Entries from Westport Public Library BOOK blog tagged with 'historical'
The Diamond Dagger
Award winning British author Peter Lovesey will be joining us at the Library on Sunday, October 25 at 2 pm, along with master blender of fact and fiction, Connecticut author James R. Benn. They will be interviewed by Joe Meyers of the Connecticut Post. This is a rare opportunity to meet Lovesey, the author Publishers Weekly says “has no peer in presenting a traditional mystery with all the clues hiding in plain sight. Skeleton Hill, his new Peter Diamond novel, is the tenth book in this contemporary series, which is set in Bath. The PW review says “Diamond remains one of the most realistic and human of fictional sleuths.”Evil for Evil
Evil for Evil finds Billy Boyle in late 1943 in Northern Ireland investigating the theft of 50 automatic rifles and 200,000 rounds of ammunition from a U.S. Army depot. The body of a slain IRA man is found a few miles away and Billy's military superiors fear the stolen weapons will be used in a Nazi engineered IRA uprising. Booklist says "author James R. Benn continues to create fascinating behind-the-scenes mysteries from little-known facets of World War II history … A solid series that keeps getting better." Benn will be joining us at the Westport Library on Sunday, October 25 at 2:00 pm along with Peter Lovesey, the award-winning author of over thirty-five crime novels, including the contemporary Peter Diamond series and the Victorian era Sergeant Cribb mysteries.
The Mystery Reader’s Tale
The Usual Suspects Mystery Reading Group will be discussing The Sempster's Tale by Margaret Frazer next Sunday, the 12th, at two. New faces are always welcome. To reserve a copy of the book, call 291-4821. Dame Frevisse, a medieval Benedictine nun, seeks to recover the gold of a murdered Duke, aided by a sempster ("seamstress," as explained in an author's note, didn't come into use until the 1600s) and her Jewish lover. Their mission is jeopardized when a crucified body stirs up anti-Semitic sentiment. The medieval mystery is an ever-expanding sub-genre.Noir and then
The seminal American noir writer was James M. Cain, who began writing in the early 1930s, and the noir novel has traditionally been set in its own time period – or the same century, at least! Author Jeri Westerson has penned a medieval noir. In Veil of Lies, disgraced knight Crispin Guest, stripped of his rank and honor for plotting against Richard II, uses his wits to eke out a living in fourteenth-century London. He is hired to determine who killed a wealthy merchant rumored to be in possession of the Mandyllon, a cloth bearing the face of Jesus and possessing magical powers.Veil of Lies has been nominated for the 2009 Sue Feder Memorial Historical Mystery, along with Kelli Stanley’s Nox Dormienda, which is also an “historical noir,” this time set even further back in history in first-century Londinium.Jack is back in town
Three recent crime novels re-visit one of the great unsolved mysteries of all time. The Empty Mirror by J. Sydney Jones takes place in fin-de-sicle 1892 Vienna, a city terrorized by a serial killer whom the press calls “Vienna’s Jack the Ripper.” Lyndsey Faye’s Dust and Shadow is set in London in the autumn of 1888. The savage slaughter of two prostitutes in London's East End piques Sherlock Holmes' curiosity. In The Frightened Man by Kenneth Cameron, rumors are flying that Jack the Ripper has returned when the mutilated body of a teenaged prostitute is found in London’s East End. It is now 1900, and London is a sprawling, chaotic city, the perfect place for a man like Denton, an American with a violent past, to obtain some much desired anonymity.The buzz on Russell and Holmes
Laurie R. King became the first novelist since Patricia Cornwell to win on both sides of the Atlantic with the publication of her debut thriller, A Grave Talent, which won the 1995 New Blood Dagger Award in the UK and the 1995 Edgar Award for Best First Novel in the US. A Grave Talent was the first of five contemporary novels featuring Kate Martinelli, a San Francisco homicide detective. King also has a long-running series which features Mary Russell and her husband Sherlock Holmes. With the creation of Mary Russell, King met with furious resistance from Sherlockian purists, but one reviewer said that the series "captures the spirit of the Holmes adventures with a great deal of love, while allowing room for female fans to more easily project themselves into the story." The Washington Post stated that King “… has relieved Holmes of the worst effects of his misogyny and, by so doing, salved the old hurt that comes to every female reader of literature … “Killer historical mysteries
