Patricia Carlson taught psychology and statistics at Cornell University and turned some of her experience into her Maggie Ryan mysteries. Maggie is married to an actor and she teaches statistics at the university level in between amateur sleuthing. Carlson also wrote a few books about a deputy sheriff in Nichols County in southern Indiana. She is a past president of Sisters in Crime, the organization that promotes women crime fiction writers, and several of her books have been shortlisted for major awards.

Somewhere in the midst of all this activity, Carlson created one of my all-time favorite fictional characters, Bridget Mooney. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, in the mid-1800s, Bridget became an actress. Her tours take her to different parts of the country and allow her to meet some of the luminaries of the day, usually to her benefit. Bridget is resourceful, determined, and opportunistic, which she learned early was essential to her survival. She only appeared in the occasional anthology and my finding one of her adventures was due to sheer luck until Crippen & Landru Publishers decided to collect them all. I was ecstatic to find the collection; one of the highlights of my conference going days was getting my copy signed by the author.

Renowned Be Thy Grave or the Murderous Miss Mooney (Crippen & Landru, 1998) contains 10 short stories originally published between 1989 and 1998. Each story is followed by a page from Bridget Mooney’s scrapbook, snippets of contemporary letters, newspaper articles, and such that documents the factual basis of the story. In The Father of the Bride, Bridget goes to Washington, DC, where she encounters President Grant and his daughter Nellie who married into the famous Kemble family. Bridget’s adventures there gave her the wherewithal to acquire the training she needed to be successful as an actress, her great ambition.

In The Eighth Wonder of the World, Bridget meets individuals involved in building the Brooklyn Bridge. The political corruption of the time inevitably affected the supply chain for the bridge construction materials, and of course Bridget stumbles into the middle of it all. Along the way the high mortality rate that resulted when the wooden buildings in New York caught fire and the inability of women to own property or take out loans in their names and their resultant victimization are examined.

In other stories such varied historical characters as Jesse James, Thomas Alva Edison, Lillie Langtry, Sarah Bernhardt, and Ida Wells appear, all in the context of their contributions to the social history of the United States during the 1880s.

Impeccably researched, skillfully written, and witty as well as insightful, this collection of stories has been overlooked for far too long. Highly recommended for fans of short crime fiction, historical mysteries and women sleuths.