Tag Archives: mystery

Late Last Night Books
10 NOVEMBER 2020

THE MAKING OF A THOUGHTFUL DETECTIVE STORY—AN INTERVIEW WITH ERIC D. GOODMAN

Think of Detective Sam Spade. Or Mike Hammer. Then put him in a beautiful location with fascinating history and culture and give him a soul that’s open to change. Author Eric D. Goodman takes this combination and stirs it up with a mystery that hinges on clever hidden clues and long-held secrets. The result is The Color of Jadeite, a noir novel that’s packed with fast action, riveting characters, and a sense of purpose.

When an unknown collector sends retired investigator Clive Allan along with Asian beauty Wei Wei to China to search for the lost jadeite tablet of Emperor Xuande of the Ming dynasty, the elements of the novel begin to swirl like a kaleidoscope.

Book Review: Kind Lies, a Mystery

Late Last Night Books

We recently exhibited our books at the Lancaster Community Library in Kilmarnock, VA, and I traded books with other vendors there. As I usually do, I signed my book to Abbot Lee Granoff, author of Crowns of Gold with the line, “Enjoy the adventure.” Later, I read the note he wrote in signing his book to me. “Enjoy the adventure.” Great minds, etc. I’ll print a review of his book later.

I also traded books with Ann Eichenmuller, whose book, Kind Lies, features a woman who lives alone on a sailboat at a marina on the Rappahannock River. It is a mystery. The book I gave her was my psychological suspense novel called The Two-Sided Set-Up, in which my protagonist lives alone on a trawler at a marina on the Rappahannock.

Thriller, Mystery or Ghost Story: How Should We Label Elizabeth Brundage’s All Things Cease to Appear?

Late Last Night Books

When Stephen King writes a blurb for a novel, readers take notice. When a book is reviewed in the New York Times Book Review section, readers take notice. Let’s look at how Elizabeth Brundage’s fourth novel, All Things Cease to Appear, which was published in 2016, is being received by the reading public.

All Things has earned over 7,000 ratings and 1,000 reviews on Goodreads. That is very good, yet the book scores only 3.72 (out of 5)––not what one might expect. On Amazon, it does a little better with a 4.1 score, but from only 300 reviews.

What are the chief objections to the novel among Amazon and Goodreads reviewers? First, and least important in my opinion, is that she does away with quotation marks.

Abandoned Homes, Vietnam, and Murder

Late Last Night Books

Abandoned Homes: Vietnam Revenge Murders  by Frank E. Hopkins looks back at the turmoil, deception, intrigue, and anger of the late sixties and early seventies in this engrossing, hard to put down mystery. It won first place for a mystery/thriller novel in the 2018 Maryland Writers’ Association novel contest.

The author dedicates the book, “To those individuals and families whose lives were disrupted, injured or lost in unwise and unnecessary wars.” That statement brought back memories. When the protests against the Vietnam War engulfed the University of Maryland, from which I had graduated just a couple of years before, I lived nearby. We marched and we housed anti-war protestors, but nothing seemed to sway this country’s leadership and that senseless, unwinnable war continued.

Elderly Sleuths Kill Stereotypes

Late Last Night Books

I’m reading mysteries featuring elderly sleuths, and I’m looking for descriptions that allow the elderly to be whole, able, and alert. No other will do. My own cozy mystery series features the 90-year-olds at Whisperwood Retirement Village, and my characters are able, alert, and active as are many 90-year-olds and 100-year-olds.

As the critique group of my first manuscript read and commented on it, I was appalled at what they said. They wanted me to present the elderly, or rather, the perennials, using all the stereotypes of the elderly, when I am pulling for a better reality. Have you seen 90-year-old Dick Van Dyke dancing with his wife on YouTube?

So I began collecting articles about people in their 90s and 100s who are running marathons, winning tennis matches and canoeing races, even learning how to read for the first time.

Author David Stever Interviewed

Late Last Night Books

An Interview with David Stever, Mystery Author

Author David Stever’s detective novel, Auburn Ride, won the Maryland Writers’ Association 2017 Book Award for Suspense/Mystery fiction. Stever delivers a fast-paced detective story in the tradition of Raymond Chandler and Robert B. Parker. His detective, Johnny Delarosa, also delivers–the cash for his client and a satisfying conclusion to the case.

I enjoyed Auburn Ride, and since David Stever lives in my neighborhood, I asked for an interview. A Google search turned up the fact that he has also been a film producer. The film, Coffin, is a horror flick with a surprise ending.

I wouldn’t associate David Stever with the horror genre. He grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania, has a business degree and in real life works

King Ludwig, His Castle & the Ludwig Conspiracy

Late Last Night Books

Reading The Ludwig Conspiracy, an historical novel by Oliver Pötzsch, opens up dark passageways into the side notes of history. The book itself is a fast-paced thriller with unexpected and persistent villains, both past and present. Published in 2011, eight years after Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, Pötzsch’s book also draws on secret codes and byzantine intrigues and superficially seems to ride Dan Brown’s wave.

