It's Show Time! - On Mystery Conferences

ROSEMARY: The New England Crimebake is arguably the last mystery con of the season. I'm sure somewhere mystery writers are getting together and talking, drinking, sharing info and experience, but most would agree that Cbake ends a very long season of possible events a mystery writer/reader can attend. (Our year is almost as long as the tennis season.) Add that to the library and general book events - and flower shows if you're me - and we could be somewhere every weekend if we didn't have families, lives, jobs and, oh yes, the need to write during all of this activity.

There are still a few shows I haven't attended, either because of bad timing or the unhappy reality that I can't be in two places at once. Magna Cum Murder and Mayhem in the Midlands are two I hope to attend one day. I love the ALA conferences and in six weeks Hank and I will be in San Diego with T. Jefferson Parker, Sue Ann Jaffarian, Naomi Hirahara, Harley Jane Kozak and others at ALA's second official Mystery Day which I'm proud to say I'm helping them coordinate. San Diego, January 8, for all you librarians out there. That leaves time for Thanksgiving, three mystery group holiday parties, and a quick cup of eggnog before I hit the road again on January 7.

I haven't filled in my entire schedule for next year yet (slacker!) but there are always some shows I hope to get to, or remember fondly. I missed the Virginia Festival of the Book last year, so I'll be going back to Charlottesville in March. Haven't been to Love is Murder, Sleuthfest, Murder in the Magic City or Left Coast Crime in a few years since my publisher changed the pub. dates on my books, and that's generally my homestretch writing time. I miss them, too.

Leaving Crimebake out of the mix because so many of the Jungle Red women are involved, do you have any favorites? Which shows are you looking forward to next year?

Gender Quiz Part Deux: the Results Show

Jerry (as Daphne): "You don't understand, Osgood! Aaah... I'm a man!"
Osgood: "Well, nobody's perfect."

**the closing lines of Some Like It Hot

Okay, so we have no winners. Of the valuable prizes we offered, at least.

And yet aren't we all winners? Getting to share our thoughts in this cyber village?

NO, huh? Okay. So lets raise a glass to the beautiful-and-talented Nancy Pickard, who got 4 out of 5 right, and that's pretty terrific. (And goodness knows, she certainly wins her share of prizes when the stakes are higher and the decisions more meaningful.)

Anonymous--and you know who you are--got three right. And Alias Mo got two. Had I guessed, which I would have been to terrified to do, I would have gotten one right. Lisa, you let them win, right?

So what can we learn from this? Besides that the Jungle Red sisters (and their sister in crime Mo Walsh who offered two of her favorites as #2 and #3) are devious and tricky?

You tell us!

Meanwhile, we'll tell you the answers.

Considering that we all did our best to fool you, congratulations to all.

#1

"I want you to kiss me. I want you to hold me. I want you to take me upstairs and make love to me. I want you to do it with no expectations because I don't have any. I could dump you tomorrow and you could dump me. It doesn't matter. But I'm not fragile.....This is a no-obligation offer....All I want tonight is you."


Male! Harlan Coben's Promise Me.


#2"He looked much as usual: bulging piggy eyes, gargoyle face, unfashionably long hair. The pallor was a change from his usual boozy redness, though, and the stain on his shirt was definitely not Chivas Regal. Louis Warren kept staring at the body, idly wondering if he had two more wishes coming."

Female! Sharyn McCrumb's Bimbos of the Death Sun



#3"Nothing had prepared me for the shock of seeing death on the face of someone I loved. I looked at him and I realized what a great power, what a great presence, what a great life had ended. I kissed my fingertips and ran them over his hard cheek and walked outside.Tears swelled from my heart, and a cold passion for revenge rose up with them."

Male! T. Jefferson Parker's Silent Joe



#4 Peter collected souvenir copies of the wannabe A-bomber flyer as he walked back to his car on Dunster Street. The damned things were posted everywhere. Peter unlocked his car. Despite his detours for coffee and encounter with Harvard Harry, he had plenty of time to get back to the Pearce for his final appointment with Rudy Ravitch before discharging him. He got into his car. Her know he should have called the police the minute he spotted Harry. MacRae and Needleman had every right to be pissed at him. No, he wasn't a detective, as MacRae so helpfully pointed out.

Female! Our own Hallie Ephron's Guilt



#5 It wasn’t raining at the moment, but an on-again off-again drizzle was expected to rev up into a torrent. Eldridge had left a message on my cell phone that he was running late, but now it was seven thirty and he hadn’t shown up yet. I told myself that it was probably a moot point. This was no night to stage an accident. How could anyone predict the physics of a rash with a downpour lubricating the streets.

Female! Our own Jan Brogan's Yesterday's Fatal.