"After some post-Christmas retail therapy in the Windy City, mystery bookshop owner and historical whodunit novelist Sam Washington is returning home to North Harbor, Michigan, on a chartered bus. With Nana Jo and her gal pals Irma, Dorothy, and Ruby Mae from Shady Acres Retirement Village along for the ride, it's a lively trip. But one passenger is not so lively - a gentleman Irma befriended is found dead in his seat after an unscheduled stop. The ladies immediately shift gears to find out who punched his ticket, while Sam slips into the driver's seat to make sure Nana Jo and her crew steer clear of fatal conclusions."--Back cover
The beating of a gentle minister and a hate message on one church wall launch wry-witted librarian Juanita Wills on a quest to learn who's shattering the peace in her small Oklahoma town. Defying her policeman boyfriend's warning against amateur sleuthing, Juanita decodes a mysterious cipher bookmark, and tracks a secret local militia. When a "war" of quotations between her feuding assistant librarians takes a threatening turn, she even suspects one of them.
Attempting the perfect murder, a killer encounters the perfect cop in this short story by Special Edgar Award and Ellery Queen Award–winning author William Link. After years of get-rich-quick schemes, Troy Pellingham’s bank account is empty and his options are down to one: take a job in his uncle’s rare book shop, and spend his days working for an unpleasant man whose only redeeming quality is a mammoth bank account. Though well into his eighties, Uncle Rodney is the picture of good health, and the day when Troy will inherit the old man’s money seems very far away. But then Troy gets a brilliant idea—why shelve books for a living, when he can kill for a fortune? After the deed is done, a peculiarly shabby police detective comes to call. Lieutenant Columbo seems dimwitted, and Troy expects he will have no trouble putting him off the scent. But as the noose tightens around his neck, Troy realizes that no murder is too perfect for Columbo. The Bibliomysteries are a series of short tales about deadly books, by top mystery authors.
Attempting the perfect murder, a killer encounters the perfect cop. After years of get-rich-quick schemes, Troy Pellingham's bank account is empty and his options are down to one: take a job in his uncle's rare book shop, and spend his days working for an unpleasant man whose only redeeming quality is a mammoth bank account. Though well into his eighties, Uncle Rodney is the picture of good health, and the day when Troy will inherit the old man's money seems very far away. But then Troy gets a brilliant idea – why shelve books for a living, when he can kill for a fortune? After the deed is done, a peculiarly shabby police detective comes to call. Lieutenant Columbo seems dimwitted, and Troy expects he will have no trouble putting him off the scent. But as the noose tightens around his neck, Troy realizes that no murder is too perfect for Columbo.
The streets of Stoneham, New Hampsire are lined with bookstores...and paved with murder. When she moved to Stoneham, city slicker Tricia Miles met nothing but friendly faces. And when she opened her mystery bookstore, she met friendly competition. But when she finds Doris Gleason dead in her own cookbook store, killed by a carving knife, the atmosphere seems more cutthroat than cordial. Someone wanted to get their hands on the rare cookbook that Doris had recently purchased-and the locals think that someone is Tricia. To clear her name, Tricia will have to take a page out of one of her own mysteries-and hunt down someone who isn't killing by the book.
With her life falling apart, thanks to professional jealousy on the part of her conniving boss, library director May Apple Moon, librarian Wilhelmina "Helma" Zukas finds herself blackmailed into participating in group counseling sessions, a situation that becomes complicated by the murders of two of the participants.
In BookMarks, Karla FC Holloway explores the public side of reading, and specifically how books and booklists form a public image of African Americans. Revealing her own love of books and her quirky passion for their locations in libraries and on bookshelves, she takes us on a personal and candid journey through children's reading rooms, prison libraries, and “Negro” libraries of the early twentieth century. Holloway also calls our attention to a remarkable trend among many prominent African American writers—including Maya Angelou, W.E.B. Du Bois, Henry Louis Gates, Malcolm X, and Zora Neale Hurston. Their autobiographies and memoirs are consistently marked with booklists—records of their own habits of reading. She examines these lists, along with the trends of selection in Oprah Winfrey's popular book club, raising the questions: What does it mean for prominent African Americans to associate themselves with European learning and culture? How do books by black authors fare in the inevitable hierarchy of a booklist? This compelling rumination on reading will urge you to reflect upon your own reading habits, what books are important to you, and why.
In more than 50 essays, young people from a wide range of backgrounds reflect on how words from literature connect with and influence their lives, goals, and personal philosophies. The essays explore topics including suffering the death of a parent, facing a life-threatening illness, letting go of perfectionism, making friends, realizing goals, and grappling with questions of faith and sexuality. Books cited range from The Grapes of Wrath and The Great Gatsby to Twilight and Lord of the Rings. Each essay includes a brief biographical sketch letting the reader know where the essay writer is today. Teachers, guidance counselors, and parents working with teens on personal essays— including for college applications—will find that the book presents a varied, intriguing group of essays to use as samples, models, and inspiration. Teachers of literature, writing, and language arts classes can also use these essays as a way to help teens explore literature—and their own responses to it—through writing. Following each essay are questions to prompt conversation, writing, and deeper consideration of the issues raised. The back matter includes tips and ideas for teachers and teens on how to use the book, including ways to use it as a jumping-off point for creating personal essays.