When plotting a murder (figuratively speaking), the mystery writer has at hand any number of M.O.s, including such tried and true conventions as the locked room, the unbreakable alibi, the double bluff, and the mistaken identity. Now, in Murderous Schemes, renowned mystery writers Donald E. Westlake and J. Madison Davis offer an illuminating look at eight such mystery conventions, illustrating each with four short stories written by some of the masters of the form. The resulting collection of thirty-two tales spans a hundred and fifty years of crime fiction and includes virtually every style...

From characters, animals and buildings to officals, geographic locations, and much more, 'The Shakespeare Name Dictionary' is the complete guide to names in all of Shakespeare's plays.

Conversations with Robertson Davies is a long overdue anthology of interviews with Canada's most respected literary figure. Journalist, essayist, reviewer, playwright, and novelist, Robertson Davies has not only been a leading figure in Canadian literature since World War II, but, since the publication of Fifth Business in 1970, he has become known throughout the world.

Conversations with Robertson Davies will be of interest both to the student of Canadian literature and culture and to the scholar examining Davies's plays and novels as well as to the general reader who...

These 32 classic crime stories illuminate the genre's best-known plot constructions--including the locked room, the caper, hoist on their own petards, and over the edge. Covering over 150 years of crime and detective fiction, featuring styles from the hard-boiled to the cozy, Murderous Schemes profiles the writing of Agatha Christie, Ellery Queen, Rex Stout, Dorothy L. Sayers, Edgar Allan Poe, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and many others.