Parade-Book_List_101_Best_Mystery_Books_of_All_Time-11-14-2021

To craft a list of the 101 best mysteries of all time, the first thing you
must do is define “mystery,” a genre we believe puts its emphasis on
solving a puzzling event—often a crime or murder but not always. If it’s set
in London and there’s fog and a man named Sherlock, you’re on solid
ground. Otherwise, the line between the best mystery book and the best
thriller, suspense or spy novel is a murky one indeed.
In this batch, we’re favoring both ongoing series and stand-alone stories,
where the puzzle of a crime drives the plot more than a race against time.
You’ll find classic locked-room mysteries, amateur detectives, cops on the
beat and a few curve balls to keep you on your toes. Oh, and we’re
sticking to one title per author, so you won’t find five Agatha Christies or
Ruth Rendells here—just one legendary book that stands in for their body
of work.
To help us narrow down the list to the absolute best mystery novels, we
reached out to acclaimed and bestselling authors, bookstores around the
country that love murder mystery, critics who review detective novels and
the like. We’ve even scoured crowd-sourcing sites like Goodreads to see
what you’ve loved the most.
Whether you’re looking for the perfect murder mystery set in your vacation
destination, a classic to recommend to a book club or a great spooky
series to dive into, it’s all here. Grab your magnifying glass, your library
card and a pen and paper—you’ll want to take notes! Leave a comment
telling us which books on here you love, which you’re dying to read and
which ones you are astonished to find missing.
The 101 Best Mystery Books of All Time
Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
Of course the Queen of Crime would top the list. (Not that it’s in any
particular order!) But which Christie to choose? On Goodreads, the various
rankings of best mystery books feature more of her titles than the body of
a gangster-turned-rat has bullet holes. Should we choose The Murder At
The Vicarage, her amusing introduction of Miss Marple? Christie’s
groundbreaking The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd? Heck, her stand-alone
puzzler And Then There Were None is probably the bestselling mystery of
all time, with more than 100 million copies sold. But we chose Hercule
Poirot’s Murder On The Orient Express. The solution to the crime is so
elegant, so simple and so audacious we imagine every other mystery
writer alive that read it smacked their foreheads and said, “Why didn’t I
think of that?”
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Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley
When it comes to a series, we gravitate to the first title because, well, if a
series is great, that’s where you want to start. No series is greater than the
Easy Rawlins books, launched in 1990 about an African-American private
investigator and WWII vet. The series has it all: great mysteries, a great and
complex hero and—as the books unfold and document decades in L.A.—a
great history of life in America as rich and ambitious as the U.S.A. trilogy by
John Dos Passos or August Wilson’s Century Cycle. At its core is this
mystery: How does a Black man survive in America with his dignity intact?
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Reflections, Inspired Novels and More
The Bat by Jo Nesbø
Nordic noir, where have you been all our lives? The flood of marvelous
mystery and suspense books from chilly Oslo and its sister cities is one of
the great joys for fans of the best mystery books around, whatever their
accent. Nesbø’s Harry Hole is the latest in a long line of sleuths who are
train wrecks in their personal (and often professional) lives. Ironically, in this
first Hole story, the Oslo inspector is consulting in Sydney, Australia. Not to
fear: Australia has its fair share of serial killers and deep-dark secrets. Yes,
this could just as easily be in thrillers, but watching Hole track down his
prey by worrying about every stray clue like a dog with a bone is very
satisfying.
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the New Mystery Books You Should Read
The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley
“Possibly the most influential crime novel of the past half-century, and
probably the best private eye novel ever written—in a world blessed with
Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett,” says Otto Penzler, proprietor
of The Mysterious Bookshop. The poetry of the prose, he says, transcends
the complex plot in which C.W. Sughrue (pronounced ’Shug’ as in sugar,
honey, and ‘rue’ as in rue the goddamned day”), is hired to find a missing
author but winds up searching for a girl who’s been missing from Haight-
Ashbury for a decade. “Best line? There are a dozen, including the best
opening line since Rebecca. But my favorite is ‘Nobody lives forever,
nobody stays young long enough.’”
Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon
Down below on this list, author Leon offers pithy praise for the legendary
Ruth Rendell’s classic Judgement In Stone. She needn’t toot her own horn
because so many others will do it for her. Leon’s bestselling Commissario
Brunetti books will have you falling in love with the city of Venice and her
decent, redoubtable hero. The 31st book is on its way in 2022, but Leon
nailed her cultured, thoughtful and usually successful protagonist right at
the start: “His clothing marked him as Italian. The cadence of his speech
announced he was Venetian. His eyes were all policeman.” Grab an
espresso, sit down and savor.
The Seven-Per-Cent Solution by John H. Watson M.D. (as
edited by Nicholas Meyer)
We could make a list of the 100 best mystery novels about Sherlock
Holmes not written by Arthur Conan Doyle and it would be shockingly
good. Indeed, you’ll find a few of them on here, including this one, The
Seven-Per-Cent Solution. It’s the granddaddy of them all. There’s the frank
treatment of drug addiction alluded to in the canon and the clever weaving
of real-world figures like Sigmund Freud. Pure joy for fans who never
imagined they would learn more about the world’s most famous private
investigator.
Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell
Do you love TV shows like C.S.I.? You can thank Cornwell and her greatest
creation: Medical examiner Kay Scarpetta, who’s a bit like Jack Klugman’s
Dr. Quincy of TV fame, just turbocharged with the latest tech. Twenty-five
books and counting feature Scarpetta tracking down killers, cutting
through office politics and dealing with a cranky but brilliant niece, not
always in that order. On the side, Cornwell also spent years researching
Jack the Ripper and delivered her own solution to the coldest case of
them all. Scarpetta means “little shoe,” but Cornwell is leaving a big imprint
on the genre.
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The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett
Why not The Maltese Falcon or Red Harvest or a number of other
Hammett classics? Because none of his other books spawned a cottage
industry quite like the irresistible husband-and-wife team of Nick and Nora
Charles. They drink, they banter, they drink, they outwit criminals and the
police, they drink some more and when the bottle runs dry, they reluctantly
get around to solving the murder. The book led to the classic films starring
William Powell and Myrna Loy and that led to everything from the TV
shows Hart To Hart and Moonlighting to charming copycat mysteries
featuring Mr. and Mrs. North and far too many more to mention.
Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem
Is this even a curveball? The acclaimed novel by Lethem features a noir-ish
mystery worthy of the movie Chinatown, an unexpected protagonist in
detective Lionel Essrog (who lives with Tourette’s syndrome) and dazzling
wordplay we’re unaccustomed to finding in the just-the-facts-ma’am world
of crime fiction. The result is a classic that embraces and enlivens the
genre. The Crime Writers Association agreed: they gave Motherless
Brooklyn its top prize—the Gold Dagger—in 2000. (It also won the National
Book Award, but that honor doesn’t have a body count requirement, so
who cares, right?)
A Christmas Journey by Anne Perry
Perry is prized for her historical detective fiction featuring the likes of
Thomas Pitt, William Monk and most recently her between-the-wars
protagonist Elena Standish. But in 2003, Perry pulled off her own heist in
plain sight by stealing Christmas. Starting with A Christmas Journey, Perry
has made a tradition of holiday mayhem and for many fans, December
wouldn’t be the same without a new one. Eggnog, It’s A Wonderful Life on
TV and a new Christmas-themed mystery from Perry aren’t just nice:
they’re essential.
The Alienist by Caleb Carr
Police commissioner Teddy Roosevelt shows up at the door of an alienist
(a proto-psychiatrist) and confides that a shockingly brutal murder has
taken place. Our hero uses cutting-edge technology like fingerprinting and
what would become profiling to track down the killer, but not before more
people die. This historical detective tale proved a true phenomenon,
hugely popular even among readers who couldn’t tell a cozy mystery from
a police procedural.
Something Wicked by Carolyn Hart
Cozies are mysteries where sex and violence take place offstage and an
amateur sleuth solves the crime, usually in an intimate setting like a
bookstore or cafe or small town. Think Miss Marple. And cozies don’t often
get the respect they deserve. They aren’t just comfort food; they’re a
challenge for a smart writer—just like making a sitcom for a network is
different than making one for HBO. No cursing! No sex! You have to be …
clever. Surely Carolyn Hart is one of the queens of cozies and her early
adventure starring mystery bookstore owner Annie Laurance is a treat,
complete with a summer stock production of Arsenic and Old Lace, a dead
body and a love interest under suspicion of murder. Quick, someone grab
a Poirot; Annie needs a little guidance!
