Russell & Holmes Day #2: Wednesday, April 10, Seattle, WA

The day before Left Coast Crime begins, we gather at the LCC hotel, the Hyatt Regency in Bellevue for a day of Russell & Holmes & Laurie King.

This is two days after the 109th anniversary of The Meet, the day when Russell nearly stepped on Holmes on the Sussex Downs, so expect some fun and games around that.

Plans for the Day

Food matters:

Continental breakfast & getting settled

Afternoon snack

No-host lunch (time to stretch your legs & chat)

For dinner, we’ll be helping attendees match up for groups at the many local eateries

Sessions include:

Lockpicking with Matt Burrough: how do Russell & Holmes casually let themselves in to locked doors, closed safes, and the like?

What’s the mystery here? Laurie in conversation with publisher/bookseller/friend Barbara Peters, about their history, their travels together, and about bookselling, past and future.

Laurie R. King on The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, her life in writing, and where she and Russell are going next

Sherlock Holmes, beekeeper. Local beekeeper Eli Ocheltree talks about 20 weird & wonderful things about bees, and how Holmes and deductive reasoning applies to the apiary arts.

And…

Beekeeper Bingo—with prizes!

Exclusive giveaways & swag including: The Russell and Holmes Times, Bellevue: A Newspaper Celebrating “The Beekeeper’s Apprentice” Anniversary Meetups, written and produced by Laurie just for this event. Also, special reprints, art work, and Beekeeper swag you won’t find anywhere else.

Plus, plenty of chat with Laurie and your fellow Friends of Russell

Hotel: If you’re attending LCC (we hope you do!) the conference hotel rate applies for Weds night. PLEASE NOTE: Please don’t book a conference-rate room if you’re not registered, since the hotel may check and be forced to recalculate your cost at check-in.

Places available: 50

Cost: $190. Please note: any profits will go to the Left Coast Crime charity. Full refund up to 2 weeks before, after that we will refund if we can fill your place from the waiting list.

Speakers

Matt Burrough is a devoted locksport hobbyist who has competed multiple times at international lockpicking tournaments. He also co-leads the Seattle Locksport group. During the day, Matt manages a professional red team [Note: testing a corporation’s security by attacking as an enemy]. He holds a bachelor’s degree in networking, security, and system administration; a master’s degree in computer science; and a variety of security industry certifications. He is the author of Pentesting Azure Applications (No Starch Press, 2018) and Locksport (No Starch Press, 2024).

Eli Ocheltree, Journeyman Beekeeper and Executive Director of the SnoKing Beekeepers Association, embraces both the science and the fascination of beekeeping. She definitely understands why Sherlock Holmes turned to beekeeping when he retired to Sussex, and she’ll tell us about it, with hands-on exploration of the craft.

Barbara Peters is known throughout the mystery-writing world as a long-time bookseller, editor, and all-around Friend of Authors. In other words, she knows everyone and everything about the mystery world, and has been a friend of Laurie since the early days of Laurie’s career, and a traveling companion to various parts of the world since then. (She’s also Laurie’s co-author of the definitive guide to Japanese toilets, Not in Kansas Anymore, TOTO.)