Bound by Mystery
Celebrating 20 Years of Poisoned Pen Press
- Publisher
- Poisoned Pen Press, Inc.
- Initial publish date
- Mar 2017
- Category
- Short Stories, Anthologies (multiple authors), General, Crime
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781464208324
- Publish Date
- Mar 2017
- List Price
- $24.95
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Description
In celebration of our 20th anniversary, Poisoned Pen Press has commissioned original short stories from thirty-five of its authors, past and present. Some names will be immediately recognizable to mystery aficionados--Kerry Greenwood with her Phryne Fisher mysteries, now also a popular television program, or Laurie R. King who has charmed Sherlockians worldwide with her beloved Mary Russell series. Some have gone on to big deals with the big leagues--Carolyn Wall, whose debut novel, Sweeping Up Glass, was purchased by Penguin Random House, or James Sallis, whose novella, Drive, was critically acclaimed and made into major motion picture starring Ryan Gosling. Several have been translated into other languages with foreign publishers. Some authors have been on hiatus, and are writing something new for the first time in years. Most have remained comfortably ensconced with us here at the Press, enjoying a modicum of fame and a steadily growing base of loyal readers who eagerly anticipate their next-in-series.
This anthology celebrates our authors, their talent, and their diversity. Some have chosen to feature characters well-established within their own series-protagonists, supporting cast, and even one villain-turned-hero. Others have gone in totally different directions, inventing new characters and going dark or cozy for the first time, with chilling and delightful results. Yet as different as these authors and their stories are, they all share a common passion for finely crafted tales of crime and murder. From Greece to Italy, India to Australia, Great Britain to Canada; from the East Coast to the Pacific Northwest and New Mexico to the Savannah low country, they are a community Bound by Mystery, and we are proud to present their short fiction to you for the first time ever.
About the authors
Kerry Greenwood is the author of more than 40 novels and six non-fiction books. Among her many honors, Ms. Greenwood has received the Ned Kelly Lifetime Achievement Award from the Crime Writers' Association of Australia. When she is not writing she is an advocate in Magistrates' Courts for the Legal Aid Commission. She is not married, has no children and lives with a registered Wizard.
Kerry Greenwood's profile page
Laurie R. King is a third generation Californian with a background in theology, whose first crime novel (1993's A Grave Talent) won the Edgar and Creasey awards. Her yearly novels range from police procedurals and stand-alones to a historical series about Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes (beginning with The Beekeeper’s Apprentice.) Her books have won the Edgar, Creasey, Wolfe, Lambda, and Macavity awards, and appear regularly on the New York Times bestseller list.
Diane D. DiBiase's profile page
Steven Axelrod holds an MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts and remains a member of the WGA despite a long absence from Hollywood. His work has been featured on various websites, including the literary e-zine Numéro Cinq, where he is on the masthead; Salon.com; and The Good Men Project; as well as the magazines Pulp Modern and Big Pulp.
A father of two, he lives on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, where he paints houses and writes.
Donis Casey is the author of ten Alafair Tucker Mysteries: The Old Buzzard Had It Coming, Hornswoggled, The Drop Edge of Yonder, The Sky Took Him, Crying Blood, The Wrong Hill to Die On, Hell With the Lid Blown Off, All Men Fear Me, The Return of the Raven Mocker, and Forty Dead Men. This award-winning series, featuring the sleuthing mother of ten children, is set in Oklahoma during the booming 1910s. Donis has twice won the Arizona Book Award for her series, and been a finalist for the Willa Award and a seven-time finalist for the Oklahoma Book Award. Her first novel, The Old Buzzard Had It Coming, was named an Oklahoma Centennial Book in 2008. Donis is a former teacher, academic librarian, and entrepreneur. She lives in Tempe, Arizona.
Mark de Castrique's profile page
Vicki Delany began her writing career as a Sunday writer: a single mother of three high-spirited daughters with a full-time job as a computer programmer. The years passed, as they tend to do, and the three daughters, somewhat hesitantly, flew the coop, leaving Vicki more time to devote to her writing. She was able to write three novels of suspense, set in Ontario, two of which, Scare the Light Away and Burden of Memory, were published to critical acclaim by Poisoned Pen Press of Scottsdale, Arizona. In 2007, In the Shadow of the Glacier, the first book in a police procedural series set in the British Columbia Interior was published. Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Vicki was raised mostly in Ontario. Vicki majored in modern history at Carleton, her interest more in the lives of ordinary women and men and the circumstances of their times than ‘big men’ and their wars. It was on a canoeing trip in Algonquin Park that Vicki, realizing that she was doing for fun what people in the past would have considered a hardship, told her trip mates stories about the incredible difficulties people endured in their attempts to get to the Klondike in search of gold, and the idea for a series of Klondike Gold Rush mysteries was set.
