Murder Ink – Murder on Broadway

Murder Ink

Murder Ink

Murder Ink – The Grandmother of Mystery Bookstores

For over thirty years the greats lived between 91st and 92nd Streets in New York. Philip Marlowe rubbed shoulders with Nero Wolfe, Mickey Spillane sat beside Dashiell Hammett, and Robert Parker passed the time with Arthur Conan Doyle.

This was no boys club, however. Dame Agatha Christy proudly sat beside Dorothy Sayers, keeping an eye on newcomers like Sue Grafton and Sara Paretsky. And for over thirty years, the mystery community was the better for it.

Murder Ink was the first of its kind; a bookstore specializing in mysteries. Opened in 1972, the store was founded by Dilys Winn, who wrote a novel of the same name. (Mystery Ink: The Mystery Reader’s Companion)

It was later owned by Carol Brener for fourteen years, and became a cornerstone of the mystery book community. One of its employees, Jane Dentinger, became the editor-in-chief of the Mystery Guild, and there was even a brief television show set in the shop, that starred Tovah Feldshuh.

Murder Ink was also home to numerous bookstore cats and at least one wire-haired pointer named Gus. Jay Pearsall, the final owner of Murder Ink, opened its sister bookstore, Ivy’s Books and Curiosities, next door and was married there in 2005.

Since its beginnings in 1972, Murder Ink fostered in similar bookshops such as the San Francisco Mystery Bookstore and M is for Mysteries in the East Bay, but Murder Ink was the grandmother of them all.

She turned off her lights for the last time in December 31, 2006, but if you are in the area of Broadway, between 91st and 92nd on a foggy night, you can still see the chalk outlines.

Get your own copy of Mystery Ink: A Mystery Reader’s Companion at Amazon!

 

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