My 10 Best Detective Novels

[antongould]

Not wishing to pollute salymap's wonderful and rightly popular thread but taking up Eudaimonia's suggestion of 9th May what about a My 10 Best?
I apologise in advance as I know such lists irritate many but I have my reputation as "Chav" of these boards to maintain - anyway

The Nine Tailors - Sayers
Swan Song - Crispin
Gaudy Night - Sayers
Voices - Indridason
Exit Music - Rankin
Service of All the Dead - Dexter
Firewall - Mankell
Five Red Herrings - Sayers
Silence of the Grave - Indridason
Devices and Desires - James

[Estelle]

I can applaud your list, having read seven of your ten. Indridason's novels are very involving, aren't they?

[antongould]

Thank you I await your list with unbounded interest!

[salymap]

Malice Aforethought - Francis Iles
Murder Must Advertise - Sayers
My foe outstretch'd beneath a tree - VC Clinton Baddeley
Tiger in the Smoke - Allingham
Moving Toyshop - Crispin
Hand in Glove - Marsh
Third Girl - Christie
Accounting for Murder - Emma Lathen
More Work for the Undertaker - Allingham
The Hollow Man - John Dickson Carr
Only a Matter of Time - V C Clinton Baddeley

List would be different next week

[french frank]

The Hound of the Baskervilles - A. Conan Doyle
Strong Poison - D. Sayers
Before the Fact - F. Iles
4.50 from Paddington - A. Christie
The Nine Tailors - D. Sayers
Le mystère de la chambre jaune - G. Leroux
The Beckoning Lady - M. Allingham
The Valley of Fear - A. Conan Doyle
Le bouchon de cristal - M. Leblanc
The Mystery of the Burnt Cottage - E. Blyton

[Petrushka]

A Question of Proof - Nicholas Blake
Trent's Last Case - E C Bentley
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie
The Nine Tailors - Dorothy L Sayers
The Wench is Dead - Colin Dexter
Green for Danger - Christiana Brand
The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle
Gaudy Night - Dorothy L Sayers
Hercule Poirot's Christmas - Agatha Christie
Black Dog - Stephen Booth
A Murder of Quality - John Le Carre

Edit: Oops can't count. Done 11 but I'll leave it as it is

[Eudaimonia]

AG-- hey, thanks! Looks like I've got some of my 'summer reading' picked out for me...I'm definitely looking forward to digging in.

[Estelle]

Antongould,
I'm afraid I shall have to disappoint you in the supplying of a list of ten best; I have done what I could on Salymap's thread in supplying the names of those writers whose detective fiction I most admire. I think it is impossible for me to choose one best book from each of those writers, but you can't go wrong if you begin almost any book in the lot. I would mention that the last two Hillermans showed a weakening in his skill, but he was close to 80 at the time, and there are sixteen others to choose from!

[antongould]

No problem you have provided us all with a lot of books to hunt for!

[amateur51]

Malice Aforethought - Francis Iles
Murder Must Advertise - Sayers
My foe outstretch'd beneath a tree - VC Clinton Baddeley
Tiger in the Smoke - Allingham
Moving Toyshop - Crispin
Hand in Glove - Marsh
Third Girl - Christie
Accounting for Murder - Emma Lathen
More Work for the Undertaker - Allingham
The Hollow Man - John Dickson Carr
Only a Matter of Time - V C Clinton Baddeley

List would be different next week

Great list, saly and thanks for reminding me about Emma Lathen - I've not read/seen anything of 'hers' in years, so you've set me off on a trail. I used to have a pile of Ellery Queen magazines but those went to the charity shop some years ago, before I realised that my retirement might start rather earlier than I'd envisaged

[Richard Tarleton]

A Murder of Quality - John Le Carre

Well done Petrushka for including this - the second appearance of George Smiley, after his debut in Call for the Dead, and something of a respite for him from the Cold War. Le Carré's third was The Spy who came in from the Cold, which of course became a runaway best seller after the slow start made by the first two. I met and heard him talking about his work shortly after his fourth, The Looking Glass War.

Smiley already seems old from the start. Had le Carré a clearer idea of what lay ahead for his hero he may well have wished to recalibrate his life - you get the impression in the later novels that he has to slow down the ageing process. A great writer who transcends genre. I have all his novels except one, le Carré enthusiasts may guess which that is. Is it worth reading?

[umslopogaas]

Post 11, Richard Tarleton, would that missing Le Carre novel be 'The Naive And Sentimental Lover'? I read it at least thirty years ago and remember being disappointed. Just dipped into it again and find I cant remember a thing about it, but it looks as if it could be entertaining. It is, however, a sort of fantasy/comedy and completely unlike his usual spy thrillers. Sorry, not much help really, I can only suggest you'll have to try it to see how you get on with it.

[Thespian]

In no order, just as i think of them

Evil under the Sun - Christie
And then there were none - Christie
Dissolution - C J Sansom
The Hollow Man - Carr
The Moving Toyshop - Crispin
The Unfinished Clue - G. Heyer
Hound of the Baskervilles - Doyle
Last Bus to Woodstock - Dexter
So Much Blood - Simon Brett
A Man Lay Dead - Ngaio Marsh

[aeolium]

Another ten:

Collins - The Moonstone
Dickens/Collins - No Thoroughfare
Doyle - The Sign of Four
Buchan - Three Hostages
Sayers - Nine Tailors
Chandler - Farewell My Lovely
Chandler - The Long Goodbye
Dürrenmatt - The Pledge
Hill - On Beulah Height
Hiassen - Double Whammy

[vinteuil]

Collins - A Stolen Letter
Collins - The Moonstone
Buchan - The Island of Sheep
Simenon - l'Homme qui regardait passer les trains
Simenon - les inconnus dans la maison
Simenon - la neige était sale
Raabe - Stopfkuchen ('Tubby Schaumann')
Léo Malet - 120 rue de la gare
Léo Malet - Les nouveaux mystères de Paris
Sherlock Holmes and Father Brown ad lib.

that's more than ten. But I'd like some Chandler and Hammett too, please...