The Next Margaret

Long out of print and no longer considered part of the official "canon" of the series, the entirety of this short novella was absorbed into a much-expanded novel Another Margaret (2015). We first meet Miranda "Randy" Craig as she returns to grad school to do an MA in English literature at the University of Alberta. Her decision is motivated by the discovery of a new "Great Canadian Author," Margaret Athers, whose second novel, Two for Joy, reads like "Pynchon and Thurber and Stoppard and Calvino all rolled into one." Athers is reported to be a reclusive figure who can only be contacted through her publisher, but all is not as it seems. Soon, Randy must use her literary deductive skills to prove that the Department of English is harbouring a killer. The story set the pattern (or running joke) of Randy Craig as the polar opposite of those "Ivory Tower" academic mystery series. Randy, like a great many brilliant minds in academe today, never quite lands that coveted tenure-track position. Instead, she moves from job to job on the periphery of the university system — with a real knack for finding trouble wherever she goes!