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Historical Mystery
Date Published: 10-23-2023
Publisher: Level Best Books' Historia Imprint
A historical mystery based on Helms' Derringer Award-nominated EQMM short story "The Cripplegate Apprehension".
In 1843 London, a Scottish woodturner named Daniel M'Naghten gunned down Edward Drummond, the private secretary to Prime Minister Robert Peel, while Drummond strolled the streets of Whitehall. M'Naghten believed he shot the Prime Minister and, after being informed otherwise and making a brief statement at his arraignment, he never spoke in public about the crime again. M'Naghten was represented at trial by firebrand Queen's Counsel Alexander Cockburn, who intended to plead insanity and rewrite four hundred years of English Common Law in the process. In this fictional retelling of the famous historical event, Cockburn recruits legendary London thief-taker Vicar Brekonridge to travel to Glasgow, M'Naghten's home, and find witnesses who can bolster the insanity defense. What Brekonridge finds instead suggests that M'Naghten was part of a frightening conspiracy to bring down the British government.
PRAISE FOR VICAR BREKONRIDGE
"In a seamless blending of historical fact and narrative skill, Richard Helms reimagines the sensational case of Daniel M'Naghten, whose 1843 murder trial set a precedent that reverberates to this day. Helms has crafted a thoroughly gripping historical mystery that will leave readers eager to hear more of the “notorious thief-taker” Vicar Brekonridge.
—Daniel Stashower, Edgar Award Winning Author of American Demon
“VICAR BREKONRIDGE may be one of (Richard Helms’) more intriguing creations...a fascinating character to follow around, as he makes his way through the streets and back alleys of London, through its open air markets and dingy taverns or journeying out to Newgate Prison to visit a man he put there...For all his rough-and-tumble manners, cynical bravado, mercenary motives and sliding scale honesty, in a shady profession not particularly known for its integrity, he struts through the streets of London, a cloud of hemp in his wake, hewing to some inexplicable personal code that betrays a startling even-minded empathy for the criminals he hunts down, and a concern for — of all things — justice, which reminded me of Sam Spade‘s moral ambivalence. “
—Kevin Burton Smith, Thrilling Detective Website
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A lifelong North Carolinian, Richard Helms retired from active practice as a forensic psychologist in 2005, after working in the field for over two decades. At one time, he was the only court psychologist covering four counties in NC. A court-recognized expert in sex crimes and the psychology of sex offenders, mystery writing was an easy transition and a logical next step after Helms left his professional career to become a college professor in Charlotte. He retired from teaching in the summer of 2016 to become a full time writer.
Helms has twenty-two novels in print. His twenty-second novel, A Kind and Savage Place, was published in March 2022 by Level Best Books. He has been nominated eight times for the Private Eye Writers of America Shamus Award (2003 for Juicy Watusi; 2004 for Wet Debt, 2006 for Cordite Wine, 2014 for The Mojito Coast, 2015 for "Busting Red Heads", 2020 for Paid In Spades, 2021 for Brittle Karma, and 2022 for "Sweeps Week") with one win, for Brittle Karma (2021). He has also been nominated eight times for the Short Mystery Fiction Society Derringer Award, and remains one of only two authors (with John Floyd) ever to win that award in two different categories in the same year (2008, for Paper Walls/Glass Houses, published in The Back Alley Webzine; and for The Gospel According to Gordon Black, published at the Thrilling Detective Website).
In 2011, he was nominated for the Derringer Award, the Mystery Readers International Macavity Award, and the ITW Thriller Award for his Pat Gallegher short story The Gods For Vengeance Cry (Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, November 2010), and won the Thriller Award presented at the ITW ThrillerFest in New York City.
In 2015, he was again nominated for three different awards, including the SMFS Derringer Award, the ITW Thriller Award, and the PWA Shamus Award, for his Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine story Busting Red Heads.
From 2007 until 2011, he edited and published The Back Alley Webzine, a hardboiled and noir short story site. Stories published in The Back Alley were nominated for the Derringer Award, the Spinetingler Award, and the Bouchercon Anthony Award.
In 2011 and 2012, he was President of the Southeast Regional Chapter of Mystery Writers of America, and a member of the National Board of Directors of MWA. In August, 2017, at the Killer Nashville Mystery Conference, Helms was presented with the prestigious SEMWA Magnolia Award for his service to the chapter.
In 2020, Helms' short story "See Humble and Die" (The Eyes of Texas, edited by Michael Bracken, Down and Out Book, 2019) was one of twenty selected for inclusion in Houghton Mifflin's Best American Mystery Stories 2020, edited by Otto Penzler and C. J. Box.
"See Humble and Die" was also nominated for the 2020 SMFS Derringer Awards, in the Best Long Story Category. In addition, Helms received a second 2020 Derringer Award nomination in the Best Novelette category for "The Cripplegate Apprehension", from Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. This was the third time Helms has received Derringer Award nominations in two different categories in the same year.
Also in 2020, Helms' fifth Pat Gallegher novel Paid In Spades (Clay Stafford Books, March 2019) was nominated for the PWA Shamus Award and won the Killer Nashville Silver Falchion Award.
In 2021, Helms' third Eamon Gold novel, Brittle Karma, won the PWA Shamus Award in the Best Original Private Eye Paperback category.
In 2022, Helms' Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine story "Sweeps Week" won the PWA Shamus Award in the Best Short Story category, and the Mystery Readers International Best Short Story Macavity Award.
Besides writing, Helms loves gourmet cooking, woodworking, traveling, simracing, amateur astronomy, playing with his grandsons, and rooting for the Carolina Tarheels and Carolina Panthers. For a peek at his non-writing life, check out his other website at www.rickhelms.com
The parents of two grown children, Richard Helms and his wife Elaine live in Charlotte, NC.
Contact Links
Website: www.richardhelms.net
Facebook: www.facebook.com/rickhelms501
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/115904.Richard_Helms
Purchase Link
Amazon: https://a.co/d/1Us1k7F
Giveaway
$5 Amazon Gift Card + eBook Copy
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