Sisters in Crime NorCal’s Autumn Authors Showcase When: November 8, 2026, 1-3 pm Where: The Best Book Store, 226 Powell St, San Francisco  Come hear brief readings of 11 just-published books by a lively group of SinC NorCal authors at a fun and funky new bookstore near … [Read more...]

My friend Barbara and I traveled to Split, Croatia, where Book 3 in my Blood & Wool 16th-century mystery trilogy takes place. While there, I learned that Daniel Rodriga was such an important real-life negotiator between Venice and Istanbul that now he’ll be a major secondary … [Read more...]

Lisa Towles writes fast-paced, nail-biter thrillers. The Weight of Cold Things is her latest. She’s also a marketing and publicity professional. Thank you, Lisa, for giving Sisters in Crime NorCal a full morning of how-to at the Santa Cruz Community Center. For many of us, … [Read more...]

Pilar, my daughter, and I took the ferry from Oakland to San Francisco to see SF-MOMA’s fabulous Matisse exhibit. We are both big fans. The exhibit showed and told us how Matisse changed how we see and think of art. We also learned that the shipping cranes that many of us think … [Read more...]

South Bay Interfaith’s Climate Gathering. We met at San Jose’s First Unitarian Church to find ways we all could help halt climate change: Unitarians, Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Zoroastrians. Strength in numbers! We met to help pass CA state climate … [Read more...]

Michelle Chouinard led a number of us mystery writers on an eye-opening walk of San Francisco’s Jackson Square area. We learned that we were walking atop land fill studded with dozens of buried wooden sailing ships. Chouinard told chilling, sometimes crazy tales of murder and … [Read more...]

My amazing, athletic, empathetic psychologist, funny, fine-writer son Ami Strutin-Belinoff died in January 2025. Brian Kwasny, his best friend and beach volleyball partner, organized the second Ami Memorial Beach Volleyball Tournament on the Del Mar/San Diego County beach. Dozens … [Read more...]

I love the Bay Area Book Festival, which sprawls over blocks of downtown Berkeley. It’s exuberant, all kinds of books, authors, readers, publishers, music, food! My friend and fellow author Simi Monheit and I stopped at the Sibylline Press booth, my new publishing home. So well … [Read more...]

SinC NorCal’s annual Spring Authors Showcase highlights our authors’ new books. Held at Book Passage, Corte Madera, each author offered a brief reading. All kinds of mystery genres. I was moderator this year. Next year, I’ll be reading from my 16th-century Deceit in the City of … [Read more...]

Stephen King, in his excellent book On Writing, said, “To write is human, to edit is divine.”  In the May issue of SinC NorCal’s Stiletta—with thanks every issue to editor Margie Bunting—I wrote my take on editing. It’s how I made my living. My favorite of Elmore Leonard’s 10 … [Read more...]