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Detective Fiction

Detective fiction

Detective fiction is a branch of crime fiction that centres upon the investigation of a crime, usually murder, by a detective, either professional or amateur. It is closely related to mystery fiction but generally contains more of a puzzle element that must be solved, generally by a single protagonist, either male or female. A common feature of detective fiction is an investigator who is unmarried, with some source of income other than a regular job, and who generally has some pleasing eccentricities or striking characteristics. He or she frequently has a less intelligent assistant, or foil, who is asked to make apparently irrelevant inquiries and acts as an audience surrogate for the explanation of the mystery at the end of the story.

Whodunit?

The most widespread subgenre of the detective novel is the whodunit (or whodunnit), where great ingenuity may be exercised in narrating the events of the crime and of the subsequent investigation in such a manner as to conceal the identity of the criminal from the reader until the end of the book, when the method and culprit are revealed. Early archetypes of these stories were the three Auguste Dupin tales by Edgar Allan Poe: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" (1841), "The Mystery of Marie Roget" (1843), and "The Purloined Letter" (1844). Poe's detective stories have been described as ratiocinative tales. In stories such as these, the primary concern of the plot is ascertaining truth, and the usual means of obtaining the truth is through a complex and mysterious process combining intuitive logic, astute observation, and perspicacious inference. As a consequence, the crime itself sometimes becomes secondary to the efforts taken to solve it. "The Mystery of Marie Roget" is particularly interesting, as it is a barely fictionalized analysis of the circumstances of the real-life discovery of the body of a young woman named Mary Cecilia Rogers, in which Poe expounds his theory of what actually happened. The style of the analysis, with its attention to forensic detail, makes it a precursor if not the inspiration of the stories about the most famous of all fictional detectives, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, who in turn set the style for many others in later years, including Holmesian pastiches such as August Derleth's Solar Pons. Another early archetype of the whodunit is found as a sub-plot in the vast novel Bleak House (1853) by Charles Dickens. The conniving lawyer Tulkinghorn is killed in his office late one night, and the crime is investigated by Inspector Bucket of the Metropolitan force. Numerous characters appeared on the staircase leading to Tulkinghorn's office that night, some of them in disguise, and Inspector Bucket must penetrate these mysteries to identify the culprit. Dickens's protégé, Wilkie Collins (1824-1889), is credited with the first great mystery novel, The Woman in White. He is sometimes referred to as the "grandfather of English detective fiction." His novel The Moonstone (1868) was described by T. S. Eliot as "the first and greatest of English detective novels" and by Dorothy L. Sayers as "probably the very finest detective story ever written". Although technically preceded by Charles Felix's The Notting Hill Mystery (1865), The Moonstone can claim to have established the genre with several classic features of the twentieth-century detective story:
- A country house robbery
- An 'inside job'
- A celebrated investigator
- Bungling local constabulary
- Detective enquiries
- False suspects
- The 'least likely suspect'
- A rudimentary 'locked room' murder
- A reconstruction of the crime
- A final twist in the plot Some readers have suggested even earlier prototypes for the whodunit, most notably the Old Testament story of Susanna and the Elders (Daniel 13; in the Protestant Bible this story is found in the apocrypha) and the story of the dog and the horse related in the third chapter of Voltaire's Zadig (1747). However, popularity of this genre has only grown in time and even has made it into the [http://privatedick.blogspot.com online community].

The Private Eye Novel

Although the British private eye Martin Hewitt (by Arthur Morrison) had already appeared by 1894, the genre was adopted wholeheartedly by the likes of Dashiell Hammett, and were considered novels of the proletariat, exploring "mean streets" and the underbelly of corruption within the United States. Several movies have been based on his work, including three versions of The Maltese Falcon and a series of movies based on The Thin Man. Raymond Chandler updated the form with his private detective Philip Marlowe, who brought a more intimate voice to the detective than Hammett's distant-third viewpoint. His cadenced dialog and cryptic narrations were musical, evoking the alleys and tough thugs, rich women and powerful men about whom he wrote. Laced with commentary, his books still hold up. Several feature and television movies have been made about the Phillip Marlowe character. Ross Macdonald, pseudonym of Ken Millar, updated the form again with his detective Lew Archer, while still writing in what is considered the PI's Golden Age, begun by Hammett. Archer, like Hammett's fictional heroes, was a camera eye, with hardly any known past. "Turn Archer sideways, and he disappears," one reviewer wrote. Two of Macdonald's strengths were his use of psychology and his beautiful prose, which was full of imagery. Like other 'hardboiled' writers, Macdonald aimed to give an impression of realism in his work through violence, sex and confrontation; this is illusory, however, and any real private eye undergoing a typical fictional investigation would soon be dead or incapacitated. The movie Harper starring Paul Newman was based on the Lew Archer character. Michael Collins, pseudonym of Dennis Lynds, is generally considered the author who led the form into the Modern Age. His PI, Dan Fortune, was consistently involved in the same sort of David-and-Goliath stories that Hammett, Chandler, and Macdonald wrote, but he took a sociological bent, exploring the meaning of his characters' places in society and the impact society had on people. Full of commentary and clipped prose, his books were more intimate than his predecessors, dramatizing that crime can happen in one's own living room. The PI novel was a male-dominated field in which female authors seldom found publication until Marcia Muller, Sara Paretsky, and Sue Grafton were finally published in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Each author's detective was brainy, physical, and could hold her own. Their acceptance then success caused publishers to seek out other fine female authors. The PI today is rich in variety. The strongest characteristic that binds them is that the detective now has a past and a life, while solving cases. The premier authors' organization of PI writers is the Private Eye Writers of America.

Cosies

English readers between the wars generally preferred a different, but equally implausible, type of detective story in which an outsider - sometimes a salaried investigator or a police officer, but more often a gifted amateur - investigates a murder committed in a closed environment by one of a limited number of suspects. These have become known as 'cosies' to distinguish them from the 'hard-boiled' type preferred in the USA. The most popular writer of cosies, and one of the most popular writers of all time, was Agatha Christie, who produced a long series of books featuring her detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, amongst others, and usually including a complex puzzle for the baffled and misdirected reader to try and unravel. The 'puzzle' approach was carried even further into ingenious and seemingly impossible plots by John Dickson Carr, who also wrote as Carter Dickson, and John Rhode, whose detective Dr. Priestley specialised in elaborate technical devices, while in the US the 'cosy' was adopted and extended by Rex Stout and Erle Stanley Gardner. The popularity of cosies has declined in the last four decades, perhaps partly due to attacks on their 'unrealistic' approach; although given that their primary goal is to present a puzzle, one might as well attack a crossword or a chess problem for its unrealism. This subgenre is also known by many critics as the "Golden Age" of detective fiction. This does not mean that the writing in this subgenre is considered to be the best but it was used to describe the way in which writers in this era approached the writing of detective fiction. The most typical characteristic of this subgenre is the strict adherence to conventions of detective fiction. The "Golden Age" also displayed many elements typical of escapist writing and this was attributed to its popularity at the time as many wished to escape the depressing state brought about by World War..

