Sarah Weinman

“How can quality crime fiction not be produced with available subject matters as the Industrial Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars, the creation of organized police forces, the dawn of forensic...”

“America in the 1800s isn't quite the historical mystery hotbed as the same period in the country it bested in the War of Independence, but its unique spectacle of rapid social change and the...”

“If you think the shifting tectonics of world history might make for a juicy crime fiction backdrop, the last decade or so has proved you right.”

“To understand the current state of mind of both Sara Paretsky and her private detective alter ego, one must first roll back the clock to 1982, when Victoria Iphegenia Warshawski took her fir...”

“'Laura' was overtly political for sure. Caspary was trying to make a point about women and independence and how men viewed them, with derision or condescension or on a pedestal, when the rea...”

“While every historical era has its unique appeal as a setting for tales of crime and detection, the 19th century is exceptional - it brought about so much change on social, political, geogra...”

“Indeed, mysteries lead readers through an endless variety of subjects and settings; yet sometimes devotees of detection seek to be transported though another dimension as well: time.”

“Longest book was '2666' by Roberto Bolano, and it was an irregular reading experience. I read the first four parts during a cross-country plane trip, reading at slightly slower-than-usual sp...”

“The make-believe world of 'The Black Tower' succeeds by broadcasting larger truths that might otherwise elude us.”

“When I first read Helen Weinzweig's 'Basic Black with Pearls' several years ago, I emerged in the sort of daze that happens when a book seems to ferret out your most secret thoughts and hope...”

“The 'Vampire of Ropraz' claims to be based on a true story, but the name of Rosa's father matches that of a notable Swiss artist and restorer. The eventual suspect has the overlong teeth and...”

“'The Lost Symbol' has much to impart about the mind-body problem as filtered through the work of Peter's younger sister Katherine, who more than dabbles in noetic science, or 'leading edge r...”

“Oddly, the anti-heroes of both 'The Chill' and veteran comics writer Peter Milligan's 'The Bronx Kill' share a first name, though their occupations and plights couldn't be any more different...”

“The quality I appreciated most about Grafton was her loyalty. She stuck with 'Kinsey Millhone' and the alphabet series conceit for her entire career but did not allow herself to stagnate as...”

“As his celebrity grew in stature, as he transformed from line cook to chef at Les Halles and further high-grade Manhattan restaurants to charismatic television star, I kept hoping - foolishl...”

“True-crime shows and podcasts aren't the only ones flattening the complexity of forensic science into easy-to-grasp narratives: journalists do so, too. They say DNA or trace evidence 'matche...”

“Ultimately, bridging the practice of forensic science and the public's need for story may be difficult. We crave narrative, order from chaos, a mystery solved, good guys winning out over the...”

“I was pretty serious about pursuing forensic science as a profession. In fact, I pursued an internship at the office of the chief medical examiner here in New York.”

“Alan Jay Lerner needed a hit. The Broadway lyricist and librettist was a decade removed from his greatest successes when his partnership with composer Frederick Loewe produced something appr...”

“Out of the ashes of the Great War came the freewheeling cultural renaissance that was the Jazz Age, but the decade-long party of flapper dresses and bootlegging came to a crashing halt with...”