The mystery genre has long been a favorite story form for readers. Authors such as Arthur Conan Doyle with his famous Sherlock Holmes stories and Agatha Christie’s many mysteries still entertain readers today. Mystery stories can be broken down into more than a dozen types that appeal to different readers. The Whodunit is the traditional or classic mystery which contains the significant elements of a puzzle. The reader follows the clues just as the detective does, trying to figure out what happened. Agatha Christie was the expert at the Cozy mystery. The murder in this type often happens off-page and the reader never has to experience the more violent or bloody aspects of the crime. The focus is more on solving the crime itself. The Hard-Boiled mystery bends more towards the realistic crime, taking it to the streets, often with a detective who is harder and has difficult personal, internal struggles to deal with in addition to solving the crime. The True Crime mystery deals with a real crime, examining the motives of real people involved in events such as the death of Marilyn Monroe or the Jack the Ripper murders. Whatever your taste, you can find a mystery story to suit.
Here are a few popular mystery authors of today.
Connelly was a Pulitzer Prize nominated crime reporter before he became a bestselling crime fiction author. Connelly began writing his first novel, basing the story around a true crime that had occured in Los Angeles and his main character, LAPD Detective Hieronymus Bosch, has become a fan favorite. Connelly has won nearly every major award given to mystery writers and his books have been translated into 39 languages.
Cornwell’s Dr. Kay Scarpetta series carries readers deep into the story by providing extremely realistic forensic-science investigations into the crimes. Her books have sold more than 100 million copies and were influential in the development of a number of popular TV series such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.
Janet Evanovich’s series of contemporary mysteries features Stephanie Plum, a unique character. Plum was a lingerie seller from Trenton, New Jersey who lost her job and became a bounty hunter to make ends meet. Evanovich’s first novels were successful in the romance category before she realized she was more interested in writing action sequences than the sex scenes. Inventing the Stephanie Plum character, Evanovich’s last seventeen novels have debut at #1 on the NY Times Best Sellers list.
Sue Grafton is best known as the author of the ‘alphabet series’ or the ‘alphabet novels’…A Is for Alibi…B Is for Burglar…C Is for Corpse. The series features private investigator Kinsey Millhone in the fictional city of Santa Teresa, California. Although Grafton is the daughter of detective novelist C. W. Grafton, she says the strongest influence on her crime novels was author Ross Macdonald. Prior to success with her mystery series, Grafton was a successful television screenwriter.