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Mystery's New Megahits: Readers' 48 Favorite Whodunits of the Past 3 Years
Most scholars agree that the modern mystery novel genre dates back to the mid-1800s, when authors like Edgar Allan Poe introduced the idea of a murder or other crime that’s investigated through deduction, clever thinking, and reasoning. Depending on how you define your terms, though, the mystery tradition is much older. For instance, there are a couple of good head-scratchers in One Thousand and One Nights, the famous collection of tales from the Islamic Golden Age (8th century to 13th century).
Today’s mystery shelves, meanwhile, are filled with 1,001 variations on the theme: detective stories, cozies, procedurals, neo-noirs, whodunits. The lines get pleasantly blurry, and contemporary authors take pride in finding new ways to futz with the standard mystery story template.
We recently got curious about which relatively new mystery novels have proved most popular among Goodreads members. So we crunched the numbers. The list below ranks, in order, the most popular mystery books of the past three years, as determined by average star ratings, reader reviews, and members’ Want to Read shelves.
You’ll find some familiar names here: Jewell and Feeney, Prose and Ware, Foley and McFadden. If there’s a central trend, it’s that female authors pretty much dominate this genre on Goodreads these days. Count them up for yourselves. Another weird little microtrend: What’s up with the maids and housemaids? Also look for a surge in cozy mysteries with particularly good titles.
Click on the book cover images for more information about each title. If you’re in the mood for some sleuthing, add any good leads to your Want to Read shelf.
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Have a great mystery recommendation? Share it with your fellow readers in the comments below!
Comments Showing 51-61 of 61 (61 new)
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message 51:
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LaceyGoodBooks
(new)
Aug 01, 2024 04:47PM
I have two of the books one is in one of my TBR so excited to read that Pacific book
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Read 31 of these, this is one of my favorite genres. Some were really good (BRIGHT YOUNG WOMEN), could have skipped others ( the Freida McFaddens.). I’m looking forward to THE QUIET TENANT, it’s has gotten great reviews.
The Only One Left had one of the most goofy endings ever. Literally laughed out loud.
I’ve read so many on this list!!! The only one left was definitely one of my favs!
Barb wrote: "Mostly thrillers. Any good mysteries, police procedurals, detective books out there?"The Detective Annalisa Vega series by Joanna Schaffhausen is pretty good
I absolutely loved Vera Wong. She was a really fun character.
Karl wrote: "@Barb: Police procedurals (more or less): Michael Connelly and John Sandford are still writing excellent books IMHO. Anthony Horowitz's Hawthorn & Horowitz series is sort of in the vein of more c..."
I love Anthony Horowitz's books. This list should be entitled "Best Thrillers" not "Best Mysteries" because it's mostly all thrillers and left off so many great books....
Law wrote: "I'm surprised The Teacher is not on here despite the abundance of Freida McFadden books here on this list. I'll avoid that author. Can anyone recommend me a book to read from this list?"The only one left by Riley Sager!
The Overnight Guest was a super good true crime book! The ending had be shocked. Never saw that coming.
xin( ◍•㉦•◍ ) wrote: "loved flicker in the dark, literally could not put it down and it had the most intricate plots ever. rock paper scissors was mid though"Same here. Really good book.
Claudia wrote: "I just finished All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker and it was fantastic!! Definitely one of my favorites! 5⭐️"Flicker in the Dark. Excellent.
