A Home for all things Crime & Detective related

The Haycraft List of Detective Story Cornerstones

2025-12-30T22:55:10Z

Posted by: pedanther

In his 1941 book Murder for Pleasure: The Life and Times of the Detective Story, Howard Haycraft included a list offering "a suggestive selection of the 'high spots'" of the first century of modern detective fiction, from "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" to The Patience of Maigret, by way of Holmes, Wimsey, and many others.

For the most part, he limited himself to one book per author, except in a few cases where he felt that the author's range or impact justified the making of an exception. Dorothy L. Sayers and John Dickson Carr, among others, were awarded a second spot on the list. Arthur Conan Doyle is the sole author to be awarded a third (in fact he gets nine, because Haycraft refused to play favourites and included the entire Canon).

I couldn't find a convenient online iteration of the List, so I made my own: The Haycraft List of Detective Story Cornerstones is now available as a reading list on The StoryGraph.

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Unconventional Courtship 2022: Multifandom Challenge

2022-04-04T14:26:45Z

Posted by: liadt

Brooding Strangers! Secret Pregnancies! Enigmatic Rakes! All those tropes you love to hate (until you discover their secret, tragic backstory and fall head over heels for them) are here, ready to be used for unconventionalcourtship, a multifandom challenge that aims to produce fics longer than 1,000 words or a piece of art 500x500 pixels based on a Mills & Boon/Harlequin novel summary.

Sign ups are now open!

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Fanart: Mrs Oliver

2021-06-10T20:28:05Z

Posted by: mekare

I did a portrait of Mrs Oliver from the Poirot TV series today. I got into the series during the pandemic and have now started listening to David Suchet‘s reading of the short stories. Very enjoyable! I also have another Poirot project in the works (a pattern) but that‘ll still take some time.

Title: Mrs Oliver
Fandom: Agatha Christie‘s Poirot TV series
Rating: G
Media: watercolour

Clicky Thumbnail:

I‘m also a big fan of the Miss Fisher‘s Murder Mysteries series and you can find my fanart for that under this tag (All images are rated G).

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Multifandom Fest: Unconventional Courtship 2021

2021-04-15T14:51:18Z

Posted by: liadt

Brooding Strangers! Secret Pregnancies! Enigmatic Rakes! All those tropes you love to hate (until you discover their secret, tragic backstory and fall head over heels for them) are here, ready to be used for unconventionalcourtship, a multifandom challenge where you write and post a 1000w+ fic based on a M&B/Harlequin plot some of which have crime solving on the path to love.

Sign ups are now open!

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Fic: Remants of an Unlife and Brief Candles

2020-10-25T21:05:04Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

Two mystery-fandom pieces of fic I have written recently, one for Jonathan Creek, for Remix Revival; the other for the Daisy Dalrymple Series.

Remants of an Unlife (The Magellan & Creek (Deceased) Remix) (2332 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Jonathan Creek (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Jonathan Creek/Maddy Magellan
Characters: Jonathan Creek, Maddy Magellan, Joey Ross, Carla Borrego, Adam Klaus
Additional Tags: Remix, Ghosts, Alternate Universe, practically a randall & hopkirk au, but not strictly, otherwise jonathan would have to wear a white duffel coat
Summary: When you spend your life going round disproving the paranormal, the last thing you want to do is end up as a ghost. Jonathan isn't exactly sure his friends are helping, either.

Brief Candles (1058 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Daisy Dalrymple - Carola Dunn
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Daisy Dalrymple/Alec Fletcher
Characters: Daisy Dalrymple, Alec Fletcher
Additional Tags: Blood, Blood Loss, Murder, Hurt/Comfort, Whumptober 2020, Community: 100fandoms, Community: hc_bingo, 500 prompts, 1920s
Summary: "You couldn't have lost this much blood. You'd be dead..."

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Queen of whodunits

2020-04-27T05:49:27Z

Posted by: pedanther

Recently, I got stuck on a crossword for several days because I couldn't figure out what the compiler was after with the clue "Queen of whodunits (6)". "Agatha" had the requisite number of letters, but I couldn't get any of the words that crossed it to work. Ditto "Sayers". After that, I was inclined to think that whatever the compiler was thinking was obviously wrong, but when I did get enough of the cross-words to figure it out -- which was at "_ _ L _ _ Y" -- I had to admit he had a point.

