Our jumbo Summer Issue #120 is in the mail and it's a corker! 

First we talk to Karin Slaughter, whose gripping, graphic Georgia police procedurals take as their theme violence, particularly violence against women, and its repercussions. Then Jeff Abbott tells us about his new international thriller series featuring a young CIA agent.

Mickey Spillane would often proclaim: "I'm not an author. I'm a writer." In "The Murders in Memory Lane," Lawrence Block ponders the subtleties of that statement - with a little help from the French author Colette.

When the nine-year-old Megan Abbott first saw the classic Rita Hayworth film Gilda, she distinctly remembers thinking "This is what life is." Some years and a literary career of her own later, she reconsiders in her essay "Bar Nothing."  

Decades after the Golden Age of Mystery ended, James Anderson's lighthearted puzzles both parodied and paid homage to classic tropes of yesteryear. The Affair of the Bloodstained Egg Cosy, The Affair of the Thirty-Nine Cufflinks and The Affair of the Mutilated Mink are just as delightful as their titles suggest - and they have no bigger fan than Jon L. Breen who discusses them in this issue.

Figuring out if a book is a true first edition is often surprisingly complicated - but vital. As Nate Pederson notes in his column, "Properly identifying a subtle variant in a printing of an edition can turn a $5 thrift store find into a $150 collectable book."

Also in this issue, Katherine Hall Page discusses the enduring appeal of Mary Stewart's novels of romantic suspense, and Kevin Burton Smith looks at William Ard, whose untimely death in 1960 robbed the genre of a potential hardboiled master. We also chat with Juliet Blackwell, whose Lily Ivory mysteries about a young witch in San Francisco offer spells, demons, romance...and some interesting thoughts on a gifted woman finding her place in the world. 

Over the summer, we will be publishing more original articles, book reviews, and commentary at the MS Website. We'll also be active on Twitter and Facebook,
so do come join us.

Sincerely,