E.J. Copperman

E.J. Copperman: Inherit the Shoes

by

This is a delicious, funny, perfect book.  Copperman, a seasoned series veteran (Haunted Guest House, Asberger’s, Mysterious Detective, Agent to the Paws, and, as Jeff Cohen, Aaron Tucker and Double Feature) brings all his writing expertise to the table in Inherit the Shoes.  Lawyer Sandy Moss has just moved to California from New Jersey to start over.  On her first day at her new law firm she’s told to sit still and be quiet (she’s new to defense, she’s come from the prosecutor’s side of the table), and, instead of being quiet, she speaks up. read more

The Cozy: a Purely American Art Form

by

In 1962, a woman named Phyllis James sat down and wrote Cover Her Face, the first Adam Dalgleish mystery.  Two years later, in 1964, Ruth Rendell wrote her first Reg Wexford mystery, From Doon with Death.  These two women pulled the golden age format created by Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers into the present, and as they wrote, they deepened the form psychologically, writing darker, more intense and longer books as their careers progressed.  They were the godmothers of what I think of as the contemporary noir police novel, and writers like Jill McGowan, Colin Dexter, Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, Peter Robinson, Elizabeth George and many others have carried it forward. read more