It’s so hard to make any top ten list, but especially one for mysteries, since I love so many. I’m mixing some classics and some new ones that I adored on this list. I’m sure I’m leaving out many great ones, but that’s the joy of making my own list, I can add the ones I want.

  1. The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – A Sherlock Holmes novel has to be on this list and this is one that sticks in my head even years after my last reading. Of course, I’ll probably reread it again sometime anyway.
  2. The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins –  Another classic, dealing with love, murder, social class, opium. It’s got a lot going on, but it suspenseful, funny and definitely readable. (review)
  3. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson – Featuring Lisbeth Salander, this one just grabbed me and kept me reading. It wasn’t until I had to turn on a light that I noticed four hours had passed since I had sat down to read for a few minutes. (review)
  4. Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie – I had to include a Christie and I do love Poirot. The solution here is memorable, too. (review)
  5. The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny – I just love this series, and this is one of the best. I even made my mom, not a mystery love in general, read it. (review)
  6. Have Gun, Will Play by Camille LaGuire – Two young married gunslingers solving crime in the Old West. Unique, funny, just great. (review)
  7. The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths – Setting, characters and plot all pulled together perfectly in this mystery set near Norfolk. I really need to get back to this series. (review)
  8. She Walks These Hills by Sharyn McCrumb – It’s a blending of Appalachia’s present and its past, of the truth behind folk songs and the way the present often echoes the past. (review)
  9. The Skull Mantra by Eliot Pattison – Like nothing I’ve ever read, this mystery takes place in a forced labor camp in Tibet where most of the inmates are Tibetan monks.
  10. Blood from a Stone by Donna Leon – Another series and detective I love. The Venice setting sucks me in and the characters feel like real people. Leon also gives us an interesting take on politics and race relations. (review)

I could have kept listing, there are so many great stories out there. Do you have a favorite mystery?

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

March Mystery Madness is hosted by Christina at Reading Thru the Night.

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