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Fic: One Step Foward (Two Steps Back) (Jonathan Creek)

2020-03-05T20:38:53Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

One Step Forward (Two Steps Back) (5525 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Jonathan Creek (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jonathan Creek/Maddy Magellan
Characters: Maddy Magellan, Jonathan Creek
Additional Tags: Time Travel, Humor, Non-Linear Narrative, Magic
Summary: Maddy’s got a problem so unusual even Jonathan can’t solve it for her. In fact, she's having serious trouble just getting him to believe it...

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60.155°N 1.145°W

2019-11-22T23:39:29Z

Posted by: aurorlaura

...is the coordinates for Lerwick, Shetland. Hello to mystery_mansion from the new shetlandbbc community for fans of the Shetland TV programme and series of novels by Ann Cleeves. We're a small fandom but with some excellent fics at AO3 and gifs at Tumblr as well as the awesome canon with beautifully filmed Scottish locations, hawt slashy men, canon lesbians, and terrific murder mystery.

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FIC: A Study in Coral (The Enola Holmes Series)

2019-11-18T04:29:35Z

Posted by: delphi

Title: A Study in Coral
Author: delphi
Fandom: The Enola Holmes Series by Nancy Springer
Characters/Pairings: Mycroft Holmes & Cecily Alistair/Enola Holmes
Rating: General
Word Count: 500
Notes/Warnings: Canon-typical sexism from Mycroft. See note at the end of the ficlet regarding the language of flowers. Also available on AO3.
Summary In which Enola and Cecily take a walk in the garden and Mycroft isn't nearly as observant as he thinks he is.

DW Link: A Study in Coral

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Sherlock Holmes (Arthur Conan Doyle) Fanfiction: Signs and Signals

2019-03-15T19:22:59Z

Posted by: saki101

Title: Signs and Signals
Author: Saki101
Rating: a mild R
Characters, including any pairing(s): Holmes/Watson, sundry OCs
Word Count: ~9K
Warnings: none
Summary: Holmes boxes. Watson wagers. There are exchanges of signals and a case.
Disclaimer: public domain

Also posted on AO3 in the ACD_Holmesfest Collection.

Excerpt: I turned from my consideration of the street to where Holmes lounged beside me. “You’ll let me see to that?” I asked. The flush of his exertions had faded from his cheeks, leaving the cut across one all the more livid in contrast.

He opened his eyes partway. “How much did you wager?”

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Historium Commentfest 2019

2019-02-23T21:03:04Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

For all historical fandoms, fictional & RPF, original historical works, and general fandoms in an historical setting. Open now for prompts and fills! Click on the banner for the link.

Historical detectives and Golden Age mysteries would definitely count.

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Of use for those writing medieval murders?

2019-02-23T17:44:38Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

I thought this was interesting - it's a murder map of 14th century London!

https://www.vrc.crim.cam.ac.uk/vrcresearch/london-medieval-murder-map

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Multifandom Friendship Commentfest

2019-02-16T17:04:37Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

So many detectives and sidekicks that would no doubt count for this one...

[Multifandom friendship fest]

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a review of Malkovich ABC Murders...

2019-02-08T16:23:29Z

Posted by: cimorene

... focusing on what exactly it is doing (/trying to do), and what recent Christie adaptations in general are doing.

Spoilers for screenplay-specific elements of The ABC Murders (2018) as well as of the recent Ordeal by Innocence (2018). Please note content warnings at the top in the post - all references, nothing graphic, but still.

cimorene: Review: The ABC Murders with John Malkovich (getting Extra Transformative with Christie)

The main thing I want to say about Malkovich Poirot, though, and the main thing that's interesting about The ABC Murders and the trend of recent Christie adaptations, is that it's an extra-transformative work, one that departs more deliberately and decidedly from the text than we've come to expect from our prestige-budget literary adaptations.

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Case Fic Challenge

2018-08-14T07:52:25Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

A fic/art challenge that looks to be potentially relevant to our interests:

Click the picture for more information!

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3 more Miss Silver books on Kindle (UK)

2018-08-10T19:03:27Z

Posted by: dimity_blue

Amazon UK has released 3 more Patricia Wentworth books featuring Miss Silver.

Spotlight (£2.99), Ladies' Bane (£1.99), and Danger Point (£2.99).

I've been waiting for Spotlight for years now! I don't even remember the other two books as it's been that long since I read them.