Laura by Vera Caspary
One of the great mysteries, Laura is now inseparable from the classic 1944
film of the same name starring Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews and the
never-better Clifton Webb. But the novel holds its own nicely thanks to the
story of a seen-it-all detective who finds himself slowly falling in love with a
dead woman he’s never met but trying to avenge. Delicious twists keep it
surprising. Caspary sold the movie rights not once but twice and then
turned it into a play. No wonder: None of her other novels came close to
replicating its success. That’s OK though, you only have to get it right once
to achieve happiness. Isn’t that right, Laura?
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The Laughing Policeman by Maj Sjöwal & Per Wahlöö
An early salvo in the crime wave of Nordic fiction, this was the fourth
outing for Stockholm police detective Martin Beck. Someone shoots up a
busload of people, but Beck realizes this shocking assault is mere cover to
disguise the real target: a fellow officer. It took the world by storm, winning
awards everywhere, including the Mystery Writers of America’s top prize,
the Edgar Award, in 1971. Maj Sjöwal and Per Wahlöö enjoyed considerable
success alone and together as writers. Romantically, she was twice
divorced when they met and he was still married, so they just lived
together for 12 years. Hey, it’s Sweden! When Wahlöö died in 1975, the
series died with him.
The Man With a Load of Mischief by Martha Grimes
You have to love a series of murder mystery novels named after pubs. This
British-set charmer stars the grumpy but handsome chief inspector Richard
Jury. It begins with several gruesome murders. One body is actually stuffed
into a beer keg, and if you’re offended by the idea that this is a shocking
waste of good ale, Grimes may not be for you. The village is Long
Piddleton and Jury is always aided and abetted by the blue-blooded
Melrose Plant and various others. Like so many of our favorite heroes, Jury
is a total washout when it comes to love but awfully good at solving crimes.
Blood Shot by Sara Paretsky
Ok, mysteries let us indulge in some fantasies. Who wouldn’t want to be
V.I. “Vic” Warshawski? She’s a crusading private investigator who invariably
takes on tough cases, even when the client can’t pay her full rate (or any
rate at all). Why? Because an injustice has taken place! Vic handles a Smith
& Wesson with ease, though she’s just as handy with karate. She roams
Chicago like a knight errant, righting (or is that writing?) wrongs, singing
arias to relax and taking long, hot baths. But that’s not the fantasy part. The
fantasy part is the eating. Vic has a ravenous appetite and doesn’t mind
telling us in detail about particularly delicious meals. Each night’s battle is
followed by a big greasy breakfast the next morning. And she looks great.
Is this fair? Little in her world is, so let Vic have one indulgence.
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John Le Carré
A towering masterpiece, even on a list of classics. This is the spy novel to
end all spy novels, and the action takes place almost entirely in the
probing mind of George Smiley. It marks the full flowering of that character
and is the first in a trilogy by Le Carré that remains a benchmark for other
writers to measure themselves against. Here, Smiley is discreetly asked to
sniff out a mole, the bane of the existence of secretive government
agencies. He gathers information. He talks to people. He observes. And he
sits and thinks. Rarely has a novel been so subtle and gripping at the same
time. At some point, you realize Smiley is way ahead of you and think, “I
really need to pay attention!” That attention is fully rewarded. A brilliant
miniseries starring Alec Guinness and the even more unlikely but
successful distillation of the novel into a two-hour film starring Gary
Oldman are classics in their own right.
From The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L.
Konigsburg
This is it: The gateway drug that turns generations of children into mystery
addicts. Two kids run away from home and take residence in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art. That leads them to obsess over a new
acquisition, a statue that may or may not be attributed to Michelangelo.
They begin researching the mystery and their conclusions lead them to the
home of the wealthy Mrs. Basil. Before you know it, with her blessing, the
kids are digging into her files to investigate even further and prove the
truth once and for all. Innocently read this as a kid, and you’re led to
Encyclopedia Brown and Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys and The
Westing Game and before you know it, you’re hooked for life and taking
up residence at 221B Baker Street. Let this be a warning!
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The Neon Rain by James Lee Burke
The rundown, seedy but glamorous world of New Orleans is matched by
the ravaged heart and mind of detective Dave Robicheaux. Alcoholism?
Check. PTSD from the Vietnam War? Probably. Unstable, semi-dependable
sidekick via bond bailsman Cletus Purcel? Yes, hopefully at arm’s length.
Romantic travails to match? Naturally. In other words, this debut has all the
ingredients that fans of detective novels love. James Lee Burke’s writing
grows in complexity and skill over the years and his Holland Family Saga is
surely a peak. But Robicheaux is not to be missed.
The Tiger in the Smoke by Margery Allingham
Originally a spoof on Lord Peter Wimsey, gentleman detective Albert
Campion began as a supporting player, soon took center stage and quietly
developed into his own marvelous character. So why do we choose the
14th entry when Allingham only continued for four more books? Well, the
series improved mightily as it went along (just like Dorothy L. Sayers’
Wimsey!) and J.K. Rowling named it her favorite crime novel of all time.
Mind you, like so many other successful series, the death of Margery
Allingham hasn’t stopped Campion from fighting crime. So far, two writers
have added 11 more titles to the total, including 2021’s Mr. Campion’s
Coven.
Raven Black by Ann Cleeves
If you love the Brenda Blethyn TV series Vera, you’re already reading the
Vera Stanhope mysteries, starting with The Crow Trap. If you love
mysteries and birding, then Cleeves’ Palmer-Jones series starting with A
Bird In The Hand is pure heaven, even if the author was just getting on her
feet, writing-wise. But she soared to new heights with the Shetland Island
books, starting with the Four Seasons quartet, which began with Raven
Black. Inspector Jimmy Perez deals with a murder that links to an older
cold case and eventually leads to the secrets you invariably find when
digging deeper. Gloomy, gripping and as good a place to start with
Cleeves as any other. She keeps getting better.
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
It doesn’t get any bigger than The Big Sleep, the detective novel Time
magazine named one of the 100 best novels of all time. Paris’s newspaper
Le Monde agreed, even if no one can make sense of the plot, including
Chandler himself. At least, that’s the story of the classic 1946 film starring
Humphrey Bogart. You can blame censorship because the novel offers a
lot more clarity than the movie. It doesn’t shy away from the seedier
aspects of the erotica and orgies trade or the then-illegal homosexuality of
a key character. You’ll read the book and say, ahhh! Chandler was a master
of atmosphere and character, so maybe plotting is for chumps after all.
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley
A writer who spends his teenage years reading books in a cemetery is
surely fated to write mysteries and very good ones, at that. That’s the
backstory of Toronto native Alan Bradley, who launched this mystery series
set in an English village even though he’d never been to England. Our
intrepid investigator is 11-year-old Flavia de Luce, a very clever child who
loves chemistry, calls her bike Gladys and takes matters into her own hand
when her stamp-collecting father is wrongly accused of murder. Droll
doesn’t begin to capture the quirky charms of Flavia or this delightful
throwback of a story.
The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
There are hits and then there are blockbusters. In the modern era of
mysteries, only Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None sold more
copies than The Da Vinci Code. With 80 million copies in print and a new
TV series continuing the adventures of Harvard symbologist Robert
Langdon, Dan Brown’s gold mine is still proving a rich vein. Combining
more conspiracy theories than you can shake a stick at, The Da Vinci Code
is widely imitated (we see you, National Treasure!) but never matched in
terms of popularity. From the Mona Lisa to the Holy Grail to Westminster
Abbey, this is the ultimate scavenger hunt.
The Black Echo by Michael Connelly
This debut novel by Connelly was an immediate hit, earning commercial
and critical praise. It launched the character of Harry Bosch, another
Vietnam vet turned crime fighter, this time serving in homicide in the LAPD.
Bosch has a haunted past (mom was a prostitute killed when he was 11-
years-old), a problem with authority and love interests that rarely last more
than a book or two. You know, the typical embattled hero determined to
dig up the truth. Black-eyed but clear-hearted, Bosch is a troubled guy who
can’t help but do what’s right, whatever the price.
