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Magicians and Mediums and Murder! Oh My!
Magic fans, impossible crime aficionados, and those interested in the parallels between mystery writers' use of misdirection and a magician's sleight of hand talents might be interested in the latest...
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FFB: Murder Goes to the Dogs - Timothy Brace
THE STORY: Inexplicably, prize-winning greyhound Sweetheart turns and runs in the wrong direction just as she is about to win the final race at the Everglades Kennel Club racetrack. Moments later...
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FFB: The Mystery of the Boule Cabinet - Burton Stevenson
THE STORY: An error in shipping sends a 17th century ornate cabinet supposedly created by André-Charles Boulle to the home of Philip Vantine, wealthy collector of antiques. He did purchase a Boule...
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FFB: Murder R.F.D. - Herman Petersen
THE STORY: In the first chapter of Murder R.F.D. a runaway bull is captured just after goring a farmhand. This leads to an investigation as to who let loose the bull and if it was a bizarre act of...
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MOONLIGHTERS: Burton Keirstead, The Economist & the R.C.M.P.
What a surprise it was to learn that this excellent detective novel was the work of a young economics professor who was teaching at the University of New Brunswick when it was published. Burton...
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Slay the Murderer - Hugh Holman
THE STORY: Owner of a wholesale produce company is found stabbed in a locked room in his house. Also found in the room is an unconscious man named Charles Cole. It is believed Cole who recently had a...
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The Singing Clock - Virginia Perdue
THE STORY: In the middle of the night Jacklin Bogart discovers the dead body of her cousin Antoinette and proceeds to cover up the crime. She is certain she knows who is guilty. We watch her remove...
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Murder at Deer Lick - A.B. Cunningham
THE STORY: Powerfully built, intimidating but respected physician John Bruce is found stabbed. His pistol still in its holster, his fierce and equally intimidating horse is roaming nearby a bit...
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Magpie Murders TV Series Coming Soon!
This just in...Magpie Murders, the meta-mystery novel by Anthony Horowitz about a mystery novel manuscript within a novel, is coming to Masterpiece on PBS here in the US. This most likely means it's...
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Poison Unknown - Max Dalman
The Juliot Research Institute in Poison Unknown (1939) is a small facility entirely funded by a philanthropic grant. The grant allows for paying the salaries of one professor, one teaching assistant...
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The Woman in the Wardrobe - Peter Shaffer
There are some books which have achieved legendary status in the Detective Fiction Hall of Fame simply because they have been largely unobtainable for decades. These are books which for one reason or...
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NEW STUFF: The Eighth Detective - Alex Pavesi
The Eighth Detective(UK title:Eight Detectives)by Alex PavesiHenry Holt & Co.ISBN: 978-1-250-75593-3289 pp. $26.99Publication date: August 4, 2020 "I think that when you're reading about death as...
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HORROR SHOW: Harriet - Elizabeth Jenkins
"But Harriet's condition...had blinded Mrs. Ogilvy to the fact that the world contains many people who are far from decent."If you had never read anything about Harriet (1934) by Elizabeth Jenkins --...
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FRIDAY FRIGHT NIGHT: The Come Back- Carolyn Wells
Boo!It's October, the season of of black cat and witch inflatables on front lawns, jack-o'-lanterns on front porches and pumpkin spice in everything. October and especially Halloween will be different...
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FRIDAY FRIGHT NIGHT: Lucifer and the Child - Ethel Mannin
From its first sentence (“On the 18th March, 1618, Margaret and Philippa Flower were burnt at the stake…for witchcraft.”) Lucifer and the Child (1945) sets up what ostensibly will be a novel of...
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FRIDAY FRIGHT NIGHT: London After Midnight - Marie Coolidge-Rask
London After Midnight– the stuff of legends. For those of you not in the know let me fill you in. It’s one of those “lost films” from the silent era, meaning that no known prints exist today. The...
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FRIDAY FRIGHT NIGHT: The Half Pint Flask - DuBose Heyward
"Strange the obsession that an imaginative woman can exercise over an unimaginative man. It the sort of thing that can follow a chap to his grave." One of the more unusual offshoots of collecting...
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HALLOWEEN SPECIAL: The Jules de Grandin Stories - Seabury Quinn
Jules de Grandin may not have been the first occult detective in weird and supernatural fiction but he will always be the original Night Stalker to me. Around the time that cult TV show Kolchak: The...
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Calling All Mystery Mavens!
Have you ever wanted to be a collaborator? Here’s your chance. I am, in a word, stuck.I’m having difficulty finishing some research for a piece that will appear in a new reprint come Spring 2021. My...
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FFB: The Dead Have No Friends - John Donavan
THE STORY: Intensely disliked, but extremely popular and financially profitable, novelist Emmanuel Cortal is murdered in his unique glass enclosed writing studio. There is only one entrance and it...
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