Police procedural

Many detective stories have police officers as the main characters. Of course these stories may take many forms, but many authors try to go for a realistic depiction of a police officer's routine. A good deal are whodunits; in others the criminal is well known, and it is a case of getting enough evidence. Some typical features of these are:
- The detective is rarely the first on the crime scene - it will be milling with uniform, paramedics and possibly members of the public.
- Forensic reports - and the wait for them.
- Rules and regulations to follow - or not.
- Suspects arrested and kept in custody - sometimes wrongly.
- Pressure from senior officers to show progress.
- A large investigating team - two, three or four main characters, plus other officers to order about.
- Pubs - places to discuss or think about the case - especially in the Inspector Morse mysteries.
- Informants - to lean on.
- Political pressure when the suspects are prominent figures
- Internal hostility from comrades when the suspects are fellow police officers
- Pressure from the media (tv, newspapers) to come up with an answer
- Interesting and unusual cars driven by the principal detective

Other subgenres

There is also a subgenre of historical detectives. See historical whodunnit for an overview.

Suspense - the core tenet of detective fiction

A beginner to detective fiction would generally be advised against reading anything about a piece of detective fiction (such as a blurb or an introduction) before reading the text itself. Even if they do not mean to, advertisers, reviewers, scholars and aficionados usually have a habit of giving away details or parts of the plot, and sometimes -- for example in the case of Mickey Spillane's novel I, the Jury -- even the solution. (After the credits of Billy Wilder's film Witness for the Prosecution, the cinemagoers are asked not to talk to anyone about the plot so that future viewers will also be able to fully enjoy the unravelling of the mystery.)

The unresolved problem of plausibility and coincidence

Up to the present, some of the problems inherent in crime fiction have remained unsolved (and possibly also insoluble). Some of them can be dismissed with a shrug: Why bother at all, even if it is obvious to everyone that an ordinary person is not likely to keep stumbling across corpses? After all, this is just part of the game of crime fiction. Still the fact that an old spinster like Miss Marple meets with an estimated two bodies per year does raise a few doubts as to the plausibility of the Miss Marple mysteries. De Andrea has described the quiet little village of St. Mary Mead as having "put on a pageant of human depravity rivaled only by that of Sodom and Gomorrah". Similarly, TV heroine Jessica Fletcher is confronted with bodies wherever she goes, but over the years people who have met violent deaths have also piled up in the streets of Cabot Cove, Maine, the cosy little village where she lives. Generally, therefore, it is much more convincing if a policeman, private eye, forensic expert or similar professional is made the hero or heroine of a series of crime novels. On the other hand, who cares for authenticity? Also, the role and legitimacy of coincidence has frequently been the topic of heated arguments ever since Knox categorically stated that "no accident must ever help the detective" (Commandment No.6). Technological progress has also rendered many of plots implausible and antiquated. For example, the use of mobile phones by practically everyone these days has significantly altered the dangerous situations that investigators traditionally find themselves in. Some authors have not succeeded in adapting to the changes brought about by modern technology; others, among them Carl Hiaasen (born 1953), have.

Famous fictional detectives

The full list of fictional detectives would be immense. The format is well suited to dramatic presentation, and so there are also many television and film detectives, besides those appearing in adaptations of novels in this genre. Fictional detectives generally fall within one of four domains:
- the amateur or dilettante detective (Marple, Jessica Fletcher);
- the private investigator (Holmes, Marlowe, Spade, Rockford);
- the police detective (Ironside, Kojak, Morse);
- more recently, the medical examiner, criminal psychologist, forensic evidence expert or other specialists (Scarpetta, Quincy, Cracker, CSI). Notable fictional detectives and their creators include:

Medical examiners, etc.

- Dr Thorndyke — R Austin Freeman
- Dr Priestley — John Rhode
- Reggie Fortune — H. C. Bailey
- Craig Kennedy — Arthur B. Reeve
- Dr Basil Willing — Helen McCloy
- Dr. Temperance Brennan — Kathy Reichs
- Dr. Eddie "Fitz" Fitzgerald (a criminal psychologist) — Jimmy McGovern: Cracker (TV)
- Gil Grissom, Ph.D. et al. — Anthony Zuiker: C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation
- Horatio "H." Caine et al. — Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn & Anthony Zuiker: CSI: Miami (TV)
- Det. Mac Taylor et al. — Andrew Lipsitz & Janet Tamaro:CSI: NY (TV)
- Dr. Jane Halifax (a forensic psychologist) — Halifax f.p. (TV)
- Daphne Matthews, forensic psychologist — Ridley Pearson
- Dr. R. Quincy, M.E. — Glen A. Larson & Lou Shaw: Quincy, M.E. (TV)
- Dr. Kay Scarpetta — Patricia Cornwell
- Dr. John H. Watson — Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Dr. Joseph Bell

Others

- Anthony Blake (Anthony Dorian in pilot episode) (magician) — Larry Brody: The Magician (TV)
- Jonathan Creek (designer of illusions for a magician) — David Renwick: Jonathan Creek (TV)
- Insp. J. Auguste Dupin, from short stories by Edgar Allan Poe. One of the earliest fictional detectives.
- Perry Mason (lawyer) — Erle Stanley Gardner
- Ben Matlock (lawyer) — Dean Hargrove: Matlock (TV)
- Tony Petrocelli (lawyer) — Harold Buchman & Sidney J. Furie: Petrocelli (TV)
- Tarot (magician) — Trevor Preston: Ace of Wands (TV)
- Arsène Lupin (gentleman-thief) Maurice Leblanc
- Batman (vigilante/superhero) — Bob Kane and Bill Finger, first appearance in 1939 comic book Detective Comics #27 (Comics, TV, Movies)
- Robert Langdon (Professor of Religious Symbology) — Dan Brown
- Takeshi Kovacs (Ultraviolent soldier turned investigator) — Richard Morgan

