Minor Offenses

If you’re not already too busy celebrating Paris’ birthday today, there are a few crime-fiction-related subjects worth checking out elsewhere on the Web: First-time novelist Julia Buckley (The Dark Backward) has devoted herself this month to “dialoguing with other writers, specifically the writers of mysteries.” Already, she’s interviewed Jeffrey Marks (Atomic Renaissance, The Scent of Murder), Bob Morris (Bahamarama), Twist Phelan (Spurred Ambition), Betty Webb (Desert Run, Desert Wives), and The Rap Sheet’s own Linda L. Richards (The Next Ex) for her Mysterious Musings blog. Anyone who’s ever done much interviewing will know what a monumental task Buckley has set for herself. … For Mystery*File, longtime writer and editor Ed Gorman recalls the genesis of the new, posthumous collection of Ed McBain short stories, Learning to Kill (Harcourt). … In what’s got to be one of the oddest exchanges I’ve ever read with Ian Rankin, the Scottish author “reveals” that “The entire [Inspector John] Rebus series has been a thwarted attempt to stop people discovering the wondrousness of Edinburgh.” ... And, since it seems we can never stuff too many birthday notices into The Rap Sheet, let me remind you that tomorrow, July 9, will mark the 64th birthday of Richard Roundtree, the actor best known for his role as New York private eye John Shaft in the stylish 1971 movie Shaft. Can you dig it?