In a Lonely Place by Dorothy Hughes
“Dorothy B. Hughes isn’t interested in your run-of-the-mill noir gumshoe
who goes around L.A. or San Francisco solving murders and attracting
“dames,” says Bennard Fajardo, bookseller at Politics and Prose
Bookstore. “Hughes is more interested in the psychology of her characters
and the motivations that force people to do what they do.” In A Lonely
Place is a novel about the killer, his motives and the history that led him to
commit violence against his victims, most of whom are women. “Beyond
being a noir novel, it’s also an exploration of postwar anxiety in 1940s Los
Angelos and of the misogyny that deems women as fodder for the egos of
men,” Fajardo says.
The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin
A gem of mystery’s golden age in the 1940s, this novel inspired the merry-
go-round sequence in Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train. It’s a pity
Hitch didn’t adapt the entire book, since author Crispin delivers wit, thrills
and a wrongly accused man with similar panache to the Master of
Suspense. In this case, think The Lady Vanishes. The accused murderer is
a famous poet who stumbles on a dead body in a toyshop, is knocked out,
wakes up somewhere else and immediately contacts the police to show
them the body…which is gone, along with the toyshop! Instead, they find a
grocery store, leaving the coppers to shake their heads over the
strangeness of poets. Naturally, he turns to Oxford don and amateur sleuth
Gervase Fen to figure it all out. Read it and you’ll realize just how many
marvelous mystery novels there are waiting to be discovered.
The Beekeeper’s Apprentice by Laurie R. King
The nerve! The sheer audacity! King doesn’t just deliver another Sherlock
Holmes adventure like so many others. She doesn’t just give him a love
interest. King actually marries him off! And he loves it. That’s the bold arc
for easily the best ongoing series of Holmesian spin-offs. It very much stars
Mary Russell as the worthy spouse for the great detective. But not so fast!
In this first adventure, Russell is a 15-year-old girl who realizes the local
beekeeper is the world’s most famous private investigator. Impressing him
with her own nascent powers of deduction, Holmes takes the girl under his
wing and trains Russell as his protege. Imagine having Holmes as your
tutor in crime-solving and you begin to appreciate the pleasures on tap
here. Their apprenticeship blossoms into friendship, which blossoms into
love over a series of novels. And 17 books in, the series is still going strong.
Jar City by Arnaldur Indriðason
Yet another Nordic mystery that took the world by storm, and rightly so.
The protagonist is Detective Erlendur, based in Reykjavik, Iceland. He’s
morose, has a daughter he’s determined to protect from the vagaries of life
(good luck with that) and a dead body of an old man that may be linked to
a crime committed decades ago. What makes Indriôason’s work unique
this time is his righteous exposure of the dangers of genetic information
being widely disseminated and the not-so-unique idea that Icelanders’
stock is superior—all neatly woven into an absorbing mystery. This was the
first of Erlendur’s cases to be translated into English, but far from the last.
Still Life by Louise Penny
Have you been drawn in by the cheeky new thriller Canadian Louise Penny
just wrote with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton? If so, stay for her
ongoing series featuring Chief Inspector Gamache, based in the village of
Three Pines. Like all such locales, the bodies pile up. But what makes the
series special is Gamache’s kindly approach to life and modest demeanor.
All new detectives on his team are offered “four sayings that can lead to
wisdom: I was wrong. I’m sorry. I don’t know. I need help.” Though closer to
a gentle, non-violent cozy than most of the books achieving critical acclaim
these days, the Gamache books hoovered up awards from the start, which
is very un-Canadian of Penny. Undoubtedly, she feels a little abashed
about all the success and praise, which would be very Canadian indeed.
The Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe
OK, we may have cheated a bit here, since this collection features all of
Poe’s poetry and fiction in a single volume. But where else would you find
short stories like The Masque of the Red Death? “The poetic prose rackets
up the tension and terror as more is revealed until you literally can’t keep
from screaming,” says Kathy Harig, bookseller at Maryland’s own Mystery
Loves Company bookstore. “Poe is the master of the macabre, the gothic
and the godfather to all mystery writers.” Indeed, he virtually invented the
genre with the detective C. Auguste Dupin. One of the mystery worlds top
honors — the Edgar — is even named after him. Harig adds, “Poe was and
is a big influence on my love of mysteries.”
Thus Was Adonis Murdered by Sarah Caudwell
A perfect bon-bon of a novel. Caudwell was a very successful barrister in
London, bursting through glass ceilings, pipe in hand. But on the side, she
delivered four delightfully funny murder mysteries over a 20-year period.
Thus Was Adonis Murdered (1981) is the first, though any one of the four is
a treat. All feature exceptionally witty, understated dialogue, more tax law
than one would expect from your usual dead-body-found-on-holiday novel
and the singular sleuth Hilary Tamar, a professor of medieval law whose
gender remains amusingly unspecified throughout. The cover of some
editions mimics the Edward Gorey artwork from the PBS Mystery!
anthology series. Either that description has you reaching eagerly for a
copy, a smile already crossing your face, or Caudwell is not your cup of
tea.
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L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy
Hammett. Chandler. Ellroy. That’s the Hard-Boiled Gods of Mystery
company that James Ellroy joined with the L.A. quartet, four novels that
raised his game considerably. The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A.
Confidential and White Jazz cemented a reputation that grew even more
with his Underworld USA trilogy. But you’ve got to start somewhere, so
why not L.A. Confidential, the novel that inspired one of the best crime
films of all time in 1997? It depicts a 1950s Los Angeles so corrupt and
violent it makes Deadwood seem like Disneyland. In other words, it’s
thrilling.
The Last Kashmiri Rose by Barbara Cleverly
We need a 40 Over 40 list, folks who changed careers or found success as
the years went on. Cleverly (love the name!) published her first book as
she hit her 60s. Maybe that explains why her talents were at their peak
right from the start. The Last Kashmiri Rose is delightfully old-fashioned,
set in 1920s India and stars a WWI hero (or should I say survivor?) turned
Scotland Yard Inspector. And it’s exactly what you want. Cleverly hasn’t
branched out much—she began another series, but it too is set between
the wars. All of them feature sharply drawn characters, solid plotting and
satisfying resolutions that surely make the Queens of Crime (Christie,
Sayers, Marsh and Allingham) smile approvingly.
Cotton Comes to Harlem by Chester Himes
You can praise Chester Himes for knocking down walls and offering
diverse voices that flourish in the mystery genre. You can celebrate the film
made from Cotton Comes to Harlem, probably the best-known novel he
wrote. You can champion his importance. But all of that diverts from the rip-
roaring fun of his Harlem detective series, the classic duo of Grave Digger
Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson, the marvelous balance of humor and horror
and how Himes captures the texture of 1950s Harlem. That makes the
eight books in the series essential reading of the most enjoyable sort.
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The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
This is the virgin spring, the novel that established forever so many
elements of the modern mystery novel, especially the British wing. Short
stories by Edgar Allan Poe and others came before, as did rickety stabs at
the mystery novel. But Collins did so many things so well that the result is
not just influential but still readable and fun today. Bungling local police,
red herrings, the setting of a country estate, a famed investigator, a
reconstruction of the crime and so on and so forth all take pride of place in
the plot. The Moonstone really did it all. Collins never came close again to
duplicating its success, but then again, a 19th-century laudanum addiction
will do that to a fellow.
One for the Money by Janet Evanovich
Another great reason to love New Jersey: Stephanie Plum is a former
lingerie buyer from Trenton turned bounty hunter in this first hilarious entry
in Evanovich’s bestselling series. Modeling her books on the classic
comedy Midnight Run, Evanovich made bounty hunting sexy and fun and
really a viable career path even for people who don’t know the first thing
about bounty hunting. People like Plum. (She gets better.) The only mystery
here is how Hollywood botched the 2012 film version and why no one has
tried again.
Time and Again by Jack Finney
Writer Stephen King declared Time and Again “the great time travel story,”
and heck, that was upon the publication of his own acclaimed time-travel
thriller 11/22/63. And no wonder. While the science is silly (people just will
themselves into the past), author Finney combines with great effect the
mystery of a half-burned letter warning of danger, a decades-spanning
romance and a jump back from 1970s-era New York City to the horse-
drawn carriages of the Big Apple circa 1882. Sure, the time travel aspect is
bunk. But everything else is convincingly done, from the actual period
photos peppered throughout for a subtle legitimacy to the desire for
escape into a sepia-toned past. No one’s ever made a film version, though
the similar-themed Christopher Reeve romance Somewhere In Time
comes close.
