David Cole continues his Cool Canadian Crime interviews. See what west-Quebec mystery writer RJ Harlick is up to. I’ll give you a hint… her characters are freezing their tushes off.
At a second-hand bookstore today, I picked up a copy of Speak Ill of the Dead. You will recall that I read this first book of the Camilla MacPhee Mystery series as one of my 13 west Quebec authors for the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge. I picked up this second copy today because I had already book crossed author Mary Jane Maffini out to Winnipeg by the time two readers wrote to request that I hold on to Speak Ill of the Dead so that we could trade Canadian authors.
When I got home today, and started to prepare my Book Crossing label I discovered the following inscription:
“To Marcia, look for the Nova Scotia clues, enjoy – Mary Jane.”
Poor Marcia. I bet she’s looking under her bed for this one. You snooze, you lose, Marcia. This signed copy is going down east as a prize to a Nova Scotian lover of Canadian mystery books.
It’s a contest.
To qualify: 1) you have to be a Nova Scotian reader who loves Canadian mystery books
2) you have to send a comment to this blog to tell readers who your all-time favourite Canadian mystery writer is and the title you’d buy twice.
3) you can also be a non-Nova Scotian lover of Canadian mystery books too and try your luck at a mystery prize
[Did I mention that there will also be a mystery prize to a non-Nova Scotian who also loves Canadian mystery writers?]
Post your comment before Halloween 2008 and I’ll pick two random readers to win. Nova Scotians and Everyone Else are welcome to try. Post your comment and try your luck.
I’ll be happy to know that this signed second copy of Speak Ill of the Dead is in good hands.
The second book on my list for the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge (and my second west Quebec / national capital cottager / local author) is mystery writer Mary Jane Maffini with Speak Ill of the Dead.
I decided to start with the first book of the Camilla McPhee series and I enjoyed the trickles of local recognition all through it. Some of the victims were colourful Ottawa personalities and I found myself likening them to certain real Ottawa personalities who were colourful in the late 90s. And I think this is a danger in reading local authors because I’ve discovered a tendency I have to create real-life plotlines in other author’s works! I kept thinking “ahh I wonder if she means so and so” and “I bet that’s so and so” and “whatever happended to so and so?”. That was kinda fun but terribly distracting because I kept wandering away from the story and then jumping back in hoping someone didn’t get knocked off while I digressed.
What I found neat is that while reading Speak Ill of the Dead I kept thinking about Maffini’s other sleuths. She didn’t stop with McPhee. She stashed a few bodies for Fiona Silk and Charlotte Adams to find too. Has does an author carry so many characters around in her head without fearing that they will spill out into the wrong story? Maffini is a founding member of The Ladies’ Killing Circle Inc. and has been a guest columnist on The Lipstick Chronicals.
From Maffini’s websie:
By Mary Jane Maffini
In the first book in the series, Camilla’s best friend, Robin Findlay, is found in a hotel room with a murdered journalist during Ottawa’s annual Tulip Festival. Many many people felt like killing Mitzi Brochu but for some reason the police decide Robin has something to do with the crime. Maybe it’s the blood on her hands. Maybe it’s because she won’t say what she was doing there. It’s up to Camilla to keep Robin out of the slammer even as the killer strikes again. And again. Each time the danger gets a bit closer to home. Meanwhile Camilla’s family, her so-called office staff member Alvin Ferguson and chain-smoking, sherry-guzzling nosy neighbour, Mrs. Violet Parnell, run interference every step of the way. To make matters worse, her favourite sister is making eyes at her least-favourite police officer. And what the devil are all those damn cats up to? Speak Ill of the Dead was short listed for the Crime Writers of Canada Arthur Ellis award for Best First Mystery of 1999.
304 pages / 5 1/8 x 7 1/2 / ISBN 0-929141-65-2