Dead Yesterday and Other Stories

Mignon Good Eberhart (1899-1996) was for much of the twentieth century one of the best known mystery writers in America. She was both talented and prolific, publishing 59 novels and many short stories in her more than 60-year writing career. Dead Yesterday contains the best of her previously uncollected stories, with tales about the following sleuths: Nurse Sarah Keate, a middle-aged no nonsense nurse who appeared not only in Eberhart s first seven novels, but she also made her rounds as a short-story character in 1930s periodicals. Her acerbic wit and matter-of-fact demeanor defy the dark forces of murder that she encounters in and out of hospital settings. Susan Dare, a saucy young mystery writer, is aided by her journalist friend Jim Byrne. She was exclusively a short story character. James Wickwire, is a rarity in the Eberhart canon -- a male protagonist. An elderly senior vice-president of a bank, Wiickwire is a bachelor whose reputation is incredibly appealing to damsels in distress and others who seek his reluctant assistance in solving crimes. Melvina Standish -- Mel Standish, like Sarah Keate is a nurse. Standish, however, had her solo appearance before Keate. In the earliest (1926) Eberhart work, Mel helps solve a murder at her Chicago Apartment house. Dead Yesterday is edited by Rick Cypert, Professor of English at Nebraska Wesleyan Universit; he is the author of America's Agatha Christie: Mignon Good Eberhart, Her Life and Works (Susquehanna University Press, 2005). His co-editor, Kirby McCauley is a writer, editor, and literary agent and is the editor of Dark Forces: Stories of Suspense and Supernatural Horror and co-editor of Dashiell Hammett's Nightmare Town.