“Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.” (Choice, 1 September 2013)
“Messent's readings are always perceptive and his book offers an excellent introduction to a diverse genre.” (The Guardian, 8 March 2013)
“The Crime Fiction Handbook is nevertheless a good introduction to a prolific genre.” (Times Literary Supplement, 1 March 2013)
“Those interested in the more arcane byways of crime fiction will find this concise but intelligent volume invaluable, with its academic (but accessible) analyses of some of the key texts in the genre. What is perhaps the most valuable aspect of the book is the fact that Peter Messent has managed to unearth new insights into this much written-about subject — no easy task in the 21st century, when a considerable amount of analysis of the field (including, in a modest way, by this writer) is so endemic.” (Crime Time, 27 February 2013)
From the Inside Flap
With its compelling blend of murder, mystery, and detection, it should come as no surprise that crime fiction is a hugely popular literary genre. The Crime Fiction Handbook presents a comprehensive introduction to the origins, development, and cultural significance of the crime fiction genre, focusing mainly on its American, British, and Scandinavian forms.
The book’s first main section presents an overview of the subject, addressing the politics of crime fiction and exploring some of its main variants – classical and hard-boiled detective fiction, the private eye and the police novel, and fictions of transgression. The section concludes with an exploration of three key elements of the genre: the links between vision, supervision, and the urban landscape; representations of the body and the acts of violence done to it; and issues both of race and gender.
In-depth readings of fourteen of the most important crime fictions in the Western tradition then follow, beginning with Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” and proceeding from classic works by Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, and Raymond Chandler to contemporary writings by James Ellroy, Thomas Harris, Patricia Cornwell, Ian Rankin, and Stieg Larsson.
The Crime Fiction Handbook offers fascinating insights into the appeal of crime fiction while revealing how the genre both entertains and provides a mirror to the most pressing social issues of the day.
From the Back Cover
With its compelling blend of murder, mystery, and detection, it should come as no surprise that crime fiction is a hugely popular literary genre. The Crime Fiction Handbook presents a comprehensive introduction to the origins, development, and cultural significance of the crime fiction genre, focusing mainly on its American, British, and Scandinavian forms.
The book&;s first main section presents an overview of the subject, addressing the politics of crime fiction and exploring some of its main variants &; classical and hard-boiled detective fiction, the private eye and the police novel, and fictions of transgression. The section concludes with an exploration of three key elements of the genre: the links between vision, supervision, and the urban landscape; representations of the body and the acts of violence done to it; and issues both of race and gender.
In-depth readings of fourteen of the most important crime fictions in the Western tradition then follow, beginning with Edgar Allan Poe&;s &;The Murders in the Rue Morgue&; and proceeding from classic works by Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, and Raymond Chandler to contemporary writings by James Ellroy, Thomas Harris, Patricia Cornwell, Ian Rankin, and Stieg Larsson.
The Crime Fiction Handbook offers fascinating insights into the appeal of crime fiction while revealing how the genre both entertains and provides a mirror to the most pressing social issues of the day.
About the Author
Peter Messent is Emeritus Professor of Modern American Literature at the University of Nottingham. A specialist on Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway, and crime fiction, he has published numerous books and articles on a variety of nineteenth- and twentieth-century American writers. His most recent publication is the prize-winning book Mark Twain and Male Friendship (2009).
Wow! eBook
