The Lineup

The World's Greatest Crime Writers Tell the Inside Story of Their Greatest Detectives

By Edited by Otto Penzler (Trade Paperback, 2010)

A great recurring character in a fictional series you love becomes an old friend. You learn about their strange quirks and their haunted pasts and root for them every time they face danger. But where do some of the most fascinating sleuths in the mystery and thriller world really come from?

What was the real-life location that inspired Michael Connelly to make Harry Bosch a Vietnam vet tunnel rat? Why is Jack Reacher a drifter? How did a brief encounter in Botswana inspire Alexander McCall Smith to create Precious Ramotswe?

In THE LINEUP, some of the top mystery writers in the world tell about the genesis of their most beloved characters--or, in some cases, let their creations do the talking.

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- Format: Trade Paperback
- Price: $15.99 US/$17.99 CAN
- ISBN-13: 9780316031943
- On Sale Date: 11/18/2010
- Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
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Formats Available: Trade Paperback, Electronic Book
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In THE LINEUP, some of the top mystery writers in the world tell about the genesis of their most beloved characters--or, in some cases, let their creations do the talking.

Otto Penzler is the proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, the editor of many mystery anthologies, and co-author of The Encyclopedia of Mystery and Detection, for which he won an Edgar Award. He lives in New York.

"The best book of its kind.... An exciting omnibus volume that has widespread appeal and adds up to much, much more than the sum of its parts....delivering memorable revelations about the mystery genre and its different incarnations....Candor is no small part of this collection's great value. Time and again these crime writers return to the same questions: Is your character like you? Where did the character's name come from? How did you get published? The answers are always interesting." (New York Times).