Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
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Criminal Element is a community website featuring daily content for fans of the crime and mystery genres in all of their forms. The site features original short stories and excerpts from upcoming crime and mystery novels along with daily blog articles.
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
18h ago
Reality doesn’t dovetail with what’d you’d expect from an almost-married couple. Meet the bride and groom: Carrie Reynolds is a nurse at Denver’s Memorial Hospital and Oliver Phoenix is a wealthy entrepreneur. They’re clearly under some strain. Oliver blows off Carrie when she asks to see a wedding gift that he’s just opened. He says ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
18h ago
On a bitingly cold February morning, thirty-one years ago, my wife woke me with an urgent request. “Get this kid outside. He’s been driving me nuts all night.” We were young parents with a one-year-old son. Out I went onto Broadway with a stroller. It was the winter of 1993. Crime, drug abuse and homelessness ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
5d ago
An ICU nurse struggles to stay emotionally detached from a case in Mary Kubica’s latest thriller. Work-life is already challenging for Meghan Michaels, as she balances being recently divorced and being present for her teenage daughter. An apparent suicide arrives at the hospital one day, and the patient, Caitlin, suffers from head trauma and is ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
5d ago
One of the hottest trends in crime fiction is seniors being murdered and/or seniors solving murders. Cheater is set in a San Diego retirement complex populated by considerably affluent retirees. How does the title of Karen Rose’s latest mystery fit the crime? A cheater is “a person who acts dishonestly in order to gain an ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
5d ago
Sisters Libby and Bernie Simmons know very little about quilting, but they’re experts when it comes to catering. Thus, they’re thrilled to be able to provide refreshments for the Longely Sip and Sew Quilting Circle’s first ever exhibition, held at the local library. The eclectic group of quilters is far from what the Simmons sisters ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
1w ago
Annie Adams is despairing of making a go of her writing career when she gets an unusual summons. Her Great Aunt Frances apparently wants her to come up from London to visit the village of Castle Knoll, where Frances has long made her home. Annie and her mother Laura have always been under the impression ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
1w ago
The disparate group of American tourists who make up the Wanderers walking tour through Devon have more in common than you might think. Rick “Chase” Chasen is a recently retired detective from San Diego. He’s happy to be in the company of his old friend, Anglophile Billie Mondreau: she’s an inveterate knitter and a wise ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
1w ago
Debut novelist Brendan Flaherty grew up outside Hartford, Connecticut and later attended Washington University. He earned an MFA from Boston University, where he was the recipient of the Saul Bellow Prize. For a time, Flaherty lived in Hawaii, though he has long since returned to his home state, where he makes his home with his ..read more
Criminal Element - Original crime stories, exclusive excerpts, blog posts, giveaways
1w ago
When I started planning my latest novel, I had nothing but a character and a situation: What if a girl of eleven climbed out her bedroom window one night and, feeling adventurous, went wandering in the woods near her house—only to find the body of a young woman lying in the grass beneath an oak ..read more