Of Patriots and Plunderers

There’s nothing inherently literary about Independence Day in the United States, but also no reason why you shouldn’t celebrate this occasion with a good book rather than fireworks. In Reference to Murder’s B.V. Lawson today posts a star-spangled rundown of Fourth of July-related mysteries, including Bill Crider’s Red, White, and Blue Murder (2003) and Rex Stout’s novella “Four of July Picnic,” published originally in the collection And Four to Go (1958). Other appropriate picks--such as Carolyn G. Hart’s Yankee Doodle Dead, R.E. Derouin’s Dead on the Fourth of July, and Jill Churchill’s Someone to Watch Over Me--can be found here and here.

If we broaden the definition of what’s appropriate a bit, you might think about looking today for harder-to-find copies of The First Lady Murders (1999), edited by Nancy Pickard; President, Private Eye (1988), edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Francis M. Nevins Jr.; or the trio of mysteries (beginning with The Big Stick, 1986) that Lawrence Alexander wrote and in which he posited turn-of-the-last-century U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt taking on a detective’s role.

Bully, all.