Since the 1979 discovery of her work in a slush pile at Little, Brown, Martha Grimes has gone on to publish more than 30 books, win international acclaim (and a Nero Wolfe Award) for her detective series, and develop a following of readers whose loyalty translates to repeated stays on the best-sellers lists. This collection of 10 critical essays provides an in-depth analysis of Grimes' oeuvre, principally the Richard Jury, Emma Graham, and Andi Oliver series. The essays address Grimes' themes of parental abandonment, loneliness, obsession, greed, mistaken and dual identity, the resilience of children, stunted romantic relationships and animal cruelty. Particular attention is paid to her engaging characters, strong sense of place and the comedy, which feature so strongly in her novels.

This unique and timely book presents nine compelling essays on contemporary crime fiction, bringing innovative and fresh perspectives to the analysis of this most popular and vibrant literary genre. Investigating contemporary crime fiction and the critical debates surrounding its reception and production, the introductory chapter sets the scene for the subsequent analyses of distinct crime fiction topics, themes and authors. The topics include the experimental detective narrative, race and ethnicity, historical crime fiction, domestic noir, feminism and crime, environmental crime, and the poetics of place. Authors examined here range from Ian Rankin, Gillian Flynn, Val McDermid, Denise Mina, Robert Galbraith, Nancy Bilyeau, and Martha Grimes, to Tana French, Dale Furutani, and J.G. Ballard, and more. Informed by the latest critical debates and theoretical perspectives in the field, this volume presents an invaluable source of information and criticism on crime fiction for students, researchers and academics alike.

The writers of these chapters are often working with changing assumptions about literary and media interpretations of an American West. Here we see critical approaches to a West that never was, a West of myth so enduring that the myth dominates nearly all artistic representation about this place that never was. In this collection, we see critical approaches to a New West, a West that is a state of mind, not a geographical place but a mythic space with no boundaries and no political inevitabilities. These New Western studies accept the idea of a West that includes Canada, Mexico, Alaska, and, in the case of the US, every geographic and historical point west of the historic founding settlements. The West we study today is a post-West, an idea of the West past the traditional views of an old West dominated by white US nationalism and gendered as uncompromisingly masculine. The idea itself of a single West no longer holds validity. We now understand that all renderings of the West are renderings of multiple Wests; Wests constructed by American nationalists, Wests constructed by EuroAmerican writers and filmmakers, Wests constructed by native peoples, or Wests constructed outside the geographical boundaries of the US. This collection presents an eclectic array of new scholarship ranging freely over the New Wests and Post Wests, dealing with issues such as the literature of a 1950s California West; eco-crime genre fiction; the West of Edward Dorn and the Beat Movement; images of prostitution in California Gold Rush literature; European perspectives on film representations of the first peoples; the six shooter and the American West; German Westerns and Italian Westerns; The Authentic Death of Hendry Jones, by Charles Neider; and films such as The Treasure of Sierra Madre, Into the Wild, There Will Be Blood, and The Last Picture Show. A unique aspect of this collection is the range of writers interpreting the American West in film and literature; besides those writing from within the United States, five of the writers provide international perspectives from the United Kingdom, and the Universities of Tunis, Vienna, and Rome. Each chapter includes a review of scholarship on its subject and an extended bibliography for further research.

The popular mystery writer and her son present a dual account of their struggles with alcoholism and sobriety, a parallel journey marked by poignant episodes of relapse, travel, and friendship.

The murder is in America, but the call goes out to Scotland Yard superintendent Richard Jury. Accompanied by his aristocratic friend Melrose Plant and by Sargeant Wiggins, Jury arrives in Baltimore, Maryland, home of zealous Orioles fans, mouth-watering crabs, and Edgar Allen Poe. In his efforts to solve the case, Jury rubs elbows with a delicious and suspicious cast of characters, embarking on a trail that leads to a unique tavern called The Horse You Came In On…

The essays in this book arise from the premise that Tiger Woods is not simply a phenomenal player but is also an Everyman who has displayed all-too-human foibles and weaknesses. The first half of the collection focuses on Tiger's superman game and how he has affected, and been affected by, the golfing world. Works on the sport that examine this supreme golfer cannot capture the full significance of the Tiger Woods phenomenon, however. Unlike many other talented athletes, Woods has transcended his sport, becoming a cultural icon. In the second half of the book, scholars examine everyman Tiger, illustrating how his life reflects significant and often contentious issues within American culture and the world.

At their basic level, sporting events are about numbers: wins and losses, percentages and points, shots and saves, clocks and countdowns. However, sports narratives quickly leave the realm of statistics. The stories we tell and retell, sometimes for decades, make sports dramatic and compelling. Just like any great drama, sports imply conflict, not just battles on the field of play, but clashes of personalities, goals, and strategies. In telling these stories, we create heroes, but we also create villains. This book is about the latter, those players who transgress norms and expectations and who we label the "bad boys" of sports. Using a variety of approaches, these 13 new essays examine the cultural, social, and rhetorical implications of sports villainy. Each chapter focuses on a different athlete and sport, questioning issues such as how notorious sports figures are defined to be "bad" within particular sports and within the larger culture, the role media play in creating antiheroes, fan reactions when players cross boundaries, and how those boundaries shift depending on the athlete's gender, sexuality, and race.