Fantasy Mysteries

I like reading mysteries and I like reading fantasies, so I was wondering what are the best fantasies that imitate the mystery genre? I'll try to think of some myself. Off the top of my head, I thought of Mairelon the Magician and its sequel Magician's Ward.

I think the Harry Dresden books by Jim Butcherwould fall into the fantasy/mystery catagory.

A few others I've read and enjoyed that seemed like mysteries are the Aisling Grey books by Katie MacAlister, Magic Lost, Trouble Found by Lisa Shearin, The Blood Books by Tanya Huff and Wicked Gentlemen by Ginn Hale. However, none of these are young adult stories like the ones you mentioned.

Tamara Siler Jones has done three terrific fantasy novels that employ early forensics. They're pretty much procedurals, except for the magic and ghosts and so on. ^^

In the mystery genre, as opposed to the fantasy genre (though sometimes you'll find his books in Horror or just the general Fiction section, too) there's John Connolly, whose Charlie Parker novels have a strong supernatural element to them.

Neither series is for the faint of heart, though, as they can get pretty dark.

Love the Artemis Fowl novels. They could be considered fantasy/mystery novels, and they are YA.

mercedes lackey has one fantasy with a detective main character and mystrie he's interested i n. four and twenty blackbirds, i think.

there is also an anthology Powers of Detection edited by Dana Stabenow with some great stories involved fantasy with a mystriy type plot.

A couple of classics:
The Lord Darcy series by Randall Garrett (Think of an aristocratic Sherlock Holmes in a Plantagenet England where magic exists--lots of fun!)
Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, Asimov's Mysteries by Isaac Asimov are science fiction, but in the same family of fantastic mysteries.
Sorcery and Cecilia and its sequels-mystery in a magical regency England-by Wrede and Stevermer

Neil Gaiman has a pair of interesting short stories that mix fantasy and mystery.

A Study in Emerald is a mix of the Sherlock Holmes mysteries with H. P. Lovecraft's mythos. It's also available for free on the author's website.

Murder Mysteries is the tale of an angel (in the trappings of the hardboiled detective) investigating the first murder in the universe.

Death of the Necromancer by Martha Wells and another of my favorites, Those Who Hunt the Night by Barbara Hambly

Lackey also did Oathblood which is a collection of shorts about a female Sword and Sourcery duo and one or two of the stories are mystery.

A lot of the urban fantasy has a mystery type plot, Jim Butcher was mentioned above. He is a bit too whiny for my taste, but there is Mark Del Franco's Unshapely Things and Unquiet Dreams featuring a supernatural consultant with the Boston PD, Simon R. Green's Nightside series about a PI in Londons nightside, Elaine Cunningham's Changeling Detective series about an (elven) PI in Providence. Kim Harrison's first book in the Rachel Morgan series about a witch PI was good, but book two a letdown to me.

I second the Lord Darcy and John Connelly recommendation - very different style - Lord Darcy is a Regency(?) take on the classical british detective stories, whereas the John Connelly books are present time and very dark although by no means horror.

There is also:
Glen Cook Garrett P.I. - PI in a preindustrial fantasy setting (avoid the Thraxas books, with much the same setup, they aren't nearly as good). Think Nero Wolfe in a fantasy setting.
P. N. Elrod The Vampire Files - a vampire PI in prohibition era Chicaco.

Melissa Scott Point of Dreams - a police investigation in an early industrial / preindustrial fantasy setting. Sequel to Point of Honor.
Jasper Fforde The Big Over Easy - Jack (from Jack and the Beanstalk) is a policedetective in a modern day England of fictional characters.

There's an element of mystery/suspense in many of Barbara Hambly's works, such as those who hunt the night, sisters of the raven or the dark hand of magic. She also writes a historical suspense series set in 1830's New Orleans, starting with a free man of color. Some of her book are a little dark, but nothing like as gruesome as tamara siler jones

Other lighter fantasies with an element of mystery:
the death of the necromancer by martha wells - adventures with a master criminal in an elegant fin-de-siecle city.
terrier by tamora pierce - adventures with a recruit to the city guard.
tea with the black dragon by r a macavoy
sister to the rain by melisa c. michaels - contemporary PI fantasy with elves.
point of honour by madeleine e robins - regency detective fantasy.
barrenlands by doranna durgin

# 11 It is funny you should call Point of Honour a fantasy, I do too, although there is no fantastic elements in it other than a very modern female PI.

Hey, if you can call Point of honour fantasy then you can count Philip Pullman's Ruby in the smoke and other Sally Lockhart mysteries fantasy too.

*Blink Blink* Nobody's mentioned Terry Pratchett's Discworld books yet? All of the City Watch books are mysteries: Guards, Guards, Feet of Clay, Men at Arms, Jingo, The Fifth Elephant, Nightwatch, and Thud!.

Also, there's Rankin's The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse, but I haven't actually finished that one, and I'm not too thrilled with it so far.

10: It's "Connolly," not "Connelly." Different guys! :) (though a couple of Connolly's books seem to be mixed in with Connelly's. x.x)

What about the Hawk and Fisher books by Simon R. Green? Not exactly high literature, but some of them make for an entertaining guilty pleasure.

(just joined this group & love this topic - I've picked up some great recommendations...)

It's a stretch to call them mysteries, but some of Christopher Moore's books might fit the bill (well, mysterious killings do take place). The Stupidest Angel: a Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror is a comic/fantasy/horror/Christmas whodunnit.

New Amsterdam by Elizabeth Bear

Lackey has another series that really are mysteries - the Diana Tregarde trilogy, Children of the Night, Burning Water, Jinx High (that's universe order, not publication). They're excellent. Lord Darcy is also wonderful, there's just not enough of it (those were the books that triggered my interest in this subgenre). There was a recent anthology called Murder by Magic - a lot of excellent fantastical mysteries.

Oh, Lord Darcy is superb! The concept of a world where magic is treated like science and science like magic was brilliant.