There’s a universe of possibility in the crime mystery. While certain settings have become a staple of fiction—the Agatha Christie murder, the hard-boiled detective, the modern police procedural—at its core a crime mystery only needs for something illicit to have taken place and the gradual revelation of it. Outer space? The Titanic? A kindergarten? Crime mysteries can be anywhere and anything.
Whether you’re an eclectic reader or just looking for a little something outside your familiar territory, this list has some inventive options to broaden your horizons.
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Matthew Reilly, The Tournament
Matthew Reilly made his name through non-stop explosive action thrillers with The Tournament being his first novel to step into a different lane. It features a young Queen Elizabeth attending a chess tournament in Constantinople in 1546. With a killer on the loose and conspiracies in play her tutor, the real-life scholar Roger Ascham, begins to investigate.
It’s not the first story to parallel chess and crime but the perspective of Elizabeth lays some lever groundwork for how she sees politics, sex and power. Reilly’s accessibly writing style in a rich historical setting makes for a good page turning mystery.
Terry Pratchett, Snuff
The Discworld series, starting in 1983, quickly evolved from its parody nature to a dense universe and a perfect setting for whatever ideas Pratchett wished to explore. Commanders Vimes is a character that evolved with it, a grizzled police veteran with an adamantine sense of justice. In Snuff he finds himself on vacation in a small country town so, of course, there is a murder.
Terry Pratchett’s skill for blending relatable characters, affectionate pastiche and cuttingly incisive satire are all on fine display here. It explores small-town politics, racial prejudice and corruption all through the fine tunes comic style that Pratchett made his own.
Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
A contained crime, the death of the neighbors’ dog, takes on a whole different form due to the perspective of the narrator. Christopher is a fifteen-year-old boy on the autism spectrum, drawn to numbers and finding human interaction deeply difficult. Investigating the death leads him on a path uncovering many other secrets, including those of his own life.
Christopher’s perceptions of his world, internal and external make for a unique book, one which has been praised by those in the field as a brilliant exploration of the autism spectrum.
Ben Elton, The First Casualty
Inspector Douglas Kingsley finds himself imprisoned as a conscientious objector, refusing to fight in World War I. He soon finds himself pressed into a different type of service, on the front lines of Flanders, investigating the murder of a solider in a field hospital.
Kingsley is keenly aware of the grim irony or investigating a single death while hundreds are dying around him and Elton doesn’t shy away from the brutal and miserable world of the trenches. The Inspector slowly unwinds the mystery, revealing a web of secrets and coverups every bit as sharp as the barbed wire that surrounds them.
Nick Harkaway, Angelmaker
It’s hard to pin this novel down to a genre. Conspiracy Thriller? Retro Sci-fi? Gangster Noir? Pulp Spy Adventure? It covers all these fields, merging them all into an intricate winding path.
The story follows Joe Spork, clock repairer and son on an infamous 1950s gangster. One day a job turns out to be more than it appears and he’s soon drawn into a world of monks, mad scientists and criminal masterminds, with the fate of the world in his hands. While the world is hyper-real it all feels consistent and, like his previous novel The Gone Away World, it’s a tale full of great twists and turns.
R.M. Caldwell, Fast and Fastidious
Pride and Prejudice meets Fast and Furious. My debut novel follows Lucy Elliot, a young woman in 1810 England, technically minded, neuro-divergent and a fan of the Night Races, underground coach racing held on country lanes. She encounters the charming but reckless Captain Dashwood in both society and at the races. Soon Lucy finds herself juggling romance, racing and a series of coach robberies that leads to a far more sinister conspiracy.
As soon as the title entered my head I knew I was onto something, but it wasn’t until I pinned down Lucy’s character that things really started rolling.
Part regency romance, part adventure mystery and part action racer, it’s been such a fun ride bringing it to print and I hope readers will share the journey.
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