Auntiemwrites Crime-Mystery Author M K Graff

Auntie M reads about three books a week, 90% crime fiction. So you can believe me when I tell you that there are dozens of great reads out there for you to discover. I’m putting the spotlight on four standouts I’ve recently read that have stayed with me, and all are highly recommended.

AJ Finn’s The Woman in the Window was a huge success with good reason, made into a movie starring Amy Adams. This story is another that took time and creativity to construct and it shows. A young detective fiction expert is invited to the home of a dying crime novelist to write his own story. Leaving her NY home behind, she travels to San Francisco, which comes alive under Finn’s talented pen and luscious prose. And there she meets what is left of Sebastian Trapp’s family: his spinster daughter Madeline and second wife Diana. For Trapp’s first wife and son disappeared twenty years ago and that mystery is only one Nicky Hunter hopes to solve.

Filled with clues and quotes from detective novels, this homage to Golden Agers feels fresh as it mines the tropes of detective fiction and manages to contain twists you won’t expect and more you won’t see coming. It’s simply terrific.

Alex Gray’s long-running DSI William Lorimer series still manages to feel fresh in this 21st outing. Gray takes the detective and his wife Maggie from Glasgow to Zimbabwe for a special holiday. Their good friend, Zimbabwean inspector Daniel Kohi, has become a PC in Scotland and must rise through the ranks, despite his elevated position before.

With Lorimer checking out Kohi’s home turf, the PC becomes involved in a Glasgow murder investigation that puts him on high alert. For back in his home country, malignant forces believe Kohi perished in the fire that killed his wife and child, and if they have found him alive in Scotland, anyone in Kohi’s circle is in danger, and that includes his elderly housemate. When news that Lorimer and Maggie are friends of Kohi, they find themselves as targets in the wilds of a safari. With a fascinating sense of place that makes this highly atmospheric, the twin stories weave together into an exciting read.

The new Inspector McLean finds the detective out of sorts on his self-imposed retirement. He’s reluctant to become involved when a well-known crime boss insists the police are not looking deeply enough into the death of an ex-con who perished when a wall collapsed in a decrepit Edinburgh church. When this body was found in the rubble, the death was deemed a heart attack from the terror.

But then a second body is found in another closed church, and McLean finally becomes involved when this man’s corpse is found to have a cross branded in his forehead. It’s a balancing act between his police and the crime lord’s worlds that leads McLean to one of his most unusual cases. Oswald has soldiered McLean through serious crimes, personal tragedy, and offbeat friends over the course of fourteen books, and they only get stronger. He also writes the newer DC Constance Fairchild series, with an intriguing lead you should check out.

Belfast born and bred Steve Cavanagh’s Eddie Flynn series is set in Manhattan and its environs. As a native New Yorker, I’d swear he lived there for at least part of his life, that’s how good his grasp of the city and its vibe is. And Eddie Flynn, the conman who is now a defense lawyer, radiates all aspects of that vibe and is such an intriguing character that I find myself anxiously awaiting each book.

This time Eddie takes on an innocent brain surgeon, accused of the murder of a neighbor. With no connection to the woman, it’s difficult to find a motive, yet the murder weapon and the surgeon’s DNA are found on it. But the other part of the equation is Ruby Johnson, a nanny who used to live on the tony Upper West side, and who is determined to provide care for her ailing mother. When she witnesses the murder and can identify the killer, she chooses to place an anonymous call to the police naming the surgeon and uses her knowledge for her own ends.

There will be more killings, hitmen, and so many twists you can’t see how Eddie can handle them all. In the words of Anthony Horowitz: “Steve Cavanagh’s twists hit you between the eyes.” You’ll love it.

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I’ve been gathering research for a stand alone mystery set in 1926, for writing next year, while at the same time working on getting the third Trudy Genova Manhattan Mystery, Death in the Orchard, ready to print in the spring. Such is the life of a writer, juggling multiple balls and plot lines, and now, eras.

It’s my first foray into a non-contemporary novel, with the challenges of getting those period details, customs, social mores right, giving me even more increased respect for the historical writers I enjoy reading. It feels like wading into a different world, where things like cell phones and the internet didn’t exist, and the language and slang are different.

Historicals with women leads show their strength and independence, as they battle against societal expectations for women in their era. Here are a few of my personal favorites, characters whose authors have gotten it right:

Sujata Massey was born in England to parents from India and Germany, and has always been interested in international affairs. After writing a long series set in Japan, she created Perveen Mistry, a 1920s lawyer who is Bombay’s first female solicitor, and who works in the esteemed firm of her father, but is unable in 1921 to appear independently in court.

There are other considerations, too, of a social nature that Massey teaches us as we learn of the constraints of a working woman in 1920s India, finding her place within a traditional family. With an assured and evocative sense of place, wrapped within a challenging mystery, these are all winners that open a window onto what women of varied social strata faced.

The first Perveen Mistry novel, The Widows of Malabar Hill, won the Agatha, Macavity, and Mary Higgins Clark Awards. The fourth and newest in the series, out now, is The Mistress of Bhatia House.

Deanna Raybourn’s Veronica Speedwell series feature a main character based on a real butterfly hunter from Victorian times. 

As a lepidopterologist, the orphaned Veronica travels the world while maintaining a foot in what society expects of her. Financially independent,  she finds herself embroiled in handsome men and fascinating mysteries.

A Curious Beginning starts this much read and loved series. Number nine in the series, A Grave Robbery, will be out in 2024.

