The author made a reference in ‘Lolita’ to a child who was kidnapped in 1948 and held captive for 21 months. The parallels are unsettling. Nabokov, of course, denied them all.
Sarah Weinman is the author of The Real Lolita and the editor of Women Crime Writers: Eight Suspense Novels of the 1940s & 50s (Library of America) and Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives (Penguin). She covers book publishing for Publishers Marketplace, and has written for the New York Times, the New Republic, the Guardian, and Buzzfeed, among other outlets. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
If you want to understand Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall, you can start by reading Martin Cruz Smith’s Arkady Renko detective series. Sarah Weinman reviews the latest—and says Smith’s stately pacing makes them all the better.
Before Gillian Flynn and Tana French, a whole generation of women writers were pioneering psychological thrillers every bit as good as the crime fiction of Raymond Chandler and Dashiel Hammett. Sarah Weinman, editor of the new anthology Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives, meets Dorothy Salisbury Davis, the last survivor among the trailblazers of domestic suspense.
After a string of disappointing books, the Cold War spymaster is back with a great new novel. Sarah Weinman says our tense times seem to have reinvigorated the legendary writer.
Even after their very public row, Oprah in a PR coup picked Jonathan Franzen’s new novel for her book club. Sarah Weinman on what it means for her ratings, and his sales. Plus 15 other Oprah spats.
Before The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and its sequels, a Swedish couple wrote a series of detective novels (featuring an abused woman) that had an eerie influence on Larsson. Sarah Weinman on the original Scandinavian crime sensation.
In the latest installment of emerging writers to watch, The Daily Beast talks to Charles Yu, whose funny, moving debut novel features a time traveler in search of the truth about his father.
Everyone loves a good murder mystery, but what about the outstanding literature of true crime?
The Today show’s weatherman speaks to Sarah Weinman about realizing his dream to write a mystery novel and why the man with the famous smile is interested in the darker side of things.
In a Daily Beast exclusive, Sarah Weinman uncovers the man behind pseudonymous bestselling mystery writer Spencer Quinn—and it turns out to be Stephen King’s favorite American suspense novelist.