# Crime Writers: Favourite And Least Favourite? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 14, 2005, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386 "2005-03-14T01:49:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/1 "2005-03-14T01:49:28Z")
Favourites, in no particular order: Carl Hiaasen - Stormy Weather Joe Gores - 32 Cadillacs Kinky Friedman - Elvis, Jesus And Coca-Cola James Lee Burke - Purple Cane Road Robert B. Parker - Double Play Lawrence Block - A Long Line Of Dead Men Richard Price - Freedomland Ian Rankin - The Falls Least favourites, again in no real order: Dennis Lehane P. D. James Andrew Vachss James Ellroy Ruth Rendell ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/2 "2005-03-14T02:46:58Z")
P.D. James is actually my favorite crime writer. šŸ˜› šŸ™‚ ---
**Author:** ![Kaspar\_Hauser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b3f665/32.png) [@Kaspar\_Hauser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaspar_Hauser)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/3 "2005-03-14T02:50:12Z")
Funny, Iā€™d put Ellroy at the top of my list, and Hiaasen near the bottom. ---
**Author:** ![pokey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ebca7d/32.png) [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/4 "2005-03-14T02:56:43Z")
PD James is my favourite too. Even though she says ā€œorientateā€ a lot. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/5 "2005-03-14T03:44:14Z")
Favorite: Raymond Chandler. Least: Joan Hess. Entertaining and funny, but not mysteries at all. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/6 "2005-03-14T04:26:51Z")
Jim Thompson is not only my favorite crime/noir writer, but perhaps one of my favorite authors overall. I donā€™t think Iā€™ve ever read any novel that has such a visceral, kick in the guts ending as _The Grifters_. I loaned it to Miss Moneypenny, whose isnā€™t a hardcore reader, and she read the thing in one sitting, and with the same response. 'Course, some of his work is utter crap, but at his best (_The Grifters_, _Pop. 1280_, _After Dark, My Sweet_) are outstanding. Ditto for Patricia Highsmith. Although her Ripley novels are most well known, I think _Cry Of The Owl_ is probably the best thing she wrote. Again, some of her work could be dismissed without loss (a fact to which she openly admitted while alive) but at her best, she was the best. James M. Cain and Raymond Chandler are also good. I used to like Gregory MacDonald before he milked the Fletch series into the ground. Iā€™m sorry he sold the rights to a studio who used it as a Chevy Chase project, but then again, so is he, apparently. Iā€™ve never read Parkerā€™s work, but people speak so highly of it I probably should. I like James Ellroyā€™s short fiction but find his novels (or at least, the later ones) to be bloated, and his ā€œshotgunā€ prose to be overly stylistic and unimaginative. He clearly does extenisve research, but often the historical facts and secondary characters seem to exist soley for the purpose of letting the reader know exactly how much research he did. I havenā€™t read _White Jazz_ or _L.A. Confidential_, of which Iā€™ve heard people describe as being his best work, so Iā€™m not going to cut him off entirely, but heā€™s not number one on the list. I never got the appeal of Vacchs. A lot of people like him, I guess; I find his work cliched and tedious. He claims to write in short bursts between court functions and whatnot, and I can believe it, as he seems to meander around from one subplot to another until coming to a completely irrelevent denouement. I give him master props for his work as a legal advocate for abused children, but I think is writing sucks. Sorry, Andy. For the most part, itā€™s a genre I just donā€™t get into all that much. Crime/mystery for itā€™s own sake just isnā€™t that interesting, and a failure of much of the genre writing is that it is either about the crime and not the characters, or the characters are soā€¦deliberately idiosyncratic, so unlike anyone youā€™d ever meet in real life, that it just comes off as a characture. Roy Dillon or Tom Ripley just seem like normal guys, albeit (in Ripleyā€™s case) with a rather distorted, sociopathic view of the world. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Idlewild](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8491ac/32.png) [@Idlewild](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idlewild)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/7 "2005-03-14T04:35:45Z")
Favourite: Dorothy L. Sayers Leslie Charteris Raymond Chandler Dick Francis Reginald Hill Ellis Peters Peter Corris Kerry Greenwood Ian Rankin Least favourite: I have an absolutely irrational loathing of Agatha Christieā€™s writing. Ruth Rendell But basically you can sit me down with any old mystery novel and Iā€™ll be happy. My grandmother read the genre almost exclusively when I was a kid so theyā€™re my comfortable fall-back. ---
