Ashland Mystery:  How To Be Your Own Detective on January 13th, 2005

 

Next up on Ashland Mystery is Librarian Investigator Amy Blossom on January 13th at 7p in the Ashland Public Library.  She will reveal insider tips on How To Be Your Own Detective and give you some of the secrets of her trade.  Blossom is expert at tracking down what you need to know -- for personal research and if you are writing your own mystery!  Find out what is publicly available about you or the person you want to research -- motor vehicle records, tax information, reverse directories, credit reports.  She'll also cover style and writing guides and techniques for researching the setting and environment for the mystery you are writing.

 

Blossom recommends several titles to give you a good feel for the complexity of information science in today's (or yesterday's) world:  Larry Beinhart's The Librarian is a mischevious look at the last election and how librarian David Goldberg becomes an unlikely hero, and unearths a global conspiracy. You'll recall that Beinhart wrote the book that became the movie, Wag the Dog.  The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown is set in the Louvre and features a cryptographer and a symbologist who penetrate the veil of history to uncover some of the greatest mysteries of western civilization.  A contemporary classic full of signs, symbols and the intricacies of Revelations is Umberto Eco's Name of the Rose published in 1980 -- an Italian murder mystery set in a 1327 Benedictine monastary. And for a lighter and very modern read, try Charlaine Harris' whimsical Aurora Teagarden mysteries.

 

Ashland Mystery features mystery writers and readers of the Rogue Valley on the second Thursday of every month. The lecture series is sponsored by the Ashland Mystery Readers Group, Friends of the Ashland Public Library and Bloomsbury Books.  

Missed one of the mystery lectures?  No problem! Enjoy Ashland Mystery, rvtv noir hosted by Maryann Mason every Wednesday at 7:30pm on Rogue Valley Television, cable access channel 31. For more information contact the Ashland Mystery Readers Group at 541-552-0743, maureen@booksandoldlace.com or www.booksandoldlace.com/