Recommended Mystery Novels
Notebooks
Recommended Mystery Novels
Last update: 03 Jun 2026 09:48
First version: Spun off from "Mysteries", 21 October 1999
Including true crime and spy stories, for lack of better places to put them.
Links on titles are generally to my own review or briefer comments.
See also:<br>Mysteries to read.
Bruce Alexander (pseud. of Bruce Alexander Cook)
Blind Justice<br>Murder in Grub Street<br>Watery Grave<br>Person or Persons Unknown
Eric Ambler
The Ability to Kill [Nonfiction]<br>Background to Danger<br>Cause for Alarm<br>A Coffin for Dimitrios<br>Journey into Fear<br>Judgment on Deltchev<br>The Levanter<br>The Light of Day [filmed as<br>Topakpi]<br>A Passage of Arms<br>The Schermer Inheritance<br>State of Siege
Donna Andrews
Murder, with Peacocks<br>Murder with Puffins<br>Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingoes
Noreen Ayres
A World the Color of Salt<br>Carcass Trade
Margaret Barrett and Charles Dennis, Given the Crime<br>Nancy Bartholomew [Very light, but fun if approached in<br>the right spirit]
Miracle Strip<br>Drag Strip<br>Film Strip
Josh Bazell
Beat the Reaper<br>Wild Thing
Alex Beer, The Second Rider<br>Cheryl Benard, Moghul Buffet<br>John Billheimer
The Contrary Blues<br>Highway Robbery<br>Dismal Mountain<br>Drybone Hollow
C. J. Box
Out of Season<br>Savage Run<br>Winterkill<br>Trophy Hunt
Edgar Box (pseud. of Gore Vidal) [Review]
Death in the Fifth Position<br>Death Likes It Hot<br>Death Before Bedtime
Kylie Brant
Down the Darkest Road<br>Cold Dark Places
Alison Brennan
Love Me to Death<br>Kiss Me, Kill Me<br>If I Should Die
Ken Bruen, The Guards<br>Paul Bryers, The Prayer of the Bone<br>Chelsea Cain
Archie Sheridan/Gretchie Lowell series<br>Heartsick<br>Sweetheart<br>Evil at Heart<br>The Night Season<br>Kill You Twice<br>Let Me Go
One Kick
Andrea Camilleri [A series, here in chronological order, but I started reading them out of sequence without losing anything]
The Shape of Water<br>The Terra-cotta Dog<br>The Snack Thief<br>Voice of the Violin<br>Excursion to Tindari<br>The Smell of the Night<br>Rounding the Mark<br>The Patience of the Spider<br>The Paper Moon<br>August Heat<br>The Wings of the Sphinx<br>The Track of Sand<br>The Potter's Field<br>The Age of Doubt<br>The Dance of the Seagull<br>Treasure Hunt
Truman Capote, In Cold Blood<br>Sarah Caudwell [Pseud. of the late Sarah Caudwell Cockburn]
Thus Was Adonis Murdered<br>The Sirens Sang of Murder<br>The Shortest Route to Hades<br>The Sibyl in Her Grave
Karen Rose Cercone
Steel Ashes<br>Blood Tracks<br>Coal Bones
Kate Collins
Mum's The Word<br>Slay It with Flowers
K. C. Constantine [A series of procedurals set in a fictional town just outside of Pittsburgh in the 1970s and 1980s. I can't say first-hand how well they capture the feeling of life then and there, but they have the way yinzers of those generations speak down cold, and are well-done mysteries besides.]
Sunshine Enemies
Amanda Cross (pseud. of Prof. Dr. Carolyn Heilbrun)
The James Joyce Murder<br>Poetic Justice<br>The Theban Mysteries
Jennifer Crusie
Welcome to Temptation<br>Faking It
Luca D'Andrea, Beneath the Mountain<br>Avram Davidson [General Review: Avram Davidson's<br>Afterlife]
The Enquiries of Dr. Eszterhazy [There's a<br>later collection, Adventures of Dr. Eszterhazy, with more stories;<br>I've not yet laid hands upon it.]<br>The Investigations of Avram Davidson<br>[Posthumous collection, ed. Grania Davis and Richard A. Lupoff]
Lindsay<br>Davis
Silver Pigs [Review by Danny Yee]<br>Shadows in Bronze<br>Venus in Copper<br>The Iron Hand of Mars<br>Poseidon's Gold<br>Last Act in Palmyra<br>Time to Depart<br>A Dying Light in Corduba<br>Three Hands in the Fountain<br>Two for the Lions<br>One Virgin too Many
Bill DeAndrea [The "Killed In" books are a series, but I won't<br>try to sort out order]
Fatal Elixir<br>Five O'Clock Lightning<br>The Hog Murders<br>The Lunatic Fringe<br>"Matt Cobb" series
Killed in the Ratings<br>Killed in the Act<br>Killed with a Passion<br>Killed on the Ice<br>Killed in Paradise<br>Killed in Fringe Time<br>Killed on the Rocks<br>Killed in the Fog
Margaret Anne Doody
Aristotle Detective<br>Aristotle and the Secrets of Life
Ruth Downie
Medicus<br>Terra Incognita<br>Persona Non Grata<br>Caveat Emptor<br>Semper Fidelis<br>Tabula Rasa
Aaron Elkins
Fellowship of Fear<br>The Dark Place<br>Murder in the Queen's Armes<br>Old Bones<br>Curses!<br>Icy Clutches<br>Make No Bones<br>Dead Men's Hearts<br>Twenty Blue Devils
Warren Ellis
Crooked Little Vein<br>Gun Machine
Janet Evanonvich [The<br>series loses interest after a while. Maybe even before the 4th book...]
One for the Money<br>Two for the Dough<br>Three to Get Deadly<br>Four to Score
Christa Faust, Money Shot<br>Robert Ferrigno
Cheshire Moon<br>Dead Silent<br>Flinch<br>Heart Breaker<br>The Horse Latitudes
Conor Fitzgerald, The Dogs of Rome<br>Shamini Flint, "Inspector Singh Investigates" series
A Most Peculiar Malaysian Murder<br>A Bali Conspiracy Most Foul
Gillian Flynn
Dark Places<br>Sharp Objects
Leslie Forbes, Waking Raphael<br>John M. Ford, Scholars of Night<br>Ariana Franklin, Mistress of the Art of Death<br>Alan Furst [To be completely honest, Furst strikes me as imitation<br>Eric Ambler, differing mostly in being more explicit about sex. However, it<br>is good imitation Ambler, and since the...