**Author:** ![Kaspar\_Hauser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b3f665/32.png) [@Kaspar\_Hauser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaspar_Hauser)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/8 "2005-03-14T04:40:54Z")
Iā€™ll second Jim Thompson. Amazing. ---
**Author:** ![Hey\_It\_s\_That\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Hey\_It\_s\_That\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hey_It_s_That_Guy)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/9 "2005-03-14T04:45:31Z")
Iā€™m a huge fan of James Ellroy and Carl Hiaasen, plus of course Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and oh yes, Mickey Spillane. I keep wanting to get into Donald Westlake/Richard Stark, who I have been told I would love. Is he/are they any good? And what is Kinky Friedman like? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/10 "2005-03-14T05:32:13Z")
> [@Big Bad Voodoo Lou](#): > > I keep wanting to get into Donald Westlake/Richard Stark, who I have been told I would love. Is he/are they any good? Westlake/Stark is very good but kind of a chameleon in style; he just doesnā€™t seem to have an identifiable style. He puts together solid stories, though, with well-developed characters, and has worked in so many different forms (novels, short fiction, short-shorts, TV, feature screenplays) that heā€™s demonstrated a mastery of not only crime novel genre but of adapting a story to any appropriate medium. (I believe he was nominated for an Oscar for adapting _The Grifters_ to film.) I like his short fiction best, and heā€™s all over any Alfred Hitchcockā€™s anthology, so itā€™s not hard to find. Give him a try; heā€™s well worth the read. Iā€™m surprised no one has yet mentioned Robert Bloch. Heā€™s another solid crime author. Thereā€™s one storyā€“I forget the nameā€“about an embezzler who stashes some money under a sappling before turning himself in, and first plans and then relies on the money hidden under the tree to support his life after prison. The twistā€“that the money is missingā€“is obvious, but the story, about how his actions and decisions revolve around the hidden cash, is outstanding. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Soul\_Brother\_Number\_Two](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/soul_brother_number_two/32/3515_2.png) [@Soul\_Brother\_Number\_Two](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soul_Brother_Number_Two)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/11 "2005-03-14T06:37:49Z")
Favorite: too many to write down. Least fave: James Patterson. How in hell he gets money for writing Iā€™ll never know. He is a really really bad writer. I love Andrew Vachss, because I love over the top stuff a lot, and his is wicked over the top. Plus heā€™s a pretty good writer most of the time. And I think Max the Silent is just fucking cool. ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/12 "2005-03-14T08:45:24Z")
> [@Stranger On A Train](#): > > Jim Thompson is not only my favorite crime/noir writer, but perhaps one of my favorite authors overall. I donā€™t think Iā€™ve ever read any novel that has such a visceral, kick in the guts ending as _The Grifters_. I loaned it to Miss Moneypenny, whose isnā€™t a hardcore reader, and she read the thing in one sitting, and with the same response. 'Course, some of his work is utter crap, but at his best (_The Grifters_, _Pop. 1280_, _After Dark, My Sweet_) are outstanding. Damn, I forgot Thompson: _The Getaway_ is utterly terrifying, especially the almost magical-realist ending. Almost no relation to either of the movie adaptations, which werenā€™t bad but werenā€™t Thompson. I canā€™t stand Ellroyā€™s prose style: itā€™s like he wants to be an Important Writer {tm}, and figures that being impenetrable is how you do it {not crime fiction, but yes, Neal Stephenson, Iā€™m looking at you too}. And Andrew Vachss would probably be happier writing Batman graphic novels - you know, the dark, ā€œseriousā€ ones. What is Kinky Friedman like, **Big Bad Voodoo Lou**? Completely nuts, and almost impossible to summarise. The _real_ KF is a Jewish Texan C&W singer {no, really: his band is called The Texas Jewboys}, who carries this persona into his books, where heā€™s an amateur NY detective surrounded by and abetted/hindered by a supporting cast of loony friends. Murder, philosophy, drunkeness, drug-taking and killer one-liners ensue. Theyā€™re like no other books, and some people hate them, but do check them out - if you like them, you get addicted. ---
**Author:** ![Skellington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/94ad74/32.png) [@Skellington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skellington)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/13 "2005-03-14T09:17:53Z")
Fav: **Gladys Mitchell** Iā€™ve never read a book of herā€™s that I didnā€™t like. Dorothy L. Sayers is good. Agatha Christie wrote 54 years worth of crap, but in the first few years she wrote a few really good stories (only 3 that Iā€™ve found but they are there). Other than that the detection club tended to be pretty good. As for least favs: I canā€™t think of any! I tend to find someone I like and stick with them (and it will take me a long time to find and read all the out of print G.M.s). ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/14 "2005-03-14T12:52:18Z")
