The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction

by Barry Forshaw, Ian Rankin (Foreword), Rough Guides

The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction takes the reader on a guided tour of the mean streets and blind corners that make up the world's most popular literary genre. The insider's book recommends over 200 classic crime novels from masterminds Raymond Chandler and Patricia Highsmith to modern hotshots James Elroy and Patricia Cornwall. You'll investigate gumshoes, spies, spooks, serial killers, forensic females, prying priests and patsies from the past, present, and future. Complete with extra information on what to read next, all movie adaptions, and illustrated throughout with photos and diagrams ...all the evidence that counts

Genres: Nonfiction, Reference, Mystery, Crime, Literary Criticism, Books About Books, Thriller

320 pages, Paperback

First published July 16, 2007

About the author

Barry Forshaw is a writer, broadcaster and journalist whose books include British Crime Writing: An Encyclopedia, The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction, Brit Noir, British Gothic Cinema, Nordic Noir, Sex and Film, Euro Noir, Death in a Cold Climate: Scandinavian Crime Fiction and BFI Classics: War of the Worlds along with books on Italian cinema, film noir and the first UK biography of Stieg Larsson, The Man Who Left Too Soon. He has written on books and films for many newspapers and magazines; he also edits Crime Time, and is one of the talking heads for the ITV Crime Thriller author profiles. He records documentaries on crime fiction and film for a variety of BBC producers for both TV and radio, along with much work for foreign broadcasters. He has been Vice Chair of the Crime Writers' Association. As well as his specialist area of books (in most genres), he writes on film (booklets for special edition DVDs) and all aspects of the arts (popular and serious). He is winner of the Keating Award for Non-Fiction for British Crime Writing: An Encyclopedia (Greenwood)
In a previous career he was an illustrator, working for both The Natural History Museum and Jackie.

Reviews

[J. · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book that covers all the aspects of Mysteries, Crime, Noir, Suspense, etc that this one hopes to survey--- must either be very long, or a beginners guide, if as brief and slender as this one.

There is the perfunctory mention of the usual suspects, Christie, Conan-Doyle, Chandler, et al, but there is hardly any depth to speak of. There are even mentions of not-so-well-known original movers like Erskine Childers, and Wilkie Collins, although without individual book entries. Funny thing. Funnier thing, though, is that most of the volume here is taken up enormously ---maybe 80% or more--- by entries of post-1999 fiction.

You shouldn't have to approach your Guide To Crime Fiction like a criminologist, but here's the case :

If, as a novice, you had only this guide to go with, you would think that the current crop of mystery novels outranks and outpaces the classics, and by a large margin. Which doesn't happen to be the case. Quite the opposite, in fact. If you had to honestly list all the worldclass crime classics from '99 onwards, you might have a very short list.

What happens to be the case for all these instant classics -- you know, from 1999, 2002, 2005, etc-- is that there are interested parties who hold financial stakes in their well-being and evolution. And in this Rough Guide, these current titles are duly noted, admired, placed high on the pillar. However. Fantastic out-of-print or public-domain titles that are from the way-distant past, --you know, before the nineties--- get roughly zero recognition here, and I'm afraid the accusing finger must be pointed to the fact that they have no publisher or publicity department priming the pump. The pump, that is, that obviously sacrifices accuracy and validity for the hype & misdirection of the "Rough Guide To Crime Fiction".
Almost criminal.

This one was just on the verge of being categorized as 'dumpster', but the saving grace of it's espionage / spy fiction chapter pushed it over the line. Which managed to hit on the prime authors fairly well for a short chapter.

Anyway, if you can dutifully ignore the cheerful puffery here about all the numerous post-1999 masterpieces, the remaining material, on the actual classics would be helpful to the beginner. What would be more helpful to the beginner is removing all those current-day emulators from the company of the true giants of the genre. Browse this with blinders on.

