I am fascinated by all that was happening in the world before WWII. Amidst a silent, looming economic collapse, many social norms were turned on their head, women broke out of their molds, and art, literature, technology, and music all flourished. And a heady mix of cultures blended not altogether seamlessly to influence the Roaring Twenties like no other decade before it. The juxtaposition of this exciting yet challenging tumult lures me into reading books and writing immigrant-forward stories about this period—and as an author with deep roots in the boot—I particularly enjoy doing so through an Italian lens.
When I really need to recharge, I go to the sea, which is why I instantly gravitated to this book. As a busy amateur detective, Lady Swift seeks some downtime, too, but it doesn’t last. Not only does a body turn up almost as soon as she lets out a big exhale at the resort where she’s staying, but her husband whom she thought was dead six years ago, is the victim. Of all the people that had to “die” while she was on vacation, it had to be him, and that’s just where this storyteller’s mastery begins. Add humor, Englishness, and the interwar years—things I often gravitate toward in my beach reads—and I had a great whodunnit on my hands.
‘OMG! What an incredible read! Where to start?… I read this entire book in a few sittings… I was so enraptured that I couldn’t put it down!’ Celebrating Authors ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
A magnificent seaside hotel, striped deckchairs, strawberry ice cream… and a rather familiar dead body? Lady Swift is on the case!
Spring, 1921. Lady Eleanor Swift, explorer extraordinaire and accidental sleuth, hasn’t had a vacation since she arrived in England a year ago. Being an amateur detective can be a rather tiring business and she is determined to escape any more murder and mysteries. So she books into the Grand…
Even if there’s just a hint of something Italian in a story by the sea, I’m smiling. When you first meet Miss Posie Parker in this story, she’s wearing a scent reminiscent of Parma Violet, first distilled by the second wife of Napoleon I. For the next 300 pages, I couldn’t stop thinking about how wonderful Posie smells and how she must leave behind a whiff of her violet-scented perfume everywhere she goes a-sleuthing. Such a telling detail about a character and one that stayed with me as I tried in vain to solve the mystery.
Posie Parker has been called to her most baffling case yet.
Amyas Lyle, London’s top young lawyer, has been found with his head in a box of poisoned saltwater.
It’s the perfect murder. But who hated him enough to do such a thing?
Following a trail of strange notes, all of which speak of the sea, and saltwater, Posie travels from London to the seaside resort of Whitley Bay, looking for answers. But nothing can prepare her for what she finds there.
Can Posie find Amyas Lyle’s cold-blooded killer before further deaths…
One summer night in a small prairie city, 18-year-old Gabriel Reece accidentally outs himself to his redneck brother Colin, flees on his motorcycle, and gets struck by lightning on his way out of town.
He’s strangely fine, walking away from his melted pile of bike without a scratch. There’s no…
This book stands out from other historical mysteries near the sea because it is about a mystery onthe high seas. On a steamship, to be exact, on its way to New York harbor. My mom was once a young Italian woman on a steamship sailing to Halifax, and while she was nothing like Fen Churche, the heroine in this story, I’ve always imagined my mom having lots of wild adventures on that Atlantic crossing. The way the author has woven this twisty, tricky tale, I could almost believe mom had an alter ego.
When a journey to New York is interrupted by missing diamonds and a body in the lifeboat, there is only one woman who can help: Fen Churche!
1945. Fen Churche follows her dreams and sails for New York. She books passage on a steam ship from France to America, excited to dance the night away in the glamorous ballroom and play games on deck. Nothing will stand in the way of her trip, not even when an eccentric heiress’s diamond tiara goes missing…
Looking forward to relaxing with her favourite crossword puzzles, Fen’s quiet passage is horribly disrupted by another…
I fell in love with Miss Phryne Fisher on TV first, then in all of the books only after binge-watching all the seasons in short order. Her attitude, her clothes, her wit—all of it makes her adventures so fun to read. Besides, what list of Jazz Age mysteries is complete without this bobbed-hair socialite and her gaggle of misfits helping her to solve mysteries? Add in a spa vacation for Phyrne and I was hooked to see how she solved a murder while on holiday in some fabulous resort town. After 7 years, my Phryne drought is over!
'. . . there is no doubt Phryne is back at her best.' The Book Muse
When a mysterious invitation arrives for Miss Phryne Fisher from an unknown Captain Herbert Spencer in Victoria's spa country, Phryne's curiosity is excited.
Phryne accepts Spencer's invitation but from their arrival, she and her loyal maid Dot are thrown into the midst of disturbing Highland gatherings, cases of disappearing women, murder and the mystery of the Temperance Hotel.
Meanwhile, Cec, Bert and Tinker find a young woman floating face down in the harbour. Tinker, with Jane and Ruth, Phryne's resilient adopted daughters, together decide…
Separating the true stories from the myths, The Duty of Memory provides a deeper understanding of the diverse motivations that drove ordinary people to join an underground network of French Resistants despite terrible odds and horrifying consequences.
This book takes the reader inside the true story of men and women…
Veering away from fiction for a moment, this is a true crime tale set in the Jazz Age in San Diego. Flappers and playboys and actors in Hollywood during Prohibition, oh my! The biggest question this narrative nonfiction book doesn’t answer, though attempts to, is who killed the dancer, Fritzie Mann? A sensational story that was splashed on newspapers across the nation in the 1920s that I happened to stumble on last year. A tragic unsolved homicide by the sea that had me gripped from the get-go—and that’s saying something for someone not usually drawn to true crime—this book reads like a novel and should be a movie.
This “fast-paced, thoughtful true-crime” examines the cultural shifts of Jazz Age America through a beautiful dancer’s mysterious and scandalous death (Kirkus, starred review).
In January 1923, twenty-year-old Fritzie Mann left home for a remote cottage by the sea to meet a man whose identity she had revealed to no one. The next morning, the dancer’s barely clad body washed up on Torrey Pines beach, her party dress and possessions strewn about the sand. The scene baffled investigators, and abotched autopsy created more questions than it answered. However, the investigation revealed a scandalous secret.
My book, Slain Over Spumoni, is set in 1920 in a seaside resort in northern Italy, and features a former WWI nurse, a former soldier, and a spumoni recipe that The Gelato King of Italy is killed over. It is a light beach read in the mystery genre with a dash of romance thrown in to sweeten the tale. You’ll enjoy this family story about sibling rivalry gone awry, but also a budding romance between two people from different cultures who find commonality that has staying power beyond sampling the famous spumoni and sleuthing by the sea.
The day the second atomic bomb was dropped, Clabe and Leora Wilson’s postman brought a telegram to their acreage near Perry, Iowa. One son was already in the U.S. Navy before Pearl Harbor had been attacked. Four more sons worked with their father, tenant farmers near Minburn until, one by…
From Kirkus Reviews: "This debut short-story collection paints the wistful life of a newspaper journalist as seen through his sexual and romantic encounters...
Throughout, Hickok writes in an assured style, pulling readers along. The narrow sexual focus results in a distorted picture, yet other aspects of Art's life emerge at…