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Obscure & British Commentfest 2018

2018-05-07T13:50:38Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

A multifandom commentfest for tiny to medium British fandoms of all kinds, including pretty much all British crime/mystery novels & series! All fanworks welcome. (Click on the banner for the link.)

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Rec: But for the Grace by Paranoidangel

2018-04-29T20:05:43Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

I took part in the recent(ish) hetswap exchange, and received this lovely pitch-perfect mini-casefic for the Daisy Dalrymple series:

But for the Grace (2918 words) by paranoidangel
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Daisy Dalrymple - Carola Dunn
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Daisy Dalrymple/Alec Fletcher
Characters: Daisy Dalrymple, Alec Fletcher
Additional Tags: Murder Mystery, Post-World War I
Summary: Alec's in danger from a murderer and Daisy's the only one who can save him.

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mystery_mansion @ 2018-04-16T15:56:00

2018-04-16T23:06:40Z

Posted by: lycomingst

Is anybody watching Unforgotten on Masterpiece Theatre on PBS (though I don't know when it was shown in the UK)? I find it riveting. The parallel families that are falling apart because of the discovery of something that happened 40 years ago. Excellent actors and acting.

Also PBS is going to have new Endeavor episodes soon. Can't wait.

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Ficlet: Protection Racket (Sid Halley Series/The Racing Game)

2018-03-21T12:53:03Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

A small thing I wrote for hc_bingo the other day:

Protection Racket (860 words) by lost_spook
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Racing Game (TV), Sid Halley - Dick Francis
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Sid Halley & Charles Roland
Characters: Sid Halley, Charles Roland | Charles Rowland (Dick Francis)
Additional Tags: Community: hc_bingo, Hurt/Comfort, Ficlet, Minor Injuries
Summary: Sid is battered and bruised, as usual. Charles is not much surprised, but he is concerned.

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Useful Link: CrimeReads & a belated welcome to 2018 in crime

2018-03-19T12:35:19Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

I found this mentioned somewhere out in the wilds and thought it might be of interest to this community:

CrimeReads: http://crimereads.com/

(I believe it's part of LitHub.)

Since this is the first post of the New Year (whoops?), how is everyone's life of crime progressing currently? Reading or watching anything good? Plotting any murders of your own? (Fictional, obviously...)

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mystery_mansion @ 2017-12-17T08:27:00

2017-12-17T16:31:03Z

Posted by: lycomingst

I just finished The Jupiter Myth by Lindsey Davis. It’s one of series of historical mysteries, set in the Roman Empire in the first century AD. I haven’t read any others of this series but I chose this one because it takes place in London and I’m a big fan of the British tv series, Time Team where they do archaeological digs, often uncovering Roman remains.

I have to confess that I thought the book engaging in the beginning but my interest petered out toward the end. I think there was too much book and not enough plot. We seemed to be covering the same ground several times. Plus there was a character introduced that I instantly realized was going to die before the book’s end. It’s never good when you know what’s coming.

In other mystery news, Acorn.com is showing the fourth series of The Brokenwood Mysteries, which is set in New Zealand. It’s sort of like Midsomer Murders only with a much smaller budget and no cute cottages.

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Marsh recs?

2017-12-08T12:41:08Z

Posted by: tamsin

I just finished Ngaio Marsh's "Artists in Crime" and really enjoyed it. I'd like to read more Marsh, but don't know where to start. Can anyone recommend something? I really liked Agatha Troy, so bonus points if she's also in it.

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Muder on the Orient Express

2017-11-13T22:28:57Z

Posted by: hyarrowen

I went to see this film at the weekend.

I've seen so many versions, and read the novel a couple of times, and I still don't know how to talk intelligently about it! But the story is so iconic that all other considerations, like sober analysis, faded into the background. It was really just a case of flailing all the way.

( Read more... )

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Fic: Old Bones, Buried Under (Inspector Alleyn Mysteries)

2017-11-12T18:28:44Z

Posted by: thisbluespirit

Old Bones Buried Under (2228 words) by lost_spook
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Inspector Alleyn Mysteries - Ngaio Marsh
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Roderick Alleyn/Agatha Troy
Characters: Roderick Alleyn, Agatha Troy
Additional Tags: Haunted Houses
Summary: Murder never, ever takes a holiday. Not even for Alleyn.

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