Oh, yeah, Sarah and Carolyn are unreasonably excited about the books we’ll be reading and discussing in 2023. We’re diving head first into the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, dear listeners. We’re talking Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Dashiell Hammett … It’s gonna be a wild ride. Join us, won’t you?
Introducing the irrepressible Lord Peter Wimsey, Golden Age amateur detective extraordinaire. In this 1923 novel, Dorothy Sayers features a gentleman sleuth who will appear in many books to come. Sarah and Carolyn enjoyed this book immensely. Now, tell us what YOU think!
Holy moly, we read and discussed some amazing mysteries and detective stories in 2022: “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” by Edgar Allan Poe, The Moonstone and The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle, and loads more. Check out our 2022 retrospective!
Our fabulous guest Deb Donner is back to discuss the stories in The Innocence of Father Brown. (By now, you surely have a copy of the book, right?) Father Brown solves mysteries by looking into men’s and women’s hearts and souls. We’re talking human nature, folks. It’s some heady, thought-provoking stuff.
Sarah and Carolyn discuss this AMAZING collection of Father Brown mysteries with their first Tea, Tonic & Toxin podcast guest, Deb Donner! Deb is wise, insightful, and patient. She didn’t complain once during the ~14 hours it took Sarah and Carolyn to get their act together. Way to go, Deb!
Sarah and Carolyn adore Lady Molly of Scotland Yard and Mary, her devoted friend (servant?). Molly’s like Charlie Cale in Poker Face (if Charlie Cale had more social graces, that is). Molly instinctively knows when people are lying and solves cases that the Scotland Yard guys can’t. Rock on, Molly.
Holmes and Watson are an amazing pair. Sherlock Holmes is a force of nature, and Watson’s a pretty impressive investigator in his own right. Both are terrified of supernatural hounds. To be fair, we’re also terrified of supernatural hounds. We are, however, BIG fans of The Hound of the Baskervilles.
The curse of the Baskervilles is scary stuff, and Dartmoor is terrifying. Until, that is, you realize that Dartmoor is stunning. (Seriously, Arthur Conan Doyle, it’s a lovely area.) Would you move into the Dartmoor family mansion if given the chance? We would. Most definitely, curse or no curse.
Israel Zangwill may not be a household name, but it should be. His 1892 novel, The Big Bow Mystery, is a locked-room mystery set in London’s working-class East End. Two detectives race to solve a murder, an innocent man is condemned, and the solution’s a shocker. (And it’s laugh-out-loud funny.)
We weren’t familiar with locked room mysteries when we started The Big Bow Mystery, but now we’re way into them. Many books have since borrowed the book’s twist ending, but Israel Zangwill did it first. What twist, you ask? Um, you really need to read the book AND listen in!