The 2008 Agatha nomineeshave been announced and author Kathy Lynn Emerson’s book, How to Write a Killer Historical Mystery, is on the Best Non-fiction list. The core of the book is Emerson’s personal take on writing and selling historical mysteries, but it also includes practical advice, anecdotes, and suggestions for research from over forty other historical mystery writers and insights from assorted editors, booksellers, and reviewers. As the author of two popular historical mystery series, the Face Down Mysteries featuring Elizabethan gentlewoman herbalist Susanna, Lady Appleton, and the Diana Spaulding Mysteries, set in 1888 in various U.S. locations featuring journalist Diana Spaulding, she certainly knows her stuff.Natural selection
The inclusion of Darwin’s theory of evolution in the science curriculum is still under fire in many places and in some cases attitudes and beliefs have not changed much since the 1925 Scopes “Monkey” Trial. Ona Russell has written a recent historical mystery set at that trial, The Natural Selection, which incorporates all of the key figures, including H.L. Mencken, William Jennings Bryan, and Clarence Darrow, as well as actual courtroom excerpts. Her protagonist, Sarah Kaufman, is a Jewish probate court official in Toledo, Ohio. She heads south to visit with her cousin and ends up in Dayton, Tennessee -- where the trial is underway -- working with Mencken to solve the murder of the cousin’s colleague, an enigmatic college professor who has left behind a cryptic Darwinian message for them. Do not mistake this is for a cozy mystery. Sarah’s search for the truth is a harrowing one as she encounters bigotry and brutality and exhausts her physical strength and psychological reserves in the process.I say, Holmes!
In what Publishers Weekly calls an “audacious revisionist view of one of the best-known mysteries of all time,” French literature professor and psychoanalyst Pierre Bayard explains his theory of “detective criticism" in Sherlock Holmes Was Wrong: Reopening the Case of the Hound of the Baskervilles. Applying this critical method, explains Bayard, allows him to be "more rigorous” than detectives and writers, “and thus to work out solutions that are more satisfying to the soul." Arguing that Sherlock Holmes often drew false conclusions, Bayard offers an alternative solution to that reached by Holmes in The Hound of the Baskervilles.What the Dickens?
Bestseller Dan Simmons has written a forthcoming (Feb. 09) fact-based novel about Dickens, Drood – a prequel, you might say, rather than a conclusion – imagining a terrifying sequence of events as the inspiration for the novel. In the course of trying to rescue fellow passengers after narrowly escaping death in an 1865 train wreck, Dickens encounters a ghoulish figure named Drood, who had apparently been traveling in a coffin. Wilkie Collins, Dickens’ real-life novelist friend, narrates the tale of Dickens’ newly acquired dark double life as he pursues the wraith through crypts and lime pits in the worst slums of London. Despite the book's length – 784 pages – PW says “readers will race through the pages, drawn by the intricate plot and the proliferation of intriguing psychological puzzles.”The City of Light
Murder on The Eiffel Tower is the first in a promising new series from Claude Izner. Izner is a pseudonym for sisters and Parisian booksellers Liliane Korb and Laurence Lefèvre. The brand-new, shiny Eiffel Tower is the pride and glory of the 1889 World Exposition. But one sunny afternoon, as visitors are crowding the viewing platforms, a woman collapses and dies on this great Paris landmark. Can a bee sting really be the cause of death? Or is there a more sinister explanation? Young bookseller Victor Legris witnesses the woman’s death. Appalled by the media coverage of the event, he is determined to find out what actually happened and is caught in a race against time when there are more mysterious deaths.Somewhere in time
A new publisher, Top Five Books, has launched a series set in 1950s Washington DC with Murder Bay by David R. Horwitz. Sgt. Ben Carey is an ambitious young beat cop with a troubled marriage. After his wife kicks him out, Carey bunks in a decrepit Victorian mansion only to find it haunted by the spirit of a man who died there from wounds sustained in the second battle of Bull Run. Carey comes to suspect that the man was murdered and takes a break from his official duties to solve the nearly-century-old cold case. The story alternates between DC in 1862 and the same city 95 years later. PW says it is a debut with “definite promise.”Shiver me timbers
