Portrait of a Murderer:
A Christmas Crime Story

by  Anne Meredith
First published in Japanese in 1933
Poisoned Pen Press 4/3/2018
Genre: Crime/Mystery/Classics
Pages: 241
Goodreads

Portrait of a Murderer is a classic, and an unusual mystery, as the first sentence of the book tells you outright that Adrian Gray, 69, was killed by one of his children at Christmas. And even though it is presented as a Christmas story, there isn’t much Christmassy spirit to it.  Click to continue reading

Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Thief

by Maurice Leblanc
Published in 1907
Genres: Mystery, Detective, Classics, France, Short Stories
Pages: 279
Goodreads

Yesterday, I explained to you how 2017 was a Sherlock Holmes year for me.  He seemed to pursue me even further, as the latest Classics Club spin, #16, fell on Arsène Lupin, gentleman-cambrioleur, a somewhat French equivalent to the detective adventures, as I explain below. I obviously read it in French, but present here the cover and the title in English: Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Thief. 

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2017: my year with Sherlock Holmes

As part of the Classics Club, I had decided to read The Hound of the Baskervilles. Well, as I usually tend not to do things halfway, lol, I thought I might as well read all the works about Sherlock Holmes. I actually ended up LISTENING to them, as my experience is that most mysteries are actually much better as audiobooks. Thanks to my library, I was able to listen on Hoopla to all the novels and short stories narrated by the amazing Simon Prebble.
I decided to listen to them in their order of publication.

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