#booklook — Public Fediverse posts

#MurderEveryMonday Maps, Maps here, there and everywhere

When I saw today’s #MurderEveryMonday theme, created by the wonderful Kate Jackson from Cross Examining Crime, was crime fiction with a map on the cover or in the inside, my first thought went to this collection of short stories, Manhattan Mayhem, edited by Mary Higgins Clark and published in 2015 to celebrate the 70th of the Mystery Writers of America.

Not only the cover has a map of Manhattan, but each story starts with a street map: for this anthology, Mary Higgins Clark invited authors to choose a Manhattan neighbourhood and set a story there.

I read it many years ago, probably when it came out, and while I can’t remember all the stories (I still have a recollection of some of them), I really liked it. Maybe it’s time to re-read it. It’s also a beautiful edition with the slip cover and all the iconic photos inside.

And if you like classic or golden age crime fiction, there is no shortage of maps, so (yes, you’re right) I turned to Agatha Christie. First, with the map on the facsimile edition of The Mysterious Affair at Styles, and then with the same map in a Portuguese edition.

Then I remembered there was a map of the plane in Death in the Clouds:

This is an edition from a Portuguese collection called The Golden Scarab and the previous owner inscribed it with the year 1952. The book also indicates it was translated from the original – sometimes Portuguese translations would be made from other translations – and the final pages have ads about flying insurance and an airway company.

#MurderEveryMonday Weather affects the plot

After several heat waves, we finally got some rain yesterday’s evening that hopefully will last for the next days. So, for today’s #MurderEveryMonday I went full Winter and chose stories that are impacted by snow and all by Agatha Christie. These were the three titles my brain picked as soon as I read the theme. Love and recommend them all.

The first is the Murder on the Orient Express, one of the best known books by Christie, where the snow stops the train that allows the closed circle of the story.

For the second, I went for The Mousetrap, the longest run of any play in the world, where the snow traps the characters in a manor house.

And finally, I also chose a not so well known title, The Sittaford Mystery, where the snow also impacts the murder investigation. I really like this one and feel it deserves more attention and more readers. And I do like the young Miss Emily Trefusis as an amateur sleuth. And now I want to re-read it again!

Thanks to Kate Jackson for creating this hashtag and check her blog for the next themes here.