Faceless Killers by Henning Mankell
Some mystery novels let you escape from the world. Others hold up a
mirror to the world and insist you take a closer look. That’s certainly the
style of Mankell, a committed activist on social issues who brought that
same passion to the Inspector Kurt Wallender series of novels. Kenneth
Branagh captured him well in the BBC series, but you need to head to the
books, starting with the series launch Faceless Killers. Set in Sweden, it
critiques that country’s famed tolerance by showing it doesn’t always apply
to the most recent wave of foreigners. Indeed, “foreign” is the last word of
a woman beaten to death by intruders, which sets off a wave of hate
crimes as police detective Wallander and his team race to reveal the truth.
The Deep Blue Good-By by John D. MacDonald
“Although written in 1964, Travis McGee, MacDonald’s protagonist in this
opener to the series, is as much a 21st-century man as any I’ve met. I was
in love with him 30 years ago, and I am in love with him each time I read
one. A classic endures because of its humanity common to us all. The
Travis McGee books are true classics in every sense.” —Joanne Sinchuk,
manager, Murder on the Beach bookstore, Delray Beach, Florida.
A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George
It’s a classic trope: Two partners who are horribly mismatched butt heads
and yet somehow do their jobs and develop a grudging, if unspoken,
respect. In this case, one is the upper crust, the eighth earl of Asherton
Detective Inspector Lynley and the other is the working class, irascible
Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers. Class, gender, temperament—their
pairing has every culture clash imaginable. It’s not for sheer comedic
effect. The duo’s relationship is complex and real, as are the crimes they
investigate. With the 21st mystery due in 2022, the Lynley stories haven’t
flagged a bit.
Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara
We certainly could have celebrated Hirahara by choosing any of the three
mystery series she has penned: the Edgar award-winning Mas Arai series
about a Japanese-American gardener and sleuth, the Ellie Rush stories
about a rookie member of the LAPD or the recently launched series
starring Leilani Santaigo set in Hawaii. But we’ll boldly suggest the just-out
and widely acclaimed historical mystery Clark and Division. This WWII-set
story of a woman trying to uncover the truth about her sister’s death
against the backdrop of the brutal internment of Japanese-Americans is
simply Hirahara’s most deeply felt and satisfying book to date.
A Is for Alibi by Sue Grafton
Her dad wrote mysteries. Her parents battled each other when they
weren’t battling the booze. She was all but orphaned. While not the perfect
background, it is one for a mystery author like Grafton and the perfect grist
for the creation of private investigator Kinsey Millhone. She’s a petite, no-
nonsense sort who favors jeans, friends over family and peanut butter and
pickle sandwiches. And if that ain’t Mystery 101 enough for you, Grafton set
her heroine’s business in the fictional town of Santa Teresa, California, a
city founded by fellow writer Ross Macdonald and also occupied at times
by the late Roberto Bolaño. Breezy, sharp and hugely popular, Grafton’s
alphabet series began with A Is For Alibi and came to an abrupt end with Y
Is For Yesterday when she passed away from cancer. As her family
beautifully put it, as far as they were concerned, “the alphabet now ends
with Y.”
I.Q. by Joe Ide
How do you become Sherlock Holmes? In Ide’s marvelous debut set in Los
Angeles, our hero Isaiah Quintabe seems gifted with preternatural smarts,
wholly deserving of his nickname IQ. But it’s the flashbacks to the still-
young IQ’s childhood that really fascinate me. We see the calm and
collected and morally righteous IQ when he was just a kid, still just as likely
to choose to use his brains for a quick buck rather than righting wrongs.
He hones his formidable deductive skills, but Ide makes IQ’s moral growth
even more fascinating. Oh and like many an errant knight, IQ devotes just
as much energy to the little problems of the neighborhood that cross his
path as the violent and dangerous task that drives the plot. It’s a funny,
sharp, dying-to-be-made-into-a-movie-or-tv-show book that’s led to four
more novels so far.
1st To Die by James Patterson
A one-man publishing industry in his own right, Patterson has a string of
ongoing series for adults and kids. His most popular one in the mystery
genre is surely the Women’s Murder Club. In the first entry, we watch this
unofficial team come together. Inspector Lindsay Boxer is suicidal,
diagnosed with a deadly illness and burdened with a new partner she’s
reluctantly finding attractive. But first thing’s first: The brutal murder of a
honeymooning couple has her full attention. At the crime scene, Boxer
finds a rapport with Cindy Thomas, a reporter assigned to cover the crime.
Soon, medical examiner Claire Washburn is working with the two to crack
the case. And before you can say “the four musketeers,” Assistant D.A. Jill
Bernhardt has joined the Women’s Murder Club with 2nd Chance and 3rd
Degree on the horizon. So far, the series has hit 22 entries, a TV movie, a
TV series and numerous game spin-offs. Unless Patterson runs out of
numbers, you can bet there will be more.
Bootlegger’s Daughter by Margaret Maron
Maron’s Deborah Knott was introduced in this novel, a rural North Carolina
criminal defense attorney who, after witnessing an unjust verdict by a racist
judge, decides to run for judge. “In this deeply atmospheric series debut,
Deborah, the daughter of a well-known local moonshiner, must not only
overcome her father’s notorious legacy but also solve a decades-old cold
case involving a young mother who disappeared with her three-year-old
daughter for a three-day period,” says author Mary Kay Andrews.
“Eventually, the daughter is found alive, but her mother has been
murdered. Exploring themes of racism, homophobia and class divide in the
Deep South, Bootlegger’s Daughter has a meticulously plotted puzzle with
a richly drawn cast of characters.” Plus, in 1993 it became the first novel to
win the Edgar, Anthony, Agatha and Macavity awards (all four major
mystery prizes) for best novel in the same year. For Andrews, Bootlegger’s
Daughter is a modern classic not only because of the lyrical writing, but
also “because it knocked down barriers in the mystery genre, which until
then, was dominated by male writers of hard-boiled novels. It opened the
doors for dozens of other female novelists whose careers were mostly
inspired—and assisted—by Maron, who died this year at the age of 82.”
The Doorbell Rang by Rex Stout
Is there a greater armchair detective than Nero Wolfe? He lives on West
35th Street in New York City, and unlike the wiry active Sherlock Holmes,
Wolfe is so voluminous in size it’s hard to imagine him even getting out of
that armchair, much less out of his home. Instead, he dines on gourmet
meals prepared by his personal chef, fusses over his orchids and sends
young Archie out and about when Wolfe desires more information or eyes
on the ground. Ask fans for their favorite Wolfe and you’ll get a dozen
different answers, a credit to Stout’s overall quality. We tossed a dart and it
landed on The Doorbell Rang with Wolfe going up against a particularly
formidable foe: the FBI.
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
Without The Name of the Rose, there would be no The Da Vinci Code. This
earlier, brainier mystery was itself an international phenomenon, selling a
reported 50 million copies, putting it third on the list of the bestselling
mysteries of all time, right behind the 100 million copies of Christie’s And
Then There Were None and the 80 million copies of The Da Vinci Code.
Unlike Brown, author Umberto Eco also enjoyed marvelous reviews for his
historical murder mystery set in a monastery in the 1300s. Yes, Eco offers
up some semiotics. But he also serves up secret rooms, the Inquisition and
some especially violent monks. And you know you’re in friendly hands
when our hero is called William of Baskerville.
The Strange Case of Peter the Lett by Georges Simenon
Some of the best-loved mystery series are comfort food, pure and simple.
No matter how well-written, no matter how ingenious and puzzling each
new crime may be, their greatest pleasure comes from routine. Here is
French detective Jules Maigret. He shakes off the cold and sits down to
smoke a pipe. He consults with his fellow colleagues, the Faithful Four. He
heads home to Madame Maigret for a meal. He is almost always simply
Maigret and rarely called Jules, even by Madame. Yes, Maigret solves
crimes and he matures and changes just a little over the course of 75
novels. But the real power of Simenon’s achievement is a world as
comforting and unchanging as 221 B. A recent plus for fans: fresh
translations of all 75 novels have been published in the past decade.
Crocodile on the Sandban k by Elizabeth Peters
For Sarah Young, bookseller at The Raven bookstore, this was her
gateway to the treasure trove of Barbara Mertz‘s books written both as
Peters and Barbara Michaels. “Amelia Peabody is the quintessential Peters
heroine: sassy, resourceful, and whip-smart,” she says. “Nineteenth-century
Egypt comes alive with Amelia and the ‘greatest Egyptologist of this or any
other era, Radcliffe Emerson.’”
Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow
The gold standard in modern courtroom mysteries. The Perry Mason books
may be one of the bestselling series of all time, but its titles are
interchangeable and rarely more than serviceable, thanks to witnesses that
will break down and conveniently confess on the stand. With Presumed
Innocent, Turow showed again how thrilling a trial and digging up the truth
could really be. Prosecutor Rusty Sabich is assigned to investigate the
brutal murder of a colleague without anyone knowing he had a brief affair
with her that ended months earlier. Then it gets complicated—and fun. And
it’s all set in the fictional world of Kindle County, which sounds like a plug
for the Amazon e-reader but Turow got there first.
Blanche on the Lam by Barbara Neely
Barbara Neely’s amateur sleuth and Black maid Blanche is so engaging
and forthright that you may not realize how deftly the author weaves in
issues of race, class and gender into her stories. That’s no surprise for a
writer who took as her primary model, not Christie or Doyle but Toni
Morrison. From being accused of writing bad checks to going on the lam,
Blanche is unexpected and memorable. With just four books from 1992 to
2000, Neely left an indelible mark on the genre.
Related: Black Booksellers Recommend 25 Books to Read During Black
History Month and Beyond
The Coroner’s Lunch by Colin Cotterill
Exotic? Not to the people living there. But for most readers, a mystery set
in Laos in 1976 just after the Communist takeover of the country is a
fascinating milieu indeed. Our hero is Dr. Siri Paiboun, a man given the
unenviable task of state coroner. He’s not trained as a coroner but he’s
practically the only doctor left who hasn’t fled the country, so the job is his,
whether Paiboun wants it or not. With little funding and even less
equipment, Paiboun must tackle the murder of a party official’s wife, a
crime almost no one wants him to solve. Toss in shamans, dreams in which
Paiboun speaks to the dead and other delicious details, and you have the
makings of a series as fresh and unique as any in years.
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
For Rhianna Walton, managing editor at Powell’s Books, The Westing
Game is easily the cleverest mystery on the market—for kids or adults.
“Raskin sends 16 intriguing characters on a wild goose chase to win a
multimillion-dollar inheritance from tycoon Sam Westing,” she says. “A
send-up of the American obsessions with bootstrap capitalism and
financial windfalls; a brilliant character study; and a compulsive riddle that’ll
confuse you as much as the characters (no cheating!), The Westing Game
is sheer brilliance.
Dead Cert by Dick Francis
Jockey turned author Dick Francis proved almost any setting is rich
material for a murder mystery. His knowledge of the racing world is deep
and hard-earned, with Francis retiring from the sport of kings after a horse
he was riding in The Grand National (for the Queen Mother, no less)
collapsed just as he was about to win. Enough of that, said Francis, who
turned to journalism, a well-received memoir and finally Dead Cert, the first
in a string of bestselling books set in the world of racing. The turf is central,
but invariably, the story dives into other interesting fields like
transcontinental train service and photography, all brought to life via
fascinating details unearthed by Francis’s partner in crime, his wife Mary.
Cover Her Face by P.D. James
The Baroness James of Holland Park (the British do like their titles), P.D.
James took 46 years to write 14 mysteries starring her greatest creation,
police commander (and poet!) Adam Dalgliesh. Each one is deeply
admired by fans and critics alike; indeed, few mystery writers enjoyed such
universal acclaim. She’s the sort of writer even people who don’t care for
mysteries devour. From her first Dalgliesh, Cover Her Face (1962), to the
last, The Private Patient (2008), James maintained the highest standards.
And if the series ends with a Jane Austen-like flourish for the brooding,
handsome, widowed Dalgliesh, who can blame James for wanting a happy
ending?
The Moving Target by Ross Macdonald
Private eye Lew Archer was modeled after Philip Marlowe and named by
grabbing the last name of an assistant to Sam Spade. Tipping his fedora to
Hammett and Chandler, Macdonald didn’t just follow in the footsteps of
those giants, he equaled them. We boldly declared the Easy Rawlins books
as good as any, but the 18 Lew Archer mysteries are often named the
pinnacle of the detective novel. Starting with 1949’s The Moving Target,
Macdonald took the elaborate plotting of those two masters and added in
a new psychological depth, along with a little Greek tragedy. Archer often
unearths past deeds that haunt wealthy families for generations. Besides,
he’s not so hard-boiled after all and this penetrating series is all the better
for it.
Dead Time by Eleanor Taylor Bland
Bland was an innovator in the genre. Her police detective Marti MacAlister
and her situation is comfortingly familiar: Marti’s a big city copy transferred
to a small town (the fictional Lincoln Prairie, Illinois); a woman paired with a
man; a person quick to make intuitive leaps alongside a partner who is
meticulous and precise; a Baptist with a Catholic and so on. But in the not-
so-distant past of 1992, an African-American woman like Marti brought to
life as a complex and compelling character with a vibrant private life while
kick-ass at her job? That was still something new in mystery literature.
Bland died too soon, but her legacy lives on, thanks to an award named
after her by the Sisters In Crime group, which champions inclusion and
equity in the mystery/crime community.
Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver
Perhaps the ultimate courtroom mystery, Anatomy of a Murder is almost
entirely overshadowed by the classic 1959 Otto Preminger film starring
Jimmy Stewart. That’s wrong. Lawyer (and later Judge) John D. Voelker,
a.k.a. Robert Traver, based his greatest novel on a real-life murder trial in
which Voelker successfully defended a military man accused of murder.
Telling it like it is, Voelker detailed for the first time in a book the entire
process of the trial, from preparation to jury selection and finally the trial
itself, with exacting and gripping detail. The book was a huge sensation,
spending more than one year on bestseller lists. Countless books followed
in its wake—no Anatomy Of A Murder, no John Grisham or Scott Turow.
The Blessing Way by Tony Hillerman
This is the first in the late Hillerman’s Edgar award-winning series with
Navajo policemen Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, which is continued today
thanks to Hillerman’s daughter Anne, who has added a female (Bernie
Manuelito) to the police squad. “Landscape and culture are the main
characters, along with the cops and the victims, and Robert Redford is
even producing a TV adaptation of the beloved series, one of the most
important in our 32-years as booksellers,” says Barbara Peters, owner of
the Poisoned Pen bookstore in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Fletch by Gregory McDonald
Forget the movie starring Chevy Chase. The book by McDonald is just as
funny but with a sharper edge and less goofiness, making it all the more
enjoyable. Fletch remains a journalist and ex-Marine. When he’s not
avoiding alimony payments to his multiple wives, the first in the series has
him looking into drug deals. Then a man assuming the in-disguise Fletch to
be a down-on-his-luck bum asks our hero to kill him. Intrigued, Fletch digs
deeper…and deeper…until he’s up to his neck in misdeeds and double-
crosses. A new film version starring Jon Hamm is coming out, but do
yourself a favor and read the original first.
The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey
Back to 1920s India we go! This time, we’re not in the company of British
invaders or wayward Scotland Yard inspectors. No, our hero is Perveen
Mistry, the only female lawyer in all of Bombay. Her suspicions are raised
when the three widows of a Muslim mill owner sign away their
considerable inheritances to a charity. Really? Since the women are hidden
away from the world in seclusion known as purdah, Mistry can barely even
contact them. And then the murders begin. Massey made a stir with her
first contemporary books focused on the Japanese-American Rei Shimura,
a woman caught between two worlds in Tokyo. But these India-set stories
put her concerns with fairness and equality into a sparkling setting that
shows how universal the fight for justice must be.
Related: From Murders to Love Affairs, We Love These 2020 Books
I, the Jury by Mickey Spillane
Originally planned as a comic book hero, the violent, tough private
investigator Mike Hammer sneers at the law, hates criminals and commies
and uses his fists with relish. Think Dirty Harry without even the pretense
of a badge and you’ll get where creator Mickey Spillane is coming from. In
the first of many vigilante tales, Hammer’s close friend Jack Williams is
brutally killed. Hammer doesn’t just vow revenge—he promises to kill the
killer in the same excruciating way Jack died. Does he do it? Oh yeah. You
can cheer Hammer on, or you can view him warily as an outdated idea of
real manhood. Just don’t turn your back on him.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark
Haddon
Anyone who’s seen the Keanu Reeves movie John Wick knows the death
of a dog can be an awfully powerful hook for a story. That’s also the
MacGuffin driving the plot of Haddon’s unique book (first pitched to young
adults but soon discovered a massive worldwide audience). Like
Motherless Brooklyn, the hero here is an unconventional one. It’s a 15-
year-old boy on the autism spectrum, determined to figure out who killed
his neighbor’s dog. The real focus is our amateur sleuth and the intriguing
way he puzzles out the emotions and desires of the people around him. It’s
a marvelous way of empathizing with someone facing emotional
challenges and how all of life can be a mystery when you really pay
attention. Since Holmes and countless other fictional detectives have been
diagnosed by fans as high-functioning people living with enough chronic
issues to fill the Merck Manual twice over, it’s not so curious to include
Haddon’s modern classic on this list.
