A few days ago, the omnipresent Dave Lull sent me a link to an article in the Independent newspaper, Around the World in 80 Sleuths. (If you would like to see the articles at the link Dave sends me on a regular basis, as I don't post here about them all, please join our OWL FriendFeed group. I also posted this link in our Crime and Mystery fiction FriendFeed group, which you are also welcome to join.) I didn't have time to read the article until today, but I have seen a few reactions to it on blogs, for example AustCrime (Karen C) and Mysteries in Paradise (Kerrie).
Anyway, back to the Independent article. It starts well, with Greenland and Iceland, but skips Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland before arriving at the Shetland Islands (the excellent novels by Ann Cleeves). Don't worry, though, although the geography is a bit odd, the rest of Scandinavia is included much further down the list (Sweden represented by Mankell, omitting Sjowall/Wahloo, Tursten, Jungstedt, Theorin, Lackberg... and Norway captured by Fossum, which omits Nesbo). There are, as might be imagined, lots of British examples and a controversial Irish choice of "Benjamin Black". Wilkie Collins is assigned to Yorkshire, but perhaps more appropriate might be Peter Robinson. Surely Martin Edwards should also have been included, for the Lake District? And I'd have gone for Brian McGilloway for Ireland -- conveniently, he can cover Northern Ireland as well as Eire. Lots of my favourites are included, for example Michael Walters (Mongolia), Colin Cotterill (Laos), Peter Temple (Melbourne) and Andrea Camilleri (Sicily) (but not, sadly, Bari's Gianrico Carofiglio) as well as several I am intending to read, such as Paulus Hochgatterer. Authors are sometimes chosen who aren't from the region about which they are writing. Fair enough, but in this case, Catherine Sampson (Beijing) and Donna Leon (Venice) justify inclusion. Los Angeles apparently features more than 80 famous fictional sleuths, represented here by James Ellroy (Robert Crais and Michael Connelly surely deserve a mention). London probably has about the same number, but the only mentions here are Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Derek Raymond's factory novels.
None of these lists is ever going to satisfy everyone, but this one is not bad at all. LA and London are probably the two towns in the world whose detectives don't need advertising, as you can't move for tripping over them. It's a good approach to draw attention to some of these less-well-known regions. In the words of a friend of mine, books of this quality save one from having to actually visit all of these places.
Obviously there is much to say about the list. To make it short, not only LA was mentioned twice but also the "capital of the world", New York, whose writers, I would assume, don't need advertising either.
Posted by: krimileser | 25 July 2008 at 17:02
I'd like to see one of those distorted maps to illustrate this. The more crime novels - the bigger the country. I would also like it correlated with temperature and hours of day light. I don't know why exactly, I just think it would be interesting.
Posted by: Clare D | 25 July 2008 at 17:31
Clare: I am sure some clever person could do that via a "mash up"....it would be beyond me, though -- but I would admire the result.
Krimileser -- Yes, indeed. I wonder if there are more LA or more New York sleuths? And would London beat them both? I will take a wild guess that LA would win.
Posted by: maxine | 25 July 2008 at 18:12
maxime, my bet would be on New York, at least nowadays.
Concerning Europe, we should perhaps not ignore Paris.
Posted by: krimileser | 25 July 2008 at 18:34
Does make you feel like doing a map of your own doesn't it, just don't know if I have the energy. I'm sure you could do a Google map of sorts.It was a funny journey
Posted by: Kerrie Smith | 26 July 2008 at 00:23
Just letting you know too that I have given you an "award". See http://paradise-mysteries.blogspot.com/2008/07/my-first-award.html which explains all.
Posted by: Kerrie Smith | 26 July 2008 at 00:27
maxime. I found something.
Several maps showing the number of crime fiction settings in cities (between 1749 and 1994, only in English). Only New York and LA have between 1000 and 4000 settings, London 600 and 1000, Paris 500 and 600. As some books that play in Paris have not been translated into English, Paris should at least come close to London (sorry to say, but still true).
Posted by: krimileser | 27 July 2008 at 17:05
Anne Zouroudi - Messenger from Athens - first in a mystery series set in Greece just read and posted about. Very promising.
Posted by: Elaine | 28 July 2008 at 23:09