Listomania

Like everyone else, I make lists and quickly lose them...grocery lists left on the kitchen counter, mailing lists left at the post office, favorite book lists lost down the back of a couch seat. Since I've begun a new blog, I thought I should begin a list of what I currently think are the best novels written in in the mystery genre. So, on occasion, I will offer some thoughts on novels I've read and remember well. I expect that some will be light, some old fashioned; some, no doubt, will possess a decided edge.
I could simply make a straightforward list, refine it and present it whole cloth but I think each novel should stand on its own. I also thought that I'd pick books as I remember them and go from there -- no one-to-one-hundred countdown or alphabetized compilation. Each on its own, one at a time in no particular order, simply as I remember them.

.

The first that comes to mind (and lurks in its dark recesses) is 1974 by David Peace. It's a grim bit of despair that begins his Red Riding Quartet. If you like bleak and violent, this should suit: It's a well-composed masterwork -- let's call it "jazz noir."
It's 1974 and Eddie Dunford is  a crime reporter for a newspaper in Yorkshire, England. It's a rough time for Eddie: His father has died, but Eddie can only focus on a 10-year-old girl who has disappeared. It may be just another story to Eddie, but following the case means headlines. So Eddie puts profession above family hoping to milk the story until Christmas.
As he digs into the story, Eddie discovers that there have been a number of similar cases that have gone unsolved, and neither his editor nor the police want him to dig deeper. Then the child is found, strangled, her body mutilated.
Like much of the best crime writing, Peace has given us a political story, here told in a choppy style -- a staccato riff as if played on a saxophone with a razor-blade reed. It is raw and disturbing, and its fractured prose conjures spasms of anxiety.
To tell the truth, I couldn't pick up another book for a week after reading 1974, and I've yet to work up the courage to read the three subsequent novels; maybe they are better; maybe I'll never know. I've yet to find myself willing to make another descent into Peace's mean streets.
1974 is that good.