CLUES UNLIMITED
A mystery bookstore
123 South Eastbourne, Tucson, AZ 85716-5317
(520) 326-8533 (voice) • (520) 326-9001 (fax)
info@cluesunlimited.com (e-mail)

Our Mystery Gift Baskets Make Perfect Presents for any Occasion!
 

We are changing our hours as of the first Sunday in February. We will be open Mondays through Saturdays 9-5, and Sundays noon to 5.  We have gotten a number of requests for Sunday opening, so we hope that this will make it easier to do your book buying.

We have a new aid for you to keep track of your favorite authors: it is a Mystery Reader’s Journal ($3.95), and has room to keep track of up to 100 authors and the books in their series. I always used the back of an envelope, and I gotta say that this purse-sized booklet is a vast improvement!

Don’t forget to let us know if you want to receive the newsletter in the mail. This is the last one we are mailing out to those who haven’t paid the $15 mailing fee. If you do want to continue receiving the newsletter, just send back the page with your address along with a check or credit card number.

As some of you know, Broadway Village has been sold. I can’t say anything with any certainty, but I am doing my best to work out a way to stay in our present location for at least the next five years. Keep your fingers crossed.

I seem to be reading lots of good books lately, so here are some to check:
Historical: Berlin by Pierre Frei (C&G, 14.00) is a police procedural set at the beginning of the Allied occupation of Berlin, but it is much much more. Each of the victims’ lives before and during WWII is examined, giving the novel a power and resonance that is rare in mysteries.

Cozy: I absolutely love mysteries set in Southern California whether it’s Joseph Wambaugh or Jerrilyn Farmer, so I jumped on Cady Kalian’s series set in Hollywood featuring Maggie Mars, aspiring screenwriter and sometimes sleuth. The Two that are available are As Dead as It Gets (STM, 6.99) and A Few Good Murders (STM, 12.95).

PI: I love Veronica Blake’s series set in Oxford featuring martial arts expert Sam Fox. Cutting Blades and Bloodless Shadow (Brk, 14.00) both offer an interesting protagonist, intricate plotting, and a strong sense of the academic setting.

Please let us know if there is anything you need and remember that we order any kind of book, we ship anywhere, and we deliver in Tucson.

        Chris, Marcelino, Sophie, Canelo, Farrah Acevedo and Daniel

December 2007/January 2008

The signed copies of Tony Hillerman’s Dance Hall of the Dead that were announced in June have still not come in due to problems with Hillerman’s health that has limited his ability to sign. I will notify those of you who have requested copies just as soon as I have them.There has been an notification of the third novel to be reissued, Listening Woman, which I will order and announce when I actually have it in the store.

Due to problems that I have had with newsletters arriving on time, I have reluctantly decided that I will have to charge for newsletter subscriptions. With a $15.00 charge I can mail the newsletters first class which will ensure that they arrive at their destination or will be forwarded if the address has been changed. If you don’t want to pay for the subscription service, you can look at the newletter on the website, cluesunlimited.com, or pick up a copy in the store. There is a form on the last page with instructions how to continue receiving the newsletter.

Looking back on 2007, I am pleased at the number of really good mysteries that have come out and the popularity of mysteries around the world that gives readers a chance to read about other countries and cultures. I want to provide a list of some of my favorites from the year, a list that shows that there are some great new mystery writers joining the ranks of old favorites.

Police Procedurals: This year has shown the strength of two of my old favorites, Reginald Hill with Death Comes for the Fat Man and Deborah Crombie with Water Like a Stone. Both writers are giving us mysteries with complexity of plotting and characterization that one expects from literary fiction. Susan Hill, a newcomer with her Simon Serralier series, and Giles Blunt with his John Cardinal series, demonstrate that the police procedural continues to flourish. Canadian Louise Penny shows that the English village mystery is going strong with her police procedural series set in Quebec.

Cozies: Robert Barnard continues to write the elegant mysteries of manners that got us all hooked in the first place. This year’s Fall From Grace is as good as anything he’s done in the past. Nancy Martin’s series featuring the Blackbird sisters in Philadelphia is a delight. I also read anything by Jerrilyn Farmer, whose funnyseries set in southern California combines cooking and the general nuttiness I love about Hollywood.

Thrillers: I just read Ghost by Robert Harris and consider it as good a thriller as I’ve read in years--great surprise ending. I have also discovered a new writer of spy thrillers--Charles McCarry--a writer who provides the kind of moral ambiguity and clever plotting that I love in spy fiction.

Great Female Protagonists: This has been a banner year for smart, competent women. Minette Walters’ The Devil’s Feather kept me mesmerized and had great plot twists. Claire Matturo’s Sweetheart Deal is a mystery that kept me thinking even as I was laughing when Lilly Cleary goes back to her small Georgia hometown of Bugfest and comes to grips with her relationship with her mother while saving her from a murder charge. Zoe Sharp demonstrated that she can write a female protagonist who is smart and successful, and in Second Shot, she shows that her depth of characterization is improving with every book when Charlie’s latest case protecting a woman and child ends with her getting shot.

All in all, despite the lamentable condition of the publishing business, mystery writing is thriving. The rise of small presses like Poisoned Pen and Bleak House for new titles and publishers who specialize in reprints of classic has kept the mystery field expanding. I am happy to have been a part of getting some of the best contemporary writers in the hands of readers for the past eleven years and hope to continue.

