CHAMPAGNE STILETTO: NEW YEAR'S EVE COCKTAIL

Happy National Champagne Day: Toast the New Year with Cara Black's recipe for  Champagne Stiletto. Cara Black's Aimee Leduc mystery series is set in Paris. Champagne and Paris? Mais oui!

SOHO CRIME PRESENTS: THE LINEUP -July 30

Be sure and register!!!

Wow! This is going to great  fun. Here's the 'skinny.'

SOHO CRIME'S new virtual author event series.

SOHO CRIME PRESENTS: THE LINEUP: a series of live conversations with Mystery & Thriller authors about their books—from new installments of fan-favorite series to captivating debuts. Attendees will have access to special signed editions, bookplates, or other select items available with the purchase of any featured book from their independent bookstore partner, Mystery to Me (quantity limited!)

For the first event: Sunday, July 30

Join authors Katharine Beutner (KILLINGLY), Naomi Hirahara (EVERGREEN), Sujata Massey (THE MISTRESS OF BHATIA HOUSE), and Nilima Rao, Writer (A DISAPPEARANCE IN FIJI) on July 30 @ 8PM ET for a conversation about Historical Mysteries moderated by NYTimes Bestselling author Cara Black.

Tune in to listen to your favorite authors for FREE and secure your copy of a limited item wherever you are. 

 

Register now and discover upcoming events at https://www.sohocrimelineup.com/

The Back Room: Cocktails & Conversation with Your Favorite Authors

Join Hank Philllipi Ryan and Karen Dionne for a fantastic evening of cocktails and conversation with your favorite authors!

March 6, 7 PM ET | Riveting Stories

Cara Black • Kellye Garrett • Catriona McPherson • Ben Mezrich

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 20 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, which is set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. This riveting 20th installment entangles Parisian private investigator Aimée Leduc in a dangerous web of international spycraft and terrorist threats in Paris's 15th arrondissement. Purchase at an independent bookstore near you via indiebound.org. Purchase online at bookshop.org. Kellye Garrett’s first novel, Hollywood Homicide, was released by Midnight Ink in August 2017 and was named one of BookBub’s Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time. In addition to receiving starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal, it won the Agatha, Anthony, Lefty, and Independent Publisher “IPPY” awards for best first novel. It was also nominated for the Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel and Barry award for Best Paperback Original. "Brimming with suspense and wit, Like a Sister is a tense, twisting mystery that explores the complex bonds within family and the elusive nature of truth. Smart, sharp, and completely engrossing—an absolutely can’t-put-it-down read!"—Megan Miranda, New York Timesbestselling author of All the Missing Girls and Such a Quiet Place Purchase at an independent bookstore near you via indiebound.org. Purchase online at bookshop.org.

National-bestselling and multi-award-winning author, Catriona McPherson (she/her), was born in Scotland and lived there until immigrating to the US in 2010. She writes historical detective stories set in the old country in the 1930s, featuring gently-born lady sleuth, Dandy Gilver. Despite efforts to create a safe environment to see out the pandemic, the residents of the Last Ditch Motel face more dangers than they imagined possible in this hilarious yet claustrophobic mystery. Purchase at an independent bookstore near you via indiebound.org. Purchase online at bookshop.org. The reigning cowboy of narrative non-fiction with a writing career spanning nineteen years, Ben Mezrich has authored twenty-four books – major international and NYT bestsellers, with more than ten million copies sold. He's best known for his book to movie pathway, including The Social Network, 21, and Bringing Down the House, which spent sixty-three weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Coming soon: his latest non-fiction title The Antisocial Network. Ben returned to his fiction roots with a serialized novella-to-book, published in the Boston Globe during the pandemic and becoming  a new hardcover from Grand Central Publishing: The Midnight Ride. “A plot to savor. Witty, smart, detailed, and highly entertaining. The Midnight Ride is exactly what you’d expect from a master storyteller.”—Steve Berry, New York Times Bestselling Author of the Cotton Malone series Purchase at an independent bookstore near you via indiebound.org. Purchase online at bookshop.org.

As always, Back Room events are free but space is limited, so sign up today!

REGISTER FOR MARCH 6 EVENT

CARA BLACK'S CHAMPAGNE STILETTO: New Year's Eve

Happy National Champagne Day: Toast the New Year with Cara Black's recipe for  Champagne Stiletto. Cara Black's Aimee Leduc mystery series is set in Paris. Champagne and Paris? Mais oui!

