Story Profile: “How to Get Bloodstains Out of Leather Pants”

Story Profile: “How to Get Bloodstains Out of Leather Pants”

 

Merry Christmas!  I hope that everybody reading this blog has a happy– and healthy– New Year!

 

The annual anthology Best New England Crime Stories is a collection of mysteries set in the New England states.  The authors of the tales don’t have to be from the region, as long as their tales prominently feature these areas.  I have a story in the 2020 edition.

 

While most of the Funderburke mysteries are set in the Milwaukee area, sometimes Funderburke and Nerissa come across crimes as they travel.  In “How to Get Bloodstains Out of Leather Pants,” the duo are attending a weekend conference at a small college in rural Massachusetts.  It’s a scruffy little campus, and not many of the faculty are particularly friendly, though the pair do make friends with a young woman who’s an adjunct in the Popular Culture department, with a specialty in Buffy the Vampire Slayer studies. 

 

When a prominent professor is murdered, it’s up to Funderburke and Nerissa to find out who did it.  But what happens when the killer seems more sympathetic than the victim?

 

Masthead: Best New England Crime Stories is now available in paperback.

Story Profile: “The Heinous Half-Crowns”

 Story Profile: “The Heinous Half-Crowns”

 

In yet another anthology from Belanger Books, there is a pastiche of mine that expands upon the Sherlock Holmes universe.

 

Beyond the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a trilogy of anthologies, all of which center around the earliest volume of Sherlock Holmes short stories, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, consisting of twelve tales.  In each volume of Beyond the Adventures, the original Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stories is reprinted, each followed by at least one and often more newly-written sequels to the classic tale. 

 

My story appears in Volume Three.  “The Heinous Half-Crowns” is a sequel to “The Engineer’s Thumb.”  In the original story, a man is mutilated after he inadvertently uncovers a counterfeiting scheme.  The story’s ending is rare in the Canon, as the villains get away.  Or do they?  In my sequel, the criminals have been caught, but their remaining cache of fake coins is a matter of great concern for the British government, and it’s up to Holmes to save the nation from scandal and financial devastation.

 

Beyond the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Volume Three, and the first two volumes in the series, are all available for purchase in paperback and Kindle editions.

 

–Chris Chan

 

 

Chris Chan’s first book, Sherlock & Irene: The Secret Truth Behind “A Scandal in Bohemia” was released on August 27^thfrom MX Publishing, and is available for sale at Amazon.com and the MX Publishing website, as well as at Book Depository (with free worldwide shipping there).  It is also available in a Kindle edition.

 

Story Profile: “Raguel”

 Story Profile: “Raguel”

 

The Trench Coat Chronicles is a new anthology of murder mysteries where every story has to feature a trench coat in some capacity.  This seemed like an interesting topic, and since my series detective, Funderburke, wears a distinctive long coat that has become a personal trademark.  For a while now, I’ve been plotting a story about how he first got his favorite garment, and it all started with one of his earliest cases as a private investigator.

 

Before he started working at a school, Funderburke was working at a rundown P.I. agency, not quite making ends meet.  He hadn’t started to focus on helping young people in need yet, but “Raguel” is set in a seedy motel, where a teenaged boy is accused of killing his own father.  This kind of investigation is new to Funderburke, but this origin story sets Funderburke on the path to realizing his calling is for helping those who can’t help themselves.

 

The Trench Coat Chronicles is available on Kindle, and the paperback edition will be released soon.

 

 

 

–Chris Chan

 

 

Chris Chan’s first book, Sherlock & Irene: The Secret Truth Behind “A Scandal in Bohemia” was released on August 27^thfrom MX Publishing, and is available for sale at Amazon.com and the MX Publishing website, as well as at Book Depository (with free worldwide shipping there).  It is also available in a Kindle edition.

 

Story Profile: “Intruders at Baker Street”

Story Profile: “Intruders at Baker Street”

 

I have two stories in the anthology The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories: Some More Untold Cases Part XXII: 1887-1897.  Other than “Merridew of Abominable Memory,” the volume includes my story “Intruders at Baker Street,” which is inspired by a reference to the “Darlington Substitution Scandal” in the original Canon.

 

Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson are inextricably linked with 221B Baker Street in the public imagination.  It is very probable that multiple people lived at that famous address before the most famous inhabitants lived there.  Holmes lived at 221B by himself during Watson’s marriage to Mary Morstan, and the sleuthing pair left the premises after Holmes’ retirement.  Someone probably moved in soon after they left, but we have no clue who those people could be.

The thought of anybody but Holmes and Watson living at 221B just seems wrong somehow,  That’s when I got the idea.  What if, at one point during Watson’s marriage, he returned to 221B for a visit and found someone other than Holmes living there?  And what if he had trouble convincing the authorities that the intruders were not the true residents?  Who would supplant Holmes in his own domicile and why?  That was the genesis of “Intruders at Baker Street.”

 

The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories: Some More Untold Cases Part XXII: 1887-1897 is available for sale now from Amazon.com and MX Publishing in both hardcover and paperback.

 

–Chris Chan

 

 

Chris Chan’s first book, Sherlock & Irene: The Secret Truth Behind “A Scandal in Bohemia” was released on August 27^thfrom MX Publishing, and is available for sale at Amazon.com and the MX Publishing website, as well as at Book Depository (with free worldwide shipping there).  It is also available in a Kindle edition.