PW chose it as one of their top ten mysteries for the fall, and now Kirkus reviews loves them some Echoes of Sherlock Holmes, too: “Inspired” is the key word here, for contributors have been encouraged to interpret their remit even more broadly than in the editors’ previous two collections (In the Company of Sherlock Holmes,…
Read MoreThe kind of books I write are always a compromise. If I did the kind of research I feel they deserve, a novel would take me three, four, six years and stretch to eight hundred pages. This invariably leaves me with a dozen areas where I’m spreading a small amount of research very thin, and…
Read MoreI’m giving away a copy of Joe Sacco’s The Great War, what NPR called a “panorama of devastation,” an accordian-fold book, 24 feet long, about day one of The Battle of the Somme. Scroll down to enter. Today is the centenary of the death of Alan Seeger. Seeger was an American poet, an uncle of…
Read MoreI’m giving away a copy of Joe Sacco’s The Great War, what NPR called a “panorama of devastation,” an accordian-fold book, 24 feet long, about day one of The Battle of the Somme. Scroll down to enter. One of those who survived that horrific first assault, and who endured the prolonged ghastliness of the months…
Read MoreI’m giving away a copy of Joe Sacco’s The Great War, what NPR called a “panorama of devastation,” an accordian-fold book, 24 feet long, about day one of The Battle of the Somme. Scroll down to enter. Those in charge—at least, in charge of the British forces—imagined that the German lines would be pounded soft…
Read MoreI’m giving away a copy of Joe Sacco’s The Great War, what NPR called a “panorama of devastation,” an accordian-fold book, 24 feet long, about day one of The Battle of the Somme. Scroll down to enter. The Battle of the Somme began 100 years ago today. The Great War started on a summer’s day just…
Read MoreI love the foods of summer. Bye-bye squash and cauliflower, hello strawberries and tomatoes with actual flavor rather than vague redness, a panoply of peppers, Romano beans, white peaches, and… corn. Ah, corn. When sweet corn first begins to appear—ears that haven’t travelled a thousand miles, with kernels as chewy as the husk—just giving it…
Read MoreI just had an hour-long conversation with my editor that reminded me why I write—and more, why I partner with a publishing house rather than go Indie. My 2017 novel, Career Day, is like nothing I’ve ever written. It’s a tapestry of a book, interweaving a lot (yes, a lot) of voices, story lines, parts…
Read MoreI love NPR. But sometimes, it puts my teeth on edge. I don’t listen to a lot of radio, mostly when I’m driving somewhere, but my local station (KAZU, 90.3 FM, at CSUMB) keeps me company whenever I’m on the road in Santa Cruz county. However, I have a complaint–not aimed at KAZU, mind you, but…
Read MoreSomething with my name on the cover has just appeared in the Publisher’s Weekly list of Top Ten Mysteries for the Fall Back in 2009, Les Klinger was in charge of the Left Coast Crime Sherlock Holmes panel. And being Les, he did not go just for the usual suspects (ie, me) but for guests of…
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