2021 is by no means over, but if you're a fan of the mystery genre, the good news is that a large number of books have already been published. We'll continue to track new mystery books throughout the year and add them whenever we think they're worth reading. We'll also be adding books that have been nominated for prestigious mystery books awards, like the Edgars in the US and the Dagger Awards in the UK. The shortlist for the Edgars was announced in January, and so we've already listed them below. Bear in mind that these are the best books of the previous year, rather than the very latest (with the advantage that they're already likely to be in paperback). We've also already added some newly-published mystery books we've enjoyed reading so far.
This list is part of our best books of 2021 series
The Distant Dead
by Heather Young
***Shortlisted for the 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
Set in a small Nevada town in the desert, The Distant Dead is beautiful, evocative and quite sad, with so many characters who can’t escape their circumstances. Once you get into the story, it’s hard to put down and you might even learn something about math and anthropology along the way.
Before She Was Helen
by Caroline Cooney
***Shortlisted for the 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
The author of Before She Was Helen, Caroline Cooney, is an incredibly successful writer of books for teenagers. But, as she explains in a Q&A at the back of the book, having written more than 75 of them, she wanted to do something aimed at adults. This is such a lovely book, set in a retirement village, with an aged 70+ heroine. One nice aspect of it is the reflections on how attitudes have changed since the 1950s. “I grew. up on the 1950s,” Cooney writes, “Those days seem as remote now as ancient Egypt or Greece. I wanted to include details that people younger than I have trouble believing.”
The Survivors: A Novel
by Jane Harper
Nobody does unsettling murder mysteries in small, remote communities—where everyone knows each other and has lots of secrets—as well as Jane Harper. The setting for The Survivors, Harper’s fourth novel, is Evelyn Bay, a small (fictional) beach town on the island of Tasmania, where the ocean provides a menacing backdrop that pervades the story. Prepare to want to read this book in one sitting.
The Missing American
by Kwei Quartey
***Shortlisted for the 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
The Missing American by Kwei Quartey is not only a pageturner but also an eyeopener. If you’ve always been curious about scam emails and who might be behind them, here’s what happens to a man who responds to one. The book is set in Ghana, which is a lot of fun to read about at a time when travelling is difficult.
Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line
by Deepa Anappara
***Winner 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line is an incredibly touching story told through the eyes of Jai, a nine-year-old boy living in a basti or slum of an Indian city. It’s an amazing book to read—you feel like you are living in the basti with Jai and his friends, experiencing the sights, the smells, the characters, including the corrupt police force. The mystery element is a minor part of the book, in the sense that there isn’t really an ‘aha’ moment, but this book is definitely a must-read. Afterwards, it was hard not to click on some of the organizations that the author recommends that work with children from impoverished communities.
These Women
by Ivy Pochoda
***Shortlisted for the 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
If you read mysteries for pure escapism, These Women by Ivy Pochoda is a tough one, with lots of drugs, streetwalking and seedy clubs. Set in LA, it’s the story of a group of mostly marginalized women, a number of whom end up murdered. The beauty of the book is that it’s really about them and their lives, and the mothers who mourn them, rather than the killer and the crimes. In terms of narrative structure, the story is told from each of these women’s perspectives, which means you do have to adjust to the next narrator, but there’s enough overlap that it doesn’t break up the reading experience.
Win
by Harlan Coben
It's always slightly hard to get into a book when the main character is detestable. You cringe, you don't want to read more, you put it down. But if you then find yourself still wanting to know what happens, it's probably a pretty good mystery. Harlan Coben's Win is this type of thriller. By the end, in addition to a good plot, I even found myself enjoying Windsor Horne Lockwood III (aka Win)'s words of wisdom and reflections on life. The audiobook, narrated by Steven Weber, is impressive, winning an Earphones Award from Audiofile magazine.
The Thursday Murder Club
by Richard Osman
***Shortlisted for the 2021 Edgar Allan Poe Awards***
The Thursday Murder Club is a relentless parody of a classic, cosy murder mystery, written by British TV presenter and comedian Richard Osman. It is laugh-out-loud funny at times, though it’s hard to know how well that humour travels beyond UK borders, so it may be worth reading a sample before committing. It’s a light and enjoyable read, set in an upscale retirement village, with the upshot that many of the main protagonists are aged 70+, which is oddly empowering.
The Marlow Murder Club
by Robert Thorogood
The Marlow Murder Club by Robert Thorogood is a classic cosy mystery, set in the UK in the town of Marlow and featuring an elderly lady who is good at cryptic crossword puzzles and goes around town wearing a cape. The plotting is serviceable, but the main attraction of the book is the setting, opening with Judith (the main protagonist) swimming in the Thames, and this general feel of a rather nice life by the river in a pleasant English setting.
Lightseekers
by Femi Kayode
Lightseekers by Femi Kayode is a novel set in Nigeria, in particular a small university town near the oil town of Port Harcourt. This setting is, in itself, really interesting, as we pick up little hints of the local history, the Biafran War, the tensions, the corruption and the feelings of the main protagonist—an investigative psychologist—as he adjusts to life back in Nigeria. Chillingly, the murders in the story are based on a real event, and the mystery investigated in the book is what might cause such horrific mob violence.
Transient Desires: A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery
by Donna Leon
Transient Desires is the 30th book in a series by Donna Leon featuring Guido Brunetti, a police chief in Venice, Italy. These are not fast-paced thrillers but move slowly, evocative of a rather melancholic city in decline. The quality of the books goes up and down—as you would expect from a series that has been going on for this many years—but this one, Transient Desires, is a good one. You end up really caring about the crime and wanting to see it punished. You will also be spending some time living in Italy—going home for lunch with Brunetti, having coffees around Venice, musing on the differences between Neapolitans and Venetians, surrounded, as everywhere in public service, with budget cuts.
