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HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: A
Theme! You know how much I love it when Jungle Red has spontaneous unplanned
themes—the other day Julia was talking about how to get rid of stuff, and the difficulties
of deciding what to keep.
Well our dear pal—the newlyAgatha winning (YAY) and fabulous Shari Randall has solved that mystery-with
one book, at least. And yeah, it’s a
step.
Question for you-do you know
what “moulage” is? Or maybe: what moulage are?
And then Shari—just returned from Spain!-- has a question for you.
No? Well, read on.
 |
| Shari celebrating! |
The Book I’ll Never Give Away
Many thanks, Hank, for
inviting me to visit with you and the Reds – what a treat! It takes my mind off
of my ongoing task of dealing with boxes of, well, stuff, that have moved with
my family for so many years that I have no idea what’s in them.
Like most booklovers, I’ve
found that the hardest part of downsizing is dealing with all of my books. I’ve
tried Swedish Death Cleaning, read The
Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up, and truly believe Less is More. After my
last move, I managed the painful process of winnowing my book collection. But
there is one book I simply cannot part with, a book I’ve had since I was ten
years old.
What is this relic of my
mystery reading youth? The Hardy Boys Detective
Handbook: Authentic Detective Methods for Solving Mysteries – the 1972
printing of the 1959 original. Why didn’t I have a Nancy Drew Detective
Handbook? Did one exist back then? Apologies to fans of Frank and Joe, but I
only read the Hardy Boys when I couldn’t get my hands on a Nancy Drew.
Why can’t I bring myself to
let go of this book?
Because whenever I crack it
open, I go back in time and fall under its spell. Once more I am a ten year old
in pigtails who believes it’s entirely possible for two nosy teenagers and
their accident prone chum Chet to bring down an international crime syndicate.
What makes this book so
irresistible? First, there’s the style. The
Handbook crackles with adolescent male energy, tough guy lingo, and a noir
sensibility. The Joe Friday approach delivers facts to wannabe detectives like
a .45 delivers lead.
Second, what a trove of
information! Among the tips it offers are (TSA take notice) directions for
pat-downs, schematics for one-, two- and three-man surveillance, a dictionary
of legal terminology and criminal slang (“Dive: a place of poor reputation”)
and directions for making moulage. If
you don’t know moulage, I highly
recommend this book.
Though many of the forensic
procedures have been rendered obsolete by modern technology, and one must no
longer carry change for the phone booth in the corner of the drugstore soda
shop, spending just five minutes with The
Hardy Boys Detective Handbook makes you feel that you can trail a perp, pat
him down, and make the collar with the confidence of a teenage detective.
More than anything, The Handbook connects me with the sheer
joy of reading mysteries, a feeling I try to channel while writing my own mystery
series.
Happily – or sadly – you can
find a copy of The Hardy Boys Detective
Handbook on Amazon for $.01 plus $3 for shipping. But the trip down memory
lane is priceless.
Readers, is there a book that
you simply cannot, and will not, ever give away?
HANK: AH, toughie! All my signed
Sue Graftons, that’s for sure. And my childhood Winnie The Pooh. The pre-arc of
TRUST ME. Oh, dear, this is a difficult one. How about you, Reds and readers?
And yeah, I had to look up
moulage. And so did you, right?
Okay—your turn. What’s a must-keep book? Family photo albums don’t
count.
Former librarian Shari Randall is the
author of the Lobster Shack Mystery series. The native New Englander lives in a
midcentury modern money pit not far from a lighthouse and plenty of great lobster
shacks. Her debut, Curses, Boiled Again,
won the Agatha Award for Best First Novel. You can check out her mermaid obsession
on Instagram or Facebook at @sharirandallauthor.
The Lazy Mermaid’s business has slowed to a snail’s pace―until a monster lobster claws his way onto the scene…
With high season behind them, ballerina on-the-mend Allie Larkin and Aunt Gully are finally lying low. But then an unexpected guest arrives at the lobster shack: a crustacean so huge he’s dubbed Lobzilla around Mystic Bay and on social media. Soon, with everyone showing up for a peek in their tank, Allie and Aunt Gully have more on their plate than they can handle.
Meanwhile, another local establishment finds itself in hot water. In exclusive Rabb’s Point, a strange burglary breaches the elegant home of Royal Parrish. Allie takes it upon herself to help with the investigation but, before she can get to the bottom of the case, another alarm sounds: the Lazy Mermaid’s Lobzilla has gone missing and is on the loose! And bodies are beginning to pile up. . .