[Monique · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction is a fantastic way of deciding where you are going to start reading in the wide world of crime fiction. I considered myself well read in crime, with an already large personal crime library, but once I read this little book I realised how much I was missing. As I read through this guide, I made a list of all the authors I wanted to investigate. This is how I discovered 1930′s Margery Allingham, GK Chesterton and Dorothy Sayers. It also supported opinions of my friends on Carl Hiassen and George Pelecanos. Next to read for me is Peter Temple’s The Broken Shore and Georges Simenon The Man Who Watched Trains Go By. On the subject of Mr Simenon, the French crime writer, The Rough Guide to Crime Fiction introduces him in a brief bio this way:
“Georges Simenon wrote that he’d slept with over 10,000 women – and while one may be sceptical of this rather boastful (or careless) claim, it’s fortunate for the world of crime fiction that he found time to write one of the greatest bodies of work in the genre anywhere in the world.”
And here I am struggling to finish a short story. I dunno.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpful guide to all things crime and mystery related; vignettes about popular and not-so-popular authors and books, with sidebars of "Top 5" lists and film adaptations. Explores the whole culture of crime fiction in depth and leaves no subgenre untouched. This is a handy reference for librarians who need a quick reference about an unfamiliar author, or for readers who want to explore further than their favorites in the genre. Short but comprehensive entries.

[Sylvester · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pretty handy guide for those interested in discovering some of the most representative crime novels. It breaks down the genre into noir, espionage, psychological thriller, serial killer, historical crime, murder mystery, etc. I am not sure if the selections are the best but it's pretty comprehensive.

[Paul Harvey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good, if now somewhat dated, introduction to the crime fiction genre. The guide examines the history and main trends in crime fiction writing, selecting the best authors and their best works, as well as some of the TV and movie adaptations to look out for.

For a more up to date version, see the same author's Crime Fiction: A Reader's Guide.

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good suggestions for future reading!

[rabbitprincess · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is certainly a very comprehensive book. It was reviewed on this blog, and I thought it would be a good source for some new mystery reads, even if I am already suffering under the weight of a massive TBR list already. And since I'd like to think I'm fairly knowledgeable about the genre, I thought it would be neat to see what recommended books I'd already read, and what the book had to say about my favourite authors (not to mention what books would be recommended for said authors).

There are a total of 15 chapters, ranging from the origins of crime fiction to crime in translation, with chapters chronicling gangsters, police procedurals, amateurs, the world of espionage, the golden age and more. Along the way the big names receive their own separate sidebars and a "top five" list of best books, with mentions of noteworthy film and TV adaptations (or ones to steer clear of).

Interestingly, the top five for a given author would sometimes not include the book being showcased for a particular author (for example, the "showcase book" for the Falco series by Lindsey Davis was The Body in the Bathhouse, but the top five were The Silver Pigs, The Iron Hand of Mars, Time to Depart, The Accusers, and Saturnalia). This was part of a rather odd trend in some of the blurbs where the guide would be highlighting a book by someone, for example Peter Robinson, and say "While this book is not as assured as In a Dry Season, it does X and Y well." If the book you're recommending is not as good as another book by that author, why not just recommend that book? I can understand not wanting to hype a book to death for fear of artificially raising expectations, but if you're going to recommend a book as a starting point for an author, stand behind it completely.

And speaking of the recommendations, some of them were kind of off-kilter for me. Perhaps there is something wrong with me, but I would not necessarily have recommended these titles for these authors:

- A Surfeit of Lampreys, by Ngaio Marsh: This one dragged a bit for me. Not sure what I would have recommended in its place -- Marsh is one of those authors where personal plot preference is paramount -- but I seem to recall enjoying Photo Finish.
- Voices, by Arnaldur Indridason: Good, yes, but Silence of the Grave is better, in my mind.
- The Man Who Went Up in Smoke, by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo: Perhaps I was in the wrong mood for this one, but Martin Beck couldn't do very much with the investigation in this one. The Laughing Policeman had a more interesting plot.
- Firewall, by Henning Mankell: How could anyone recommending a Wallander novel NOT pick Sidetracked? My mum and grandparents were totally hooked by that one. Grandma received Firewall for Mother's Day and Grandpa flipped through it but couldn't get into it. Therefore my highly subjective experiment and limited sample size says Sidetracked is better.

