Episodes

The Anthony Award-nominated YA writer talks about Hero Complex, the second novel in the Keaton School series. Margaux’s main character, Devon Mackintosh, is a fish out of water at her boarding school, which gives her a unique perspective. Pretty handy when you’re trying to get to the bottom of a mysterious death school... Read more »

What better way to celebrate the publication day of The Empire of Night than listening to the author read chapter one! Signed first edition copies of The Empire of Night are available from MYSTERIOUS BOOKSHOP

In The Empire of Night, we pick up the story of Christopher Marlowe Cobb, who survived the sinking of the Lusitania, as he hunts down German sympathizers in the British aristocracy during the early months of World War One. The idea of Christoper “Kit” Cobb, grew out of “The One in White,” a... Read more »

Billy Boyle is back in The Rest Is Silence, the ninth installment in the series of Billy Boyle World War II Mysteries. James. R. Benn first book, On Desperate Ground, took place during World War II, but was not a mystery. But one of the story’s secondary characters, police detective Billy Boyle, stayed... Read more »

The writer of the Mary Russell-Sherlock Holmes series of mysteries talks to Leslie Klinger and Nancie Clare about projects past, present and future. Laurie talks about her next Mary Russell-Sherlock Holmes mystery, Dreaming Spies; the creative highs and lows of writing a series; Career Day, the stand alone thriller scheduled for publication in... Read more »

In Sabotage, Matt Cook’s first thriller, a luxury cruise ship in the North Atlantic is paralyzed by an electromagnetic pulse, an enigmatic Stanford professor and founder of a high tech defense company disappears and a group of Stanford students of a variety of disciplines are the only ones who can save both—and the world—from Viking... Read more »

The 2012 Kitschie Award Winner for Angelmaker, talks about his latest novel, Tigerman. Among many, many other things. As soon as the interview was over, I was madly Googling to bookmark as many of Nick Harkaway’s references as I could. In our conversation about the designation “literary thriller,” he discussed the stories of... Read more »

A perfect interview for the waning Dog Days of summer, David Rosenfelt talks about his latest Andy Carpenter mystery Hounded, the ups and downs of writing and the redeeming quality of dogs. David Rosenfelt was so funny and self-deprecating in his interview. And he made some surprising revelations about his writing methodology. But... Read more »

Lawyer, Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Loyola University Chicago School of Law, Director of Life After Innocence, author of 14 novels—including her just released The Dog Park and the Izzy McNeil series of mysteries—and the non-fiction Long Way Home: A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him. ... Read more »

The protagonist of Roger Hobbs’ debut novel, Ghostman, may not be a nice guy, but he’s a great character. This is the second in our two-part series on fixers. Roger Hobbs is nothing if not thoughtful and methodical. He timed the seven years of rejections that writers endure to coincide with his time... Read more »

The Baker Street Babe talks with Les Klinger about the next book in the Timothy Wilde trilogy, writing for the Watson and Holmes graphic stories and how Jane Eyre can coax out the dark side for a character in her new novel. By her own admission Lyndsay Faye thinks it’s a good idea... Read more »

Political Fixer Joe DeMarco is back in House Reckoning, which takes him back to his hometown of Queens, New York, to rekindle old friendships and make new enemies. I like what Mike Lawson had to say about choosing a fixer as a central character. Not a private investigator, police detective, or lawyer, a... Read more »

Becky Masterman describes Brigid Quinn, the 59-year old protagonist of her debut novel, Rage Against the Dying, as a cross between Bruce Willis and Sarah Jessica Parker. It turns out people are interested in female characters over the age of 30, in spite of what one agent to whom Becky Masterman initially sent... Read more »

Later next month, just in time for a good Labor Day read, Summer of the Dead—the third in Julia Keller’s series about Raythune County, West Virginia prosecuting attorney Bell Elkins—will be released. If you haven’t read Ms. Keller’s previous two works A Killing in the Hills and Bitter River, I suggest you start reading... Read more »

Toto, I don’t think we’re in Cabot Cove anymore. For the most part, popular culture associates the intersection of mysteries and the state of Maine with Murder She Wrote. You know, the circa ‘80s episodic TV series that featured the quite brilliant Angela Lansbury as a bicycle-riding, Miss Marple-esque mystery writer in a fictional Maine... Read more »

“The suburbs are filled with secrets.” –Megan Abbott Read any of Megan Abbott’s last three books and you’ll find there is no darker heart than that of a teenage girl. I think she’s invented a genre: teenage girl suburban noir. Reading one of Megan’s novels is a little like looking at the American... Read more »

The author of Midnight in Europe talks to SoM about everything from good and evil to romantics and two-lane blacktop roads in France. Book tour for Midnight in Europe photo: © Rainer Hosch

The New York Times best selling author on her book that delves into the secret program the U.S. employed to sanitize the relocation of Nazi scientists to America after the end of World War II. Annie Jacobsen and I sat down at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books to discuss her most recent book,... Read more »

The author of The Amazing Harvey gets tricky with SoM! Les Klinger and I enjoyed a lunch at the Napa Valley Grill with Don Passman to talk about The Amazing Harvey, his first mystery. The afternoon was entertaining on all fronts. Talking about mysteries is one of our favorite pastimes — and meeting a writer... Read more »

Norway’s best-selling crime fiction writer talks politics, revenge and what makes Sonny —and Harry Hole — tick. I spoke to Jo Nesbø by phone on Tuesday May 13, 2014 — the U.S. publication day of his most recent crime novel, The Son — from the New York City office of Knopf, his U.S. publisher. It... Read more »

The fourth in our series of interviews conducted at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Jeff Parker lets us in on his feelings about ending his Charlie Hood series after having the characters as companions through almost a decade and six books. I find adjectives woefully inadequate when it comes to describing Jeff... Read more »

SoM’s third installment recorded at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. Welcome back! Les and I do our best to make sure our podcasts are published at the beginning of each week, but last week he and I were otherwise engaged in New York City at the Edgar Award’s banquet. I talk about it... Read more »

Our second installment of interviews recorded at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books features Lee Goldberg and Stuart Woods. Les and I are off to the Edgar Awards being held Thursday, May 1 at the Grand Hyatt in New York City. If you are looking for a reading list of epic caliber, you can’t... Read more »

At the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, Les Klinger and I spoke first to Peter James and later to Cara Black. Peter James talks about his character Roy Grace’s missing wife, how he found the inspiration for his most recent Grace novel, Dead Man’s Time, his research methods and gives us a preview of... Read more »