Monthly Sub-Genre Challenge: What Type are You? - April 2017

Each month a randomly selected sub-genre of Mystery and Suspense will appear. We want you to discuss your favorite books and make recommendations. You may choose books to read in this sub-genre and post comments or reviews about the books read. Even a sentence or two will do!

The sub-genre for the month of April 2017 is...Scotland Yard

The name Scotland Yard invokes the image of a foggy London street being patrolled by a detective in a trench coat puffing smoke from his pipe. But Scotland Yard has an easily muddled history, full of misnomers and controversy. Neither in Scotland, nor in a yard, it is the name of the headquarters of London's Metropolitan Police and, by association, has become synonymous with the force. The Yard doesn't serve the city either, but instead the Greater London area. With all this confusion, it's time to investigate the story of Scotland Yard and some of its most infamous cases, from Jack the Ripper to the 2005 London bombings. (Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brief-history-of-scotland-yard-172669755...

I’m sure this will be quite easy for this group to find books to satisfy this challenge ☺ But, if you should need some help, I’ve included a few links below in case you’d like to check out some new authors or series. I know one of my favorites in this group would be the Inspector Lynley series by Elizabeth George.

https://www.amazon.com/Scotland-Yards-Murder-Squad-Book/dp/B01ARHVG9O
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/scotland-yard
https://www.jillianstone.com/book-shop
http://www.flashlightworthybooks.com/Books-Best-British-Police-Detective-Series/...
https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB123336908791135827
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gideon_of_Scotland_Yard

I’ve included a link below for those of you who would like to read a book about the history of Scotland Yard:
https://www.amazon.com/Scotland-Yard-History-British-Policing-ebook/dp/B01LKBBPM...

And, who knew? There was even a comic series, Mysteries of Scotland Yard...


And, a board game!


Happy Reading ❤

Quite a lot to choose from in this theme, will need to give it some considered thought.

I love the Gideon series by J J Marric (also published under the John Creasey name). These give a real authentic feel to policing in London post World War II but quite difficult to locate these days. Although contemporary books when they were written it is like they are historical mysteries now.

Apparently, "all" the books on my tbr tagged "scotland yard" are Agatha Christies!
The Thirteen Problems
or
The Murder at the Vicarage

...I looked at what my library has available, and I could get either one. I'm afraid I might find an audio a bit slow, but I found a BBC dramatization, so I might give that a try.

I've been waiting for just the right time to read The Black Country. I read The Yard last year and really liked it

Thanks,Brenda for another interesting challenge. >6 Olivermagnus: I loved The Black Country. It was the best thus far of that series. I've read The Yard and The Devil's Workshop also but still like The Black Country best. After I did the review someone on Shelfari posted that she had friend that live in what is known as "the black country" and that the descriptions were right on the money. She even posted some pictures. This is a series that you do have to read in order or you'll never understand the "why" of what is happening.

Here are my choices from the books I own:
The Yard (Scotland Yard's Murder Squad, #1) by Alex Grecia
A Great Deliverance (Inspector Lynley, #1) by Elizabeth George
The Man With a Load of Mischief (Richard Jury, #1) by Martha Grimes
A Study in Scarlet (Sherlock Holmes, #1) by Arthur Conan Doyle
Thunderstruck by Erik Larson
The Salton Killings (Chief Inspector Woodend, #1) by Sally Spencer
Cover Her Face (Adam Dalgliesh, #1) by P.D. James
A Beautiful Blue Death (Charles Lenox Mysteries, #1) by Charles Finch
Dead Scared (Lacey Flint, #2) by Sharon Bolton
Black Dog (Ben Cooper & Diane Fry, #1) by Stephen Booth
The Burning (Maeve Kerrigan, #1) by Jane Casey
The Last Detective (Peter Diamond, #1) by Peter Lovesey
River of Darkness (John Madden, #1) by Rennie Airth
The Final Cut (A Brit in the FBI, #1) by Catherine Coulter
Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson by Lyndsay Faye
Murder as a Fine Art (Thomas De Quincey, #1) by David Morrell
A Bespoke Murder by Edward Marston
The Sherlockian by Graham Moore

Link from Goodreads

Popular Scotland Yard Books

>9 Olivermagnus: Perusing through the GR link, I see Thunderstruck by Erik Larson there. I'd recommend that, if anyone is interested!

I plan to start with The Witch Maker by Sally Spencer and The Man With A Load of Mischief by Martha Grimes. We'll go from there.

The Witch Maker by Sally Spencer
DCI Woodend series Book #11
4.5 Stars

From The Book:
To be Witch Makers in the moorland village of Hallerton is both a great honor and a heavy burden. But this Witch Maker never lives to witness his moment of triumph and is discovered tied to the Witching Post early one morning with a length of twine wrapped tightly around his neck. Will DCI Charlie Woodend solve this mystery?

My Thoughts:
I enjoyed this book much more than I had thought I would. Sally Spenser did an outstanding job of portraying the small village and the strangeness of the people that inhabited it. The reader felt that they had been dropped into a time capsule and transported back 350 years. It seems that DCI Woodend and his Sergeant Monika Paniatowski also had that feeling...but while they were sorting out how to handle this case...another...seeming unrelated murder is dropped on their plates.