You know King Ludwig II of Bavaria as “Mad King Ludwig,” who commissioned the building of Schloss Neuschwanstein, famous as the Disney World castle. He also built Schloss Linderhog and an imitation Versailles known as Herrenschiemsee. Ludwig was born in 1845 and crowned king in 1864. He was a Roman Catholic who struggled with his homosexuality and he was a patron of the composer Richard Wagner.

Miss Marple Still Going Strong

Late Last Night Books
1 FEBRUARY 2016 Miss Marple Still Going Strong

GUEST BLOGGER – MILLIE MACK

I recently attended a course on Agatha Christie. At the first class the teacher asked—what makes Agatha Christie’s mysteries as popular today as when they were first published? I found this question of interest, because I have some personal experience with the popularity of one of her characters — Miss Marple.

Back in October of 2012, I wrote a blog entitled the “Quotable Miss Marple.” To this dChristie-2ay, this blog remains one of my most popular. Therefore, like my teacher I will ask a similar question. What is it about this detective that continues to attract readers, fans and admirers?

Miss Marple is not your typical detective. She’s elderly, she knits and she’s nosy. She lives in the tiny village of St.

January 17 – Always Learning

Late Last Night Books

I am an avid reader of mysteries. No apologies. And I find I enjoy women writers more than male writers because I am often irritated by the usual male mystery writer’s lavish descriptions of fawning, willing and pulchritudinous women. Fantasy land. The acknowledged “grand dame” of mysteries is, of course, Agatha Christie. So it was with interest that I found out about a book called A Is for Arsenic: The Poisons of Agatha Christie by British chemist Kathryn Harkup. Amazon reviewers give it 4.5+ stars. Each chapter features a specific poison beginning, of course, with arsenic and continuing on to veronal.

This is by way of introducing the topic of the latest meeting of the Chesapeake Chapter of Sisters in Crime, an association of mystery writers and fans.

6-23-15 GLAMOUR AND CLAIRVOYANCE IN NEWPORT

Late Last Night Books
23 JUNE 2015 6-23-15 GLAMOUR AND CLAIRVOYANCE IN NEWPORT

6-23-15 GLAMOR AND CLAIRVOYANCE IN NEWPORTNewport a novel

In her new novel Newport, Jill Morrow creates a mystery worthy of Masterpiece Theatre with unexpected and clever twists on the British model. One surprise is there is no crime and no death—until the gathering-of-the-suspects scene. And then there’s another surprise, and another.

It’s the 1920s and suave lawyer Adrian de la Noye is on a ferry to Newport. He’s on his way to an opulent sea view cottage, “beautiful in an old-fashioned, lavender-and-crepe sort of way,” at the insistence of his firm’s wealthiest client to draft a new will. At Adrian’s side is his awkward young colleague Jim Reid. 

PREVIEW OF OUR APRIL 1 GUEST BLOGGER NANCY LYNN JARVIS

Late Last Night Books

PREVIEW OF OUR APRIL 1 GUEST BLOGGER NANCY LYNN JARVIS – Mystery author Nancy Lynn Jarvis finally acknowledged she’s having too much fun writing to ever sell another house and let her license lapse in May, 2013, after her twenty-fifth anniversary in real estate. After earning a BA in behavioral science from San Jose State University, she worked in the advertising department of the San Jose Mercury News. A move to Santa Cruz meant a new job as a librarian and later a stint as the business manager for Shakespeare Santa Cruz at UCSC. She invites you to take a peek into the real estaNancy Jarviste world through the stories that form the backdrop of her Regan McHenry Real Estate mysteries.

Crime and Punishment

Late Last Night Books

3/17/2015 – Crime and Punishment

I learn so much from attending meetings of the local chapter of Sisters in Crime, an association of writers and fans of mystery fiction. This month’s meeting was no exception. Guest speaker was playwright Betty May. As a volunteer with I-WISH, a group of women prisoners at the Maryland Correctional Institution for women, she encouraged them to write about their lives, and then compiled their essays, poems, memoirs, and prayers into a chronological format which became a play called Faces.

Too young, too stupid, too ignorant, these women say and so they made bad choices and bad friends. Now they’re serving life sentences in a maximum security prison. They describe unspeakable things that

A Review – The Gates of Babylon

Late Last Night Books
26 FEBRUARY 2014 A Review – The Gates of Babylon

02/26/2014 THE GATES OF BABYLON BY MICHAEL WALLACE – A REVIEWGates of Babylon

We know what we like and we like what we know. That simple logic is what draws readers to books that are part of a series. We like the consistency of knowing what we’ll get when we throw down our hard earned dollars for some reading entertainment. If we like the storyline and the characters in one book, we hope the author will be consistent and bring us the same great storytelling in the next and the next.