CARA BLACK in Conversation with Juliet Grames

I love Book Passage, an Indie Bookstore that dedicates a lot of time to mysteries with talks, signings, and workshops. Tomorrow, Saturday, April 11,  they will continue their Shelter-in-Place series "Conversations with Authors"as Cara Black is live in conversation with her Editor Juliet Grames. You have to register, but it's free. Of course it would be great if you ordered Cara's latest book from Book Passage or become a Supporter of Book Passage. Last week I watched two great conversations, one with Anne Lamott and another with Isabel Allende. If you sign up for the Conversations, you'll find last week's are archived.

From Elaine at Book Passage:

Please get ready to join us again Saturday, April 11th, at 7pm est/4pm pacific, for

Cara Black 

live, in conversation with Juliet Grames

Already, more than 9,000 friends have registered to take part in this brand-new online series that re-creates as best we can something we have always been proud to offer our community: intimate conversations with authors as committed to good ideas, to books, and to Book Passage as we are.

If you missed last weekend's wonderful and inspiring conversations with Anne Lamott or Isabel Allende, you can view them now, or any time, at our Conversations with Authors website. (If you know someone who would like see them, please fee free to share this email with them, and direct them there, and encourage them to take part.)

And, please also consider becoming a Supporter of Book Passage. We so appreciate everyone's overwhelming, generous response to this program. too.

Three Hours in Paris: Guest Post by Cara Black

CARA BLACK: 
THREE HOURS IN PARIS

Today the world has changed and we’re in uncharted waters. I’m trying hard to wrap my head around how to help readers find THREE HOURS IN PARIS, and think about its relevance today since this interview I did with my editor. On one level my book is a story about resistance and the fight against fascism. We’re living in a time when so much going on echoes the past. Yet, given a situation like the one Kate Rees, my protagonist, finds her self in; choosing to fight back in a way she can, lends itself to today. Fighting back can be interpreted in everyday ways; speaking out, questioning and making your voices heard ie #metoo. Not all of us would or could fight back Kate’s way but every act of resistance is Resistance.

Kate to me is an everywoman - a daughter, a sister, a mother, a wife - who finding herself against the circumstances of war and tragedy, struggles and persists and doesn’t let up. She knows the world wasn’t always like this. That it will pass but in so doing there’s a toll taken. Yes, her struggle and survival is hopeful because it’s about persisting and doing what you feel is the right thing. Hope you’re staying safe and reading all the books in your TBR pile!

An Interview with Author Cara Black and Her Editor Juliet Grames 
(reprinted with permission of Cara Black and Juliet Grimes)

What made you decide to write a story about a female assassin? 

CB: Years ago, I read my father’s copy of The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth, and then I saw the 1973 film. This is the tale of a brilliant for-hire assassin tasked by the OAS with killing de Gaulle. Pitted against him are the government, who flounder in the dark to prevent the assassination attempt until they draft one of their own Parisian police. It’s a riveting cat-and-mouse story—we know before reading that de Gaulle survived, but it’s still so suspenseful, so tense, so delicately balanced. My throat catches every time I rewatch the film, which I do every year. Every time I pass the Montparnasse train station I look up at the Jackal’s window where he was aiming at de Gaulle and calculate the rifle angle. I think that inspired my window for Kate in Montmartre. I wanted to try my hand at writing an assassin story—but with my own spin, one that could include pieces of the WWII resistance history I have hoarded over twenty years of researching the Aimée Leduc novels in Paris. 

But there was also a historical template for female assassins in WWII. The Russian army had a regiment of highly successful female snipers. The star female assassin, Lyudmila Pavlichenko, was credited with 309 kills, the highest of a woman and in the top five of all snipers. In 1943 she was invited to the White House, met Eleanor Roosevelt and toured the USA. Of course, the United States didn’t enter the war until after Pearl Harbor in 1941 but I was still intrigued by that what if: What if an American woman had been a sniper in WWII? Why not?

I read a newspaper article in 2010 about the death of a quiet and reclusive elderly lady in a British coastal town. The woman had no known relatives and no friends, but when local authorities entered her home they found she was far from the typical pensioner. They discovered among her possessions a medal from Britain as well as France’s highest wartime honor, the Croix de Guerre. She was Eileen Nearne—aka Agent Rose, one of the female spies dispatched by Britain into occupied France in World War II by the SOE. Eileen Nearne became a clandestine radio operator, was caught and put in Ravensbrück but survived. There are stories like this that beg to be told; women who worked as spies, who signed the Official Secrets Act during the war and never broke their silence.

Kate to me is an everywoman—a daughter, a sister, a mother, a wife—who, due to tragedy and loss in war, seeks revenge and rises to the challenge of using her skill set. In war time, “doing one’s part” is a larger-than-life task, and so rising to the challenge includes becoming a larger-than-life character.

