Mystery and suspense on the Internet.

It was a dark and stormy night. You are alone. You're surfing the net to keep your mind occupied. When all of a sudden, the power goes out and your computer crashes! If that's not scary enough, try some of these sites to keep the blood coursing through your veins over the holiday season.

Alfred Hitchcock: The Master of Suspense (http://nextdch.mty.itesm.mx/~plopezg/Kaplan/Hitchcock.html) is an excellent source for everything you've always wanted to know about the man. From biographical information to his sources of inspiration, this site has it all. You can also find reviews of his films and current television listings for Hitchcock programs. Alas, there was no reproduction of the famous Hitchcock profile.

The Sherlock Holmes Museum (http://www.sherlock-holmes.co.uk) is an interesting site. It contains the menu from Hudson's, the restaurant in the bottom of 221b Baker Street. It sells novelties such as horsebrasses and deerstalker hats from the museum gift shop. There is a Sherlock Holmes quiz that contains ten multiple choice questions and it automatically scores you. You can find Holmes' resume under the Links section. The guest book provides interesting reading in itself with entries and comments from fans all over the world.

The Mysterious Homepage (http://users.aol.com/bchrcon97/mysteris.htm) is a huge site with links to general sites, conferences, publishers, magazines, organizations, film and television, mailing lists, and mystery games on the internet among other sections. There are links to specific characters such as James Bond, Nancy Drew, Rumpole, and Columbo. This is the site to start at if you are looking for any resources on the genre.

NowTV! Murder Mysteries (http:/nowtv.com/mystery/index.htm) has a few selections from which to choose. I stayed with the text only options and found them to be amusing interactive fiction. Along the same lines is the Mystery Corner (http://www.cruzio.com/~mystcor/mcor.htm) which is an interactive mystery or as the graphic on the page says a "murder u wrote".

ClueLass HomePage (http://www.slip.net/~cluelass/) is a cleverly constructed page. There is an extensive listing of fiction award winners as well as helpful sites for those trying to break into publishing. The sections regarding factual (Cybercrime) and fictional sites (Black Widow's Web) are noteworthy. Short annotations make useful comments about the links. There are even frequently asked questions about mysteries.

Genre Fiction: Mystery and Suspense (www.vmedia.com/shannon/mystery.html) has a clear listing of major mystery authors and their homepages, but what is unique about this site is its listing of sites that can be used in the teaching about the genre. Although they link to gopher sites, the information is in a methodical form that any instructor would find useful.

Dr. Cecil Greek at the University of South Florida has provided lecture notes for his class Crime and Media (http://www.fsu.edu/gradc&m.html). Reel Cops (www.fsu.edu/~crimdo/lecture6.html) traces how police and detectives have been portrayed in movies and television over the years. From 1910 to the present, he describes how society's concerns over crime have been reflected in the media portrayal of law enforcement. Hollywood Lawyers (http://www.fsu.edu/~crimdo/lecture8.html) provides the same treatment of lawyers.

The Crime Writers of Canada (http://www.swifty.com/cwc/cwchome.htm) is a must for the Canadian mystery fan. The site has the definitive listing of members' publications as well as winners of the Arthur Ellis Awards going back to its inception. There is also a table of contents for the association's cookbook, Dishes To Die For. Excerpts from the newsletter Fingerprints are provided including interviews with major Canadian authors such as L. R. Wright, Gail Bowen, Eric Wilson, and Max Haines.

The Mystery Zone (http://www.mindspring.com/~walter/mystozne.html) is billed as the Web's first magazine of mystery, suspense and crime fiction. Totally free, this site provides everything you would expect in a regular print magazine including short stories, reviews, articles about authors, and letters from readers but in addition it has links to other sites and free images to download for wallpaper on your computer.

Twists, Slugs and Roscoes: A Glossary of Hardboiled Slang (http://www.io.org/~buff/slang.html) is an alphabetical listing of lingo used in crime and mystery fiction. Compiler William Denton has read through major works and picked out unique words and phrases that have littered the genre. Citations to sources are provided.

Time for me to be getting on my flogger and taking a powder.