Big Red and Old Red are back (again)!
Now available for pre-order: the new Rough Edges Press ebook edition of the second “Holmes on the Range” novel, On the Wrong Track. Release date: July 4. Somebody light up some fireworks!
Big Red and Old Red are back!
Rough Edges Press is relaunching the “Holmes on the Range” series, beginning with a new edition of the first novel coming out June 13. (You can pre-order the ebook version now.) The rest of the series will follow every few weeks throughout the summer, leading up to three — three! — new “Holmes on the Range” books this fall. That’s a lot of “Holmes on the Range.” Get ready to get your deducifyin’ on!
New author event!
FYI, NorCal pals — I’m one of three local crime writers who’ll be appearing at the Alameda Free Library from 2 to 3 p.m. Sunday, May 21. Janet Dawson, Daisy Bateman and I will talk mysteries, publishing and more. (What will the “more” be? Beats me. But you always need an “and more” at the end of these things, right? I don’t know…maybe we should swap recipes…?)
Super-newsy new news!
I’ll be making a big, big, BIG announcement about the future of the “Holmes on the Range” series tomorrow at noon Pacific Time via my email newsletter. Sign up if you want the scoop (and the chance to win some magazine giveaways, too)!
New yuletide caper in Alfred Hitchcock!
In the mood for a holiday slay ride? My latest story of deadly Christmas crime, “The Grown-Ups’ Table,” is available now in the January/February issue of Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Learn more on the AHMM website!
New "Holmes on the Range" story in Ellery Queen!
Big Red and Old Red are back in the saddle in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine! The new “Holmes on the Range” story “Can the Cat Catch the Rat?” is featured in the January/February issue. Check out a free excerpt on the EQMM site!
New essay about how dang slow I am!
There's a bit of a sneak preview over on Trace Evidence, the Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine blog. It's me reflecting on a story of mine coming up in the magazine and its role in a book I'm oh-so-slowly writing. I also acknowledge that it's been way too long between books for me...a situation I'll be correcting in a big way in 2023. But that's an announcement for another day... For now: Check out the blog post!
Yet ANOTHER new video review!
Man, I've never liked that cover. Oh well. I DO like when people say nice things about the book. Which is the case over on YouTube: The "I Read the Best Mystery" series has continued its journey through the "Holmes on the Range" novels, this time reviewing "The Crack in the Lens." Check it out!
Yet another new video review!
Shawn Pollock’s “I Read the Best Mystery” video series continues on YouTube with a look at the third “Holmes on the Range” novel, The Black Dove. Once again, Shawn has picked the perfect images to accompany his review (and has the good taste to like the book). Bonus: How many mystery novel reviews quote The Cranberries? Check it out!
Free (for a little while) story!
The fine folks at Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine have made my Macavity Award-nominated story “Curious Incidents” available free on their website for a limited time. Check it out (quickly)!
Another new video review!
Shawn Pollock has posted another fun video review of a “Holmes on the Range” mystery. This time he’s set his sights on the second book in the series, “On the Wrong Track.” Check it out!
New award nomination!
Mystery Readers International has announced the finalists for this year’s Macavity Awards, and Big Red and Old Red (and I) are in the mix. “Curious Incidents,” a “Holmes on the Range” novella from the January/February 2021 Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, is among the nominees for Best Mystery Short Story. I’m up against a bunch of my writer pals, so I’m happy no matter how things turn out. Check out the full list of finalists!
Another old story (in a new place)!
The fine folks at Black Cat Weekly have reprinted my story “Frank,” which originally appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine way back in 2012. I’m in good company in the issue: It features a bunch of top genre writers, including the late great Manly Wade Wellman. (How could he not be great with a name like “Manly Wade Wellman”?) Check it out!
New video review!
Shawn Pollock has kicked off a new series of book reviews on YouTube, “I Read the Best Mystery,” and guess which novel he choose to feature first? Why, it’s good ol’ Holmes on the Range! Shawn did a great job encapsulating the book. Even the pictures he picked for Big Red and Old Red are perfect. Check it out!
Public appearance!
It’s been a long time since I did a book event. Feels like maybe the last one was in the 1980s…? It was a couple presidencies ago, that much I know. So it’s exciting to have the Bay Area Book Festival to look forward to. I’ll be there Sunday, May 8, at 1:30 for the panel “How to Write a Mystery” with Laurie R. King, Dale Berry, Catriona McPherson and Gary Phillips. I’ll also be signing books and hanging out in the Mystery Writers of America booth later that afternoon, so if you’re in NorCal come find me! Check out the details!
25th anniversary story!
Uh oh – does this mean I’m old? The new anthology Death of a Bad Neighbour: Revenge is Criminal, released today, marks my 25th anniversary as a professional short story writer. Death of a Bad Neighbour features my oddball mystery story/parable “The Book of Eve.” Check it out!
Old story (in a new place)!
The new issue of Black Cat Weekly features stories by such legendary writers as Charles Beaumont, Frederik Pohl, Richard S. Prather, James Blish and (blush!) me. (Not that I'm legendary. Just ask my wife. I'm quite real. Unless I'm a product of her imagination...) My contribution is a story of skullduggery in the 1990s called "Where the Strange Ones Go." If that sounds familiar you might have read it when it first appeared in Ellery Queen a few years ago. If you missed it then, now’s your chance to check it out!
New stories!
Two new stories by me just hit the newsstands: one in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and the other in Alfred Hitchcock. If you’re a try-before-buying type you can read a lengthy excerpt from the Ellery Queen tale — a “Holmes on the Range” novella — on the magazine’s website. Check it out!
New spooktastic event!
Interested in creating stories that combine skullduggery and the supernatural? (You know…like my tarot mysteries?) Join me at 2 p.m. on All Hallows Eve Eve (a.k.a. Oct. 30) for “Things That Go Bump on the Page: Writing the Paranormal Mystery,” a free Zoom discussion with fellow writers Margaret Dumas, Melissa Bourbon Ramirez, Nancy Cole Silverman, Margaret Lucke and Maggie Toussaint. Check it out!
New musings on great books!
The fine folks at the new book-focused website shepherd.com asked me to write about fave books in the genre of my choice. The result: “The Best Westerns That Will Transport You to the American Frontier.” Check it out!