How does one define a traditional mystery? Everyone’s take on the genre is a little different, as we found out when we asked authors to define the traditional mystery for us in a roundtable discussion earlier this year. According to a soon-to-be-published article by Sulari Gentill, the traditional mystery has evolved from a story aimed at the restoration of order to an edgy formula where protagonists need not succeed in making the world a better place—they must merely try their hardest, and that’s the definition we went with in composing our list of the year’s best traditional mysteries.
Marlowe Benn, Relative Fortunes (Lake Union)
In this terribly amusing twist on the 1920s historical, a soon-to-be heiress with a struggling publishing company heads to New York to come into her fortune. On the voyage, she reconnects with an old school friend; when that friend’s suffragette sister is murdered, it’s up to Benn’s feisty flapper to discover what’s up. Relative Fortunes is a love letter to an era of sweeping changes in both women’s roles and in the publishing industry.
Lynne Truss, The Man Who Got Away (Bloomsbury)
Brighton may be a mid-century noir paradise, but Lynne Truss, the author of the popular Eats, Shoots and Leaves, is bringing traditional mysteries to the classic seaside setting. In her second droll mystery to feature Constable Twitten and Inspector Steine, the two take on a complex case involving a blind sculptor, a wax body, and a dead young man in a deck chair. Lynne Truss knows how to craft tight plots, witty sendoffs, and twists and turns galore, for one of the most fun mysteries you’ll pick up all year.
Martin Edwards, Gallows Court (Poisoned Pen)
Martin Edwards is a longtime champion of the traditional mystery, having crafted numerous introductions for reissued mysteries over the past few years in collaboration with the British Library, and now it’s time for Edwards’ fiction to shine just as brightly. In Gallows Court, a killer is on the loose in smog-filled London, and it’s up to the fierce daughter of a notorious hanging judge to track him down.
Soji Shimada, tr. by Louise Heal Kawai, Murder in the Crooked House (Pushkin Vertigo)
This one is filled with puzzling crimes—and even more puzzling architecture. In a wintry chateau that feels like it was inspired by German Expressionist set design, a murder has taken place. Detectives arrive just before a snowstorm cuts the whole mansion off from the outside world, for a locked room mystery that’s bound to satisfy traditional mystery fans and armchair travelers alike. Pushkin Vertigo has been bringing a number of classic and contemporary international crime books into circulation, and we’re pleased to see another work from Soji Shimada become widely-available on American shores.
Rachel Howzell Hall, They All Fall Down (Forge)
This is the first stand-alone from author of the Lou Norton series, Rachel Howzell Hall, who knows her genre just as well as she knows her city of Los Angeles. In Hall’s latest, seven strangers, each with their own peculiar secrets, find themselves imperiled during a beach vacation on a private island gone terribly awry. Hall is an expert at capturing a giant metropolis, and we’re pleased to see her talents on display in a more intimate, locked-room setting.
Jacqueline Winspear, The American Agent (Harper)
In this 15th work to feature the ever-independent crime-solving nurse, Maisie Dobbs, Winspear’s heroic investigator must solve a mystery against a backdrop of the London Blitz, while also working hard to protect an evacuee staying under her roof. Winspear, as always, delivers both history and thrills, as her sensible sleuth applies the tricks of her trade to the craft of espionage.
Naomi Hirahara, Iced in Paradise: A Leilani Santiago Hawai’i Mystery (Prospect Park)
Naomi Hirahara wrapped up her long-running Mas Arai series last year, and we were psyched to see that she’s got a new series going already! Iced in Paradise is a breezy mystery set in Hawaii, introducing Leilani Santiago, stuck working for her family’s shaved ice business and bored out of her mind—at least, until she stumbles across the body of a pro-surfer and finds herself investigating the crime.
Nicholas Meyer, The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocols (Minotaur)
Nicholas Meyer was the first author to establish the now wildly-popular genre of Sherlockian pastiche, introducing the world to the further adventures of Sherlock with his 1970s novel The 7% Solution; now, after a hiatus from the character of nearly two decades, he returns to the character with The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocol. Sherlock is tasked with investigating the pernicious anti-Semitic text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and discovers a vast conspiracy of slander in a work that both does justice to its setting and resonates with a new era of fake news and its real consequences.
Louise Penny, A Better Man (Minotaur)
What list of mysteries, traditional or otherwise, could be complete without Louise Penny’s latest entry? Every Penny novel is a treat sure to please fans across the crime and mystery board, and A Better Man is no exception. Inspector Gamache is already dealing with rising floodwaters on his first day back in the office when a frantic father turns to the police to locate his missing daughter. The case would be difficult enough to investigate in the best of times, but with multiple crises, and mounting pressures from all sides, Gamache has his work cut out for him.
Alan Bradley, The Golden Tresses of the Dead (Delacorte Press)
The precocious preteen detective, chemistry wiz, and amateur poisoner Flavia de Luce is back in this tenth installment of her detective series, set in 1950s England. The novel takes place during the much-anticipated wedding of Flavia’s older sister Ophelia to the dashing Dieter Schrantz. But things take a slight turn for the macabre when a human finger is found inside the wedding cake. And Flavia, who has just established a detective business of her own, is ready to take up the case.
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Notable Selections
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Gigi Pandian, The Glass Thief · Terry Shames, A Risky Undertaking for Loretta Singletary · Christopher Fowler, The Lonely Hour · Donis Casey, The Wrong Girl · Kate Saunders, Laetitia Rod and the Case of the Wandering Scholar · Jon Land, A Time For Murder · V. M. Burns, Bookmarked for Murder · Martha Grimes, The Old Success · Alexander McCall Smith, The Department of Sensitive Crimes · Sherry Thomas, The Art of Theft · Erica Wright, Famous in Cedarville · Marty Wingate, The Bodies in the Library · Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anna Waterhouse, Mycroft and Sherlock: The Empty Birdcage · Celia Imre, A Nice Cup of Tea · Cara Black, Murder in Bell-Air · Donna Leon, Unto Us A Son Is Given