And for younger readers

- Encyclopedia Brown — Donald J. Sobol
- Nancy Drew — Carolyn Keene and others
- The Famous Five — Enid Blyton
- The Hardy Boys — Franklin W. Dixon and others
- The Secret Seven — Enid Blyton
- The Three Investigators — Robert Arthur and others

Historical

:In chronological order.
- Gordianus the Finder (Roman Republic of the 1st century BCE) — Steven Saylor: Roma sub Rosa series
- Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger (Roman Republic of the 1st century BCE) — John Maddox Roberts: SPQR series
- Marcus Didius Falco (the Roman Empire of the 1st century CE) — Lindsey Davis
- Judge Dee (7th-century China) — Robert van Gulik
- Sister Fidelma (7th-century Ireland) — Peter Tremayne
- Li Kao (7th-century China) — Barry Hughart
- Brother Cadfael (12th-century England and Wales) — Ellis Peters
- Brother William of Baskerville (1327) — Umberto Eco: The Name of the Rose
- Brother Athelstan (late 14th century London) — P. C. Doherty (as Paul Harding)

In science fiction and fantasy

- Basil Argyros — Harry Turtledove (Byzantine Empire)
- Marty Burns — Jay Russell (writer)
- Elijah Baley and R. Daneel Olivaw — Isaac Asimov
- Lord Darcy — Randall Garrett
- Hawk and Fisher — Simon Green
- Dirk Gently — Douglas Adams
- Gil "the ARM" Hamilton (of the Amalgated Regional Militia [UN police] in the early known space history — Larry Niven
- Jonas, der letzte Detektiv — well done funny & hardboiled radio play in Germany
- Kline Maxwell — S. Andrew Swann (a journalist in Dragons of the Cuyahoga)
- Tex Murphy — Aaron Conners
- Nohar Rajasthan — S. Andrew Swann
- Sam Space — William Nolan
- Wendell Urth — Isaac Asimov
- His Grace Commander Sir Samuel Vimes — Terry Pratchett's Discworld series

Other notable authors

- Leigh Brackett
- Alan Gordon
- Jack Vance

Detective debuts and swansongs

Many detectives appear in more than one novel or story. Here is a list of a few debut and swansong stories:

Books

- Bloody Murder: From the Detective Story to the Crime Novel - A History by Julian Symons ISBN 0571094651
See also

- List of detective fiction authors
- Crime fiction
- Mystery fiction
- List of crime writers
- Whodunit
External resources

- [http://www.classiccrimefiction.com/ Classic Crime Fiction Website]
- [http://members.aol.com/rrandisi/myhomepage/writing.html Private Eye Writers of America website]
- [http://book.awardannals.com/genre/mystery/ Most Honored Mystery Books] Category:Fiction
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Crime fiction
; together these characters popularized the genre.]] Crime fiction is the genre of fiction that deals with crimes, their detection, criminals, and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred. It has several sub-genres, including detective fiction (including the whodunnit), legal thriller, courtroom drama, and hard-boiled fiction.
History of crime fiction
hard-boiled genre.]] Main article: History of crime fiction Crime fiction began to be considered as a serious genre only around 1900. The earliest inspiration for books and novels from this genre came from earlier dark works of Edgar Allan Poe (eg. "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" (1841), "The Mystery of Marie Roget" (1842) and "The Purloined Letter" (1844)). The evolution of locked room mysteries was one of the landmarks in the history of crime fiction. The Sherlock Holmes mysteries, probably based upon Auguste Dupin, are said to have been singularly responsible for the huge popularity in this genre. The evolution of the print mass media in Britain and America in the latter half of the 19th century was crucial in popularising crime fiction and related genres. Literary 'variety' magazines like Strand, McClure's, and Harper's quickly became central to the overall structure and function of popular fiction in society, providing a mass-produced medium that offered cheap, illustrated publications that were essentially disposable. Like the works of many other important fiction writers of his day — Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens — Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories first appeared in serial form in the monthly Strand magazine in Britain. The series quickly attracted a wide and passionate following on both sides of the Atlantic, and when Doyle killed off Holmes in The Final Problem, the public outcry was so great and the publishing offers for more stories so attractive that he was reluctantly forced to resurrect him. Later a set of stereotypic formulae began to appear to cater to various tastes.
Categories of crime fiction
Crime fiction can be divided into the following branches:
- Detective fiction
- The whodunnit
- Locked room mystery
- The Golden Age whodunnit
- Later and contemporary contributions to the whodunnit
- The historical whodunnit
- Spoofs and parodies
- The American hard-boiled school
- The police procedural
- The legal thriller
- The caper story
- The spy novel
- The psychological suspense novel
- The criminal novel (Novels told from the point of view of criminals such as The Godfather)
Crime fiction and mainstream fiction
When trying to pigeon-hole fiction, it is extraordinarily difficult to tell where crime fiction starts and where it ends. This is largely attributed to the fact that love, danger and death are central motifs in fiction. A less obvious reason is that the classification of a work may very well be related to the author's reputation. For example, William Somerset Maugham's (1874–1966) novella Up at the Villa (1941) could very well be classified as crime fiction. This short novel revolves around a woman having a one-night stand with a total stranger who suddenly and unexpectedly commits suicide in her bedroom, and the woman's attempts at disposing of the body so as not to cause a scandal about herself or be suspected of killing the man. As Maugham is not usually rated as a writer of crime novels, Up at the Villa is hardly ever considered to be a crime novel and accordingly can be found in bookshops among his other, "mainstream" novels. A more recent example is Bret Easton Ellis's (born 1964) seminal novel American Psycho (1991) about the double life of Patrick Bateman, a Wall Street yuppie and serial killer in the New York of the 1980s. Even though in American Psycho the most heinous crimes are depicted in minute detail, the novel has never been labelled a "crime novel", maybe due to the fact that the police are conspicuously absent and Bateman is never tracked down and brought to justice. On the other hand, U.S. author James M. Cain is normally seen as a writer belonging to the "hard-boiled" school of crime fiction. However, his novel Mildred Pierce (1941) is really about the rise to success of an ordinary housewife developing her entrepreneurial skills and — legally — outsmarting her business rivals, and the domestic trouble caused by her success, with, in turn, her husband, her daughter and her lover turning against her. Although no crime is committed anywhere in the book, the novel was reprinted in 1989 by Random House, alongside Cain's thriller The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934), under the heading "Vintage Crime". When film director Michael Curtiz adapted Mildred Pierce for the big screen in 1945, he lived up to the cinemagoers' and the producers' expectations by adding a murder which is absent from the novel. As potential cinemagoers had been associating Cain with hard-boiled crime fiction only, this trick — exploited in advertisements and trailers —, in combination with the casting of then Hollywood star Joan Crawford in the title role, made sure that the film was going to be a box office hit even before it was released. Seen from a practical point of view, one could argue that a crime novel is simply a novel that can be found in a bookshop on the shelf or shelves labelled "Crime". (This suggestion has actually been made about science fiction, but it can be applied here as well.) Penguin Books have had a long-standing tradition of publishing crime novels in cheap paperbacks with green covers and spines (as opposed to the orange spines of mainstream literature), thus attracting the eyes of potential buyers already when they enter the shop. But again, this clever marketing strategy does not tell the casual browser what they are really in for when they buy a particular book.
"High art" versus "popular art"

