include Allison Brennan, Grant Blackwood, Raymond Khoury, Karen Dionne, Steven James, Hank Phillippi Ryan, Peter James and Kathleen Antrim.

Perfect Crime, the first crime writing festival set in the heart of Liverpool, is gearing up for its inaugural convention on November 14 with a new website. Ann Cleves is the special guest, with more authors and evnets to be announced soon.

More good conference news: Noireland 2020 is returning with a one-day festival packed full of panels, workshops, tours, and screenings on Saturday, March 28 in Belfast at the Clayton Hotel. Organizers plan to announced the program soon with more information about registration and tickets.

Level Best Books is partnering with Lee and Denene Lofland to launch New Arc Books, a new imprint. Lee, a veteran police investigator, has served as a consultant for Slate Magazine, Spike TV and for many well-known bestselling authors. As an expert, he has appeared on BBC television, CNN, NPR radio’s Talk of the Nation and Public Television. Denene received a Ph.D. from Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, and while her career is focused on science, her life-long passions are fantasy and science fiction. They are actively seeking submissions, from agents or authors, of novels between 70,000 and 100,000 words with a tilt toward crime titles, both fiction and nonfiction.

Faber will celebrate the 100th anniversary of P D James’ birth by publishing her short story "The Part-Time Job" in book form for the first time. August 3 will mark what would have been the 100th birthday of James, which Faber published for over 50 years following the publication of her first novel, Cover Her Face, in 1962. In celebration of this centenary, Faber will publish short story "The Part-Time Job" in book form, which editorial director Angus Cargill described as "an ingenious, dark-treat of a story." Faber will also publish a specially designed new paperback edition of A Mind to Murder, the second novel in James' Adam Dalgliesh series. Faber said it hopes to draw a new generation of readers to "this great character and classic series."

Nancy Drew debuted in 1930 in The Secret of the Old Clock and has been busily solving crimes ever since. She has become an icon as few other characters have. But while you’ve certainly heard of the celebrated girl detective, how much do you really know about her? This quiz poses 15 questions about the characters and cases that appeared in the original 56 Nancy Drew books.

Speaking of Nancy Drew, her fans might not be thrilled to learn that a new graphic novel by Anthony Del Col just killed off the teen detective. But Bustle came to the rescue with a list of "15 Female Detective Novels To Read While You Mourn Nancy Drew."

If you work a lot of crossword puzzles (guilty!), then you've probably come across the word "yegg." Ever wonder how this unusual crime-associated term came about? Grammarphobia has you covered.

This week's crime poem at the 5-2 is "Xannie" by J.B. Stevens.

In the Q&A roundup, Deborah Kalb spoke with Tanen Jones about her new thriller, The Better Liar; the Irish Examiner chatted with Jo Spain, author of Six Wicked Reasons, about how she multitasks to get a lot done; and the Washington Times interviewed Otto Penzler, a long-time champion of short crime fiction through his Mysterious Press imprint.