A Word From the Editor
This summer issue has a lot packed into it. Stories, features, interviews, and lists of books you may find worth reading. We're happy to see that our good friends, Rosemary and Larry Mild, have a new book out. Copper and Goldie contains 13 mystery tales many of which have appeared …
Stories
Loud voices, announcing the arrival and departure of trains, overlapped in a confusing cacophony that made her head swirl. It was late morning and the shadows created by the sun streaming through the windows resembled prison bars encircling the travelers, keeping them trapped. Dust motes, highlighted in the daylight, cascaded …
Stories
Episode Ten in the Copper and Goldie Mysteries Dense clouds hid more than the full moon hovering over Auntie Wila’s house. They also hid an intruder lurking among her lush bougainvillea bushes. It was a moke—pidgin for a local guy whose idea of fun is to smash someone’s kisser. Wila …
Stories
“Autumn? Why don’t you make us some lemonade?” Granny Livvy called from the porch. It was mid-morning and already a scorcher. Through the open window in the kitchen, I caught the squeal of machinery nearby, which had been running since dawn. I let the water flow until the red tinge …
Stories
Old western movies always feel the same. Eighty-five minutes of lead up until a final gunfight that ends with the piercing howl of a coyote in the background when the bad guy is shot dead. In modern day Hartford we use ambulances instead of coyotes. The high pitched sirens crying …
Stories
Her Majesty’s Marooned Detective
I woke up slowly to a half-remembered nightmare in my dark little bedroom in the middle of a storm. The rain battered on my windows and the shadows around my bed moved slowly, turned menacing, as if being egged on by the wild wind. But in one moment they were …
Stories
Killer Stalks Nursery Rhyme Land
He detects the faintest upward movement, one moist eyeball rotating independently toward the source: a metal waterspout. Inside the greeny, lipless mouth his sticky tongue unfurls, erupting to seize the itsy-bitsy morsel. Hopping into the grass alongside a tuffet, he stills, a moiré shadow awaiting dessert.
Stories
“It’s seven o’clock. Time to get him out here.” Nancy looked toward the wooden door of the tiny Circulation Office where mystery writer Barley O’Day was waiting to address the group. “He needs an introduction,” she said. “Then introduce him.” Harry gestured toward the small crowd gathered in the …
Stories
The Riddle of the Missing Shoes
If a case is insufficiently challenging or concerned with mere trivia, I leave it for Holmes. I and my factotum, Crump, solve mysteries so perfect they are not even classified as such. We know why the Masked Man never showed his face. We exposed the scoundrel who went from house …
Stories
That’s My Story (And I’m Sticking To It)
I was standing on the forward deck of the Allure, the Wanderlust Company’s newest ship, looking out at the sea thanking its gods for my good fortune. I’m Monica Delmar, Director of Passenger Events. And to say I’ve seen many unusual things occur onboard a ship would be like …
Stories
Some might say Wynton, Kansas, wasn’t much of a place to come back to, but those people have probably never sat in Katie’s Corner Café sipping a cappuccino (yes, Katie makes a mean one) and getting a warm hello and an update from every single person who comes in. Those …
Stories
Chuck pushed open the door whose glass was marked ‘Snug’—the section of the pub set aside for ladies and quiet conversation. It wasn’t quiet. He hunched over his table, half aware of Elvis crooning on the jukebox, half eavesdropping on the knot of wan-faced girls who’d arrived in a gale …
Columns
New Gay Mystery Titles for 2019
A Selected List of New Gay Mystery Titles for 2019 New Gay Mysteries Jan – June, 2019: January – Abaddon's Locusts (BJ Vinson Mystery Book 5) by Don Travis – Confidential Investigator, B. J. Vinson, learns his young friend, Jazz Penrod, has disappeared and has not been heard from in a …
Columns
A Midsummer Night's Crime My February 2019 Mysterical-Eye column covered my September 2018 switch from cable TV to Internet-streaming YouTube TV. In May 2019, YouTube TV rose from $40 to $50 per month, and I decided I'd rather give it up than give into another TV provider's climbing cost. Fortunately, …
Columns
Ironweed, the 1987 film based on William Kennedy’s novel, is set in Albany, NY in the winter of 1938. Directed by Hector Babenco the film stars Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep. Kennedy, who also wrote the screenplay, uses the weather to such great effect that it becomes a central character …
Columns
Hot & Sizzling Summer-Fall Reads! I’m writing this as it hits 90+ degrees all week, but what better way to spend my time than talking about new stories and books to read? Yay! I talked to several authors about their latest releases and their characters, along with their short story …
Columns
At the beginning of 2019, we asked authors to submit answers to a few questions in the hopes of giving our readers some insight into the various methods writers use to produce their mystery fiction. We got lots of terrific answers, as varied as their writing. Here are the replies …
Interviews
An Interview with Rosemary Poole-Carter
Rosemary Poole-Carter Rosemary Poole-Carter explores an uneasy past in her novels Only Charlotte, Women of Magdalene, What Remains, and Juliette Ascending, all set in the late 19th century South. Her plays include The Familiar, a ghost story, and The Little Death, a Southern Gothic drama. Fascinated by history, mystery, and the performing and visual arts, she is …
Interviews
An Interview with Paul D. Marks
Paul D. Marks Paul D. Marks is the author of the Shamus Award-Winning mystery-thriller White Heat. Publishers Weekly calls White Heat a “taut crime yarn.” Betty Webb of Mystery Scene Magazine calls its sequel Broken Windows “Extraordinary”. His short story Ghosts of Bunker Hill was voted #1 in the 2016 …
