This story first appeared in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. Of it, editor Linda Landrigan said, "...Catherine... More > Mambretti...brings to life the period of the early European settlement of America...." Mike Grost (http://mikegrost.com/zbest.htm#A2007) lists the story as a "real detective story" and among the best of the year. < Less

When an ancient church frescoe peels, an even more ancient crime is revealed. Is this why the nun took a vow of silence--so... More > she wouldn't have to confess? This story first appeared in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, April, 2004. < Less

At midnight, as the 12th century becomes the 13th, a sign appears on a church wall--The End is Near. “Painter of the... More > Seven-eyed Beast,” first appeared as the cover story in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, November, 2002 (Vol. 47, No. 11, pp. 98-115, ISSN-000205224). It was a finalist for the Derringer Award that same year. This is a revised version of the story. < Less

In the griddle-hot summer of '52, a Chicago skip tracer chases a teenage runaway down Route 66. He soon discovers that "the... More > highway that's the best" passes through his hometown, where he stops to find out what really happed to his mother after his father hog-tied her and threw in the back of the family one-mule wagon. (This story was accepted for publication in Murderous Intent Mystery Magazine and then in Amazon Shorts before both ceased publication.) < Less

In 1953, if you were the gay defendant in a murder trial, you probably weren't very happy. Rumors about your private life... More > could hang you. A lady librarian juror discovers that she can do the math, even if the crime-lab experts can't. < Less

Forensic experts may think there's no such thing as a perfect crime, but all that means is they've never caught the perfect criminal.

In 1997 a management consultant who looks like Sharon Stone conceives of the perfect crime. There's just one problem: her... More > victim isn't as stupid as she thinks he is. (This story was first published in HandHeldCrime, Issue 12, Feb. 16, 2001.) < Less

"At the Foot" is excerpted from THE EVIL THAT MEN DO, a collection of 8 short stories designed for mobile reading, in... More > particular, cell phones and SmartPhones. The aftermath of the Bosnian War reaches all the way to a century-old resort hotel at the foot of the Rockies, where (of course) something goes horribly wrong. < Less

“The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones” (William Shakespeare). So said Mark... More > Antony at Caesar’s funeral. But even when no one wants to speak ill of the dead, the effects of their evil lives linger forever. These stories explore those lingering aftereffects. In Medieval Catalunya, evil persists on the walls of long-abandoned churches in murals where demons torture saints and martyrs. In Colonial Virginia, native Powhatan bones preserve the tale of genocide. In Post-War Chicago, a P.I. finds evil interred with his mother’s bones, then deduces how the weak are punished for the crimes of the powerful. In the 1990s, a young woman decides there’s no benefit in being more sinned against than sinning.Suitably at the end of this collection, a maid at a resort hotel at the foot of Mount Powhatan uncovers bad memories in the sheets and pillowcases she changes each day—but it’s nothing compared to the evil that stalks the foothills of her Serbo-Croatian homeland. < Less