Edward Chupack expands the story of one of Robert Louis Stevenson's most memorable characters—Long John Silver—in his Treasure Island spinoff, Silver. Told from the pirate's perspective, it opens on board a ship carrying an unrepentant Silver to his execution in England. He shares the story of his early life and rise to infamy and chronicles his lifelong pursuit of an elusive treasure. Silver is a man with a plan and hopes to secure his release by promising to reveal the whereabouts of the fabled trove. Publishers Weekly, in a starred review, called it a “swashbuckling debut” and a “riveting narrative” and it is, indeed, peppered with superb pirate dialogue – along with a murder, a map, ciphers and codes, and even a bit of romance.Mummy dearest
Joan Hess’s 17th Claire Malloy mystery, Mummy Dearest, pays tribute to the Amelia Peabody novels of the celebrated mystery writer Elizabeth Peters, to whom the book is dedicated. Fans of P.C. Doherty’s Amerotke, Chief Judge of the Halls of Two Truths mysteries which actually take place in ancient Egypt, in the 1400s – B.C., that is – are enjoying the 6th title in the series, The Poisoner of Ptah, which received a starred review from PW.The Anatomy of Deception
“What makes his book so fascinating is the attention to the medical procedures and innovations of the time ... Readers who enjoy Anne Perry’s and Caleb Carr’s psychological thrillers will welcome Goldstone’s brooding, paranoiac addition to the genre.”—Booklist Local author Lawrence Goldstone will be our speaker on Monday, February 11th, to discuss his recently released forensic thriller, The Anatomy of Deception. A young doctor is plunged into a maze of murder, secrets and unimaginable crimes and tracks a daring killer through the operating rooms, drawing rooms, and back alleys of 1889 Philadelphia.Io, Saturnalia!
If you think Christmas and Hanukkah are a lot of work, just be glad that Saturnalia is no longer on the calendar. Saturnalia, an ancient Roman festival of the winter solstice, was originally celebrated for three days beginning December 17th, but later extended to seven days – seven days of non-stop revelry that make all modern celebrations pale by comparison. A large and important public festival in Rome, it was by far the most popular. Besides the public rites there were a series of private family celebrations as well. If you would like to learn a little more about it, enjoy a good mystery and have a few laughs at the same time, try Lindsey Davis’s Saturnalia, the eighteenth title in her Marcus Didius Falco series, in which Davis does her usual sound job of bringing first-century Rome to life.Up in smoke
Here’s one for the Cornwell and Reichs fans out there. In Simon Beckett’s new suspense novel Written in Bone, forensic expert David Hunter travels to a remote Scottish island to investigate the death of a young woman by what appears to be spontaneous combustion. Within days, two more people are dead by fire. Hunter’s job is to coax the dead into telling their stories. At first, terrorist activity is suggested, but the answer turns out to be much closer to home.Skullduggery
I am not a big fan of noir or hard-boiled mysteries, although I will pick one up from time to time on someone’s recommendation. I found James Crumley that way. Someone told me that reading his books was like reading Steinbeck. I tried them and I was smitten. So, the best possible recommendation you can make for books that tend to be a bit on the dark side is to promise me that it will read like Crumley. A recent review for Craig Macdonald’s Head Games did just that.Gather around
Three authors of interest to mystery fans will be speaking at the Library over the next few weeks as part of the Authors @ the Library series. On Tuesday, October 30, at noon Jerry Labriola will discuss his book The Strange Death of Napoleon Bonaparte, a suspense novel that combines equal parts mystery and rich historical detail. On Wednesday, November 7, at 7:30 p.m. Jed Rubenfeld will discuss his book The Interpretation of Murder, a historical mystery and a psychological thriller - in the truest sense of the term -- with a cast that includes Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. On Monday, November 12, at 7:30 p.m. Susan Schaab will discuss her book Wearing the Spider, which Liz Smith called "The Devil Wears Prada in legal Technicolor."See Jane run!