Of course, the point of such guides is to be a starting point for discussion, and opinions are opinions, but I don't like feeling like I'm wrong.

Another thing that kind of rubbed me the wrong way was the writing style. Breathless superlatives, lit-crit jargon littered with borrowed foreign words and expressions (sine qua non, fin de siècle, zeitgeist, métier), and lots of big words and overused adjectives (how many detectives can be considered "doughty"?). Perhaps this book is not meant to be read in a marathon session or three for that reason. Yes, there is some element of hyping with all of these books, but it wears on you after a while.

But overall, I enjoyed seeing what the author put forward as the best examples of the genre, and while this book hasn't really added too many new authors to my list, it's reminded me of old ones I used to read more often: Minette Walters, James Lee Burke, Tom Clancy, John le Carré... and it's also sparked an interest in revisiting Dostoevsky. And I have a couple of new series/authors to check out but haven't settled on a particular title yet (Lindsey Davis, Edward Marston's Domesday series).

In short, if you're looking for new recommendations on the mystery front, this is a good place to start. Just take your time with it.

[Michael Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Any heavy reader enjoys finding a new source for authors and titles. There are the usual literary and professional library serials, but for targeted recommendations you really need a book, and I’m always on the look-out for new ones. This small volume is recent enough to include newer authors, which is always useful. Its nearly 300 pages are divided thematically, so selected titles by a given author may appear scattered throughout the book. Forshaw, who edits Crime Time magazine, is first and foremost a fan himself, and he seems to know his field. His descriptions (judging by his treatment of the books I’m already familiar with) are generally accurate, including his comments on public reception of them, and he notes also the films (good and bad) that often have resulted. By the time I finished the volume, I had a “to read” list of nearly two dozen authors and works, which is exactly why I picked it up. There are some problems, though. First, the editors (I assume he had an editor) have allowed Forshaw to retain rather too much excessively Brit slang -- “taking gardening leave,” “sink estate,” information being “freighted in,” etc. A semi-reference book like this should convey what it wants to say without causing the reader to pause and think about what’s meant. He’s also annoyingly Anglo-centric; Henning Mankell, for instance, is hailed as the leading writer of “foreign crime fiction,” as if mysteries are only properly written in English. Only one of the dozen or more excellent Japanese mystery writers is mentioned -- and not the best one, either. (That would be Natsuo Kirino, or possibly Ryu Maurakami.) More puzzling, though, the author includes any number of quite minor writers (especially British ones) with only one or two books under their belts. But where is Jacqueline Winspear’s popular and ever-lengthening historical series featuring psychological detective Maisie Dobbs ? Or Jeff Lindsay’s novels about Florida serial killer Dexter Morgan, which have spun off a television series? Or Robert Eversz’s noirish stories about the dangerously attractive Nina Zero? Or Susanna Gregory’s popular medieval mysteries? Finally, and most egregiously, why does he omit Martha Grimes’s long-running, bestselling Superintendent Richard Jury novels? And yet he includes Robin Cook’s medical thrillers (when he’s not being Derek Raymond), which are in no way crime novels. They’re not even spy stories. The same is true of Frederick Forsyth’s Avenger -- a pretty good book but still a pure military/political thriller. Still, there are enough authors discussed here that any dedicated reader of mysteries is sure to find some new ones.

[Kestrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you wanta basic but wide-ranging introduction to crime fiction, which can include such subgenres as the Golden Age mysteries of Sayers and Christie, classic and neonoir, police procedurals, amateur sleuths, legal and spy thrillers, and international crime writers, this book provides a solid start. An additional plus for me was it includes brief but relevant reviews of the classic films based upon many of the novels. There are more academic books and books which are more in-depth on specific subgenres, but this book provides an nice well-rounded perspective on the field.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

c2007. Great little book that reminded me of some of the best Crime Fiction that I have read. It also alerted me to some new (to me) writers so sadly the amount owed in reservation fees to the library has just gone up again!

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Who thinks any book is `amazing` ?
Anyhoo,gonna read this again.
I`m always finding new authors or works to chase up.