This is the story of a father seen through the eyes of a son who grew up in his shadow. A father who in late 1940 was quite suddenly thrust into notoriety consequent upon the vagaries of a congenital heart condition and a Luftwaffe bomb; this shunted him from Nuevo Riche café owner's. son to shop floor worker at the Austin Motor Company. Ironically fate interceded once again when shortly after completing National Service the son joined him there in 1957 working on the other side of the fence, after motor magnate Sir Leonard Lord sponsored him as an undergraduate trainee at the Austin.

For the first time in one place, Roger M. Sobin has compiled a list of nominees and award winners of virtually every mystery award ever presented. He has also included many of the “best of” lists by more than fifty of the most important contributors to the genre.; Mr. Sobin spent more than two decades gathering the data and lists in this volume, much of that time he used to recheck the accuracy of the material he had collected. Several of the “best of” lists appear here for the first time in book form. Several others have been unavailable for a number of years.; Of special note, are Anthony Boucher’s “Best Picks for the Year.” Boucher, one of the major mystery reviewers of all time, reviewed for The San Francisco Chronicle, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and The New York Times. From these resources Mr. Sobin created “Boucher’s Best” and “Important Lists to Consider,” lists that provide insight into important writing in the field from 1942 through Boucher’s death in 1968.? This is a great resource for all mystery readers and collectors.; ; Winner of the 2008 Macavity Awards for Best Mystery Nonfiction.

Discussing the ways in which the mystery novel reveals the fabric of fears and fantasies behind American culture, Winks argues that detective fiction, in its high seriousness, is a bit like a religion, in pursuit of truths best examined at a distance.