I’ve spoken before of my fondness for the Josephine Tey series Nicola Upson writes, which has taken us to Mont St. Michel in Cornwall, to Suffolk and the Mystery of the Red Barn, to the theatre world Tey inhabited as the author of plays under the pen name Gordon Daviot.

Using the crime novelist’s pen name for the character she’s created, Upson brings Josephine through a series of British crimes in different settings in the UK. It helps that her good friend is Scotland Yard detective Archie Penrose.

The previous books have all been set in the UK until now, when Upson takes Josephine across the pond in 1939 so we experience a transatlantic crossing, to train west to Hollywood, where Alfred Hitchcock’s filming of Rebecca is in progress.

A murder investigation back in England has ties to the cast and crew of the filming. Upson’s meticulous research imbues the book with details of the filming of Daphne Du Maurier’s famous gothic novel. If you haven’t discovered this series of eleven books yet, the first is An Expert in Murder.

We jump to post World War II, where Iris Sparks and Gwendolyn Bainbridge have started The Right Sort Marriage Bureau to assure their own income and remain independent.

This readable series has it all, from the pressures brought on Gwen as a war widow from an upper class family, to the very modern Iris, with her complicated past work for the government and her romantic entanglements.

Each of the seven in the series lead the two friends to call on their prior experiences for a twisted mystery. Details of postwar London plus their interesting backstories of both women add to these well-plotted mysteries, that often revolve around clients who’ve come to their agency seeking a partner.

There are seven in the series by Allison Montclair, with Murder at the White Palace due in 2024.

You know you are in talented hands when an eleven-year-old girl can lead a series through eleven books and remain a constant character of interest.

Alan Bradley’s Flavia de Luce series starts in 1950, and is a startling twisted mystery, full of the complicated chemistry that so delights and fascinates the precocious Flavia, and her dysfunctional family still grieving the loss of their matriarch.

Throw in a couple of older sisters, and a staff who love and support Flavia’s eccentricities, and you have a recipe for a delightful read that also has moments of sorrow. It’s an assured hand that can travel these roads, throw in complications, and retain a delicious mystery that a young girl can solve.

These will appeal to YA readers but the bulk of Flavia’s devotees are adult readers. The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie starts this series, which won multiple awards with good reason.

Readers, who are your favorite historical women sleuths?

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No, not Cagney and Lacey, although they remain a very popular team from television.  Norwegian crime writer Anne Holt (ret. Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen series), also a lawyer and former Minister of Justice, credits the duo with stirring her to write crime fiction, and gives a nod to Lynda LaPlante’s Jane Tennison for her gritty character, too. She says these women were all ” . . . tough, driven, and damn good” at their jobs.

Yet female detectives represent only approximately 26% of characters in crime fiction, according to a recent survey. That’s actually lower than I would have thought, as both of my prime protagonists in two series are women, Trudy Genova and Nora Tierney.

Yet women remain popular as lead characters—just look at Nancy Drew—despite many of these characters having to deal with entrenched male hierarchies, especially if they are within a police system. In my humble opinion, the sensitivity and empathy to victims that women bring to their investigations, whether an amateur sleuth or a professional detective, enhances their need to see justice done. Women are determined and resourceful, too.

So who are my personal favorites in crime fiction? Too numerous to count I see, as I look over my shelves of whose books grace them. I’ll likely leave out many I love, but here are that ones that pop out as I run my eye over my library:

Ann Cleeves’ DCI Vera Stanhope is mistaken for a bag lady in her first outing (The Crow Trap) and has gone on to remain a stable in the long-running series. Played on television by Brenda Blethyn, Cleeves has said the actor is the embodiment of the detective who suffers no fools and solves crime in Northumberland wearing her rumpled raincoat and trademark hat.

Miss Marple stands out, and I suspect features on many crime writers’ lists, appearing in 12 of Christie’s novels. The kindly spinster who seems totally unassuming, yet misses nothing, has a mind like a steel trap that makes connections of human nature. Joan Hickson remains my favorite Jane Marple on television.

Barbara Havers is on my list, too, from Elizabeth George’s long-running Inspector Lynley series, the endearing misfit who is badly dressed but see things others miss, and whose working-class background is a great contrast to the handsome and worldly Lord Lynley. She can’t help constantly rubbing against authority, and was ably played in the TV series by actress Sharon Small.

The character Josephine Tey of Nicola Upson’s historical series is based on Elizabeth McKinnon’s real life, but this Tey finds herself embroiled in crimes while navigating her own stormy home life. Elly Griffith’s archeologist Dr. Ruth Galloway is another favorite, her voice at once self-deprecating with a wry humor, but a mind like no other, as she assists in more ways than one as DCI Nelson solves crimes.

James Oswald’s DC Constance Fairchild is another gal whose brain serves her well, as does Jane Casey’s DS Maeve Kerrigan, and I can’t leave out Aline Templeton’s DI Marjorie Fleming, married to a sheep farmer who keeps her grounded.

Of course, in addition to her standalone, Val McDermid has her own stable of female detectives, writing strong women over five series: Carol Jordan, Kate Brannigan, Lindsay Graham, Karen Pirie, and the newest, reporter Allie Burns.

I’ll end with the Skelf women of Doug Johnstone’s remarkable series, three women in one family who run a funeral home and private eye agency. These books are so original and so heartwarming yet darkly funny, based around the women, their lives, and their cases. If you haven’t found Dorothy, Jenny and Hannah yet, you’re in for a treat.

Readers: who are some of your favorite women sleuths?

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