There is so much Jane Austen buzz these days. Book clubs are still dissecting Karen Joy Fowler's The Jane Austen Book Club -- the film version of which opens today -- and people are still queuing up for Becoming Jane, which is making the rounds at art cinemas. PBS is launching an Austen extravaganza in mid-January 2008 when Masterpiece Theatre will begin airing adaptations of all six of her novels. There are two mystery series which arise from the Austen legacy. Stephanie Barron has a series in which Austen herself is the detective and Carrie Bebris has a series where Austen's fictional characters Fitzwilliam Darcy and his wife Elizabeth (née Bennet) do some genteel sleuthing.That's Mrs. Raisin to you!
Marion Chesney is a popular and prolific author. She has written numerous successful historical romance novels under her own name, as well as an Edwardian mystery series featuring Lady Rose Summer, a charming debutante with an independent streak, and Captain Harry Cathcart, an impoverished aristocrat. Under the pseudonym M. C. Beaton, she has written two immensely popular mystery series featuring Hamish Macbeth and Agatha Raisin.Off the beaten track
Railway buffs and fans of the "penny dreadful" style will enjoy Andrew Martin’s The Necropolis Railway.
Set in 1903, this thriller features a young man who dreams of driving a locomotive.
Jim Stringer finds work with the London Necropolis and National Mausoleum Company which delivers coffins from the city morgue to suburban cemeteries.
He soon learns that his predecessor has mysteriously disappeared and then he is beset by a series of murderous attacks.
Say again?
When many books pass through your hands on a daily basis, you often see a particular historical event manifest itself in several books that appear at the same time.
Last week I cataloged a non-fiction book called Driven Out: the Hidden War against the Chinese. Its subject was the “ethnic cleansing” of the Chinese on the West Coast in the latter half of the nineteenth century. It is not one of the finer moments in our history, nor is it one that many people are aware of.
On page 256 there was an illustration that appeared in an 1869 issue of Harper’s Weekly depicting the marriage of a Chinese man and an Irish woman. It was a rare “I didn’t know about that!” moment for me. Librarians are vast repositories of miscellaneous facts and fictions, so this doesn’t happen to me too often.
Working my way through the cataloging pile, a few books later I hit upon Victoria Thompson’s new “Gaslight” mystery, Murder in Chinatown. Midwife Sarah Brandt finds herself in Chinatown to deliver a baby to an Irish and Chinese couple and gets involved in the disappearance of a young woman who is distraught over a marriage that has been arranged for her by her Irish aunt and the aunt’s husband, who is a successful Chinese businessman.
And the winner is …
The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin is the winner of the 2007 Edgar Award for best novel.
The New York Times review called it “the perfect escapist mystery.”
It is set in 1836 during the Ottoman Empire's declining decades. Just before the Sultan announces sweeping modernizations, a wave of murders threatens the fragile balance of power in his court.
For 400 years the Janissaries were the empire's elite soldiers, but they grew too powerful, and ten years ago the Sultan had them crushed. Are the Janissaries staging a brutal comeback?
The investigation is in the hands of a court eunuch, Yashim Togalu, who is of the opinion that he is the perfect man for the job as he is “unencumbered by the plums.”
