Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 129, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 787 & 788, March/April 2007

Blog Bytes by Ed Gorman

Copyright © 2007 Ed Gorman

From the cozy to the hardboiled:

The following Agatha Christie site is one of the best organized and laid out I’ve seen. Christie’s output was so prodigious it requires skill to present it in a simple coherent fashion. The types of mysteries and suspense novels she chose to write, her various triumphs as a playwright, her characters, her familiar themes — it’s all here. Her history and her output are presented with such vitality that you think Dame Agatha may still be with us — hiding behind the curtain and sneaking a peek at us now and then. This site demonstrates the kind of important and impressive scholarship one can do on the Internet. www.twbooks.co.uk/ authors/achristie.html

The Gumshoe Site, written and edited by Jiro Kimura, is filled with current news about the field in virtually every aspect, from awards to conventions to notable obituaries. Jiro also writes a column called “What’s Cool” that points us to books and stories we might otherwise miss. Great information and a fun tour through the mystery world. www.nsknet.or.jp/~jkimura

Black Mask Magazine. “The namesake of this site, Black Mask Magazine is the pulp magazine that launched a thousand pulp-fiction dreams. This site will also incorporate Dime Detective, Dime Mystery, Strange Detective Mysteries, Terror Tales, Horror Stories, Adventure, and Famous Fantastic Mysteries, but great as they all were, Black Mask Magazine still reigns supeme, holding a unique place in our hearts and in American popular culture.” Publisher-editor Keith Alan Deutsch has created a site not just for noir lovers but also for fans of pulp fiction in general. Interviews with the men and women who wrote for the pulps, stories from the era itself, and Deutch’s enthusiastic promotion of Black Mask make this essential reading for pulp fans. www.black maskmagazine.com/blackmask.html

Ed Gorman’s own blogs appear on www.mysteryfile.com.