Memes, history and crowd control

Apologies to those who have kindly nominated me for two recent memes - I am not a very meme-y person and I am afraid I could not write a list of things about myself in an interesting form however hard I tried. I hope that you won't mind, therefore, if I default to Brian McGilloway, who is a jolly good writer, and who has posted in fascinating vein six random facts about himself. I couldn't come close. There is another review of his latest book, Gallows Lane, at International Noir Fiction, by the way.
While on the topic of books and reading, Sharon Wheeler asks for recommendations of good historical crime fiction, to "lure her to that side of the genre". She writes that she does not usually like historical crime fiction, but enjoyed "RS Downie's delightful Medicus series, where a beleaguered Roman quack finds the Brits more than a tad troublesome, and CJ Sansom's dark, intense books set during Henry VIII's tumultuous reign and featuring lawyer Matthew Shardlake." I haven't read these two authors, or come to think of it, very much historical (by which I mean pre-1900) crime fiction. Name of the Rose, Daughter of Time (which doesn't really count);one or two Brother Cadafel books, probably a few others that I can't call to mind just now. So I must check back to see if Sharon received some appealing recommendations. (There are already some for Denise Mina's Paddy Meehan series but someone of my age does not call the 1980s "historical").
What is of interest historically (if local to the UK) is what the Romans would have done about the congestion charge, information conveyed by the peerless Mary Beard. Their solution would not have worked for Kings Cross underground station, which in terms of (pedestrian) crowd control is truly dreadful, and evidence of a total absence of planning, care or thought about what would happen to this already overstretched venue when the St Pancras International Eurostar terminal opened. Make passengers' daily life a serious form of torture, that's what.

Comments

[Dave Lull]

Michael E. Grost says that "Lillian de la Torre's short stories about Dr. Sam Johnson are the ancestors of much of today's historical mystery fiction. Real life personages and events are often woven into these stories, and there is a great deal of historical atmosphere and dialogue. Unusual aspects of 18th Century law enforcement are often worked into the tales."

http://members.aol.com/MG4273/unalign.htm#Torre

[ksmith]

my reaction to memes is similar to yours Maxine - see my blog today - they do tend to leave me a bit cold. I can usually think of the answers to the questions - and ones that say "copy out something from page 147 of the nearest book" are pretty easy; it is passing the baton on which I find hard. Who to victimize? who will think less of me if I choose them?

[Maxine]

Yes, Kerrie, and you can't use Brian's excuse for not linking to "victims" (he's too lazy), as anyone can tell from reading your blog that lazy is one thing you definitely are not!