0:08
The Sheep Detectives is the Ultimate Cozy Mystery
Featured image credit: Amazon MGM Studios via Variety
In the new film The Sheep Detectives, the rules that govern murder mystery novels—specifically fair play whodunnits—are holy principles. They very clear, entirely foolproof, and apply to life as much as they do to fiction—commandments you can follow like a roadmap to find out what happened, should anyone you know die in suspicious circumstances.
The film’s protagonists do just that… they end up using tenets of detecting that they have gleaned from Agatha Christie-esque mystery stories to solve a real-life (or real-death, I should say) murde
0:53
Craig DiLouie on Making the Familiar Frightening in Horror Fiction
Why are rollercoasters fun? It’s the thrill, of course. Adrenaline, dopamine, endorphins. They allow one to experience danger in a safe environment.
Fiction can serve a similar purpose. Researchers have found it can, in effect, place the reader’s brain in the protagonist’s body. The brain interprets reading as physical experience, altering brain chemistry. VR for the brain.
This is what makes horror fiction fun.
1:27
Crime and the City: Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland, Ohio, the most populous city on Lake Erie and the second-most populous city in the state (after Columbus) with over two million residents in the Greater Cleveland area. Looking right across the border to Ontario, Canada. There’s a lot of factors conducive to crime in Cleveland – it’s close to a border, it’s a port, there’s plenty to smuggle in, out and over… so what’s the crime writing about the city like?
Perhaps the first person to ask is Les Roberts, author of nearly 20 mystery novels featuring Cleveland detective Milan Jacovich.
2:08
The Undeniable Bisexuality of Gilda
The movie Gilda, starring Rita Hayworth, is known for many things, including the lush cinematography, and for solidifying the stardom of Hayworth, previously known primarily for musicals and comedies. The film features the most iconic scene of Hayworth’s career, a gif-length meme (long before such things existed) of Hayworth tossing her auburn tresses and turning her head to greet the camera with a broad smile.
2:41
10 New Books Coming Out This Week
Another week, another batch of books for your TBR pile. Happy reading, folks.
James Ellroy, Red Sheet
(Knopf)
“As always, Ellroy’s jargon is jazzy, his characters caricatures on steroids. In the late Otash adventure, readers will find themselves seduced by Ellroy’s hipster take on history’s seamy underside and the amped-up atmosphere in which the plausible and improbable ooze together in a head-spinning daze.” —Booklist
Caroline Kepnes, You First
(Random House)
“The most distinctive voice in thrillers is back with a master class in tone and tension.
3:22
Liza Tully on Tragicomedy, Murder Mysteries, and Using Grudges as Plot Devices
Grudge is a funny word.
It looks sort of funny with its crowd of heavy Germanic consonants flanking a little u, while a silent e trails pointlessly behind.
It sounds funny too, if you can say it at all. A person trying to learn English will take one look at dg and confidently explain to you that it is impossible to make any sound out of that combination of consonants.
3:54
Architecture, Arson, Murder: The Night Frank Lloyd Wright’s Estate Went Up in Smoke
“Ugly things happen….The best and worst of everything came to me.”
–Frank Lloyd Wright, Spring Green, Wisconsin, August 15, 1914
Uncle Jenk smelled death. The foul odor of blood and burned flesh punched through his nostrils and made him nauseous.
4:19
The American Archeologists Who Created a WWII Intelligence Network in Greece
Rodney Young arrived in Cairo in May 1943 and moved into a hand-some three‑story stone villa near the Greek legation. A staffer showed the spymaster to his room, which he found to be completely empty, not a stick of furniture in sight.
4:43
Camille Perri and Alafair Burke on Dog Park Culture, Friendship, and Mystery
Camille Perri is the author of The Assistants and When Katie Met Cassidy. She has worked as a books editor for Cosmopolitan and Esquire. She has also been a ghostwriter of young adult novels and a reference librarian. She splits her time between New York City and the Hudson Valley with her wife and their Brussels Griffon named Pip. Her new novel, Social Animals, is now available from G.P.
5:16
There’s a new Poirot!
Photo credit: Edward Bluemel (Image: Mammoth / Jonathan Ford) via BBC
I like to imagine that the deliberations to cast the eponymous lead in the new Hercule Poirot series went a bit like the choosing of a new pope. Meetings are held behind closed doors, totally outside of the public eye, and then suddenly—a puff of smoke shoots into the air above the BBC headquarters. The smoke is purple. It smells like crème de menthe. The assembled crowds cheer.