The story features a suspenseful and well-developed story line. A surprise ending and several semi-Gothic elements along with quaint setting and the sense of dark foreboding...all adds up to a first rate mystery.

The Man With A Load of Mischief by Martha Grimes
Richard Jury Series Book #1
4 Stars

From The Book:
At the Man with a Load of Mischief, they found the dead body stuck in a keg of beer. At the Jack and Hammer, another body was stuck out on the beam of the pub’s sign, replacing the mechanical man who kept the time. Two pubs. Two murders. One Scotland Yard inspector called in to help. Detective Chief Inspector Richard Jury arrives in Long Piddleton and finds everyone in the postcard village looking outside of town for the killer. Except for one Melrose Plant. A keen observer of human nature, he points Jury in the right direction: into the darkest parts of his neighbors’ hearts.

My Views:
Not a bad book at all but the author sure loves the adjective. It was a really good story and all the unnecessary description didn't make it any better. The plot was different than anything I have ever read... and that fact alone makes the reader want to read "just one more page" until before you know it the "one more page" has turned into the last page.

Another likable element about the book is the author's sense of humor. Martha Grimes made several of the characters quirky to the point of peculiarity thus having them provide a lot of levity for this essentially straightforward tale of greed gone wild. The Inspector Richard Jury character could stand to be fleshed out more but since this is the first book of 23 currently written...this may have already happened. I will certainly plan to explore more of this series.

The Red Herring by Sally Spencer
Inspector Woodend Series Book # 7
4 Stars

From The Book:
The discovery of the body of a young, red-haired school mistress, lying in a pig-pen with her face half-eaten away, is the beginning of a new investigation for Charlie Woodend. But it is to be an investigation he is soon ordered to abandon when Helen Dunn, the daughter of Wing Commander Dunn - and a pupil at the school where the dead woman taught - suddenly vanishes into thin air. While Woodend and Rutter race against time in the desperate hope of finding the girl alive, Woodend's bagman, Monika Paniatowski, continues to work on the murder, under the supervision of the mysterious Chief Inspector Horrocks, a Scotland Yard man who seems to have only a mild interest in finding the killer. Are the two cases connected? Woodend begins to wonder. And if they are, who is it who seems to be blocking both investigations at every turn?

My Views:
I just discovered this author and this series and must say that I find the stories really interesting with gripping, creative plots. They are not the usual types of mystery and suspense books that i usually read but they are a refreshing break. They are not "cozies" by any means and will satisfy anyone that wants a well plotted mystery with plenty of clues to help you try and solve the crime without the contents of the grittier ones.

Not sure why this is tagged "Scotland Yard", but it is. I think many of her books are tagged that way.

Murder at the Vicarage / Agatha Christie
4 stars

This is the first Miss Marple book. Mr. Protheroe is found murdered at his desk. Very soon after, two different people confess to the murder. Miss Marple lives not far away, so she must have seen or heard something! What could have really happened?

I am always mixed on Agatha Christie’s books. I decided, this time, to try the BBC dramatization instead of the book itself, and I’m certain that made a difference for the higher rating. I think it made it a bit more interesting to me, and I am glad that’s the version I listened to. I do like Miss Marple.

>15 LibraryCin: There are some strange books that are tagged Scotland Yard erroneously just because there is a Detective involved.

>15 LibraryCin: It's been a while since I've read this one, but I think the Colonel in charge of the investigation was from Scotland Yard.

>17 jguidry: And I wondered if that was the case; I just missed them mentioning it... or, it was a dramatization - maybe it wasn't specifically mentioned in the BBC version!

>18 LibraryCin: Probably glossed over it quickly. After all, Miss Marple is the focus of the whole affair, right? ;0)

>19 jguidry: haha! Yes, exactly!

I finished my Scotland Yard book and wish I had more time to read others. It's a genre I really enjoy and my TBR is filled with some great ones. This author is phenomenal with descriptive writing.

The Black Country by Alex Grecian - 4.5 Stars

The Black Country is the second book in Alex Grecian’s Scotland Yard Murder Squad series featuring Inspector Walter Day and Sergeant Nevil Hammersmith. This time they are headed to the coal mining town of Blackhampton in what is known as the “Black Country.”

Coal miner Sutton Price, his second wife Hester, and their young son have unexpectedly vanished, leaving their three other young children alone. The local constable, who believes the missing Prices to be dead, has searched the village for their bodies without success. He believes their bodies may never be found because so much of the land is filled with underground coal tunnels. In another story-line, many of the town's residents have come down with a mysterious disease. The villagers have their own superstitions which seem to govern their existence, but Day and Hammersmith both know there is a real killer out there. There are also two "interlude" chapters where we find out some interesting backdrop history on two of the characters.

This is an excellent historical mystery with a very complex plot. I enjoyed the way the way the author gave us a look at the early forensics of the time and filled his story with authentic Victorian atmosphere. I was completely hooked by the story which had plenty of menace and mystery to keep the pages turning very quickly. The characters were richly developed and this story will appeal to fans of historical Victorian mysteries.