The discrepancy between taste and acclaim
Up to the 1960s or so, reading the paperback edition of a crime novel was usually considered a cheap thrill — with the word "cheap" used in both meanings: "inexpensive" and "of minor quality". The educated and civilized world was often interested, or at least pretended to be, in the "high art" categorised by classical music, paintings by renowned artists, in famous classical plays and novels like those of William Shakespeare. The term "popular art" referred to folk music, jazz, or rock 'n' roll, photography, the design of everyday objects, comics, science fiction, detective stories or erotic fiction (the latter circulating in private prints only to beat the censor) to quote a few examples. The idea of a "main stream" of literary output suggested that any book deviating, in either content or form or both, from the established norm of "high art" was "cheap", and anyone interested in that kind of stuff weird and/or uneducated. The universities and the other institutions of higher learning also looked down on artists producing "popular art" and categorically refused to critically assess it. This often did not correlate with the immense popularity of popular art on both sides of the Atlantic, sometimes due to sensationalism. For example, the British had been fascinated by Edgar Wallace's (1875–1932) crime novels ever since the author set up a competition offering a reward to any reader who could figure out and describe just how the murder in his first book, The Four Just Men (1906), was committed.
A re-assessment of critical ideals
In the long run, the vast output of popular fiction could not be ignored any longer, and literary critics — gradually, carefully and tentatively — started questioning the whole idea of a gap between "high art" (or "serious literature") on the one hand and "popular art" (in America often referred to as "pulp fiction", often verging on "smut and filth") on the other. One of the first scholars to do so was American critic Leslie Fiedler. In his book Cross the Border — Close the Gap (1972), he advocates a thorough reassessment of science fiction, the western, pornographic literature and all the other subgenres that so far had not been considered as "high art", and their inclusion in the literary canon: :The notion of one art for the 'cultural,' i.e., the favored few in any given society and of another subart for the 'uncultured,' i.e., an excluded majority as deficient in Gutenberg skills as they are untutored in 'taste,' in fact represents the last survival in mass industrial societies (capitalist, socialist, communist — it makes no difference in this regard) of an invidious distinction proper only to a class-structured community. Precisely because it carries on, as it has carried on ever since the middle of the eighteenth century, a war against that anachronistic survival, Pop Art is, whatever its overt politics, subversive: a threat to all hierarchies insofar as it is hostile to order and ordering in its own realm. What the final intrusion of Pop into the citadels of High Art provides, therefore, for the critic is the exhilarating new possibility of making judgments about the 'goodness' and 'badness' of art quite separated from distinctions between 'high' and 'low' with their concealed class bias. In other words, it was now up to the literary critics to devise criteria with which they would then be able to assess any new literature along the lines of "good or "bad" rather than "high" versus "low". Accordingly,
- A conventionally written and dull novel about, say, a "fallen woman" could be ranked lower than a terrifying vision of the future full of action and suspense.
- A story about industrial relations in early 20th century-Britain — a novel about shocking working conditions, trade unionists, strikers and scabs — need not be more acceptable subject-matter per se than a well-crafted and fast-paced thriller about modern life. But, according to Fiedler, it was also up to the critics to reassess already existing literature. In the case of U.S. crime fiction, writers that so far had been regarded as the authors of nothing but "pulp fiction" — Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, James M. Cain, and others — were gradually seen in a new light. Today, Chandler's creation, private eye Philip Marlowe — who appears, for example, in his novels The Big Sleep (1939) and Farewell, My Lovely (1940) — has achieved cult status and has also been made the topic of literary seminars at universities round the world, whereas on first publication Chandler's novels were seen as little more than cheap entertainment for the uneducated masses. Nonetheless, "murder stories" such as Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment or Shakespeare's Macbeth are not dependent on their honorary membership in this genre for their acclaim.
Pseudonymous authors
As far as the history of crime fiction is concerned, it is an astonishing fact that many authors have been reluctant to this very day to publish their crime novels under their real names — as if they were ashamed of doing something "improper". In the late 1930s and 40s, British County Court judge Arthur Alexander Gordon Clark (1900–1958) published a number of detective novels under the nom de plume Cyril Hare in which he made use of his profound knowledge of the English legal system, for instance in Tragedy at Law (1942). When he was still young and unknown, award-winning British novelist Julian Barnes (born 1946) published some crime novels under the assumed name of Dan Kavanagh. Other authors take delight in cherishing their alter egos: Ruth Rendell (born 1930) writes one sort of crime novels as Ruth Rendell and another type as Barbara Vine; John Dickson Carr also used the pseudonym Carter Dickson.
Contemporary critical views
At the beginning of the new millennium the output of crime novels in both the United Kingdom and the United States is enormous. As far as many authors writing today are concerned, crime fiction is still seen as a distinct literary subgenre, but it is no longer regarded as automatically inferior to "mainstream" fiction. However, there is a certain amount of overlap. Many novels cannot be accurately categorized, a fact which is gradually being recognized. For example, Patrick Redmond's (born 1966) first novel The Wishing Game (1999) certainly deals with both capital and petty crime, and has been advertised as "a powerful psychological thriller of haunting suspense", but it could just as well be subsumed under mainstream literature. Similarly, Helen Zahavi's novel Dirty Weekend (1991) about a frustrated woman on a three-day killing spree can either be seen as a fresh voice in radical feminism or as a thriller, or as both.
Film and literature: The case of crime fiction
feminism (2001). Here, David Suchet (foreground) plays Poirot in the film.]] Crime fiction and the motion picture industry have complemented each other well over the years. Both cater to the need of the average audience to escape into an idealist world, where the good reaps the rewards, and the bad incur their punishment. Adaptations of crime fiction into films have been hugely successful. For a detailed explication of the history of the relationship between crime fiction and the film industry, see the main article crime film.