During the Second World War, secret services around the world knew women made perfect agents: in many ways, they were invisible as a man wouldn’t be. As innocent as they might appear while walking with a basket of eggs or mopping a floor, they could escape detection and perform sabotage, set up resistance networks, operate radios, and infiltrate occupied buildings as cleaners, mail couriers, housewives. The possibilities were endless.

Kate is recruited by a British intelligence officer to work for Section D, a deniable branch that specializes in foreign interference and sabotage. How much of your description of Section D is real? 

CB: Section D was real, and some of its records have even survived the war and been declassified, although of course many more were destroyed, so it is impossible to know its full scope and nature. I envision a clandestine department that specialized in missions like Kate’s—ungentlemanly war, fought by recruits of Irregulars who performed sabotage and assassinations in Occupied Europe.

What about the technology you mention? Was it real? 

CB: All of the technology I mention has a basis in real wartime inventions, although I have taken fictional liberties. At the beginning of the war, in the British race for building airplanes and fighting equipment, many tools were also being developed for clandestine warfare. I became intrigued when I discovered information about the S-phone, very cutting-edge, which the British developed, buried in a Stanford University library archive. I was also fascinated by the way Lee Enfield rifles were adapted to sniper capabilities as prototypes before field and general operational use. There was even a lipstick gun which I was dying for Kate to use, but alas, it didn’t quite fit in the story.

Kate has very little formal training in spycraft but endless creativity for inventing ways to get herself out of jams—for surviving. Where did you get these ideas? 

CB: I was inspired by the idea of what skills Kate would have had to develop as a girl growing up on a series of Oregon ranches. Ranch work is a tough job, and would have been even harder in the 1930s. Life was subject to incessant rain, blizzards, falling trees, insect infestation or crop failure. Cattle would get stuck in barb wire, tractor tires puncture, equipment breaks—all these problems need to be solved on the fly, with few resources. One would learn to think on one’s feet, make do and get creative with what’s available. So Kate, who grew up in a rough and tumble environment with five brothers, learns to hold her own and becomes resilient.

This is your 20th book. Do you have any advice for aspiring writers about the writing life? 

CB: Just write what you’re passionate about. If there’s a what if that won’t leave you, listen to yourself.

Cara Black's Recipe for Champagne Stiletto

Toast the New Year with Cara Black's recipe for  Champagne Stiletto. Love Cara's Aimee Leduc mystery series. The books are set in different arrondissements in Paris. What's not to love?

CARA BLACK & LIBBY HELLMANN: Lit Salon in Berkeley Thursday 8/1

Upcoming Literary Salon in Berkeley, CA

When: Thursday, August 1, 7:00 p.m.

Who: Cara Black, Libby Hellmann

Where: RSVP for venue address (Berkeley, CA)

This is a free event, but YOU MUST RSVP to attend.

Space is limited. Venue address sent with acceptance.

Please make a comment below with your email address.

Cara Black

Murder in Bel-Air, the riveting 19th installment in Cara Black's New York Times bestselling Parisian detective series, entangles private investigator Aimée Leduc in a dangerous web of international spycraft, post-colonial Franco-African politics, and neighborhood secrets in Paris’s 12th arrondissement.

Cara Black is the author of nineteen books in the New York Times bestselling Aimée Leduc series. She has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, and her books have been translated into German, Norwegian, Japanese, French, Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew. She lives in San Francisco with her husband and son and visits Paris frequently.

Libby Hellmann

Libby Fischer Hellmann left a career in broadcast news in Washington, DC and moved to Chicago 35 years ago, where she, naturally, began to write gritty crime fiction. Thirteen novels and twenty short stories later, she claims they’ll take her out of the Windy City feet first. She has been nominated for many awards in the mystery writing community and has even won a few. More at http://libbyhellmann.com.

Her novels include the now five-volume Ellie Foreman series, which she describes as a cross between “Desperate Housewives” and “24;” the hard-boiled 4-volume Georgia Davis PI series, and four stand-alone historical thrillers set during Revolutionary Iran,  Cuba, the Sixties, and WW2. Her short stories have been published in a dozen anthologies, the Saturday Evening Post, and Ed Gorman’s 25 Criminally Good Short Stories collection.

To RSVP, send an email to janet @ mysteryreaders (dot) org

***

Upcoming Literary Salons: Mark your Calendar

August 21: Hallie Ephron, 7 p.m. Berkeley
August 25: Naomi Hirahara, 3 p.m. Berkeley

An Evening in France with Cara Black and Susan Shea: July 11

Celebrate Bastille Day with a Francofile Literary Salon with Authors Cara Black and Susan Shea. Drink and eat and enjoy the discussion  and readings about France, books, people, and more!

