Dear Friend,

It's quite an achievement to be well over 25 years into a literary career and still be on top, but John Sandford is no ordinary writer. Every time one of his "Prey" novels arrives, I have to pry it out of Brian's fingers in order to send it out for review. Then a Virgil Flowers novel comes in and Teri has to pry it out of my fingers. (Luckily, Oline Cogdill gets her own review copies or there would be a riot in the Mystery Scene offices!) Oline has a chat with John Sandford, aka the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Camp in his private life, in this issue.

Also in this issue, Ed Gorman chats with Libby Fischer Hellmann, author of amateur sleuth and private eye novels as well as political thrillers, and Lynne Kaczmarek interviews the prolific Scottish author Peter May. Cara Black, creator of the bestselling Aimée Leduc series, considers Georges Simenon's Inspector Maigret and his Paris, and Michael Mallory takes a look at Dorothy Gilman, who created the beloved Mrs. Pollifax, a New Jersey grandmother turned globetrotting CIA agent. That's quite a range of crime fiction!

From The Big Sleep to Rio Bravo to The Empire Strikes Back, Leigh Brackett's celebrated screenwriting career spanned genres and decades. Brackett also had a great run as a novelist and short story writer with a sideline in television scripts. Jake Hinkson takes a closer look in this issue.

Kevin Burton Smith offers a survey of the new streaming services and the avalanche of films and television shows, both new and old, which are now available to crime fans. It truly is a Golden Age of Television. We'd love to hear what you're watching these days - write and let us know!