The Cozy Mystery List Blog

Cozy Mystery (and Other Favorite) Books, Movies, and TV

Another author I haven't read… yet…

I just added a new author to my list:  Shirley Rousseau Murphy. I belong to a forum, and some of the posting members thought that her Joe Grey Cat Mystery series should have been on my cozy site. I haven’t read any of her books yet, but when I looked her up, yes indeed, her books look like they qualify as cozy.

I know that I have said this before, but I always enjoy hearing about a new author who has a lot of books out. By "new" I mean new to me. Isn’t it fun when you find an author who has… let’s say… seven books out already?

An example of this comes to my mind… When I "discovered"  M. C. Beaton, I started by reading her Agatha Raisin series. It took me a little while to "catch up" with the recently released, and I got a lot of enjoyment from reading those books.  When I read the synopsis of her Hamish Macbeth books, they simply didn’t interest me. I had found, in the past, that when I was a devoted fan of one of an author’s series, I generally didn’t like the other series that author wrote. That had happened on several occasions.

Anyway, I finally "made" myself read the first Hamish Macbeth book. I could NOT believe I had been putting that series off! I absolutely loved it! (And still do!) As a matter of fact, I have found that I much prefer the recent Hamish books over the recent Agatha books. 

House of Cards Trilogy

The House of Cards Trilogy is one of the finest BBC productions set in “modern days” that I can think of.  Although the trilogy started in 1990,  it doesn’t seem at all dated to me. There are, of course, concrete things like the use of cassette recorders and the absence of today’s ever-present cell phones that double as cameras, but, for me, those types of props don’t make a story line outdated/obsolete.

This political thriller/drama stars Ian Richardson as Francis Urquhart, the deliciously evil, ambitious Chief Whip of the Conservative Party. Do not worry about becoming lost with regards to the British political system… Francis Urquhart provides a lot of information in his wickedly clever asides to the camera.

The trilogy follows Urquhart as he schemes, ruins, manipulates, back stabs, charms, corrupts, uses, destroys, conspires, flatters, (and any other adjectives that you can think of when you think of the lowest of the lows) his way up the British political ladder. Ian Richardson is absolutely delightful to watch!

I have to admit that of the three series that make up this trilogy, the first one… rightfully named “House of Cards” is by far my favorite. The second series (“To Play the King“) brings in one of my favorite actors (Michael Kitchen), who, as the Prince of Wales seems very familiar to us.  “The Final Cut“ is the third part, and, it is by far my least favorite series of the trilogy.

Others might find the second or third parts of the trilogy the best parts….. “You could think that, but of course, I could never comment.”     

If you would like to see more TV and Movies suggestions, click here.

Too Many Lists… So Little Space… A Whole Lot of Time…

I have been working on the Edgar Awards for the last few days, and am not sure that I am going to continue. You know, they started in 1946, and with as many awards as they give out each year, and with as many nominations, that’s a lot of information.

So, right now I am contemplating just going back to the year 2000… for listing all of the nominated mystery authors and people who have helped foster the mystery genre. I am thinking that from 1946 to 1999, I will just list the winners.

The problem I have with the above mentioned solution to my problem of too many lists, is that I truly believe that all nominated people and works of mystery are winners. If you are nominated for such a prestigious award, then you truly are a winner, and deserve to be celebrated.

And, as I type up each year’s nominations and winners….. I am amazed at how many of them are familiar to me. I would hate to think that because I think that the space on this website is limited, that I didn’t include a nominated person, book, movie, TV show, ETC,  that truly did help make "the mystery" flourish.

As you can probably see from reading this blog, I am no closer to deciding what to do. Of one thing, I am sure: I should get back to work on the Edgar Awards right now!

Edgar Allan Poe or Edgar Awards?

As I said in an earlier blog, I am going to try to make my way through all of the awards that are presented to mystery authors and their books…….. There are many more than I was aware of!

Today, I am writing about the Edgar Allan Poe Awards, or the more commonly called "Edgar Awards." They are awarded by the Mystery Writers of America, for works in several different mystery genres.

The different categories are : Best Novel, Best First Novel, Paperback Original, Biographical/Critical Fact Crime, Young Adult, Juvenile, Best Short Story, Motion Picture Screenplay, Play/TV Episode/Teleplay, the Robert L. Fish Memorial, the Raven Award, the Mary Higgins Clark Award, and the Grand Master Award.

The Awards are presented in April of each year, and are for works that were published the previous year. I am just finding all of the winners and nominees, and by the looks of it, it is going to take me a while to get them all listed on the awards page. I will, however, get it done…. eventually… The awards go back as far as 1946!

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