When: Wednesday, July 11, 7 p.m.
Where: RSVP for venue address (Berkeley, CA)
This is a free event, but YOU MUST RSVP to attend.
RSVP required. Address of venue sent with acceptance.
RSVP: janet @ mysteryreaders.org

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 18 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, which is set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. Murder on the Left Bank is her latest Aimée Leduc mystery.

Susan Shea spent more than two decades as a non-profit executive before beginning her critically praised mystery series featuring a professional fundraiser for a fictional museum. Dressed for Death in Burgundy is the latest in her French Village series. She’s a regular on the 7 Criminal Minds blog, is secretary of the national Sisters in Crime board, on the board of the Northern California chapter of Sisters in Crime, and is a member of Mystery Writers of America. 

BAY AREA BOOK FESTIVAL: Mystery Programming

The Bay Area Book Festival has moved its date but kept its exceptional programming. Over the weekend of April 28th and 29th, 2018, the fourth annual Bay Area Book Festival will fill downtown Berkeley (CA) with a literary extravaganza that offers pleasure to anyone who has ever loved a book.

Whether you’re a fan of science fiction, mystery, or history, of fiction or memoir, of poetry or food writing, of children’s literature or science, come experience one of the best book festivals on the planet! Tickets for the Festival and/or individual panels and talks are now available. Get tickets here.

In addition to panels and talks, there will be booths. Mystery Writers of America, NorCal chapter will have a booth with author signings. Be sure and check the booth when you arrive for times and signings.

For the full program, go Here

Here are some panels of interest to mystery readers. Several of the panels are sponsored by Mystery Writers of America, Northern California Chapter.

Murder She Writes: 
Catherine Coulter Talks with Laurie R. King

Catherine Coulter interviewed by Laurie R. King

Saturday, April 28

10:00 AM - 11:15 AM

Catherine Coulter, No.1 New York Times best-selling suspense writer and author of 82 novels (almost all of them New York Times bestsellers!), is interviewed by Mystery Writers of America NorCal president Laurie R. King, herself a bestselling author of 25 novels. These two remarkable writers will talk about Coulter’s journey from Regency romances to FBI thrillers, the research she does for her widely varied stories, and her craft, art, and life of writing.

Hotel Shattuck Plaza - Crystal Ballroom

Insider, Outsider: Do PIs or Cops Do It Better?

Cara Black,Candice Fox, Matt Goldman, Rachel Howzell Hall, moderated by Bill Petrocelli

Saturday, April 28

11:45 AM - 1:00 PM

At the center of every good crime novel is a hero sniffing out the truth, whether a veteran police officer hardened and informed by years on the force, or a plucky private eye who takes on the case with little to no resources. Four accomplished crime writers battle it out to determine once and for all who does it better, cops or PIs? Vouching for private investigators, Cara Black (Aimée Leduc, PI) and Matt Goldman (Private detective Nils Shapiro) will go head to head with Candice Fox (Detective Harriet Blue) and Rachel Howzell Hall (Detective Elouise Norton). Mystery author Bill Petrocelli moderates.

Hotel Shattuck Plaza - Crystal Ballroom

Viet Thanh Nguyen on Art and Politics

Viet Thanh Nguyen interviewed by Karen Tei Yamashita

Saturday, April 28

1:30 PM - 2:45 PM

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 2016 for his novel “The Sympathizer,” Viet Thanh Nguyen—fiction writer, essayist, activist, and UC Berkeley doctoral alum—has become an outspoken voice for refugee rights and justice for immigrants. In 2017 he received a MacArthur Genius Grant, and while he was commended for “challenging popular depictions of the Vietnam War and exploring the myriad ways that war lives on for those it has displaced,” his latest efforts move outward to the plight of refugees across the world. His lauded story collection “The Refugees” explores immigration, identity, love, and family. His latest project, “The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives,” brings together a host of prominent writers. He joins us to today to talk with Karen Tei Yamashita, novelist and essayist on the immigrant experience, about the role of the writer in society, the importance of art to politics, and the power of the written word.

Freight & Salvage

Women Plot the Crime

Sara Blaedel, Anne Holt, and Yrsa Sigurdardóttir, moderated by Cara Black

Saturday, April 28

1:30 PM - 2:45 PM

The plot for the perfect crime may very well reside in the minds of these three cunning women. This panel of authors will discuss what it takes—and what it takes out of you—to write a complex, compelling, and believable (but un-guessable) crime story. Come plumb the minds of Sara Blaedel (Denmark’s “queen of crime”), Anne Holt (Norway’s best-selling female crime writer), and Icelandic best-selling author Yrsa Sigurdardóttir, as they talk with fellow crime writer Cara Black.