Availability of crime novels

Quality and availability

As with any other entity, quality of a crime fiction book is not in any meaningful proportion to its availability. Some of the crime novels generally regarded as the finest, including those which are regularly chosen by experts as belonging to the best 100 crime novels ever written (see bibliography), have been out of print ever since their first publication, which often dates back to the 1920s or 30s. The bulk of books that can be found today on the shelves labelled "Crime" consists of recent first publications usually no older than a few years — books which may or may not some day become "classics"; books which will either be remembered (and reprinted) for a long time to come or forgotten (and not available) tomorrow.

Classic bestsellers

In other words, the books which are most readily available are those published over the last few years, whether they are selling well or not. In addition, a handful of authors have achieved the status of "classics", which means that all or at least most of their novels can be had anywhere anytime. A case in point is Agatha Christie, whose mysteries, originally published between 1920 and her death in 1976, are available in both British and U.S. editions practically wherever you go. But also lesser known authors who are still producing books have seen reprints of their earlier works. One example is Val McDermid, whose first book appeared as far back as 1987; another is Florida-based author Carl Hiaasen, who has been publishing books since 1981, all of which are readily available.

Forgotten classics

On the other hand, English crime writer Edgar Wallace, who was immensely popular with the English readership during the early decades of the 20th century (and who achieved fame in German-speaking countries due to the many B movies made in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s which were based on his novels), had almost been forgotten in his home country until [http://houseofstratus.com House of Stratus] eventually started republishing many of his 170 books around the turn of the millennium. Similarly, the books by the equally successful American author Erle Stanley Gardner (1889–1970), creator of the lawyer Perry Mason, which have frequently been adapted for film, radio, and TV, were only recently republished in the United Kingdom — books such as The Case of the Stuttering Bishop (1937), The Case of the Green-Eyed Sister (1953), etc. Even television adaptations are not enough to save some authors. Gladys Mitchell rivalled Agatha Christie for UK sales in the 1930s and 1940s but only one of her 66 novels remains in print despite a BBC television series of the Mrs. Bradley Mysteries in 1999.

Revival of past classics

From time to time publishing houses decide, seemingly at random, to revive long-forgotten authors and reissue one or two of their better-known novels. Apart from Penguin Books, who for this purpose have resorted to their old green cover and dug out some of their vintage authors, Pan started a series in 1999 entitled "Pan Classic Crime", which includes a handful of novels by Eric Ambler, but also American Hillary Waugh's Last Seen Wearing .... In 2000, Edinburgh-based [http://www.canongate.net Canongate Books] started a series called "Canongate Crime Classics", in which they published John Franklin Bardin's The Deadly Percheron (1946) — both a whodunnit and a roman noir about amnesia and insanity — and other novels. For some strange reason, however, books brought out by smaller publishers like Canongate Books are usually not stocked by the larger bookshops and overseas booksellers. Sometimes older crime novels are revived by screenwriters and directors rather than publishing houses. In many such cases, publishers then follow suit and release a so-called "film tie-in" edition showing a still from the movie on the front cover and the film credits on the back cover of the book — yet another marketing strategy aimed at those cinemagoers who may want to do both: first read the book and then watch the film (or vice versa). Recent examples include Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley (originally published in 1955), Ira Levin's Sliver (1991), with the cover photograph depicting a steamy sex scene between Sharon Stone and William Baldwin straight from the 1993 movie, and, again, Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho (1991). [http://www.bloomsbury.com Bloomsbury Books] on the other hand have launched what they call "Bloomsbury Film Classics" — a series of original novels on which feature films were based. This series includes, for example, Ethel Lina White's novel The Wheel Spins (1936), which Alfred Hitchcock — before he went to Hollywood — turned into a much-loved movie entitled The Lady Vanishes (1938), and Ira Levin's (born 1929) science fiction thriller The Boys from Brazil (1976), which was filmed in 1978. Older novels can often be retrieved from the ever-growing Project Gutenberg database.

External links

- [http://www.classiccrimefiction.com/ Classic Crime Fiction Website ] Category:Fiction
- [http://book.awardannals.com/genre/mystery/ Most Honored Mystery Books]
- [http://www.macavitys.co.uk/ Macavity's - Crime Fiction, True Crime and Crime Reference] ja:%E6%8E%A8%E7%90%86%E5%B0%8F%E8%AA%AC

Murder

:For other uses of the word "murder," see Murder (disambiguation). In the criminal law, murder is the crime where one human being causes the death of another human being, without lawful excuse, and with intent to kill or with an intent to cause grievous bodily harm (traditionally termed "malice aforethought"). In some common law jurisdictions, an accused is not guilty of murder if the victim lives for longer than a year and a day after the attack. This reflects the likelihood that, if the victim has survived so long after the initial attack, there will be other factors contributing to the cause of death and so break the chain of causation). Subject to the local statute of limitation, the accused can still be charged with an offense representing the seriousness of the initial assault. But, with the advance of modern medicine, the majority of countries have abandoned a fixed time period and test causation on the facts. In most countries murder is considered the most serious crime, and invokes the highest punishment available under the law. As with most legal terms, the precise definition varies between jurisdictions.

Murder and other illegal killings

Some instances of premeditated, intentional killing may be treated as justifiable homicide which excludes liability for murder and, in some countries, all criminal liability for the death. This may include:
- killing a non-surrendered enemy combatant in time of war;
- executing a person in accordance with a legally imposed sentence of death; or
- in a more limited number of countries, killing a person who represents an immediate threat to the lives of others, i.e. in self-defense. In most countries, if one person intentionally kills another, the killer might be charged with murder, or with some lesser offense depending upon the circumstances:
- In the United States, an intentional killing with provocation may sometimes charged as voluntary manslaughter rather than murder.
- Unintentionally causing a death due to recklessness or criminal negligence is treated in most countries as the lesser crime of manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide.
- In some jurisdictions, killings under extreme provocation or duress may be a legal exculpation (see excuse and crime of passion).

