Genre :: Mystery (38 books)

  • In Cold Blood

    #242

    In Cold Blood

    by Truman Capote

    (11 Reviews)

    86 Points

    "The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call 'out there'."

  • The Maltese Falcon

    #248

    The Maltese Falcon

    by Dashiell Hammett

    (9 Reviews)

    85 Points

    "Samuel Spade's jaw was long and bony, his chin a jutting v under the more flexible v of his mouth."

  • The Magus

    #251

    The Magus

    by John Fowles

    (4 Reviews)

    83 Points

    "I was born in 1927, the only child of middle-class parents, both English, and themselves born in the grotesquely elongated shadow, which they never rose sufficiently above history to leave, of that..."

  • Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

    #269

    Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

    by Patrick Suskind

    (11 Reviews)

    78 Points

    "In eighteenth century France there lived a man who was one of the most gifted and abominable personages in an era that knew no lack of gifted and abominable personages."

  • The Moonstone

    #278

    The Moonstone

    by Wilkie Collins

    (3 Reviews)

    76 Points

    "In the first part of Robinson Crusoe, at page one hundred and twenty-nine, you will find it thus written: 'Now I saw, though too late, The Folly of beginning a Work before we count the Cost, and..."

  • The Riddle of the Sands

    #346

    The Riddle of the Sands

    by Erskine Childers

    (2 Reviews)

    64 Points

    "I have read of men who, when forced by their calling to live for long periods in utter solitude - save for a few black faces - have made it a rule to dress regularly for dinner in order to maintain..."

  • The Secret History

    #348

    The Secret History

    by Donna Tartt

    (8 Reviews)

    63 Points

    "The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation. (Prologue)Does such a thing as "the fatal flaw," that..."

  • The Da Vinci Code

    #357

    The Da Vinci Code

    by Dan Brown

    (20 Reviews)

    59 Points

    "Robert Langdon awoke slowly."

  • Snow Falling on Cedars

    #363

    Snow Falling on Cedars

    by David Guterson

    (6 Reviews)

    58 Points

    "The accused man, Kabuo Miyamoto, sat proudly upright with a rigid grace, his palms placed softly on the defendant's table - the posture of a man who has detached himself insofar as this is possible..."

  • The Thirty-Nine Steps

    #369

    The Thirty-Nine Steps

    by John Buchan

    (3 Reviews)

    57 Points

    "I returned from the City about three o'clock on that May afternoon pretty well disgusted with life."