Hotel Shattuck Plaza - Crystal Ballroom

Utter Fascination: The Art of the Exceptionally Complex Character

Åsa Avdic, Therese Bohman, Carl Frode Tiller, Laleh Khadivi

Saturday, April 28

1:30 PM - 2:45 PM

How do writers create complex characters? These three authors discuss how they dream up, and then capture on the page, entirely new people who are exceptionally complicated. What narrative strategies do they use to create them? How did the characters develop in the authors’ minds? Don’t miss the complex characters on this panel: Asa Avdic, a journalist and breakout novelist whose debut, “The Dying Game,” is a chilling version of an Agatha Christie ensemble (characters trapped and slowly disappearing) in a futuristic Sweden; Therese Bohman, whose scintillating novel “Eventide” about a middle-aged woman’s life “explores complex inner worlds with great sensitivity and insight” (Kirkus); and Carl Frode Tiller with the “Encircling” trilogy, which endeavors to reconstruct a man’s mind piece by piece after he loses his memory.

The Brower Center - Tamalpais Room

Noir at the Bar: A Flight of Mystery! Sampling Bay Area Writers of Murder and Mayhem, with Drinks

Lillian Bell, Cara Black, Ellison Cooper, Reece Hirsh, Beth McMullen, Eileen Rendahl, Kelli Stanley, Domenic Stansberry, emceed by Sheldon Siegel

Saturday, April 28

5:00 PM - 6:15 PM

A Festival favorite returns! There’s no better way to celebrate the Bay Area’s love of noir than to toast mystery writers who have mastered the form. Feel like a bonafide gumshoe listening in on riveting short readings by these modern masters of noir. And while you’re at it, order your cocktail (or whiskey) of choice.

The Marsh - Cabaret

Know Thyself: The Ultimate Mystery

Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi, Mark Sarvas, Carl Frove Tiller

Saturday, April 28

5:00 PM - 6:15 PM

It’s high literary tide mark on Saturday afternoon. Three of the smartest novelists working today discuss how fiction explodes the question of how we know ourselves. In “Call Me Zebra,” partly set in Spain, Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi depicts a heroine on a Quixotic quest; the Wall Street Journal said, “Hearken ye fellow misfits, migrants, outcasts, squint-eyed bibliophiles, library-haunters and book stall-stalkers: Here is a novel for you.” Mark Sarvas’ “Memento Park,” partly set in Hungary, was praised by Salman Rushdie as “a gripping mystery novel about art that is also a powerful meditation on fathers and sons.” Norwegian writer Carl Frove Tiller has written a trilogy whodunit about a man who’s lost his memory and reconstitutes himself via letters from friends telling him who he is; you can imagine how that turns out. Said Kirkus, “A wholly satisfying story about how unreliable narrators tell tales not just about events, but about our core emotions.” Who are you? Come explore how we know ourselves.

The Marsh - Theater

Nordic Noir: The Enduring Genre of Cold Climate Thrillers

Sara Blaedel, Anne Holt, Karo Hämäläinen, Steffen Jacobsen, Yrsa Sigurdardóttir, moderated by Randal Brandt

Sunday, April 29

2:00 PM - 3:15 PM

One of the most popular sessions at the Festival returns for its fourth year. Traveling all the way from Scandinavia and Iceland to join us today, these authors will illuminate why their books—which situate grisly stories of murder and chaos in frigid regions—have the enduring power to captivate audiences worldwide. From Denmark, Sara Blaedel will discuss her internationally best-selling and female-led Louise Rick and Ilka Jensen series. Norway’s best-selling female crime writer Anne Holt will consider how her years working for police departments and as a lawyer have influenced her work. Finnish crime savant Karo Hämäläinen will let us in on how he became “a wicked and controlled writer who rarely allows his readers a moment of peace” (Toronto Sun). Hear from Icelandic best-selling author Yrsa Sigurdardóttir, who The Times UK said “is ensconced at or near the summit of Nordic crime writing.” And learn how Danish physician and thrill-master Steffen Jacobsen uses his talent for the macabre to create gripping reads.

Magnes Museum

Post-Bastille Day Literary Salon: Cara Black and Susan Shea

Immerse yourself in France at this Post-Bastille Day Literary Salon: An Evening with Mystery Authors Cara Black and Susan Shea. Both authors set their mysteries in France. Drink and eat and enjoy the discussion  and readings about France, books, people, and more!

When: Thursday, July 20, 7 p.m.
Where: RSVP for venue address (Berkeley, CA)
This is a free event, but YOU MUST RSVP to attend.
RSVP required. Address of venue sent with acceptance.
RSVP: janet @ mysteryreaders.org

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 17 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, which is set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. 