Mitigating circumstances

Most countries allow conditions that "affect the balance of the mind" to be regarded as mitigating circumstances. This means that a person may be found guilty of "manslaughter" on the basis of "diminished responsibility" rather than murder, if it can be proved that the killer was suffering from a condition that affected their judgment at the time. Depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and medication side-effects are examples of conditions that may be taken into account when assessing responsibility. The defenses of insanity or mental disorder may apply to a wide range of disorders including psychosis caused by schizophrenia, and excuse the person from the need to undergo the stress of a trial as to liability. In some jurisdictions, following the pre-trial hearing to determine the extent of the disorder, the verdict "not guilty by reason of insanity" may be used. Some countries, such as Canada, Italy, the United Kingdom and Australia, allow post-partum depression, or 'baby-blues', as a defense against murder of a child by a mother, provided that a child is less than a year old (this may be the specific offense of infanticide rather than murder and include the effects of lactation and other aspects of post-natal care). Those who successfully argue a defense based on a mental disorder are usually referred to mandatory clinical treatment until they are certified safe to be released back into the community, rather than prison.

Country-specific murder law

United Kingdom

About 850 murders per year (reported in 2000) are committed in the United Kingdom. This is low compared to the United States with 12,000. These are only raw numbers which do not take varying populations into account: a better perspective can be gained by comparing murders per year per hundred thousand population (1 in the UK, 4 in the USA, and 63 in Colombia - [http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_mur_cap source]). In English law, murder is divided between several offences, including:
- Murder - the killing of another person having either the intention to kill (with "malice aforethought") or to cause grievous bodily harm.
- Infanticide - the intentional killing of an infant under 1-year-old by a mother suffering from post-natal depression or other post-natal disturbance.
- Causing death by dangerous driving (of a motor vehicle) was introduced because jurors, many of whom were drivers, thought the charge of manslaughter to carry too great a level of stigma for the degree of fault actually shown by some drivers and refused to convict when the charge was manslaughter. Now "motor manslaughter is considered an acceptable charge for the more seriously dangerous examples of driving resulting in death. English Law also allows for transferred intent. For example, in the circumstances where a man fires a gun with the intent to kill person A, or at least maim them but the shot misses and kills an otherwise unconnected person B then the intent to kill transfers from person A to person B and a charge of murder would stand. The accused could also be charged with the attempt to murder A. As to mens rea, following R v. Woollin http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/ld199798/ldjudgmt/jd980722/wool.htm, the model direction to be given to juries is a modified version of that proposed by Lord Lane, C.J. in R v Nedrick [1986] 1 W.L.R. 1025, namely: :Where the charge is murder and in the rare cases where the simple direction is not enough, the jury should be directed that they are not entitled to infer the necessary intention, unless they feel sure that death or serious bodily harm was a virtual certainty (barring some unforeseen intervention) as a result of the defendant's actions and that the defendant appreciated that such was the case, the decision being for the jury to to decide on a consideration of all the evidence. Most common law jurisdictions, including the British Commonwealth countries, do not allow the defense of necessity and limit duress. Comparatively recent adaptations to the English law of murder include the abolition of the "year and a day rule", and the proposed introduction of an less restrictive regime for corporate manslaughter.
- See also Scottish Criminal Law for differences with English Law.
Canada
Canada has about 550 murders per year, a number that is fluctuating. This is equivalent to numbers in most of the western world, except the U.S. which has triple the number per capita. The main methods of murder in Canada are shootings (30%), stabbings (30%), and beatings (22%). Canada has four types of crime that can be considered murder:
- first degree murder - the intentional killing of another person with premeditation, in the furtherance of another serious criminal offense (kidnapping, robbery, etc.), or the killing of a peace officer
- second degree murder - the intentional killing of another person without premeditation (ie killing in the heat of the moment)
- manslaughter - the killing of another person where there is no intent to kill
- infanticide - the killing of an infant by a mother while still recovering from the birth, and the mother's mind is "disturbed" (there are exceptions to the above - certain types of murder are always first degree murder, such as the killing of a peace officer, and certain types of killings are murder regardless of intent, such as a death resulting from sexual assault) The maximum penalties for murder are:
- first degree murder - mandatory life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for 25 years (can be paroled under the "faint hope clause" after 15 years imprisonment, but such a reduction is rarely given and is not available for multiple murders)
- second degree murder - mandatory life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for 10-25 years (parole eligibility determined by the judge at sentencing) (exception: if the person had committed another murder in their past, parole eligibility is 25 years)
- manslaughter - maximum life imprisonment; if firearm was used to commit the offence, the minimum penalty is 4 years' imprisonment
- infanticide - maximum 5 years imprisonment
- There is a clause where persons convicted of multiple murder, and deemed unable for rehabilitation, to be declared a 'dangerous offender' upon examination of doctors and psychiatrists (usually for sexually related murder). Persons declared as dangerous offenders have an undetermined prison sentence, although it usually means an increase of 10 years (possibly to 35 or more years). For every murder in Canada there are about 1.5 attempted murders. Attempted murder carries the same consequences as murder itself; it is the intent, not the result, that determines the sentence. About one in three Canadian murders are committed by a family member. One in eight is gang related. About 80% of murderers in Canada are caught within a year. (All statistics are from the 2001 census)
The United States
In the United States, murder, or "homicide", is normally a crime only under state law, and a murder suspect will be arrested and held by local officials and tried in a local court on behalf of the state. For murders that are federal crimes (e.g. a killing of a federal official or on federal property), the trial would occur in a federal court. Approximately 16,000 cases of murder or nonnegligent homicide occur each year in the US according to official FBI crime statistics; among solved cases, almost half of murders are committed by a narrow social group of black males age 17 to 50 (constituting less than 3% of general US population) [http://www.fbi.gov/filelink.html?file=/ucr/cius_03/xl/03tbl2-5.xls]. Traditionally, and still in some states, the following terminology is used: ;First-degree murder (or murder in the first degree, or colloquially, murder one) refers to :a murder that is premeditated (or planned beforehand), or murder which occurs after some degree of reflection by the murderer. This reflection can be years or less than a second. First degree murder is done with malice (i.e., with intent to kill). ;Voluntary Manslaughter, :refers to homicide done in the heat of the moment by an actor demonstrating legally adequate provocation, mitigating the crime from murder. ;Involuntary Manslaughter, :occurs without the specific intent to kill, but usually after an act of criminal negligence or some other act resulting in a person's death. This would in some cases include a death caused by drunk driving or someone dying as the result of an assault in which case the perpetrator didn't have the intent to kill or inflict serious bodily injury. In some other states, the definitions have been adjusted to reflect factors like a perceived need for greater deterrence, rather than the usual distinctions listed previously. For instance, the murder of a police officer, or a murder committed while serving a life sentence, is in some states a first-degree murder regardless of other circumstances.
Felony murder statutes
