CRIMINAL ELEMENT by Leigh Lundin When Terrie Moran introduced readers to Criminal Element some weeks back, I harbored the suspicion secret dark depths lay beneath the surface of this felonious theme park. Thus I asked our good friend Terrie to give CB readers a crime-ridden tour, treading the dark alleyways, sidestepping the blood and slime, […]

I’m giving up my Saturday slot today so we can include a guest column by my friend Fran Rizer, who joins Leigh and me in the current issue of the online magazine Pages of Stories. As you might already know, Fran is the South Carolina author of the delightful Callie Parrish mysteries, and (thank goodness) […]

ROAD TRIP (part three) by Steven Steinbock It’s been almost three weeks since Nate and I completed our cross-country drive from Portland, Maine to Seattle, Washington. It already feels like a lifetime. After we arrived in Seattle, we were joined by my younger son, Sam, and his buddy who flew out from Maine. Sam’s friend […]

FICTIONAL GIFTS by Deborah Elliott-Upton Talking about short stories never bores me. The elements are pared down to what is really important and nothing more or less. There is no time to meander about someone’s intricate background. Yes, it may be interesting, but no, it may not really matter all that much by the end […]

Although he is the author of several books—including the young adult romance Just in Time for Love and the hardboiled private eye novel All White Girls—Michael Bracken is better known as the author of almost 900 short stories in various genres. He began writing professionally while still a teenager and has been a full-time freelance […]

THRILLERFEST by Melodie Johnson Howe Joe Finder, David Morrell, Melodie Johnson Howe I just got back from New York where I attended Thrillerfest. Sleep deprived, I am writing this column from memory with no notes or programs to help my recollection. So it’s very sketchy. For the first two days of the convention they have […]

WHAT’S IN A NAME? by Janice Law “What’s in a name?” asked Juliet, but she was being disingenuous, knowing quite well the vast difference between being Juliet of the Scullery and the heiress of the Capulets. Her creator surely knew, too. While many of his characters’ names were set by history and legend, he let […]