Susan Shea spent more than two decades as a non-profit executive before beginning her critically praised mystery series featuring a professional fundraiser for a fictional museum. Love & Death in Burgundy is the first in her new French Village series. She’s a regular on the 7 Criminal Minds blog, is secretary of the national Sisters in Crime board, on the board of the Northern California chapter of Sisters in Crime, and is a member of Mystery Writers of America. 

***

Upcoming Literary Salons in Berkeley

July 26: James Ziskin and Marla Cooper, 7 p.m.

September 13: Amy Stewart, 7 p.m.

Murder in Saint-Germain: Guest Post by Cara Black

Cara Black is the New York Times bestselling author of 17 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, which is set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. Pre-order Cara Black’s Murder in Saint-Germain from any bookseller before 6/6/2017 and send proof of purchase to preorders@sohopress.com to receive a free Eiffel Tower USB pre-loaded with Cara Black’s tour guide inspired by her latest book!

Cara Black:
Murder in Saint-Germain

Utter the phrase Left Bank in Paris and one thinks of world renowned locations; the prestigious Ecole des Beaux Arts, Picasso’s studio where he painted Guernica, back offices of the Sénat, the church of Saint Germain des Pres, and the Closerie des Lilas, famous as one of Hemingway's favorite cafés to name a few. We think of the artists and writers at outdoor cafes where they nursed a coffee all day, the chic passersby, the tang of Gauloise. It all called to me. Especially the Jardin du Luxembourg, the spreading lawns, chalky gravel paths, with the pond and boats, statues staring from flower beds, the quiet spots under the leafy trees for reading. So ripe for murder.

A few books back while researching in Paris, I was lucky to meet Catherine, a former Brigade Criminelle officer (the elite Paris homicide squad) who then worked part-time at the Comissariat in the 14th arrondissement. I wanted to know what her experiences were as a woman, in the late 80’s into the 90’s, in a male dominated team. I’ve learned success comes from finding the right question to ask an interviewee. Even more interesting, that when I think I do, the person relates experience much more fascinating, giving a me a kernel of thought for a new idea or a story. I’ve learned it’s always better to go with the conversations and where they drift and learn new things and tidbits.

It’s a great way to discover procedure and how the police operate in ways that I’d never have thought of asking about. Catherine spoke about the Eastern European criminals and gangs as a source of arms smuggled into France. Arms were brought in from the then recently collapsed Soviet Union through routes to Europe. Later, the arms came from the conflicts in Sarajevo, the Balkans. Also, a lot of these former soldiers took mercenary jobs, or just redirected their efforts to crime in Europe. The famous Pink Panther jewelry heist gang, very slick, organized, come from the Balkans. Catherine opened up about her secondment to the International Court Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and her tours of duty there. She made several years doing tours of duty and enforcement with an International team. She burned out there, suffered trauma and we’d call it PTSD. Looking at my notes about those conversations, I felt there was an issue to address and it intrigued me. I hadn’t set a book in Saint-Germain. It was perfect, full of history, charm and buckling cobblestones. Yet everyone probably knew it better than I did - who didn’t go to St Germain des Pres and have a coffee where Albert Camus and Sartre and de Beauvoir sat? What backdoor could I find for Aimée? Off the beaten track interests me more. I wondered what would she be doing there?

A real challenge. Then thinking about it, Aimée had gone to Ecole des Medicins in Saint-Germain, her grandfather had loved a model at Ecole des Beaux Arts…I’d been to that seedy hotel where Oscar Wilde had died. .. Complicating matters for Aimée is the fact that she is now the single mother of an 8-month old baby. So now I was off and running with Aimée and Murder in Saint- Germain. Fiction, especially crime fiction, can connect the past and present. We see historical themes and trends come to the forefront.

Crime novels encompass all levels of society, from the street cleaner to a countess, murder doesn’t respect class or upbringing. It’s a way to explore sociology, the issues facing today and breathe relevancy into present day as characters experience it.

International Mysteries Literary Salon January 26: Jeffrey Siger, Cara Black, Lisa Alber

Mark your calendars for Thursday, January 26, 7 p.m.!
INTERNATIONAL MYSTERY NIGHT! 

Join Mystery Readers NorCal for a LITERARY SALON in Berkeley (CA) with Jeff Siger (Greece), Cara Black (Paris), and Lisa Alber (Ireland).
Open to All, but you must RSVP to attend. Space Limited. Address given when you RSVP.
Make a comment below with your email.

Jeffrey Siger (Greece)

Jeffrey Siger, born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, practiced law at a major Wall Street law firm and, while there, served as Special Counsel to the citizens group responsible for reporting on New York City's prison conditions. He left Wall Street to establish his own New York City law firm and continued as one of its name partners. He now lives and writes full-time in Mykonos, his adopted home of 30+ years.