Please remember that we order all kinds of book--not just mysteries, we ship anywhere, and we deliver in Tucson.

Wishing you all the best in the holiday season and a great New Year!
            Chris, Marcelino, Daniel, Canelo, Farrah, and Sophie
 

I think I have worked out a way to order books from the UK (and actually have them arrive!) I have included a small list and will put more on the website and in the next newsletter.

The Tony Hillerman novel announced in July will probably arrive in October. The new Aimee and David Thurlo will arrive in November. When you order something and then don’t hear from us, don’t think we’ve forgotten--usually the book has been delayed.

We have some very attractive Halloween gifts in the store including skull cups and black cat magnets and windchimes. We will have Edward Gorey gifts in time for the holidays.

If you would like to read any of the advanced reading copies that I get, please come to choose one. The catch? Write positive reviews for me to post on the website. If you don’t like the book you pick, just bring it back and try another. I especially need people to read historical mysteries and cozies.
 

                             Read and Recommended

Thriller: Steve Hamilton’s PI series set in Northern Michigan is a favortie of mine, so I was slightly disappointed when I found out that Night Work (STM, 24.95) was a stand-alone, but I changed my mind about 10 pages in. Set in upstate New York and featuring a juvenile probation officer whose lovers are murdered, this is a mystery reader’s delight with fantastic plotting.

Non-category: Jennifer Lee Carrell’s Interred with their Bones (Dutton, 25.95) is one of those mysteries that I as a bookseller love because it crosses so many categories and is so good in so many different ways. The story of the search for a missing Shakespeare manuscript has very well-drawn female characters, plenty of action, and lots of information about Shakespeare.

Creepy: The Ruins (Vintage, 7.99) by Scott Smith is one of the best scary novels I’ve read recently. Two couples vacationing in Mexico go into the jungle to hunt for a missing tourist, and what starts as a fun day trip spirals into a nightmare.

Remember that we order all kinds of books, we ship anywhere, and we deliver.

August/September 2007
As you have noticed, there is no British imports section in this newsletter. I am having serious problems getting books from the UK thanks to the Department of Homeland Security. I have had three large orders disappear between New York and Tucson, including one large box that arrived containing one book. Until I’ve found a solution, I’ll use the space for international thrillers, which are becoming a major element of mystery fiction. An odd footnote to my problem with my British distributor is that the paperback edition of Barbara Cleverly”s Tug of War has disappeared from the data base, so it may not be available until next summer.

I am having to change the shipping charges due to the increase in postage, but I’m still not sure what the final charges will be. Until we have enough experience with the new rates to decide what we should be charging to cover costs, we will use a formula that is $2 for handling plus actual postage.

Here are my picks for summer reading:
Offbeat: Either the Thursday Next series or the Nursery Crimes by Jasper Fforde are a delight for the reader, filled with puns and literary allusions, but with surprisingly good mystery plotting.
Southwestern: Bella Pollen’s Midnight Cactus is set in southern Arizona and has a slight mystery about our major criminal problem in the area, people smuggling, but it is also a wonderful read as the main character, an Englishwoman, falls under the spell of the Sonoran desert.
Foreign: If you like a solid police procedural with interesting characters and classic plotting try Karin Fossum’s mysteries set in Norway. The first one is Don’t Look Back.
Historical: Catriona MacPherson’s series featuring Dandy Gliver set in Scotland after WWI is quite well-written and well-researched, giving a strong sense of the tremendous social changes wrought by the war, seen through the eyes of an aristocratic heroine who is trying, more or less successfully,  to adapt.
Legal: My Summer of Southern Discomfort by Stephanie Gayle is a debut about a high-powered  lawyer who moves to Macon Georgia to work as a county prosecutor after a disastrous love affair.
PI/Cozy: Thirty years ago, they were the three most famous female PIs in Los Angeles; now they are wives and mothers who call up all their skills when someone threatens their children in Rick Copp’s Fingerprints and Facelifts.

Remember that we do special orders, mail books anywhere, and deliver here in Tucson.

 July/August 2007
The Patricia Cornwell mystery that was supposed to come last November has been postponed from April to next October. Tony Hillerman’s second mystery, The Dance Hall of the Dead ($30) should be in the first part of June. I will have a small number of signed copies, so reserve early.

Summer to me means watermelon and mysteries, so let me give you some suggestions:

Historical: Frank Tallis’ Death in Vienna is a fascinating mystery set in turn of the nineteenth century Vienna with an investigator who is a disciple of  Freud.

Slightly Offbeat: The Savage Garden by Mark Mills is a wonderful, lyrical mystery set in Italy, where a young British scholar finds two mysteries in a country house, one from the Renaissance and one from WWII. This is very satisfying.

Foreign Police Procedural: The Inspector Montalbano series set in Sicily by Andrea Camilleri is filled with food, wine, well-plotted mysteries, and a wonderful characters. A perfect armchair vacation.

Thriller: Lori Andrews’ two thrillers featuring Dr. Alexandra Blake, a geneticist at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology are well-plotted, filled with insider detail, and feature a smart, competent woman protagonist.

Please remember that we order all kinds of books, mail anywhere, and deliver in Tucson.