On
The Magic Book podcast,
Rebecca Josephy (Oakland Univ) talks about the collection she edited,
Magic, Magicians and Detective Fiction: Essays on Intersecting Modes of Mystery (McFarland, 2025), on the use of magic and magicians in mysteries, including discussion of impossible crimes and supernatural elements. It analyzes this subgenre's nineteenth-century roots and features reflections on writers such as Canadian-born author
Grant Allen (
An African Millionaire), Japanese writer
Edogawa Ranpo, and American magician-author-editor-illustrator
Clayton Rawson. Josephy, a French literature and detective fiction specialist, contributes an essay on gentleman thief
Arsène Lupin, created by
Maurice Leblanc.
• Read about Josephy's earlier Clues article, "A Study in Daniel: Tracing the Biblical Origins of Sherlock Holmes" (38.1, 2020)