The Killings at Badger’s Drift by Caroline Graham
The long-running TV series Midsomer Murders features Detective Chief
Inspector Barnaby solving brutal crimes in the county of Midsomer. Its
villages are filled with so many shocking murders and scheming and
backstabbing, you’d happily move to Miss Marple’s St. Mary Mead or invite
Jessica Fletcher over for the weekend and count yourself safe. It all began
with The Killings at Badger’s Drift, the first of seven Midsomer mysteries by
Graham. An immediate success, her novels have been surpassed in body
count by the TV show but never surpassed for cleverness and charm.
A Morbid Taste for Bones by Ellis Peters
You can keep your doddering Father Brown by G.K. Chesterton. We much
prefer the more muscular adventures of Brother Cadfael, the amateur
sleuth at the heart of Ellis Peters’ 20 historical mysteries. A one-time
soldier and sailor, the worldly Cadfael enters orders in his 40s and has a
lifetime of experience to draw upon, not just Father Brown’s modest
intuition. Oh and he’s an expert herbalist, useful when diagnosing a
poisoning or two. Set in the 1200s, the novels feature major historical
events and fascinating insights into pilgrimages, the making of wool and
other facts of life familiar to those at the time but engrossing to us today.
Those who yearn for a sense of completion will appreciate that Peters
wrote the final volume shortly before her death and clearly intended it as a
swan song.
The Tattoo Murder Case by Takagi Akimitsu
Too many of Japan’s great mystery novels remain inaccessible to us so far.
The great Edogawa Rampo (a successor to Edgar Allan Poe) is more well
known for his short stories, but Takagi Akimitsu is an heir to his work, and
the kinky murder mystery The Tattoo Murder Case gives a glimpse into a
rich body of work waiting to be discovered (or at least translated into
English). It took 50 years for this novel to reach our shores but it feels
thoroughly modern. A young doctor in post-war Tokyo helps his brother
working on a classic locked-room murder. A young woman is killed and
dismembered—except for the part of her body containing one of the most
beautiful tattoos ever rendered. Is it a murder? Or a theft?
Not to Disturb by Muriel Spark
The Baron and the Baroness have locked themselves in the study with
their young male secretary. “We know where this is going, and so do a
troupe of loyal servants, who begin preparing for the inevitable murder
with the same ice-cold care and deadpan scheming with which they do
everything,” says author Daniel Handler (also known as Lemony Snicket).
“Meanwhile, strange noises are coming from the attic, and this mystery, or
thriller, or satire, whatever it is, locks itself in your head and screams to get
out.”
The Monkey’s Raincoat by Robert Crais
Screenwriter and novelist Crais would be admired forever by fans of crime
novels for his Emmy-nominated work on TV alone. He wrote scripts for the
likes of Cagney & Lacey, L.A. Law, Miami Vice, Quincy and the greatest
cop show of them all, Hill Street Blues. Then in 1987, he stepped out on his
own and delivered The Monkey’s Raincoat, an immediate success and the
launch of the Elvis Cole series. Another Vietnam vet turned private eye
(was deductive reasoning and fingerprinting a requirement at Parris
Island?), Cole and his partner Joe Pike are driven to do the right thing, just
like Marlowe and Spade and so many others before them. It never gets old
when it’s done this well.
The Bride Wore Black by Cornell Woolrich
This novel started the career of one of the most important writers in the
history of mystery. “Cornell Woolrich’s The Bride Wore Black is a hybrid of
suspense and detective fiction that remains, to this day, stylistically fresh
and unique,” says Charles Perry, bookseller at Mysterious Bookshop. “The
episodic structure, which alternates between a series of murders and the
investigation that follows each, presents a tense game of cat-and-mouse
that builds to one of the most shocking and tragic twists in the genre.”
Woolrich’s tales inspired numerous films, including titles by Francois
Truffaut and Quentin Tarantino. “This one is the best of the bunch.”
Death in a Tenured Position by Amanda Cross
At Harvard in the 1970s, it’s expected that talent will rise to the top, as long
as said talent is wielded by a man. Women are most decidedly not in the
running. That is, until a bequest funds a chair in the English department for
a female professor. The new hire is drugged and ultimately killed (giving
new meaning to the idea of publish or perish). But in comes fellow
academic Kate Fowler to figure it all out. Cross was a pseudonym for
Carolyn Gold Heilbrun, who delivered 15 Fansler mysteries in all, not to
mention her own acclaimed work in various academic areas, such as
feminist studies—she was the first tenured professor in the English
department at Columbia.
Related: 20 Books About Feminism That Will Get You Thinking and
Talking
Promised Land by Robert B. Parker
Parker revolutionized the detective novel not through crusading but via
great entertainments that cast an even wider net of diversity and
acceptance. The Spenser novels were set in Boston, and we’re starting
with the fourth book Promised Land because that’s the one that introduces
Hawk, Spenser’s one-time boxing opponent and good friend. Written in
every novel are a diverse cast of characters from different ethnic
backgrounds and sexual orientation. Oh and he’s in a committed
relationship! That makes Spenser a real rarity for a private eye.
Finding Nouf by Zoë Ferraris
There’s Nayir, a Palestinian guide living in Saudi Arabia; Nouf, a teenage
girl that a coroner declared died from drowning—even though her body
was found in the desert. And most shocking of all to the pious Nayir,
there’s a female lab tech named Katya Hijazi at the medical examiner’s
office who doesn’t shroud her face and works in public. But Nayir needs
her help to uncover this crime in the first of a series starring these two
unlikely partners. Empathetic to people of faith yet quietly critical of the
oppression women face in the oil kingdom, Finding Nouf is a singular
debut.
Ratking by Michael Dibdin
In the first Aurelio Zen mystery, our out-of-favor Police Commissioner hero
is transferred to Perugia and assigned a case no one really wants.
Mordant, dour and never caring about his career, Zen is precisely the sort
to ignore not-so-subtle hints and solve the high-profile kidnapping before
he’s removed entirely from the job. Wryly humorous, the 11 Zen novels
grow darker as they go along, so like many of the best series on this list,
it’s best appreciated from start to finish.
A Judgement in Stone by Ruth Rendell
This was named a favorite mystery of author Donna Leon (Commissario
Guido Brunetti series). “The first sentence of Ruth Rendel’s A Judgment in
Stone gives the name of the victims, the killer and the motive,” she says.
“The reader spends the next three hundred pages hoping to find a way to
stop it happening, to somehow prevent these poor lambs from leading
themselves to the slaughter.”
Death of A Red Heroine by Qiu Xiaolong
Author Qiu was stranded in the U.S. after the 1989 Tiananmen Square
massacre of student protestors. Along with his many achievements as an
academic, poet, translator and critic, Qiu launched a detective series with
Death Of A Red Heroine. It’s done in the style of a traditional Chinese
novel, which means chapters begin and end with snatches of poetry,
alongside historical allusions, Chinese idioms and other literary touches
that illuminate a Chinese perspective from the inside out. Oh, and there’s
the murder in Shanghai of a young woman in the Communist Party who led
a double life—a double life some authorities would prefer to remain
hidden. In typical gumshoe style, our hero must solve the crime in a way
that keeps the higher-ups at bay until justice of a sort can be done. With 11
books and counting, it’s another reminder of how the mystery genre can
open up countless worlds.
Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz
It still amazes us that the acclaimed TV series Foyle’s War wasn’t based on
any mystery novels. It’s that rich and good. But it sprang from the mind of
creator Anthony Horowitz, who also co-created Midsomer Murders (based
on books by Caroline Graham, of course). The prolific Horowitz also
delivered young adult thrillers starring a teenage James Bond called Alex
Rider, two new authorized Sherlock Holmes mysteries, three authorized
James Bond adventures and too many other works to count. And perhaps
best of all is Magpie Murders, a fiendishly clever meta-mystery in the style
of Agatha Christie. It should be too smart for its own good, what with the
story within a story format and all those sly nods to a genre it’s celebrating
and spoofing at the same time, but you’ll have too much fun reading it to
complain.
