D I S C U S S I O N    F O R U M :    B O O K    L I S T S J O H N ' S    B O O K    L I S T The purpose of the Lists section is to allow readers to share books they have liked (or maybe even disliked) with other visitors to the website. Please feel free to theme your list should you choose (i.e. Ten Best Police Procedurals, Ten Best Scottish Mystery Novels, Ten Best Cat Mysteries - well, maybe not Ten Best Cat Mysteries, but you catch the drift...) TO ADD YOUR LIST - visit our Discussion Forum and open the subject Book Lists. John's list of authors - old and new - off the top of his head (and various titles by them) (in alphabetical order) Basically, this list consists of thirty authors - some of them very new arrivals, and some of whom might not consider themselves mystery novelists, or the work in question a typical mystery - whose work I've enjoyed. Simple as that. . . Peter Ackroyd, Hawksmoor James Lee Burke, Heaven's Prisoners/ In The Electric Mist With Confederate Dead/ Black Cherry Blues. . . in fact, just about any James Lee Burke book, although Neon Rain and Burning Angel are probably not the best ones with which to begin. Caleb Carr, The Alienist Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep/ The Long Goodbye Harlan Coben, The Final Detail Michael Connelly, The Black Echo/ The Concrete Blonde/ The Last Coyote Robert Crais, LA Requiem James Crumley, The Last Good Kiss Sean Doolittle, Dirt Bill Fitzhugh, Pest Control Philip Kerr, A Philosophical Investigation/ The "Berlin Noir" novels Kinky Friedman, Armadillos and Old Lace Dashiell Hammett, The Dain Curse/ The Glass Key Thomas Harris, Red Dragon/ The Silence of the Lambs Carl Hiaasen, Tourist Season/ Native Tongue Paul Johnston, The Blood Tree/ The House of Dust Dennis Lehane, Mystic River/ A Drink Before the War/ Darkness, Take My Hand Elmore Leonard, City Primeval Ross Macdonald, The Chill/ The Doomsters (Macdonald was a huge influence on me and, as with Burke, almost all of the Archer novels are worth reading, although these two, along with The Underground Man, are among the best. There is also an excellent biography of Macdonald available, written by Tom Nolan.) Walter Mosley, the Easy Rawlins novels George Pelecanos, The Big Blowdown Ian Rankin, Black & Blue John Sandford, Cold Prey Karin Slaughter, Kisscut Scott Smith, A Simple Plan Newton Thornberg, Cutter & Bone Barry Unsworth, Morality Play (This is a stunning example of a literary novelist taking the structure of the mystery novel, and running with it...) Martyn Waites, Mary's Prayer (very graphic, but Waites is a writer with a social conscience...) Julia Wallis Martin, A Likeness in Stone/ The Bird Yard Charles Willeford, the Hoke Moseley novels . . . plus a dozen non-mystery writers but, hell, it's my site and I can do what i like. . . Donald Barthelme, Sixty Stories/ Forty Stories (one of the most imaginative short story writers ever) Peter Biskind, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls (great book on the Hollywood generation of the sixties and seventies) Bruce Jay Friedman, The Lonely Guy's Guide to Life (one of the funniest books ever written about what a sad lot men are...) Ford Madox Ford, The Good Soldier F. Gonzalez-Crussi, Notes of an Anatomist (the writer is a Mexican coroner, and a brilliant essayist) Ben Hamper, Rivethead (Hamper worked in the GM plant in Flint, Michigan, and this book covers similar territory to Michael Moore's documentary Roger & Me George V. Higgins, On Writing (a superb, if slightly depressing, book on writing and publishing) M.R. James, Collected Ghost Stories (simply the best writer of ghost stories) Thomas Lynch, The Undertaking (Lynch is a poet and funeral director, and this book is beautiful, moving and funny) Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian/ All The Pretty Horses (if you haven't already read them...) Philip Pullman, The Northern Lights (The Golden Compass in the US)/ The Subtle Knife/ The Amber Spyglass - the best children's books for adults (or adults' books for children) published in the last fifty years. Giles Smith, Lost in Music (one of my favourite books about popular music - brilliantly funny)