Poe biographies are crawling out of the woodwork this year, including Poe, A Life Cut Short by Peter Ackroyd which the Atlanta Journal-Constitution says "rescues Poe from the layers of cliches and misinterpretations built up over generations," and A Dream Within a Dream by Nigel Barnes which the Guardian liked but added it "fails to crack the conundrum of how such an astonishing literary legacy emerged from such a chaotic life."
You have until midnight tonight to vote for In Cold Blog's Detective Awards which focus on true crime books, publishers, and sites.
Barbara Fister is waving goodbye to the carnival, as she wraps up the last Carnival of the Criminal Minds blog entry. In Reference to Murder was pleased and honored to have been able to participate in this worthwhile endeavor on two occasions.
Twilight Times Books has plans in the works to publish an anthology in trade paper in 2010 for Futures Mysterious Anthology Magazine. Publisher Lida E. Quillen says that they plan on publishing an annual anthology thereafter. She has an open call for submissions with a deadline of July 15, and there will be more details available on the FMAM site by April.
The Globe and Mail reported on retired engineer Alan Bradley who submitted 15 pages to a British book competition, won the prize and sparked a lucrative bidding war for his six-book murder-mystery series.
Sarah Weinman gives us the poop on the latest fad in crime fiction: crime-fighting animals.
The Library Journal looked at 23 graphic novels featuring African-Americans in honor of Black History Month, including Incognegro: A Graphic Mystery by Mat Johnson (text) and Warren Pleece (illus.).
On the heels of the National Academy of Sciences scathing look at forensic labs comes the report that DNA left at crime scenes could soon be used to create pictures of a criminal's face with a new forensic technology.
And for your moment of fluff: The Washington Post's Short Stack blog posed the question to several writers, "If you could spend one unbridled night with any fictional character in the world, who would it be?" Replies included Janet Evanovich: "Uncle Scrooge, from Carl Barks's Disney comics. He's always going on adventures, he pushes his money around with a bulldozer, and he wears a top hat but no pants. Does it get any better than that?" and Lisa Scottoline: "I would spend the night with the Three Musketeers from Dumas's classic novel. My motto is 'One for all, all for me.'"
I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would
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Miriam
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Posted by: Miriam | February 23, 2009 at 07:56 AM
Thanks for the positive feedback, Miriam!
Posted by: BV Lawson | February 23, 2009 at 10:20 AM