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Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Crime Fiction Alphabet: Letter N


I have signed up for a second year of The Alphabet in Crime Fiction, a community meme sponsored by Mysteries in Paradise. Each week she'll be expecting participants to produce a post featuring a mystery/crime novel or novelist related to that week's letter. 
I hope our hostess and my fellow alphabet tourists will forgive me for wandering aimlessly about this summer and totally losing my way.  I skipped out on "J," managed to rejoin the group for "K," and got lost again on "L" and "M."  So....we're all ready for "N," are we?  Okay....

N is for Meredith Nicholson (hey!  this could make up for me missing "M" too!).  What do you mean you never heard of Meredith Nicholson?  Why, he's that best-selling author (newspaperman, politician, and diplomat) from Indiana.  Most of his writing focuses on the triumph of young love over various obstacles thrown in its path. This is true, in a way, even of the mystery novel that I read this year.  He was born in 1866 in Crawfordsville and had three books hit the bestseller list:

  • The House of a Thousand Candles (#4 in 1906)
  • The Port of Missing Men (#3 in 1907)
  • A Hoosier Chronicle (#5 in 1912)
Not nearly as well known today as his contemporaries, Booth Tarkington and James Whitcomb Riley, he is, however credited with helping to create a Golden Age of Indiana literature.  (We had a Golden Age of literature here in Indiana?  I never realized.  I mean--I knew about Tarkington and Riley, but can't say I ever thought of them in the same sentence as Golden Age.)  The main reason I know anything at all about Nicholson is that I did a reading challenge (no, really, Bev? you--do a reading challenge? surely not).  And the challenge required that we read one novel set in the state/province where we live.  By chance, I had picked up Nicholson's The House of a Thousand Candles at our library's used book shop sometime last year--so I promptly made that my choice.


For a much better look at Meredith Nicholson than I've given here, please click on his name.  And for a review of The House of a Thousand Candles, please click above.



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7 comments:

  1. AnonymousAugust 21, 2012 at 2:58 PM

    Bev - Now see? I lived right next door so to speak in Illinois for a few years and never knew about Indiana's Golden Age either. Bad Margot! But I am glad you featured Nicholson for this meme. He's an author whose work I've never read and ought to try.

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  2. Peter ReynardAugust 21, 2012 at 10:51 PM

    And I lived in Ohio and Pennsylvania and never knew either. The things ya learn. :)

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  3. CarolAugust 22, 2012 at 10:37 AM

    Add me to the list of people who never knew Indiana had such a rich history, although I did read the other day that 80% of all RV's are made in your state. And why did I think you lived in Kansas?

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  4. ElizabethAugust 22, 2012 at 5:48 PM

    Sounds like a fun thing to do, but I doubt I could keep up.

    Stopping by from the Partners in Crime Host List of Hosts...been here before visiting as well.

    Elizabeth
    Silver's Reviews
    http://silversolara.blogspot.com

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  5. Bev HankinsAugust 22, 2012 at 6:14 PM

    Carol: I have no idea why you thought I lived Kansas. And, no, I don't have a dog named Toto, either. :-)

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  6. Peggy AnnAugust 22, 2012 at 11:27 PM

    Sounds really interesting Bev. Will be on the look out for his books!

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  7. ScottAugust 22, 2012 at 11:38 PM

    Interesting. Goes way back. :)

    ReplyDelete

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