Santorini Caesars is the eighth novel in his internationally best-selling and award nominated Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis series, following up on Devil in Delphi, Sons of Sparta, Mykonos After Midnight, Target: Tinos, Prey on Patmos, Assassins of Athens, and Murder in Mykonos.

Cara Black (Paris)

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 14 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, which is set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime.

With more than 400,000 books in print, the Aimée Leduc series has been translated into German, Norwegian, Japanese, French, Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew.

Lisa Alber (Ireland)

Lisa Alber is the author of the County Clare mystery series, which has been described as atmospheric, complex, and with enough twists and turns to keep you guessing. The first novel, "Kilmoon," was a Rosebud Award finalist for best debut novel. The second novel, "Whispers in the Mist," is now available. Lisa is busy writing the third (and fourth!) novels in the series.

Travel with Cara Black: A Week in Paris

A Week in Paris with Cara Black 
November 13 through 19, 2016 
Optional 3-day Extension November 19 through 22, 2016

Ready to pack your bags? Click here for the registration form. 

You’re invited to join Cara and other Cara Black mystery-lovers for an exclusive week in Paris. You’ll spend time with Cara exploring some of the most memorable scenes associated with the cases private investigator Aimée Leduc has solved in several books. And you’ll also have time to spend in some of the small gems of Paris – the lesser-known museums, the spectacular parks, the off-the-beaten- track cafés, the hidden passages that are home to specialty boutiques, antiquarian bookstores and other treasures.

Whether you’ve been to Paris before or not, you’ll get to know the city in a more intimate way. On some days, Cara will lead you to the “scene of the crime” and other settings you’ve read about in the Aimée Leduc series. On other days, you’ll choose from a menu of options that you’d like to do with Donna or Sheila (museums, walking tours, shopping).

Trip leaders Donna Morris of Best Friend in Paris and Sheila Campbell of Wild Blue Yonder, have managed a number of sold-out Paris and Provence experiences, including one last year with Cara, – trips that earn rave reviews from participants. They’ll lead you in small groups, via Metro or city buses, moving about the city like Parisians. You can spend as much time – or as little – with the group as you like.

Donna and Sheila will help you find the things you’re most interested in, and tell you the best way to get there. They function as your friends on the ground, depending on your needs.

Boutique hotel is located in the Paris neighborhood described in Murder in Clichy, in the 8th arrondissement.  Group will meet in the hotel salon each evening with Cara to sample French wines and discuss the days’ events, with a bit of book talk thrown into the mix.

Read more Here.

Literary Salon: Cara Black & Lisa Brackmann June 8

Join Mystery Readers NorCal for a Literary Salon on Wednesday, June 8, in Berkeley, CA at 7 p.m. with Cara Black & Lisa Brackmann. Comment below or send email for location and to RSVP.

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 14 books in the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series, set in Paris. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. With more than 400,000 books in print, the Aimée Leduc series has been translated into German, Norwegian, Japanese, French, Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew.

Her latest Aimee Leduc, Murder on the Quai, is a pre-quel to the series (June 14, 2016-Soho Press) 

November 1989: Aimée Leduc is in her first year of college at Paris’s preeminent medical school. She lives in a 17th-century apartment that overlooks the Seine with her father, who runs the family detective agency. But the week the Berlin Wall crumbles, so does Aimée’s life as she knows it. First, someone has sabotaged her lab work, putting her at risk of failing out of the program. Then, she finds out her aristo boyfriend is planning to get engaged to another woman. And finally, Aimée’s father takes off to Berlin on a mysterious errand. He asks Aimée to help out at the detective agency while he’s gone—as if she doesn’t already have enough to do. But the case Aimée finds herself investigating—a murder linked to a transport truck of Nazi gold that disappeared in the French countryside during the height of World War II—has gotten under her skin. Her heart may not lie in medicine after all—maybe it’s time to think harder about the family business.

Lisa Brackmann has worked as an executive at a major motion picture studio, an issues researcher in a presidential campaign, and was the singer/songwriter/bassist in an LA rock band. Her debut novel, ROCK PAPER TIGER, set on the fringes of the Chinese art world, made several “Best of 2010” lists, including Amazon’s Top 100 Novels and Top 10 Mystery/Thrillers, and was nominated for the Strand Magazine Critics Award for Best First Novel. Her second novel, GETAWAY, won the Los Angeles Book Festival Grand Prize and was nominated for the T. Jefferson Parker SCIBA award. HOUR OF THE RAT, #2 in the Ellie McEnroe series, was short-listed for Left Coast’s World Mystery award, as was Ellie #3, DRAGON DAY (and was a Seattle Times Top 10 Mystery Pic). Lisa lives in San Diego with a couple of cats, far too many books and a bass ukulele.

