Nancy Barr Mavity

A legendary newspaper reporter and feature writer for the Oakland Tribune for more than a quarter of a century, Nancy Barr Mavity (1890–1959) also served as the literary editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. She wrote numerous newspaper and magazine articles on various subjects in addition to producing fiction and nonfiction books, most notably her series of mystery novels featuring crime reporter James Aloysius “Peter” Piper: The Tule Marsh Murder, The Body on the Floor, The Other Bullet, The Case of the Missing Sandals, The Man Who Didn’t Mind Hanging, and The Fate of Jane McKenzie.

Randal S. Brandt is a librarian at the Bancroft Library, the primary special collections library at the University of California, Berkeley. He catalogs rare books and has been dubbed “UC Berkeley’s Crime Librarian” for his role as curator of the California Detective Fiction Collection.