The Collaborator of Bethlehem by Matt Rees
Exploring a little-known society via crime is a great way to make your
mystery novel a cut above the rest. That’s as true for journalist Matt Rees
as anyone else. His Palestinian quartet starring Omar Yussef proves it yet
again. Starting with The Collaborator of Bethlehem, Rees set his books
against the backdrop of the Palestinian First Intifada for tension, raising
comparisons to Graham Greene and John Le Carré. He shows the
Palestinians in all their complexity—good, bad, corrupt, kind, and every
shade in between. Acclaim and three more books soon followed. Rees
moved on to historical mysteries and modern thrillers with similar success,
but it’s this captivating quartet that remains his best achievement. So far.
Hallowed Murder by Ellen Hart
The trailblazing Ellen Hart is a treat for both fans of cozy mysteries and
fans of seeing the real world reflected in fiction, thanks to her queer
heroine Jane Lawless. A Twin Cities restauranteur by trade, Jane is forever
stumbling into murder investigations. In her first case, the body is found at
a sorority where the accusations and thefts spill out almost as quickly as
the blood. Joined by her sidekick Cordelia Thorn (a very amusing Watson
to Jane’s Holmes), the Lawless books are a delicious treat that toss in
some foodie details as a bonus.
Roman Blood by Steven Saylor
Saylor studied history and classics at the University of Texas at Austin and
then he delivered a series of historical mystery classics. Set in ancient
Rome, it begins with 1991’s Roman Blood. We’re immersed in the life of
Gordianus the Finder, the best sleuth since Brother Cadfael, though to be
accurate Cadfael wouldn’t appear for another 1200 years. Historical figures
like Cicero, Marc Antony and Pompey The Great pop in with regularity.
And most recently, Gordianus is tangled up in one of the most famous
murders in history: the assassination of Caesar on the Ides of March.
Smallbone Deceased by Michael Gilbert
Lawyers cum authors are nothing new, apparently. English solicitor and
WWII veteran Gilbert famously wrote his many novels only while daily
commuting to and from Kent and Lincoln’s Inn on the train. The result?
Some 30 spy novels, thrillers and mysteries, dozens of short stories and at
least one classic. Smallbone Deceased is set in a lawyer’s office and
delights in the windbaggery of solicitors who can’t help holding forth even
when they’re the focus of a murder investigation. It’s tight, funny , focused
and nigh on perfect.
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The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Historical fiction. A coming-of-age tale. A romance. A fantasy. A crime
thriller. An international bestseller. The Shadow of the Wind is all of these
things and more. In 1945 Spain, a boy is introduced to the Cemetery of
Forgotten Books by his antiquarian father. Choosing one title to save and
protect, Daniel realizes it may be the last copy of a marvelous book written
by an author almost entirely erased from history. Plumbing that mystery
leads Daniel to a dangerous story of revenge, star-crossed lovers, political
intrigue, a violent Inspector Fumero on his trail and murder. This novel is
compared to everything from Gabriel García Márquez to Umberto Eco but
best to savor it as a rarity, a genuinely unique work.
Related: 25 Great Novels, Cookbooks, Memoirs and More by Latinx
Authors
The Franchise Affair by Josephine Tey
“Tey is not as well-known as Christie and Sayers but she’s a key Golden
Age of Mystery figure,” says Barbara Peters of The Poisoned Pen. “A theme
she explores in most of her mysteries is reputation, fear of losing it. The
Franchise Affair not only embodies the country house mystery structure,
but it also paves the way for Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train and the
tsunami of trust-no-one mysteries published since.”
Theodore Boone: The Accused by John Grisham
One of the great pleasures of reading is sharing it with your children or
younger relatives or any kids in your life. So adult fans of Grisham’s legal
thrillers were delighted when he launched a series geared toward middle
grade readers. And based on the reviews you’ll find on Goodreads,
Amazon and elsewhere, plenty of adults read them too. While Grisham
revels in courtroom machinations, the Theodore Boone series leans more
toward Hardy Boys-style mystery. In the third in the series, Theo (who
yearns to be a courtroom lawyer when he grows up) is framed for the
burglary of a local electronics store. At the same time, someone is slashing
his bicycle tires. Theo must figure out who’s framing him, who’s targeting
him and who the real thieves might be before his legal career is over
before it starts. Now instead of just telling a kid you loved this or that book
when you were young, you can both read and talk about a new book at
the same time.
A Man Lay Dead by Ngaio Marsh
One of the original Queens of Crime alongside Agatha Christie, Dorothy L.
Sayers and Marjery Allingham, Marsh is surely the first to be inspired by
them and then reach their heights. She read a story by Christie or perhaps
Sayers on a rainy Saturday, wondered if she could do something similar
and went at it. The result? A Man Lay Dead and the introduction of the
blue-blooded bobby (ok, Chief Inspector) Roderick Alleyn. He is erudite,
handsome and as big a fan of the theater as Marsh. This first case revolves
around a country estate where guests indulge in a popular pastime of
playing a murder game. Needless to say, things go horribly wrong—or
right, since Alleyn continued for almost 50 years and 32 novels until
Marsh’s death in 1982.
Fadeout by Joseph Hansen
Readers enjoy seeing themselves in stories, and diverse protagonists and
locales aren’t just enjoyable, they’re necessary. Heading to a new country
or century and making your sleuth a Mormon mother or Botswanan lady
offers countless opportunities for fresh perspectives. Meet Dave
Brandstetter, one of the first gay heroes of a detective novel. In this case,
the WWII vet and ruggedly handsome Brandstetter is an insurance
investigator looking into the death of a folk singer and radio personality.
None of it adds up, especially since a body was never found. Brandstetter
gets to work, using his two fists when necessary just like Spade and
Marlowe.
Bullet for a Star by Stuart M. Kaminsky
If you love Sara Paretsky, check out Kaminsky: Paretsky dedicated her first
V.I. Warshawski novel to this fellow Chicagoan and kindred spirit. A
denizen of Hollywood, Kaminsky was left adrift when a planned biography
of Charlton Heston fell through in 1977. With nothing to do, he delivered
the first Toby Peters book, starring a guy Kaminsky called the anti-Marlowe.
(Jim Rockford may have been an influence, too.) Set in Hollywood during
the 1940s, it finds our hero working to clear the name of Errol Flynn after a
photograph shows the swashbuckler unbuckling in front of an underage
girl. (“It’s a fake!” insists Flynn. “Fix this problem!” say the doubtful Warner
brothers.) Wandering onto the production of The Maltese Falcon and other
glorious set pieces, this establishes the tone for Kaminsky’s next 23
adventures with Peters. If you love movies and mysteries, this is a slam
dunk.
Watchmen by writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons and
colorist John Higgins
“One of the greatest achievements in comic books, Watchmen by Moore,
Gibbons and Higgins is also a classic mystery. After all, it begins with New
York City detectives getting nowhere in a murder investigation until
costumed vigilante Rorsharch digs deeper,” says Geoff Boucher, journalist,
writer and host of the podcast Geoff Boucher’s Mindspace. “Watchmen
ranks alongside Frank Miller’s noir-drenched Sin City and Moore’s own V
For Vendetta (with artist David Lloyd) as great mysteries from the comic
book world. But maybe the greatest of all for hardcore comic book fans is
writer Alan Moore and artist Curt Swan’s Whatever Happened to the Man
of Tomorrow?, a two-issue tale from September 1986. It’s like the 1949
classic noir film D.O.A. with x-ray vision as Superman tries to solve his own
impending murder.”
Blind Goddess by Anne Holt
Holt worked as a member of the Oslo police department, a lawyer, a
journalist, a TV anchor and even a member of government when she
served briefly as the Minister of Justice before poor health forced her to
resign. One wonders how she found time to write novels, but write them
she has. Her heroine is Hanne Wilhelmsen, also a police officer in Oslo,
also like Holt in a long-term relationship with a woman and also very good
at her job. A case that begins with a confession (“I did it!”) soon collapses
into a web of conspiracy, dirty lawyers and drugs. It’s another great
example of Nordic noir, but anyone anywhere can identify with Wilhelmsen
as she does her job and struggles to pay the bills.
