The Triumphs of Eugène Valmont

Author	Liam O'Flaherty
ISBN	0156443562

Was reminded by a NYT article in today's paper on the newest Irish prime minister that I had read this book long ago. This story is a modern tragedy - the seeming futility of Frankie McPhillp's proto-IRA terrorism against the British occupiers and the ignorance and poverty of Gypo Nolan's sad, tag-along...

Author	Raymond Postgate
ISBN	0897331982

This was a delightful read. It's hard not to use the word "delightful" when describing this old fashioned British courtroom drama. Verdict of Twelve is a republication of a book originally released in 1940. It starts with the backstory of the twelve jurors selected for a murder trial, describes the...

Author	Michael Sims
ISBN	0143105663

Take a trip back to a time when criminals armed themselves with wit rather than with guns, and the pinnacle of crime-fighting technology was represented by Sherlock Holmes's magnifying glass. Edited by award-winning author and editor Michael Sims, The Penguin Book of Gaslight Crime presents, for...

Author	Helen Eustis
ISBN	0140007180

This was a weird book, just weird.

First off, it's about a popular, handsome, debonair, poetic, young male teacher of English literature at a posh or elite girls' college circa 1943 or so. He's found dead, bludgeoned by a fireplace poker. (Pokers can come in so handy.) This happens on the very...

Author	Francis Iles
ISBN	0330373153

This crime classic is the basis of the Hitchcock masterpiece "Suspicion" and in this case the movie was definitely better than the book.

Lina McLaidlaw a plain spinster approaching 30 recklessly marries the charming Johnny Asygarth even though she suspects he is just marrying her for her...

Author

O. Henry

O. Henry is the pen name of American writer William Sydney Porter (1862-1910). Porter's 400 short stories are known for their wit, wordplay, characterization and the clever use of twist endings. He travelled to Austin in 1884, where he took a number of different jobs over the next several years, first...

Author	Arthur B. Reeve
ISBN	1406538205

Arthur Benjamin Reeve (1880-1936), was a graduate of Princeton and attended New York Law School. He is best known for creating the series character Professor Craig Kennedy, sometimes called "The American Sherlock Holmes," and for writing 18 mystery/detective novels. His works include: The Black...

Author	Grant Allen
ISBN	1934555436

When her stepfather dies, Miss Lois Cayley finds herself alone in the world with only twopence in her pocket. Undaunted, the intelligent, attractive, and infinitely resourceful young woman decides to set off in search of adventure. Her travels take her from London to Germany, Italy, Egypt, and India,...

Author	Jacques Futrelle
ISBN	0812970144

This irascible genius, this diminutive egghead scientist, known to the world as “The Thinking Machine,” is no less than the newly rediscovered literary link between Sherlock Holmes and Nero Wolfe: Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen, who—with only the power of ratiocination—unravels...

Author	Freeman Wills Crofts
ISBN	1842323849

Freeman Wills Crofts (1879-1957) was one of the most successful of the crime writers from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, writing a book almost every year during his writing career. He was a member of the Detection Club, alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers and became a full time writer...

Author	A.E.W. Mason
ISBN	0881841110

At the Villa Rose is a detective novel by British writer A.E.W. Mason featuring his character Inspector Hanaud.
In Aix les Bains during the early 20th century, Celia Harland, a beautiful (of course) young English girl down on her luck is befriended by a rich widow, Madame Dauvray, an addict of "spiritualism",...

Author	Melville Davisson Post
ISBN	1410106314

This work usually appears on lists of the ten most important books of detective stories published in the United States. The tales of Uncle Abner take place in what is now West Virginia, in the 1840's or 1850's. Melville Davisson Post (1869-1930) was a lawyer, political insider, and candidate for President...

Author	Phoebe Atwood Taylor
ISBN	0881500461

1931, #1 Asey Mayo, with Miss Prudence Whitsby, Cape Cod
nasty author gets his head bashed in - well, he *did* seem to enjoy making enemies, so there's lots of suspects, including several of Miss Prudence's visitors - and friends; classic small-town cosy mystery, three-and-one-half stars.

When...

Author	Stuart Palmer
ISBN	1601870132

For the third graders at Jefferson School, a field trip is always a treat. But one day at the New York Aquarium, they get much more excitement than they bargained for. A pickpocket sprints past, stolen purse in hand, and is making his way to the exit when their teacher, the prim Hildegarde Withers, knocks...

Author

Frances Lockridge

First in a long and extremely popular series, the main sleuth is actually Lt. Weigand of the NYC police - this is a cosy police procedural, with some nice bits of The Norths - who find the body - even though most people only remember them. In this first novel they do only a little sleuthing, and the focus is...

Author	J.S. Fletcher
ISBN	0486239101

All this led up to the appearance of Mr. Aylmore, M.P., in the witness-box. And Spargo knew and felt that it was that appearance for which the crowded court was waiting. Thanks to his own vivid and realistic specials in the Watchman, everybody there had already become well and thoroughly acquainted with...

Author	Ellery Queen
ISBN	0060810688

Wrightsville, a typical American town, buried in the great American heartland, up to its neck in good old American corn. The well-respected Wrights: daddy Wright is the town banker, Momma Wright is the town social lioness, daughter Patricia the town beauty, Nora the town recluse, Lola the town scandal....

Author	Anthony Berkeley
ISBN	0755102053

This crime classic written and set in the 1930's, preWW2 England has been recently reprinted. I've given it 5 stars and would recommend this book to any fans of mystery.

Poor Mr. Todhunter has been informed by his Dr. that he has a heart aneurysm that could go off at any time. He has instructed him...

Author

C.S. Forester

discussed as a pair with: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

What a fascinating pair to read back to back. Payment Deferred is a very modern psychological thriller which hooks the reader in from the start: an astonishing work to come up with in the 1920s by a young man at the start of...

Author	Émile Gaboriau
ISBN	0486225704

1905. Gaboriau was the first French novelist to write detective novels. His character Monsieur Lecoq, private detective, first appeared in the novel, The Widow Lerouge. The novel begins: On February 20, 18-, a Sunday that chanced to be Shrove Sunday, about eleven o'clock in the evening, a party of...

Author

Otto Penzler

An amazing collection of locked-room "impossible crime" short stories. I thought I was well read in the genre, but I hadn't read most of these stories. I really enjoyed most of them, and Otto Penzler's introductions to each story were fascinating.

My favorite stories included Martin Edwards'...

Author	S.S. Van Dine
ISBN	0684164043

1927. Illustrated with scenes from the Paramount photoplay. Around 1925 Willard Huntington Wright, critic and writer, underwent a long illness. As part of his convalescence he wrote The Benson Murder Case, in which he created the character of Philo Vance, a master sleuth. So that the book would not...

Author	Richard Hull
ISBN	1558820388

In this darkly comic, quite immoral masterwork, Edward is an effete, poor young man who has something in store for his only relative, his wealthy aunt. First published in 1934, this classic mystery is considered a masterpiece of the inverted detective story, in which it is known "whodunit." The question...

Author

Dashiell Hammett

Από τον Φεβρουάριο του 2015 είχα να διαβάσω κάποιο βιβλίο του Ντάσιελ Χάμετ, τότε που διάβασα την καταπληκτική συλλογή διηγημάτων "Κοντινένταλ Οπ". Και...