Absolute favorite: Ed McBain. Heā€™s the grand old master of the genre. I like Kinky & Vachss too. The absolute worst, how the hell did she get a contract and do a series when she cannot write to save her soul is Sue Grafton. Iā€™m sure thereā€™s a spot in hell waiting for her. ---
**Author:** ![kayT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayt/32/3633_2.png) [@kayT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayT)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/15 "2005-03-14T16:45:01Z")
Specifically what do you dislike about Sue Grafton? ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/16 "2005-03-14T17:11:44Z")
Well I _love_ Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine. I wish that she would put away her London street atlas, though. Portions of her books read like Morington Crescent. _No Night is Too Long_ and _The Chimney Sweeperā€™s Boy_ are just about perfect, IMO. Like: **Ruth Rendell** **Tony Hillerman** - these books are virtually all the same, but I enjoy them anyway. **Rex Stout** **Alexander McCall Smith** **CJ Box** **PD James** , with a couple of exceptions. I disliked _The Murder Room_ and _A Certain Justice_. **Charles Todd** - nice First World War crime books. **Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child** - calling these ā€œcrime novelsā€ is a stretch, but I included them because Agent Pendergast is my favorite detective, ever. Dislike: \*\* Patricia Cornwell\*\* - she has a few good characters, but horrible plots and unsatisfying resolutions. She needs a better editor. **James Patterson** ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/17 "2005-03-14T17:35:27Z")
> [@kayT](#): > > Specifically what do you dislike about Sue Grafton? Iā€™ll admit, I only tried to read one of her books, and I found it just totally unreadable. Itā€™s rare that I donā€™t finish a book, but her writing has no flow or style to it. Doesnā€™t anyone but me like Ed McBain? He has been published since 1956, and his later works are as good as, if not better than, his earlier ones. And he started a series of alphabet titles long before Grafton did. Notably missing is ā€œE,ā€ as McBain has written "EXITā€™ to be published after he dies. ---
**Author:** ![Interrobang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/interrobang/32/17463_2.png) [@Interrobang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Interrobang)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2005, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/18 "2005-03-14T18:04:24Z")
Two current authors that havenā€™t been mentioned yet: The good: **John Connolly** ā€™s series of Charlie Parker (not the musician) novels is very good. He reminds me a bit of Faulkner, a bit of Thomas Harris, and somewhat more of Stephen King, though that may be because of his Maine setting. Itā€™s also possibly because his series is about 95% mystery/thriller and 5%, well, fantasy, I guess. Start with his first book, _Every Dead Thing_, because his series really builds on itself. I mean, you could start later, but why? (Donā€™t bother with _Bad Men_, though, a mostly self-contained novel, unless you really love Connollyā€™s other stuff.) The bad: James Swain. His Tony Valentine novels start out hamfisted and cliched and riddled with massive factual errors, and end up (as of the second-most-recent, the last Iā€™ll read), actively offensive, using a 9/11-style conspiracy as a backdrop for a hamfisted and cliched ā€œthriller.ā€ Awful stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Idlewild](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8491ac/32.png) [@Idlewild](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idlewild)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2005, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/19 "2005-03-15T01:08:06Z")
> [@koeeoaddi](#): > > Well I _love_ Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine. I wish that she would put away her London street atlas, though. Portions of her books read like Morington Crescent. _No Night is Too Long_ and _The Chimney Sweeperā€™s Boy_ are just about perfect, IMO. I should probably give her another try. I just found her a bit dry and heavygoing. Of course I was probably 12 when I was knicking Grannyā€™s library books to read šŸ˜‰ ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2005, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386/20 "2005-03-15T01:20:32Z")
Robert Van Gulikā€™s _Judge Dee_ Mysteries, set in the Tang Dynasty era. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crime-writers-favourite-and-least-favourite/294386.md?page=2)