At the moment, my desk is covered with various reference works I’m using on the latest pass through my second, as yet untitled mystery, a follow-up to O’ Artful Death, about an art historian who specializes in gravestone art and mourning objects. They are, from top to bottom: A book of epitaphs from New England gravestones called Epitaphs to Remember collected by Janet Greene (page 32: “Molly tho’ pleasant in her day / Was suddenly seized and went away / How soon she’s ripe, how soon she’s rotten / Laid in her grave and soon forgotten”); The Collector’s Encyclopedia of Hairwork Jewelry by C. Jeanenne Bell (Page 10: “In the sixteenth century it became fashionable for widows to wear rings that were embellished with skulls or death’s heads”); the excellent Howdunit: How Crimes are Committed and Solved, edited by John Boertlein (page 28: “The responsibility of the first officer at the scene of a crime is to preserve its integrity until the patrol supervisor can arrive”). Also: the aforementioned, untitled novel, in manuscript form, distressingly unfinished; an extremely large bowl of paper clips (various colors); nail polish (Cover Girl Cabernet Frost); a cat (white and gray, of an embarrassingly fancy breed, who...