J.M. DONELLAN is a writer, musician, poet, radio DJ, and teacher. He was almost devoured by a tiger in the jungles of Malaysia, nearly died of a lung collapse in the Nepalese Himalayas, and once fended off a pack of rabid dogs with a guitar in the mountains of India. As a poet, he has performed at the Sydney Writers' Festival, TEDxSouthBank, and the Sydney Opera House. His works include the novels A Beginner's Guide to Dying in India and Killing Adonis, the plays We Are All Ghosts and The Theory of Everything, and the poetry collection, Stendhal Syndrome.
Warren C. Easley's profile page
Kelly Garrett is a writer and amateur dog walker based in Portland, Oregon. The Last To Die is her first novel.
Charlotte Hinger is an award-winning novelist and Kansas historian. The first book in her Lottie Albright series, Deadly Descent, won the Arizona Book Publishers award for Best Mystery/Suspense. Fractured Families is the fourth. Come Spring, a historical novel, won the Western Writers Medicine Pipe Bearers award, and was a Spur finalist.
Charlotte Hinger's profile page
Tag, You're Dead is J.C. Lane's first thriller. She writes mysteries as Judy Clemens, including the Stella Crown series, the Grim Reaper mysteries, and the stand-alone, Lost Sons. She lives in Ohio, where she shuttles her kids to events, loves cooking and baking new recipes, and is training for a half-marathon.
Ann Littlewood was a zoo keeper in Portland, Oregon for twelve years. She raised lions and cougars, an orangutan; and native mammals, as well as parrots, penguins, and a multitude of owls. The financial realities of raising primates (two boys of her own) led Ann to exchange a hose and rubber boots for a briefcase and pantsuit in the healthcare industry. Ann has maintained her membership in the American Association of Zookeepers and has kept in touch with the zoo world by visiting zoos and through friendships with zoo staffers.
David Moss is an advertising copywriter who has worked for many national agencies. After writing in every conceivable medium from TV and radio to coffee cup sleeves and menu tray liners, he moved on to screenplays and novels. His script, Saving Flora, about a circus elephant, is in development to be filmed in Puebla, Mexico, in 2017. This Isn’t a Game is his first novel. David lives in Santa Monica, California.
Vasudev was born in Delhi and has meandered around the world with lengthy stopovers in Tallahassee and Dallas. His books span a variety of interests, from Indian classical music to crime fiction, humor, and business management. A violinist and animal rights activist, Vasudev lives with his family and five snoring dogs in Bangalore, India where he runs a consulting firm.
Frederick Ramsay has published fourteen books that range from historicals (The Jerusalem Mysteries), to Africa (The Botswana Mysteries), to police procedurals (The Ike Schwartz Mysteries). In addition, his stand-alone Impulse was named one of the Best 100 Books of the Year in 2006 by Publishers Weekly. He is an iconographer and an accomplished public speaker. He lives and writes in Arizona.
Frederick Ramsay's profile page
Priscilla Royal, author of fourteen books from Poisoned Pen Press in the Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas medieval mystery series, grew up in British Columbia and earned a BA in World Literature at San Francisco State University where she discovered the beauty of medieval literature. Before retiring from the Federal Government in 2000, she worked in a variety of jobs, all of which provided an excellent education in the complexity of human experience and motivation. She is a theater fan as well as a reader of history, mystery, and fiction of lesser violence. When not hiding in the thirteenth century, she lives in Northern California and is a member of California Writers Club, Mystery Writers of America, and Sisters in Crime.
Priscilla Royal's profile page
David P. Wagner is a retired foreign service officer who spent nine years in Italy, learning to love things Italian. Other diplomatic assignments included Brazil, Ecuador, and Uruguay, as well as two hardship postings to Washington, D.C. He and his wife, Mary, live in Pueblo, Colorado.
