William J. Palmer is the author of seven novels, four in the “Mr. Dickens” series of Victorian murder mysteries, andThe Wabash Trilogy, three novels–a sports novel, a crime novel, a comic novel–set in the Wabash river valley of Indiana. He has also written three books of film history covering the 1970s, 80s, and 90s as well as two books of literary criticism. He is the former editor of the critical quarterlyModern Fiction Studies and is Professor Emeritus at PurdueUniversity in West Lafayette, Indiana