The Mysterious Garden Muse

Mention historical crime in Chicago and most people will think of Al Capone , the St. Valentine's Day Massacre , Eliot Ness and the Untouchables , More recent history brings us to serial killers Richard Speck and John Wayne Gacy , or the all-too-common gangland killings that keep today's death tolls high. And then there is the notorious murderer H.H. Holmes , who terrorized women at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair - the Columbian Exposition, killing and disposing of his victims at his "terror castle." Holmes had faded into obscurity until Erik Larson's brilliant book, THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY became a best seller.  (Images and blurbs from Barnes & Noble's BN.com) Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the cou...

Once - in the almost 20 years I lived in Cincinnati - exactly one time I can recall coming across a book set in Clermont County, Ohio, where I lived. (I think it was Susan Donovan's PUBLIC DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION - it's buried somewhere on my many keeper shelves.) Since I moved to Chicago, it's a different story. I already knew of many books set in Chicago, and in the two and a half years I've lived in the city, I've discovered a lot more. For those who love the Windy City - particularly those who also like to read history, mystery, suspense and romance - you might want to give these a shot! Since there are so many good books to choose from, I'm splitting them up by genre. (The book blurbs and book cover images are from Barnes & Noble at Barnesandnoble.com.) Susan Donovan's KNOCK ME OFF MY FEET : Autumn Adams never planned to follow in her mother's footsteps as Chicago's answer to Martha Stewart--she can't cook, doesn't clean, a...

I'm not a fan of winter. It depresses me to see the sun go down in the afternoon, to see endless white and gray where green and colors used to be. No matter how many layers I wear, I'm always cold - or within memory of cold. I can stand in front of a hot radiator, soaking up the heat, but the sound of the wind whistling outside will still make me shiver. I think I'm part bear, primed to hibernate through the long winter and wake up when the bulbs start to bloom. Winter finds me watching more TV than usual (mystery shows, of course), but in winter I always read a lot, too. Even when I'm tired, I'll stay up into the wee hours to finish a book. I'm not a great one for self-analysis, but I've come to realize I respond to winter in specific ways. 1) When it's cold outside, I start compulsively solving Sudokos (sometimes giving myself a headstart by filling in a few blanks with the help of the solved puzzles at the end of the book. It's not a...

I was never in Girl Scouts, but for a short period of time I belonged to a Brownie troop. I think it was while I was a Brownie that I learned this ditty: "Make new friends, but kee-eeep the old. One is silver and the other's gold." At least, that's how I remember the words - not sure how reliable my memory is on song lyrics learned fifty-odd years ago. I bring this up because I recently realized I have a silver-and-gold relationship with books and authors. I'm not sure how it's intended in the song, but I've always taken the lyrics to mean that old friends are precious gold, and new friends are silver. By that token, my golden oldies include Agatha Christie, Mary Stewart, Ngaio Marsh, Doris Miles Disney, Patricia Wentworth, Paul Gallico, Dorothy Eden, Josephine Tey, Martha Grimes, Peter Robinson, P.D. James, Dick Francis, Ian Rankin, Evelyn Anthony, Ray Bradbury and James Thurber. My addiction to the books by many of these authors goes back near...