Winter is coming fast, and it’s time to abandon the garden for a warm fire and a pile of cozy mysteries. I’d feel that way even if the deer had not broken in and eaten everything this year. I tell myself they were just saving me on cutting back the plants for winter. So in […]
Beverley Nichols: A Dark and Stormy Garden Writer
So very excited to be talking with The Strand Magazine about Watson & Doyle, Dazzlepaint, and the trials and tribulations of historical research. Please stop by and check it out.
Interview with the Strand Magazine
There is no-one hipper than Johnny Depp. Unless it is Johnny Depp just having sold his yacht to J.K. Rowling for 22 million pounds. No, that is not a typo, although it is by all accounts small potatoes in the oligarch’s world of super-yachts. Rowling, too, has moved on, and the Arriva has arrived at
Hudson Valley Hipster Watch #4: Death on the… er… Rondout Creek?
Of the three iconic literary monsters of the nineteenth century, two of them were created by women writers. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is so well known that she is often (rightly) credited with being the mother of science fiction. Jane Webb’s The Mummy is treated more as a curiosity; indeed she is better known as a
Had a great time at the Saratoga Book Festival with my fellow Mavens of Mayhem, including my tablemate, Chris Keefer.
John Duncan has been one of my favorite painters ever since I happened across this rather constipated-looking Tristan sharing the Love Potion with Isolde, while I was teaching a course in Arthurian romance. John Duncan (1866-1945) was born in Dundee, Scotland to a cattleman father. John, however, had no interest in farming and turned to a career in
What They Made at Byrdcliffe: John Duncan
I admit I had my snark cannon loaded for camelid when I first got wind of the NYS Sheep and Wool Festival. (So to speak. Barns smell like barns regardless of whether they are inhabited by horses, cows, goats, or alpacas.) But then I gave ear to the insidious little voice in the back of
Hudson Valley Hipster Watch #3: Admit it. You Want to Pat a Llama Too.
Saturday, October 15, from 11 am until 4 pm. Please stop by and say hi — and you just might get a sneak peek at The Brooklyn North Murder.
So Excited to be Returning to the Hoboken Library Festival
Remember summer camp? Remember reveille at 6:30? Remember the swim instructor who wouldn’t let you go to lunch until you jumped into the icy water over your head? Remember arts and crafts and the various mysteries of beads, lariats, and decoupage? Remember the communal toilets and showers? Most of all, remember those tents set up
Hudson Valley Hipster Watch #2: Glamping — So Old It’s New
Whenever I’m asked to describe my new Watson & Doyle series, I begin “No-one ever said ‘I want to write a detective series based on Tsvetan Todorov’s literary theories’… but I did.” So imagine my pleasure when I discovered Lawrence Block had long since beat me to it with his Bernie Rhodenbarr series. Todorov argued
What I’m Reading at Byrdcliffe: The Burglar who Met Frederic Brown