I’ve always loved classic mystery fiction – why? Well, there’s always a “proper” story, where everyday life is plunged into chaos and then re-invented. There’s always a puzzle, of course, but in addition, there’s the characters and the settings. All the books I’ve recommended – and I could recommend so many more! – have a cracker of a story where emotion is fused with logic to give both an emotional and an intellectual treat.
There’s something in the woods that shouldn’t be there…In 1620 William Cayden, privateer and pirate, brought home his wife, an Inca Princess, to Birchen Bower, Sussex. Ever since the unhappy princess is rumoured to have haunted the chapel and grounds in the form of a jaguar. In 1870 his descendant, Josiah Cayden, enthralled by the legend and in love with the Amazon, turned the estate into a jungle with monkeys, crocodiles – and jaguars.
In 1927 the ruined estate is bought by the wealthy Canadian Tom Jago – and the Jaguar Princess strikes again. But can a legend kill? That’s what Jack Haldean is determined to find out.
Murder on the Orient Express is an absolute classic of mystery fiction. Filmed many times, none of the films capture the tension of the book. Based on a real-life experience of Agatha Christie’s and the shocking true crime of the Lindberg baby kidnap, this is the book to read as a perfect introduction to one of the best mystery authors of all time. You’ve probably seen Agatha Christie on film or TV but if you’ve never read one of her books – start here!
THE MOST WIDELY READ MYSTERY OF ALL TIME—NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE DIRECTED BY KENNETH BRANAGH AND PRODUCED BY RIDLEY SCOTT!
“The murderer is with us—on the train now . . .”
Just after midnight, the famous Orient Express is stopped in its tracks by a snowdrift. By morning, the millionaire Samuel Edward Ratchett lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside. Without a shred of doubt, one of his fellow passengers is the murderer.
Isolated by the storm, detective Hercule Poirot must find the killer among a dozen of the dead man’s…
Published in 1868, The Moonstone is a terrific story of stolen Indian jewels, fraud, murder, and true love that cracks along at a pace that belies its age. Rachel
Verrinder should have inherited the Moonstone from her wicked uncle for her
18th birthday but the fabulous diamond is stolen. Rachel seems to fight any attempt to recover the diamond and, in the process, spurns Franklin Blake, who she loved. But why? If you’re wary of Victorian fiction, start here – you’ll love it!
Who, in the name of wonder, had taken the Moonstone out of Miss Rachel's drawer?
A celebrated Indian yellow diamond is first stolen from India, then vanishes from a Yorkshire country house. Who took it? And where is it now? A dramatist as well as a novelist, Wilkie Collins gives to each of his narratorsa household servant, a detective, a lawyer, a cloth-eared Evangelical, a dying medical manvibrant identities as they separately tell the part of the story that concerns themselves.
One of the great triumphs of nineteenth-century sensation fiction, The Moonstone tells of a mystery that for page after…
Philip MacDonald fought in WW1 before becoming one of the most popular mystery writers of the 1920s and 1930s. Sheldon Garret, the successful American playwright, goes into a London tea shop and overhears two women plotting to kidnap a child and – maybe – murder. Sheldon turns to Anthony Gethryn and with the slender clue of an abandoned shopping list to guide him, Anthony must try to prevent a ruthless crime. Kidnap, murder and blackmail form the spine of this, one of MacDonald’s best novels as Anthony Gethryn races to prevent yet more deaths.
A brief shopping list is the only clue Anthony Gethryn has to help Sheldon Garrett, an American dramatist, find the two women he accidently overheard plotting a crime
Written at the start of the First World War, when victory was very much in doubt, this cracker of a thriller sees Richard Hannay evade both crooks and cops in a chase across Scotland to preserve the secret of a murdered man. If he loses, the war might be lost – the stakes are that high. Hannay’s ingenuity is pushed to the utmost as the hunted fugitive. Buchan’s love of Scotland shines through, a terrific background to an unputdownable thriller. Filmed many times, the book has a tension and a pace that has never been really captured on screen.
Richard Hannay has just returned to England after years in South Africa and is thoroughly bored with his life in London. But then a murder is committed in his flat, just days after a chance encounter with an American who had told him about an assassination plot which could have dire international consequences. An obvious suspect for the police and an easy target for the killers, Hannay goes on the run in his native Scotland where he will need all his courage and ingenuity to stay one step ahead of his pursuers.
Before becoming a world-renowned author, Dorothy L Sayers worked in an advertising agency and it’s Pimm’s Publicity that’s the fascinating background for Lord Peter Wimsey to discover who’s behind death, drugs, and debauchery. Peter has to join Pimm’s Publicity but it seems incredible that the chatty, humdrum world of the office should hide a killer, let alone an illicit drug distribution network.
Dorothy L. Sayers’s writing is some of the very best of the “Golden Age” of classic mysteries and this is a story you won’t forget.
The tenth book in Dorothy L Sayers' classic Lord Peter Wimsey series, introduced by bestselling crime writer Peter Robinson - a must-read for fans of Agatha Christie's Poirot and Margery Allingham's Campion Mysteries.
Victor Dean fell to his death on the stairs of Pym's Advertising Agency, but no one seems to be sorry. Until an inquisitive new copywriter joins the firm and asks some awkward questions...
Disguised as his disreputable cousin Death Bredon, Lord Peter Wimsey takes a job - one that soon draws him into a vicious network of blackmailers and drug…
My book recommendations reflect an abiding passion for Japanese literature, which has unquestionably influenced my own writing. My latest literary interest involves Japanese poetry—I’ve recently started a project that combines haiku and prose narration to describe my experiences as a part-time resident in a 1300-year-old Japanese hot spring town that Bashō helped make famous in The Narrow Road to the Deep North. But as a writer, my main focus remains novels. In late 2023 the second in a planned series of novels set in Ishikawa prefecture will be published. I currently live in Kanazawa, but have also been lucky to call Sapporo, Akita, Tokyo, and Fukui home at different times.
Emmitt’s plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of purchasing their dream home. Disappointed, he’s surprised to discover her subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo.
In his search for a meaningful life in Japan, and after quitting his job, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa’s most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English. He becomes drawn into the mysterious death of a friend of Mirai’s parents, leading him and his father-in-law to climb the mountain where the man died. There, he learns the somber truth and discovers what the future holds for him and his wife.
Packed with subtle literary allusion and closely observed nuance, Kanazawa reflects the mood of Japanese fiction in a fresh, modern incarnation.
In Kanazawa, the first literary novel in English to be set in this storied Japanese city, Emmitt's future plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of negotiations to purchase their dream home. Disappointed, he's surprised to discover Mirai's subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo, a city he dislikes.
Harmony is further disrupted when Emmitt's search for a more meaningful life in Japan leads him to quit an unsatisfying job at a local university. In the fallout, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa's most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English.
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