13 - Postmortem, Patricia Cornwell
Kay Scarpetta knows death inside and out. As the Chief Medical Examiner of Virginia, Scarpetta is hot on the trail of a vicious serial killer. Using cutting edge forensics and her own take-no-prisoners sense of anger, angst and personal outrage, Kay struggles to stop a murderer before he claims another victim.
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12 - Dead Cert, Dick Francis
Heart-stopping action at the racetrack sent murder mystery fans on edge to uncover crimes in Dick Francis' debut novel. Jockey Alan York discovers that his best friend and fellow jockey's death in a fatal riding accident was no accident at all. It was murder. A thundering mystery takes readers on a wild gallop to the finish line.
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11 - The Murder Room, P.D. James
Commander Adam Dalgleish, a poet and a policeman, makes an unexpected visit to the quirky Dupayne Museum near Hampstead Heath. Intrigued by the museum's focus on the between-the-wars years and specifically an entire room devoted to notorious Victorian murders, Dalgleish had no clue that he would shortly be returning to the museum – this time to solve a grisly murder.
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must-reads10 - A is for Alibi, Sue Grafton
Kinsey Millhone knows the ABCs of murder. Struggling (in her personal and professional life as a P.I.) Kinsey follows a stone cold dead trail to catch a killer who her client believes got away with murder in the idyllic California seaside community of Santa Teresa.
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must-reads9 - The Cat of Many Tails, Ellery Queen
Silently as a cat, a murderer has claimed nine lives. This puzzling mystery is ripe with atmosphere as New York City is paralyzed with fear. An unstoppable homicidal strangler is on the loose and suave amateur detective, Ellery Queen, baits a trap to beckon the killer to strike again in an evil and compelling battle of wits.
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8 - The Case of the Velvet Claws, Erle Stanley Gardner
The first in the wildly popular Perry Mason series, this mystery begins with blackmail and ends with brutal murder. Lawyer-sleuth Mason discovers shocking secrets in this raw-edge detective novel where Perry is tougher and more determined than you've ever seen him.
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7 - The Body in the Library, Agatha Christie
Miss Jane Marple, has seen a lot of evil in her quaint English village of St. Mary Mead. Her neighbors, Dolly and Arthur Bantry, have awakened to discover a dead body in the library of their manor house. A platinum blonde that somehow just doesn't seem quite real. However, the lifeless corpse is certainly there on the hearth rug and the elderly Miss Marple must solve the murder.
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6 - Murder Must Advertise, Dorothy L. Sayers
Using her extensive knowledge of the world of marketing and advertising, Sayers creates an imaginative novel that spotlights the split between the classes and the dangers when society circles are crossed. Aristocratic toff, Lord Peter Wimsey, goes undercover as an advertising copywriter to solve a puzzling mystery.
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reads5 - The Big Sleep, Raymond Chandler
A classic gumshoe detective story, this 1939 novel introduced the hard-boiled private detective Philip Marlowe to mystery fans. Marlowe is hired by the decrepit General Sternwood to stop a rare book dealer from blackmailing his nymphomaniac daughter. What follows is a twisting tale of revenge, murder and more double-crosses than you'll find in a pretzel factory.
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read-books4 - The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Agatha Christie
Hercule Poirot, the famous Belgian sleuth renowned for using his ‘little grey cells' to solve the most puzzling of mysteries, comes out of retirement to solve a mystery in the sleepy village of Kings Abbot. Murder, suicide, blackmail and a hornet's nest of secrets are revealed but the surprise ending will leave you gasping.
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must-reads3 - The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett
Sam Spade epitomizes the tough, hard-boiled P.I. Coldly detached and capable of dishing out his own brand of justice, Spade operates on the darker side of San Francisco's society. With his partner murdered and suspicions mounting that his beautiful client is to blame, Spade begins a hunt for the mysterious Black Bird, a jewel-encrusted falcon statue from the island of Malta.
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must-reads2 - The Hound of the Baskervilles, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
A lonely manor house on the moors. A legend of a ghostly hound that haunts the Baskerville family. The game's afoot when Sherlock Holmes and his trusted friend, Dr. Watson investigate the case to see if a devil dog is to blame for an aristocrat's brutal death.
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must-reads1 - Murders in the Rue Morgue, Edgar Allan Poe
Some say it all began here in 1841. Was the birth of the modern detective story created when the tortured genius of American author Edgar Allan Poe published his short story, The Murders in the Rue Morgue in Graham's Lady's and Gentleman's Magazine (where Poe worked as an editor and reviewer) in Philadelphia? Without a doubt.
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