Crime and Punishment, continued
In The Gentle Axe, R.N. Morris has picked up police magistrate Porfiry Petrovich’s career where Dostoevsky left off.
Two dead bodies in St. Petersburg’s Petrovsky Park. A big, burly man hanging from a tree with a bloodied axe tucked into his belt and a dwarf packed inside of a suitcase with a deep axe wound in his head.
Petrovich soon has reason to reject the obvious explanation that one man killed the other and then hanged himself.
Have toga, will travel
Meet Septimus Quistus, a man with nothing left to lose.
In one fateful hour, his life is destroyed when his much-loved wife and family are murdered, except for his seventh son and only daughter.
Not caring if he lives or dies, Quistus resigns his public offices and travels the world searching for his lost children.
“Oh, who can ever be tired of Bath?”
Jane Austen’s Catherine Morland journeys to Bath in Northanger Abbey to “walk and be seen” and is quite taken with the city.
I will be visiting there this coming week to walk in the footsteps of Jane Austen herself, albeit hoping to see, rather than be seen.
This is the city of Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond as well, and I will be watching for all of the landmarks described in author Peter Lovesey’s mysteries. I am eagerly awaiting the newest book in the series, The Secret Hangman, which is due out in early summer.
Positively medieval
The latest addition to the celebrity detective list is none other than Dante Alighieri, newly installed Prior of the city of Florence, who is searching for shards of evidence in The Mosaic Crimes by Giulio Leoni.
It is June, 1300. Ambrogio, a master mosaicist has been found tortured and murdered, his face covered with quicklime.
While making enquiries about the dead artist, Dante is welcomed by the Third Heaven, a group of scholar-philosophers who discuss theology, philosophy, and question the workings of the powerful and mysterious Knights Templar.
The Amlingmeyer brothers ride again!
Fans of Steve Hockensmith's Holmes on the Range, this is your lucky day! "Old Red" and "Big Red" are back in the "detectifying" business in On the Wrong Track, which is hot off the presses. I so thoroughly enjoyed the first book, finding it the freshest take on the Holmes mystique in years.
If you want a real treat, try it on CD. Read by William Dufris, it is an absolute delight.
Not your mother's academic mystery
The Grave Tattoo by Val McDermid. Edgy, tense, compelling.
A 200-year-old body appears when a peat bog in England’s Lake District dries up. There is much speculation as to who the man covered with South Seas tattoos was and how he ended up there.
Wordsworth scholar Jane Grisham is convinced that he was Fletcher Christian, famed HMS Bounty mutineer, who somehow managed to escape from Pitcairn Island and make his way back to England.
Finely tuned mysteries
Here are a few musical mysteries for mystery fans who want to keep pace with the excitement of this year’s Westport Reads which features Mark Salzman’s The Soloist.
Highbrow gothic
Dead of winter, 1804. Konigsberg, East Prussia, already on edge awaiting invasion by Napoleon Bonaparte.
An aged, eccentric Immanuel Kant enlists the aid of a young rural magistrate to unmask a serial killer terrorizing the city.
Elements of the mystic and demonic combine in Michael Gregorio’s Critique of Criminal Reason as bodies continue to turn up, with no visible wounds. Is it the devil’s handiwork?
MURDER, WESTERN STYLE
While there are many excellent mystery series set in the contemporary American West, 2006 has bought four historical mysteries that give us superb glimpses of it’s fabled past.
Didn’t she see it coming?
Psychics are very popular in mysteries these days, both in print and on screen.
The latest in the Louisa May Alcott mysteries by Anna Maclean, Louisa and the Crystal Gazer, has Louisa May attending séances at the home of Boston's most famous crystal gazer and then investigating the medium’s mysterious death.
Foyle’s War fans …
The historically accurate WWII background and appealing characters of James R. Benn’s new mystery Billy Boyle might be just the book you’ve been looking for.
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