Many jurisdictions in the United States have also adopted felony murder statutes, according to which anyone who commits a serious crime (specifically, a felony), during which a person dies, is guilty of committing murder. This applies even if one does not personally cause the person's death. For example, a driver for an armed robbery can be convicted of murder if one of the robbers killed someone in the process of the robbery, even though the driver was not present and did not expect the killing to occur. In a few cases, some robbers have been found guilty of felony murder for the deaths of their accomplices.
Capital murder
Capital murder is murder which is punishable by death. In 38 states and the federal government itself, there are laws allowing capital punishment for this crime. Depending on the state, a murder may qualify as "capital murder" if (a) the person murdered was of a special class, such as a police officer; (b) "special circumstances" occurred in the crime, such as multiple murder, the use of poison, or "lying in wait" in order to murder the victim. Capital murder is quite rare in the United States compared to other murder convictions, but it has generated tremendous public debate. See also capital punishment and capital punishment in the United States.
Cultural references
In California, 187 is a well-known slang term for murder, and it often appears in music made in that state. The number refers to section 187 of the California Penal Code which covers murder.
Germany
In Germany the term Mord (murder) is officially used for the premeditated killing of another person: # for pleasure, satisfaction of the sex drive, greed or other "low motives", # insidiously (an unsuspecting victim) or cruelly, by means dangerous to the public (for example with a bomb), # to cover up or facilitate another criminal offense. A killing which is not a murder may be either Totschlag (manslaughter) or fahrlässige Tötung (negligent homicide). Also, if the death is not a foreseeable consequence of an intended or not intended act of violence, it might be classified as Körperverletzung mit Todesfolge (injury resulting in death). The penalty for Mord is lifelong imprisonment, the penalty for Totschlag is five to fifteen years imprisonment.
The Netherlands
By Dutch law, murder (moord) is punishable by a prison sentence of up to twenty years, which is the longest prison sentence the law allows. Under special circumstances, such as multiple murders or prior convictions, a life sentence may be imposed. In addition to a prison sentence, the judge may sentence the suspect to TBS, or "terbeschikkingstelling", meaning detention in a psychiatric institution. TBS is imposed for a number of years (most often in relation to the severity of the crime) and thereafter prolonged if deemed necessary by a committee of psychiatrists. This can be done indefinitely, and has therefore been criticised as being a life sentence in disguise. In 2003, 202 murders were committed in the Netherlands.
Finland
Finnish law calls the crime of causing the death of another human being "manslaughter" (tappo). The minimum sentence is eight years of imprisonment. Attempt is punishable. The crime of murder (murha) is defined as a manslaughter:
- with a firm intent (i.e. it is planned), or
- done in an especially brutal or cruel way, or
- while endangering public safety severely, or
- of a government official keeping the law and order. The only sentence for murder is life in prison. However, the president can and usually will give a pardon (when requested) some time after 12-15 years. Involuntary confinement to a psychiatric institution may also result. It ends when the psychiatrist decides so, or when a court decrees it no longer necessary in a periodical review. There is also the crime of "death" (surma), which is a "manslaughter" under mitigating circumstances, with the punishment of four to ten years. Involuntary manslaughter (kuolemantuottamus) has a maximum punishment of two years of imprisonment or fine (see day fine).
Israel
Israel had 174 murders in 2004 (up from 135 in 1996 and down from 234 in 2001). There are five types of homicide in Israel: # Murder. The premeditated killing of a person or the intentional killing of a person whilst committing, preparing for, or escaping from any crime is murder. The mandatory punishment for this crime is life imprisonment. Life is usually commuted (clemency from the President) to 30 years from which a third can be deducted by the parole board for good behaviour. Terrorists are not usually granted pardons or parole other than as part of deals with terrorist organizations or foreign governments and in exchange for captured Israelis (or their bodies). # Reduced sentence murder. Where the murderer did not fully understand his actions because of mental defect (but not legal insanity or imbecility), or in circumstances close to self-defence, necessity or duress or where the murderer suffered from serious mental distress because of long-term abuse, the court can give a sentence of less than life. # Manslaughter. The deliberate killing of a person without premeditation (or the other circumstances of murder) is manslaughter for which the maximum sentence is 20 years. # Negligent killing or vehicular killing. Maximum sentence is 3 years (minimum of 6 months for the driver). # Infanticide where a woman killed her baby of less than 12 months and could show she was suffering from the effects of the birth or breast-feeding. Maximum sentence is 5 years.
Vikings (8th to 11th centuries)
The Viking culture had no concept of murder. If you killed someone, then it was up to you to pay the family fair compensation (weregild) for the labor lost by the member's death. If the perpetrator refused to pay weregild, it was up to the family of the slain to extract it from the perpetrator, or take his life. The only other type of killing with consequences in Viking culture was "unjust killing', i.e., while the victim was sleeping, or if the victim's back was turned. While there were no more financial repercussions for this other than the normal rules of weregild, the killer in question suffered from a tremendous loss of trust.
Other uses of the word
The word "murder" is sometimes used colloquially to mean some forms of mistreatment, e.g. a bad singer "murdering" a song, or describing something difficult to handle as "absolute murder". Sometimes during sports play an opponent may tell his rival "I'm gonna murder you!", "I'm gonna kill you!", "I'm murdering you!" or "I'm killing you!". A murder is also the name given to a flock of crows (see also Collective nouns for birds).
Murder demographics
Murder occurrences vary wildly among different countries and societies. In the Western world, murder rates in most countries have declined significantly during 20th century and are now between 1-3 cases per 100,000 people per year. Murder rates of Japan and Iceland are among the lowest in the world, around 0.5; rate of United States is highest among all developed countries, at 5.5 (2000). On the other hand, developing countries often have rates of 10-100 murders per 100,000 people per year. Evolution of murder rates over time in different countries is often used by both supporters and opposers of capital punishment and gun control. Using properly filtered data, is possible to make the case for or against either of these issues. For example, one could look at murder rates in United States during 1950-2000 [http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm] and notice that those rates went up sharply shortly after a moratorium on death sentences was effectively imposed in late 1960's. This fact could be used to argue that capital punishment serves as a deterrent and, as such, it is morally justified. Capital punishment opposers would counter that United States have much higher murder rates than Canada and European Union countries, although all those countries have abolished death penalty. Gun control advocates could further point out that, unlike United States, many European countries disallow gun ownership by private citizens, etc. Overall, the global pattern is too complex and, on average, the influence of both these factors is probably insignificant. It is also often claimed that murder rates are correlated with overall wealth of the population ( i.e. that murders happen more often in societies where larger percentage of people lives below the poverty level ). This claim is not supported by evidence. On the other hand, many researchers have observed significant correlation between murder rates and wealth distribution inequality, as measured by Gini coefficient. In the Western World, nearly 90% of all murders are committed by males; yet, according the the US Department of Justice, males are also the victims of 74.6% of murders. There is a sharp peak in the age distribution of murderers between the ages of 17 and 30. People become increasingly uncommon to commit a murder as they age. Incidents of children and adolescents committing murders are extremely rare. Also, about 50% of murders in the United States are commited by black males age 17-45, about 3% of the population.
Documentary Films

