Puzzles, tricks and whodunits...

I love mysteries. Since the much lamented demise of BBC Japan I have had to search out alternatives to the brilliant The Mrs Bradley Mysteries in which Diana Rigg - as Mrs Adela Bradley - extols pragmatic words of wisdom like the following:

"Same old coiffure, husband secure. New style of hair, husband beware!"

Fortunately we do have LaLa TV here in Japan, which replays some classic TV shows like Murder, She Wrote starring the indomitable Jessica Fletcher - aka Angela Lansbury:


(Image from here)

Now, while I do enjoy sitting back and watching Mrs Fletcher handily solve a murder mystery in 45 minutes...woman cannot live on TV alone - she also needs books and lots of them!

DCI Alan Banks live in North Yorkshire and "is lean and wiry with short, cropped black hair greying a little at the temples...not especially handsome in the classic sense, but attractive to women...fanatical about music..." (Inspector Banks' PIR will fill in the blanks for you.)


(Image from Amazon UK)

Critics regard Peter Robinson's In A Dry Season to be the best of his literary police procedurals starring Banks. It links the lives of residents from Hobbs End - a village that was surrendered to the waters of Thornfield Reservoir - to discover how a young woman may have died over 50 years ago.

Hieronymous "Harry" Bosch is a man with a mission, a mission to "speak for the dead". Michael Connelly selected this name as "I didn't want to waste anything. I wanted all aspects of his character to be meaningful...I saw the metaphorical possibilities of juxtaposing contemporary Los Angeles with the Bosch paintings." (Read Michael Connelly's FAQs for the full description.)


(Image from Amazon UK )

The Last Coyote details Bosch's attempts to investigate an unsolved crime from 1961. A brutal murder that has profoundly affected Bosch, as the victim was his mother. He discovers that someone was able to keep the investigators away from the key suspects...will the cover-up remain intact today?

Commissario Guido Brunetti lives and works in La Serenissima (Venice, Italy), a relatively crime-free locale. "He loves his family, the majesty of Italian cuisine, and his job, even as he constantly rails against the bumbling and interference of his superiors...Guido is an island of integrity in a sea of corruption." (This site has the full details.)


(Image from Amazon UK)

Acqua Alta reintroduces some colourful characters from the first Brunetti mystery, Death At La Fenice, and forces Brunetti to investigate a savage beating and a swollen corpse against the backdrop of a cold and grey Venice.

Banks, Bosch and Brunetti are investigators that are looking to provide some sense of meaning to life and are inexorably drawn to the victims in their respective series. Each murder provides more details about their personalities and motivations. While you can delve into any of the novels for a complete tale, you will enjoy the character development more if you read the series in order. (Does anyone else find it weird that they all have "B" names?!)