J.C. Bernthal on Agatha Christie, Best Part of the Book podcast.

J. C. Bernthal, author of Agatha Christie: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction, will discuss the life, work, and enduring popularity of Christie as well as his experiences as a Christie fan and challenges in writing the book on the Mar 14 episode of The Best Part of the Book, McFarland and Co.'s podcast. I edit the companion series. 

Take 25% off the Christie Companion with coupon code BESTPART on the McFarland website.

Poison and espionage.

On the Spy Museum's SpyCast, host Andrew Hammond discusses the role of poison in espionage (such as with Alexander Litvinenko) with Neil Bradbury, professor of physiology and biophysics at the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, and author of A Taste for Poison: Eleven Deadly Molecules and the Killers Who Used Them.

The wide effects of art theft.

On the International Spy Museum's SpyCast, historian Andrew Hammond talks with Robert Wittman, a founder of the FBI's Art Crime Team who has recovered more than $300 million of stolen art and similar items over the course of his career, including a Rodin sculpture. Wittman discusses some of his past experiences that often involved undercover work and states that 90 percent of art thefts in U.S. museums were found to be inside jobs.

Sherlock Holmes through an ethical lens.

Tom Fox of the Adventures in Compliance Podcast looks at Arthur Conan Doyle's The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes through an unusual lens, "review[ing] each story and min[ing] them for leadership, compliance, and ethical lessons." He notes, "The Sherlock Holmes stories, including 'The Adventure of the Yellow Face,' offer valuable leadership lessons and shed light on societal issues of the Victorian era." For a rundown of the episodes, go here.

Mysterious Journey: "Poirot and the Body on the Train."

A new episode of Mysterious Journey, a podcast of short radio plays produced by the Artists' Ensemble Theater (IL), is "Poirot and the Body on the Train" (based on Agatha Christie's "The Plymouth Express"). A body is found under a train seat, and Hercule Poirot is called upon to investigate.

Literature & Film in Lockdown: Rear Window.

 

Thelma Ritter, James Stewart, and Grace Kelly in Rear Window (1954).

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Notre Dame's Kylemore Book Club conducted the virtual series "Literature & Film in Lockdown," with one episode on Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window as "a film about being in lockdown."

Another library podcast with mystery short stories.

William Faulkner by Carl Van Vechten.
Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Div

The Elmhurst (IL) Public Library offers the Storytime for Grown-Ups podcast. The following mystery-related stories have been read on the podcast:

• "Wasps' Nest" by Agatha Christie
  
• "The Landlady" by Roald Dahl (Edgar winner, Best Short Story)
  
• "Poison" by Roald Dahl
  
• "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner
  
• "Wikipedia Brown" by B. J. Novak
• "The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe
  
• "Here Lies Another Blackmailer" by Bill Pronzini
• "The Hangman" by Ian Rankin
  

Podcast with Bramah, Morrison, Orczy mysteries.

Arthur Morrison. NYPL

Staff of the Saint Paul (MN) Public Library have initiated the Adult Storytime Podcast with the following mystery readings:

• "The Lenten Croft Robberies" by Arthur Morrison (with detective Martin Hewitt, 1894)

Ernest Bramah

• "The Coin of Dionysus" by Ernest Bramah (with blind detective Max Carrados, 1913)

Baroness Orczy

• "The York Mystery" by Baroness Orczy (with the Old Man in the Corner, 1902)

 

 

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

• Update, September 24, 2020. Episode 4, "The Horror of the Heights" by Arthur Conan Doyle (1913)

I Spy.

The International Spy Museum in DC holds regular "SpyCasts" with cloak-and-dagger guests; recent podcasts feature Milt Bearden, a former CIA station chief; Jonna Hiestand Mendez, a former head of the CIA's Office of Technical Services (which develops gadgets, among other things); and Tony Mendez, who extracted six Americans from Iran with the help of the Canadian Embassy during the 1979 hostage crisis.