There are so many detective novels and fun detective series that it’s really not useful or even possible to focus on labels such as “The Best.” If you spend any time perusing my Inventory of books read, you might notice some clues of my own preferences: I read all the Spenser books by Robert B. Parker starting with the fourth or fifth title; I read all of the Ludlum books before the author died and the same thing goes for John D. MacDonald’ s Travis McGee; I read all the Fletch books and followup novels; I read all or most of the novels by authors such as Gregory Maguire, Laurence Sanders, and especially George Simenon (actually I have read more Maigret novels than any other but Simenon wrote so many).
Continue reading “The Nameless Detective”Tag: Detective Novels
Is That a Gat or …
I confessed recently that I have an uncontrollable urge to read a mess of detective fiction. I recognize several strong influences, any one of which might boost Mickey Spillane ahead of Henry James on my short-term reading lists. But there are two facts that I need to recognize before I go full-out Peter Whimsey: first, I never have abandoned the fun of mystery stories like I have the tedium of science fiction (look at my reading lists: there’s a mystery or two almost every month), and second, there is so many examples of mystery or detective fiction available and being written every day — so many that no one, let alone I, would ever hope to read them all.
Continue reading “Is That a Gat or …”How To Read Detective Novels
This month I am dedicating my reading to a wide variety of mystery or detective novels, some classics, some contemporary, and even a couple of pincher-hit authors. As I was collecting the list I noticed two things: first, twenty novels is woefully insufficient to cover the genre; and second, so many of the titles I selected were purposely early examples of narratives which developed into series consisting of numerous titles over many years.
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A Celebration of Reading 