Her latest mystery is Go-Between (Soho Press).

An all-too-realistic thriller about for-profit prisons, big-money politics, shady non-profits, the war on drugs — and the people who would kill to keep the system intact

Emily runs a successful bistro in Humboldt County, California, where she lives with her boyfriend, Jeff, a volunteer firefighter. A lot of her best customers are in the cannabis business, but so what? It’s true, firefighting isn’t really Jeff’s main job — that would be flying Humboldt’s finest weed to out-of-state customers. And sure, he isn’t really Emily’s boyfriend, more like the guy she’s stuck with by circumstance. Actually, his name is Danny, not Jeff, and Emily’s real name is Michelle Mason, although no one can ever know that. She’s on the run from her past — which has just caught up with her. Gary, an ex-CIA agent who got her and Danny into this whole mess, has just shown up in Humboldt County. Michelle should have killed him when she had the chance, but now she’s stuck playing Gary’s game — and if she loses, she or someone close to her will pay the ultimate price.

Cara Black & Libby Fischer Hellmann: March 18 Literary Salon

LITERARY SALON: Cara Black & Libby Fischer Hellmann 
Wednesday, March 18, 2015 2 p.m. Berkeley, CA 
RSVP for Directions.
Space Limited Potluck sweets and hors d'oeuvres
(email: janet@mysteryreaders.org)

Cara Black is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 14 books set in different arrondisement in Paris featuring the Private Investigator Aimée Leduc series. Cara has received multiple nominations for the Anthony and Macavity Awards, a Washington Post Book World Book of the Year citation, the Médaille de la Ville de Paris—the Paris City Medal, which is awarded in recognition of contribution to international culture—and invitations to be the Guest of Honor at conferences such as the Paris Polar Crime Festival and Left Coast Crime. With more than 400,000 books in print, the Aimée Leduc series has been translated into German, Norwegian, Japanese, French, Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew.

Libby Fischer Hellmann writes Compulsively Readable Thrillers. Her 11th novel, Nobody’s Child, the 4th entry in her Georgia Davis series, was released in September, 2014. The year prior, Havana Lost, a stand-alone literary thriller and love story set in Cuba, was released. A Bitter Veil, set in revolutionary Iran during the late ’70s was released in 2012. Along with Set The Night On Fire (2010), which goes back to the late Sixties in Chicago, these stand-alone thrillers are what Libby calls her “Revolution Trilogy.” She also writes two crime fiction series: The Ellie Foreman series, a four volume set which Libby describes as a cross between “Desperate Housewives” and “24.” Chicago P.I. Georgia Davis first appeared in one of those novels, but now has her own series, which has grown to four volumes as well. She has just finished The Incidental Spy, a novella set during the early years of the Manhattan Project in Chicago, and she’s currently working on the 5th Ellie Foreman novel.

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COMING UP!!!

March 26: Award winning author Timothy Williams, 7 p.m. Tim lives in Guadaloupe. He writes two series: one written in English set in Italy and a second written in French set in Guadaloupe.

Cara Black and Jeffrey Siger Lit Salon November 8

International Mystery Literary Salon: 
Friday, November 8, 7 p.m. Berkeley, CA

Cara Black and Jeffrey Siger

Leave a comment below with email to RSVP.

Cara Black writes award-winning police procedurals starring Parisian detective Aimee Leduc. Each novel is set in a different arrondisement of Paris and focuses on a specific issue or topic that's relevant to the arrondisement. The newest Aimee Leduc novel is Murder Below Montparnasse. Cara Black is a San Francisco Library Laureate and a member of the Paris Societe Historique in the Marais. She received the Medaille de la Ville d Paris last year. Cara Black is the Guest of Honor at Left Coast Crime, in Monterey, March 20-23, 2014. Cara splits her time between San Francisco and Paris. How lucky is Cara Black!

Jeffrey Siger practiced law at a major Wall Street law firm and while there served as Special Counsel to the citizens group responsible for reporting on New York City's prison conditions. He left Wall Street to establish his own New York City law firm and continued as one of its name partners until giving it all up to write full-time among the people, life and politics of his beloved Mykonos, his adopted home of more than 30 years. The City and County of San Francisco awarded him the Certificate of Honor citing that his "acclaimed books have not only explored modern Greek society and its ancient roots but have inspired political change in Greece." When not in Greece, he enjoys his other home, a farm outside New York City. He has 5 books in the Inspector Andreas Kaldis series. His latest is Mykonos After Midnight.