Booktalk: Historical Fiction Writer Marie Benedict’s QUEENS OF CRIME

Host Diana Korte speaks with award-winning novelist Marie Benedict, author of nine books, whose newest title, QUEENS OF CRIME, features the 5 greatest women writers of the Golden Age of Mystery (1920s-1930s) and their bid to solve a real life murder.

That murder is the death of May Daniels, a young English nurse on an excursion to France with her friend, who seemed to vanish into thin air as they prepared to board a ferry home. Months later, her body is found in the nearby woods.

The death has all the hallmarks of a locked room mystery for which these authors are famous: how did her killer manage to sneak her body out of a crowded train station without anyone noticing? If, as the police believe, the cause of death is manual strangulation, why is there is an extraordinary amount of blood at the crime scene? What is the meaning of a heartbreaking secret letter seeming to implicate an unnamed paramour? Determined to solve the highly publicized murder, the Queens of Crime embark on their own investigation, discovering their combined skills and friendship make them stronger together.

Top authors are interviewed on this 10-minute program that captures their words about their books and ideas and often the story behind the story. The show, hosted by Diana Korte and engineered by Gene Korte, is in its 30th year of production.