David P. Wagner's profile page
Carolyn D. Wall is Senior Staff Writer for Persimmon Hill magazine, the publication of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, OK. As Artist-in-Residence for the Oklahoma Arts Council, she has taught creative writing to more than 4,000 children in her home state of Oklahoma. She operates a national prison-writer program, and authored the only literary book written on the Oklahoma City bombing. Among her awards two Crème-de-la-Crème awards from the Oklahoma Writers Federation Inc. and one from the Kansas State Writers. Sweeping Up Glass is her debut novel.
Tina Whittle is a mystery writer living and working in the Georgia Lowcountry. The Dangerous Edge of Things, the first novel in her Tai Randolph series, debuted February 2011 from Poisoned Pen Press. Described in Publishers Weekly as a “tight, suspenseful debut,” this Atlanta-based series has garnered starred reviews in Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal. Reckoning and Ruin is the fifth in the series.
Catherine A. Winn, a former art and elementary school teacher, lives and writes in Texas. An avid reader of all types of mysteries from cozies to thrillers, she’s found writing them to be equally thrilling. She is currently working on her next Whispering Springs mystery.
Reavis Z. Wortham's profile page
Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel spent her childhood learning ancient stories and traditions from her Mohegan tribal elders. She currently serves as the Medicine Woman for the Mohegans and writes fiction and non-fiction about the extraordinary real world of the Native Americans of New England.
Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel's profile page
The husband and wife team of Mary Reed and Eric Mayer published several short stories about John, Lord Chamberlain to Emperor Justinian, in mystery anthologies and in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine prior to 1999’s highly acclaimed first full length novel, One for Sorrow. Entries in the series have been honored by a Best Mystery Glyph Award, an honorable mention in the Glyph Best Book category, and was a finalist for the IPPY Best Mystery Award (Two For Joy), nominations for the Bruce Alexander Memorial Historical Mystery Award (Four For A Boy and Five For Silver), and a Glyph Award for Best Book Series (Five For Silver). The American Library Association’s Booklist Magazine named the Lord Chamberlain novels one of its four Best Little Known Series.Mary Reed & Eric Mayer also write under Eric Reed.
The husband and wife team of Mary Reed and Eric Mayer published several short stories about John, Lord Chamberlain to Emperor Justinian, in mystery anthologies and in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine prior to 1999’s highly acclaimed first full length novel, One for Sorrow. Entries in the series have been honored by a Best Mystery Glyph Award, an honorable mention in the Glyph Best Book category, and was a finalist for the IPPY Best Mystery Award (Two For Joy), nominations for the Bruce Alexander Memorial Historical Mystery Award (Four For A Boy and Five For Silver), and a Glyph Award for Best Book Series (Five For Silver). The American Library Association’s Booklist Magazine named the Lord Chamberlain novels one of its four Best Little Known Series.Mary Reed & Eric Mayer also write under Eric Reed.
Editorial Reviews
One of the very best mystery/suspense anthologies in the last few years, "Bound by Mystery" is a tour-de-force and an absolute 'must' for any and all dedicated mystery buffs. "Bound by Mystery" is unreservedly and enthusiastically recommended, especially for community library Mystery/Suspense collections.
<b><i>Midwest Book Reveiw</i></b>
Bound by Mystery is a celebratory anthology commemorating Poisoned Pen Press' 20th anniversary. Edited by Diane D. DiBiase, it includes an impressive number of stories, 34 in total, rich with diversity and high on both entertainment and quality. The majority of the tales reside firmly within the mystery genre, but it also features a handful of outliers that are something else entirely. The writers are all Poisoned Pen Press alumni and include luminaries Laurie R. King, Kerry Greenwood, James Sallis, and so many others I blush at the prospect of listing only a few.
<i><b>Mystery Scene</b></i>
This wide-ranging anthology boasts 34 entertaining new stories from novelists published by Poisoned Pen, the pioneer small press devoted to mysteries. The locations of the tales, a few of which are not mysteries, are as varied as the provenance of their authors, and include Canada, Australia, Italy,and England. The periods vary, too, from Ancient Roman times and the Byzantine era to the Great Depression and the contemporary. A preface from each contributor describes how he or she came to be associated with Poisoned Pen. These serve as the volume's unifying thread, offering readers a peek behind the curtain at the trials and tribulations of fledgling writers. Some of these brief intros are outright love letters to the editors who helped shape the authors' ideas. Cheers to Poisoned Pen on its 20th anniversary!
<i><b>Publishers Weekly</b></i>