Wolf in the Shadows by Marsha Muller
We take our tough, no-holds-barred female private eyes for granted. But
it’s a long road from Miss Marple to the present bounty of great distaff
protagonists. A number of people paved the way, like San Francisco’s
Sharon McCone. She’s been packing heat and kicking ass since her 1977
debut. In Edwin of the Iron Shoes, McCone worked for others while looking
into an antique dealer stabbed to death by a vintage dagger. Over the
years, she’s grown ever more resourceful and headed out onto her own.
Along the way came peaks like 1993’s award-winning Wolf in the Shadows
right up to 2021’s Ice and Stone, where McCone ventures farther afield to
bring justice for two murdered Indigenous women. Miss Marple and Vic
Warshawski are surely proud to know her.
Related: Kristin Hannah Shares Why the Time Is Right for Her Epic Story
of Female Resilience
Full Dark House by Christopher Fowler
The Peculiar Crimes Unit series by Fowler is a winning combination of
classic detection, dry humor, London history and the moving friendship
between two detectives of a certain age. Twenty volumes strong so far, it
begins beautifully with Full Dark House. A bombing rips through the lives
of Bryant and May, prompting the memory of how this team first met and
worked together during the Blitz. Successive volumes chart decades of
British history, culture and the byways of London from the sewer system to
St. Paul’s Cathedral. It’s delightful, droll and ultimately rather touching
when one of them begins to succumb to dementia, a cruel fate for a man
who lives by his brains. Thoroughly satisfying.
The Chinese Maze Murders by Robert van Gulik
Inspired by an 18th century crime novel he discovered in an antique store,
van Gulik wrote new adventures in a classic Chinese style for the
historically-based character Judge Dee. That meant Dee solved three
unrelated cases each time out (as is traditional) and with less emphasis
than usual on identifying the criminal as the climactic act. Never imagining
Westerners would care that much, van Gulik had it published in Japan (it
was a hit!) and then China (again, a hit!) and finally in the West (yet again, a
hit!). More than a dozen novels and various short stories followed, all of
them opening Western eyes to the philosophy and world of China in the
1700s. When Fu Manchu loomed large as a symbol of the wicked Orient,
characters like Dee and Charlie Chan offered welcome humanistic and
intelligent heroes to cheer on, whatever the ethnicity of their creators.
Vanishing Act by Thomas Perry
“This book quickly made Jane Whitefield one of my favorite characters!,”
says Deb Leonard, bookseller at Literati Books. “She is half-Seneca and
half-white, with an Ivy-League education, and she is a ghostmaker—
someone who helps people in trouble disappear. She isn’t afraid to bend
the law, but she has her own strict moral code rooted in her Native
heritage. Jane is smart, self-possessed and can be extremely dangerous.
Prepare to compulsively read the whole series.”
Last Bus to Woodstock by Colin Dexter
Geniuses can be insufferable and DCI Endeavour Morse is too clever for
his own good. He is irascible, irritated by authority, infuriated by
grammatical and spelling errors, patronizing to women but wrapped
around their fingers, besotted by classical music and above all joined at
the hip to his slightly younger partner Lewis, the not-so-dim Watson to his
Holmes. It’s a great friendship, despite Morse’s inevitable groans of
“Lewis!” when the man doesn’t keep up with Morse’s train of thought. And
it’s a great series of books made even more popular by the TV series
Inspector Morse and its spin-offs. If we can’t help thinking of actor John
Thaw when we read the mysteries, well, there are worse fates for a
character.
Gaudy Nights by Dorothy L. Sayers
If there’s anyone to recommend a Sayers novel, it’s Dr. Crystal L. Downing,
author of award-winning books on Sayers and co-director of the Marion E.
Wade Center, home of the world’s largest Sayers collection. Downing says
that after several novels, Sayers was weary of the fictional sleuth she
created in Lord Peter Wimsey, marrying him off to Harriet Vane, whom she
introduced in her sixth novel Strong Poison (1930). “Sayers valued Harriet
so much she decided to write two more books in order to change Lord
Peter into a partner worthy of her. This culminated in what many consider
to be Sayer’s best detective novel, Gaudy Night (1935), which challenges
the very genre,” Downing says. “Unlike most detective fiction, there’s no
murder to solve. Instead, Harriet investigates mysterious activities at her
alma mater, an Oxford University women’s college. Crimes committed
against female students and faculty highlight the ultimate mystery at its
heart: whether a woman can balance a career and marriage in 1930s
England.”
The Steam Pig by James McClure
It’s every writer’s dream: Finish that novel you keep in the bottom drawer
of your desk at work and when said book is rightly a huge whopping
success, quit your job in triumph. That actually happened for McClure, who
set his murder mysteries in South Africa and paired off the Afrikaner
Lieutenant Kramer with the Bantu Detective Sergeant Zondi. An immediate
success, McClure published two more of their adventures and then quit his
job. Clearly, journalism was in his blood, however. McClure later took a
“brief” break from mystery writing to return to newspapers—which lasted
for another 17 years. But while today’s newspaper might be tomorrow’s
birdcage liner, the eight detective novels of Kramer and Zondi will last
forever.
Home Sweet Homicide by Craig Rice
Often called the Dorothy Parker of detective fiction, Rice had a gift for
combining the hard-boiled genre with screwball comedy to a unique effect.
Her zippy series starring John J. Malone, Jake and Helene are notoriously
nutty. But we’re plonking for Home Sweet Homicide, a stand-alone comedy
about the children of a mystery writer who plunge themselves into solving
the murder next door when mother is too busy pounding out her latest
bestseller. After said investigation turns up an annoying cop, a dead
stripper, blackmail and kidnapping, well, mother decides maybe they’re
onto something. Zany to say the least.
Knots and Crosses by Ian Rankin
A classic of Tartan Noir, the Inspector Rebus books of Rankin are
astonishingly popular in the United Kingdom, sometimes accounting for 10
percent of all crime books sold in a year. They’re also astonishingly good
and the series gets better as it goes along. Edinburgh is a living, breathing
character as familiar to readers of the series as the damaged but
determined Rebus himself. The storylines grow more confidently elaborate,
the people in his world more vivid and the sense of cumulative power as
the series builds is impressive. Like many authors before him, Rankin tried
to retire Rebus, but you can’t keep a good man down: the 23rd murder
mystery came out in 2020.
Naked In Death by Nora Roberts, writing as J.D. Robb
A sci-fi procedural romance series? When you’re Nora Roberts, an
astonishingly successful author who can do anything, why not? Her
franchise, led by Lieutenant Eve Dallas of the NYPSD, was set 60 years in
the future when Naked In Death came out in 1995. Now, more than 50
entries later, the books are as popular as ever and that futuristic setting is
just 30 years out. By the time Roberts hits book No. 100 in the series, will it
be set in the present? Maybe by then someone will realize the torrid,
complicated and fascinating relationship between Dallas and her uber-
wealthy love Roarke is the stuff long-running TV dramas were made for.
Wobble to Death by Peter Lovesey
Some countries are rich in diamonds. Others drill for oil and come up a
gusher. In the United Kingdom, its cash crop is great mystery writers, to say
the least. Maybe it’s the beer? Or the fog? One more delightful example is
this Victorian-set mystery by Lovesey. Slightly daft and bursting with period
detail even devotees of history will find surprising, Wobble to Death was
an immediate hit in 1970. Who can resist a murder set at a speedwalking
(or “wobbling”) competition in London circa 1879? Not us, surely. And once
you’ve fallen for Lovesey, you’ll have the ongoing contemporary mystery
series starring “the last detective” Peter Diamond to savor as well. Wobble
to your nearest bookstore or library!
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan
Doyle
Well, you knew he’d make the list, didn’t you? We began with Dame
Agatha Christie and end with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the alpha and omega
of detective fiction and amateur sleuths. The Hound of the Baskervilles is
the bestselling Holmes novel, but Sherlock is offstage a bit in that story;
while it’s nice to see Dr. Watson get his due, it’s just not the definitive
Holmes. That would be the short stories, starting with this first, great
collection. It’s almost all here: the landlady Mrs. Hughes, Watson’s
amazement, 221 B, the hapless Inspector Lestrade and even the woman,
Irene Adler. This book is where many people begin when falling hard for
mysteries—and it’s where we’ll end.
Next up, the American Library Association’s ranking of the 100 most
banned books.BOOKS
Want to Crack the Case? These
Are The 101 Best Mystery Books
of All Time
NOVEMBER 14, 2021 – 9:30 AM – 0 COMMENTSParade Daily
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