Nusrat Jahan Progga
Always loved Law and Order? Got hooked to CSI and Death Note? Can’t get enough of crime and mystery and so you decided to start reading some novels of that genre? You have come to the right place, my friend, because yours truly is a huge fan of the genre, and can tell you right where to start!
Without further adieu- let’s begin the list of enigma and awe-smackingly-awesome-ness!
• The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett- I want you to google greatest crime fiction novels of all time, and if you don’t find this one in the list, I will treat you to some good pizza. Hammett is the first true master of the private eye genre, or as some might call him- the creator. If only you know how many characters from mystery novels were actually inspired from Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade (the number being very large). The story starts off with a woman called Mrs Wonderly hiring private detectives Sam Spade and Miles Archer to tail a man who has allegedly run off with her little sister. The duo take on the job because of the good money but Spade can sense that their client might be trouble. Being the poster book for the private eye genre, it has al the necessary elements- the strong detective, a secretary in love, adversarial government agents, a criminal mastermind, and of course the must have oomph factor known as femme fatale!
• The A.B.C Murders by Agatha Christie- Start off with this book and then try reading every single Agatha Christie book there is. She is the QUEEN of the crime and mystery genre, I kid you not. She holds the record of being the best selling novelist of all time. After the Shakespeare’s works and then the bible, Agatha Christie work comes in third in the list of the world’s most widely published books. She was made Dame in 1971, due to her immense contribution to literature. This book in particular another fictional private-eye character that is also revered as the greatest of all time, like Sam Spade. It might seem odd to some how the quirky Belgian detective shares the same line of work as the tough Sam Spade, but you should know that Mr. Poirot shines in his own version of badassery. He tracks a smart serial killer, in a dexterously plotted and well characterized thriller. The novel has an unusual form as it utilizes both first and third person narrative. Here, Poirot receives a letter from a mysterious serial killer called A.B.C where he writes down the location of the next murder. (Some other personal favorite of yours truly written by Dame Agatha Christie includes Nemesis, And Then There Were None, Murder On The Orient Express, The Seven Dials Mystery, Funerals Are Fatal, and The Secret Adversary)
• Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler- Although Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon set the standards, Farewell, My Lovely remains as the more influential one. Chandler is lauded as a pioneer due to the his sardonically humorous first-person narratives with interesting metaphors every here and there. He started what is now the most imitated prose style of the genre. In this book, Private detective (you can’t really get tired of them) Philip Marlowe is investigating a missing person case that he just can’t seem to figure out when he sees a felon, Moose Malloy, barging into a nightclub looking for his ex-girlfriend. The club, having changed owners, doesn’t have a single person in it who has any clue to where the girl is. Malloy ends up killing the black owner of the club and running away. Of course, the dead-beat cop won’t handle a case involving a black man, so Marlowe ends up taking this elusive case.
• The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain- Oh, don’t we all love crimes of passion? This book contains a simple yet thrilling love story of a man and a woman plotting to kill the woman’s husband. The best part about is that the criminal protagonists seem more ordinary than like criminal masterminds. So you can actually relate to them! The Postman Always Rings is also one of the imitated novels of all time. Even the author himself imitated the novel and created another one just like it called Double Identity.
• The Innocent Man by John Grisham- Although some might argue that Pelican Brief and The Firm are some of Grisham’s better works, but the Innocent Man hold a special place in my heart since it is the first Grisham Novel I ever read. What makes it even better that it is based on a true and heartbreaking story, and the book even includes pictures of the real families and victims and suspects. The story, as the name suggests is about an innocent man going behind bars for the rape and murder of Debra Sue Carter in 1988.
• The Hound of Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle- This list would be incomplete without some Sherlock Holmes in it, like duh! I don’t think I even need to tell you why you should read this because the basic law of life includes reading book featuring the great detective Holmes! The book had the first appearance of Holmes after his apparent death in The Final Problem, and eventually led to the revival of the character. The story follows an attempted murder inspired by a mysterious supernatural hound.