Yes, go with Wolfe and Archie. Likely the best American mysteries of all. (Note that the first is not the best, they actually get better later in the series. But the first is still damn good)
If you like historical fact mixed in with a mystery, try the SPQR series by John Maddox Roberts.
Along with many of those that have been mentioned already, I enjoy Lindsay Davis’s Marcus Didius Falco mysteries, a series of hard-boiled detective stories set in ancient Rome. Great detail and enough humor to keep them from being too heavy.
I recommend Colin Dexter’s Inspector Morse series. These are set in Oxford. Morse is a very likable character, with his share of human frailties (including an over-fondness for drink and of letting his sergeant pay for it), a sharp eye for grammatical errors, and an absolutely brilliant mind. He often makes wild assumptions and strays from the solution several times before reaching an always satisfactory conclusion. His partnership with Sergeant Lewis is amongst the best in detective fiction IMO.
YES, I love Inspector Morse by Colin Dexter! I don’t agree he’s a likable character, though! A right bastard, he can be, and a sharp tongue! But if you like him, Reginald Hill has a long series about a pair of Yorkshire coppers, the ‘fat man’ Andy Dalziel and his partner Pascoe. My favorite that comes to mind is “Bones and Silence”. Not only are they engrossing procedurals, but the fat man can be astonishingly witty, and you will laugh! And Elizabeth George has written any of a number of doorstops about an English Lord who was born to the manor but became a police detective - and HIS partner, Barbara, his frumpy dumpy total opposite. Very good depictions of current day life in England.
I recommend these from a variety of styles:
*The Murder of Roger Acroyd *by Agatha Christie (*Death on the Nile *is also very good IMO)
*The Maltese Falcon *by Dashiell Hammett
*Cat of Nine Tails *by Ellery Queen. (One of the first novels to deal with serial killers and still one of the best, IMO, despite having a major character who’s phonier than a three-dollar bill.)
*Point Deception *by Marcia Muller
*Trent’s Last Case *by E.C. Benson
*No Defense *by Kate Wilhelm
*The Little Sister *by Raymond Chandler (The critics are quite probably right – The Long Goodbye is Chandler’s best novel – but in this one Marlowe has to deal with a bevy of femme fatales, and the ending offers a beautiful example of the moral ambiguity that is such a feature of noir.)
*An Unsuitable Job for a Woman *by P.D. James (how I wish she would write more Cordelia Gray novels)
*Silent Joe *by T. Jefferson Parker (one of the best crime/mystery writers today, even if the MWA were tripping their balls off in awarding the Edgar to a mediocrity like California Girl)
*The Zebra-Striped Hearst *by Ross McDonald
*The Moonstone *by Wilkie Collins is one of the first, if not the first, detective novels, and, IMO, it is still one of the best.
Dick Francis is just an excellent author. I’ve read about 15 of his novels and have liked them all. I will also re-emphasize that, with the exception of California Girl, Parker is one of the best authors around today.
When it comes to series, I second Marcia Muller’s Sharon McCone novels. The vast majority of them are quite good, and McCone is one of the most likeable detectives out there.
Some of Martha Grimes’s Richard Jury/Melrose Plant novels are quite good, but beginning with The Old Contempibles, the series went south in a big way. I would not read any of these novels written after *The Old Silent *with the exception of The Lamorna Wink.
Kate Wilhelm’s Barbara Holloway novels are exceptional.
I cannot recommend highly enough Michael Slade’s series of novels about the RCMP’s Special X division. Be warned, though, these novels can also be considered horror novels, and the blood-letting gets quite graphic at times
When it comes to hard-boiled fiction, James M. Cain seems to be forgotten today, but he wrote some classics.
When it comes to Sherlock Holmes, I highly recommend *The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes *and The Return of Sherlock Holmes. At least half the stories in each book are classics, and nearly all are worth reading. *The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes *contains “Silver Blaze,” which is of my favorite short stories and a work I regard as perfect for its genre. When it comes to the novels, *The Hound of the Baskervilles *is the only one really worth a damn.
I second Janet Evanovich, at least up to and including book 9. They are light reading and are quite funny. I don’t know if they’re true mysteries as much as plots with a lot of twists in them. “High Five,” “Three To Get Deadly,” and “Seven Up,” are the books that have the most mystey going for them.
Joanne Fluke writes mysteries and the heroine is a person who runs a cookie shop, so she puts recipies in them. If you like to cook deserrts you’ll like these. As with Evanovich, Fluke’s writing style is light and they are easy reads, (for like if you’re on a plane). Though I do admit Fluke can be a bit “Pollyana” for some people. But the action is fast so you can easily buzz over those parts.
Though not really a mystery a great and I mean great book I read is Rebecca. Daphne du Maurier creates one of the greatest literary villians of all time in Mrs Danvers.
It’s worth the read.
for a truly odd read try carl hiaasen they are so very fun and wacky.
for a really interesting main character try carol o’connell’s mallory series.
go into the future with j.d.robbs’ “in death” series.
I had totally forgotten about Daphne du Maurier. Rebecca was one of my favorite books in my youth.
Are there any other fans of Elizabeth Peters or Margaret Frazer out there?
Elizabeth Peters writes about Amelia Peabody-Emerson, as the series progresses, her family. They’re archaeologists working in Egypt aroun 1900, although the series has covered about 25 years and has now gone through World War I. The problem is, Amelia and company have a habit of coming across recently dead bodies. I thoroughly enjoy the books. They can be a little over the top, but they come complete with a Master Criminal and they’re good, fun, light-weight reads. I think the series works better if you start with the first one Crocodile on the Sandbank, but I could be wrong. The Last Camel Died At Noon was also a particularly good one, if memory serves, but if the melodrama implied by the title puts you off, the series is not for you.
Margaret Frazer has a couple of heroes, Dame Frevisse, a cloistered nun and great niece (?) of Geoffrey Chaucer and Joliffe, an actor. These stories are set in England in the 1400s and touch on some of the politics and culture of the time. Ms. Frazer’s website does a better job of explaining the way she gives you a sense of place than I can and I think she succeeds. I’d especially recommend her to fans of Brother Cadfael.
I’m a glutton for mysteries, although I prefer lighter-weight ones. As you may have gathered, I’m a fan of Brother Cadfael, and I think I’ve read and enjoyed every mystery Dick Francis has written, including the recent ones with his son. My parents subscribed to the Mystery Lovers Book Club and got me hooked on them, starting with Hugh Pentecost who’s become very dated, I think. Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin remain old friends and, while Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot gets a little pretentious for me, I’ll take Miss Marple any time and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is one of the best. I’ve also been known to have a crush on Lord Peter Wimsey.
On the recommendation of my sister, it’s the only du Maurier I’ve ever read - but it’s very, very good.
Just posted this in the dystopian-novel thread, too, but it fits here too:
Fatherland by Robert Harris is an alternative-history mystery, set in 1964. Nazi Germany has conquered Europe and severely worn down the Soviet Union, and is engaged in a cold war with the U.S. Hitler is about to have his first summit meeting in Berlin with President Joseph Kennedy when an SS criminal investigator begins looking into the mysterious deaths of senior Nazi Party officials.
A very good, very chilling novel.
I like Elizabeth Peters and Margaret Frazer, Siege. And Peters when she writes as Barbara Michaels, too.
It’s non-fiction (which is icing on the cake for me), but check out The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher. Very engaging book. Good mystery.
An excellent Alfred Hitchcock film, too. Winner of the Best Picture Oscar for 1940.
Just came across this book recommended in another thread on another board.
I think I’ve read it three times now, and if it stands up to re-reading, it’s pretty damned good. It’s good.