This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Fall is almost here, but nature is having a last hurrah. In Maryland and the states nearby, farmstands are loaded with corn and tomatoes. Peaches are ripe and a second harvest of raspberries looms. For me, the fruit that’s calling out the loudest is the simple brown fig. … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. (Ed. note: Perveen Mistry, a female lawyer living in 1920’s Bombay, has reached across time and reality to write a frank letter to 2024 voters. As the chronicler of Perveen’s legal mysteries, I’m impressed by her forthright investigations of political issues and modern technology. Let us enjoy her … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. It’s just after six in the morning, and I’m sitting outside with my coffee watching a morning mist flowing across the top of Lake Kawaguesaga. It seems like a spectacular illusion straight out of a movie’s computer animation department. But this is real, and I am here, spending … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Can a woman become a successful president? The mission was attempted just once before in the United States, with Hillary Clinton at the top of the Democratic ticket. Although Hillary won the popular vote, she didn’t win enough electoral college votes and ultimately lost the election to Donald … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. When life is stressful, resting my eyes on clear surfaces and straight lines helps me take a deep breath. Getting through the last pages of an edit is always a tough time—I’m housebound and frustrated. So during one of my stomps around the house, I caught sight of … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. “I don’t want to talk about age.” A smart, accomplished, and elegant woman friend said this to me recently. I still do not know her age and am not going to ask her again. I suspect that this lovely person believes she’d be treated differently if people knew; … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Like so many Baltimoreans, I spent yesterday on the phone telling friends and relatives that I was alive. No, I hadn’t been anywhere near the Francis Scott Key Bridge early Tuesday morning. But I was following the news from before sunrise, because my email carried an emergency bulletin … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. I write this during my last few hours in the March sunshine of Arizona. How lucky I feel to have had a mystery gathering again during a very drab time of the year in Baltimore. I arrived on March 8 as a guest at the Tucson Festival of … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. Friends, I am back in India. It turned out that my wonderful October-November visit to India was not fulfilling enough. During that two-week journey, I’d gathered the information to finish one Perveen mystery; but now I was itching to learn more about Kerala for a subsequent book. … Read more
This post originally appeared on Murder Is Everywhere. The Amazon-owned Washington Post recently reported on a poll by The Economist/YouGov on people’s reading habits. Forty-six percent of people living in the United States read no books last year. Just five percent read one book. This book reading rate was about the same as when I began my … Read more