- Blind Spot: Murder by Women, A film by Irving Saraf, Allie Light and Julia Hilder, 2000
- Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer, Director: Nick Broomfield, 2003
See also

- -cide
- Child murder
- Combination of murder and suicide
- Cult homicides
- Deicide
- Democide
- Filicide
- Femicide Murder of women, see Deaths in Ciudad Juarez
- Fratricide
- Genocide
- Human sacrifice
- Infanticide
- Killology
- List of massacres
- List of murdered people
- Lust murder
- Mass murder
- Matricide
- Patricide
- Regicide
- List of unsolved murders and deaths
- Serial killer
- Spree killer
- Thrill killing
- Torture murder
- Proxy murder
- Suicide
External links

- [http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/pubs/pubd/other/atlas/atlas.htm U.S. Centers for Disease Control "Atlas of United States Mortality"]
- [http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/picture-of-month/furtherReading.asp?id=141&venue=2 Cezanne's depiction of 'The Murder']
- [http://www.unesco.org/shs/human_rights/hrfv.htm 1986 Seville Statement on Violence]
- [http://www.culture-of-peace.info/ssov-intro.html Introduction and Updated Information on the Seville Statement on Violence]
- [http://www.mvfr.org Murder Victims Families for Reconciliation, Inc. - An Anti-Capital Punishment Group ja:殺人 simple:Murder Category:law

Detective

:To see the article about the Nintendo game, see Gumshoe (video game). A detective is
- an officer of the police who performs criminal or administrative investigations,
- in some police departments, the lowest rank among such investigators (above the lowest rank of officers and below sergeants). Some departments have distinct levels of detectives, depending on their experiences and skills. New York City and Los Angeles both have three grades. A number of larger police departments have rank structures for their investigators that parallel the "street" police, such as Detective Sergeants and Detective Lieutenants,
- a civilian licensed to investigate information not readily available in public records (a private investigator, also called "P.I." or, in a pun on "private i.", private eye), or
- informally and primarily in fiction, any unlicensed person who solves crimes, including historical crimes, or looks into records.

Detectives and their work

Becoming a detective

In most American police departments, a candidate for detective must have served as a uniformed officer for a period of one to five years before becoming qualified for the position. Prospective British police detectives must have completed two years as a uniformed officer before applying to join the Criminal Investigation Department. In European police systems, most detectives are university graduates who join directly from civilian life without first serving as uniformed officers. In fact, many European police experts cannot understand why British, American and Commonwealth police forces insist on recruiting their detectives from the ranks of uniformed officers, arguing that they do a completely different job and therefore require completely different training, qualifications, qualities and abilities. The opposing argument is that without previous service as a uniformed patrol officer a detective cannot have a great enough command of standard police procedures and problems and will find it difficult to work with uniformed colleagues. Detectives obtain their position by competitive examination, covering such subjects as:
- Principles, practices and procedures of investigations
- Principles, practices and procedures of interviewing and interrogation
- Local criminal law and procedures
- Applicable law governing arrests, search and seizures, warrants and evidence
- Police department records and reports
- Principles, practices and objectives of courtroom testimony
- Police department methods and procedures Private detectives are licensed by the state in which they live after passing a competitive examination and a criminal background check. Some states, such as Maryland, require a period of classroom training as well.

Organization of detectives

The detective branch in most larger police agencies is organized into several squads or departments, each of which specializes in investigation into a particular type of crime or a particular type of undercover operation, which may include:
- Homicide
- Robbery
- Stolen vehicles
- Fraud
- Burglary
- Narcotics
- Forgery
- Criminal intelligence
- Sex crimes
- Street crime (mugging etc.)
- Computer crime
- Crimes against children
- Surveillance
- Arson

Techniques of detectives

Street work

Detectives have a wide variety of techniques available in conducting investigations. However, the majority of cases are solved by interrogation of suspects and witnesses, which takes time. In a policeman's career as a uniformed officer and as a detective, a detective develops an intuitive sense of the plausibility of suspect and witness accounts. This intuition may fail at times, but usually is reliable. Besides interrogations, detectives may rely on a network of informants they have cultivated over the years. Informants often have connections with persons a detective would not be able to approach formally. In criminal investigations, once a detective has a suspect or suspects in mind, the next step is to produce evidence that will stand up in a court of law. The best way is to obtain a confession from the suspect, usually in exchange for a plea bargain for a lesser sentence. A detective may lie or otherwise mislead and may psychologically pressure a suspect into confessing, though in the United States suspects may invoke their Miranda rights.

Forensic evidence

Physical forensic evidence in an investigation may provide leads to closing a case. Examples of physical evidence can be, but are not limited to:
- Fingerprinting of objects persons have touched
- DNA analysis
- Luminol to detect blood stains that have been washed
- Bloodstain pattern analysis
- Footprints or tire tracks
- Chemical testing for the presence of narcotics or expended gun propellant
- The exact position of objects at the scene of an investigation Many major police departments in a city, county, or state, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, maintain their own forensic laboratories.

Records investigation

Detectives may use public and private records to provide background information on a subject. These include:
- Fingerprint records. In the United States, the FBI maintains records of people who have committed felonies and some misdemeanors, all persons who have applied for a Federal security clearance, and all persons who have served in the U.S. armed forces
- Records of criminal arrests and convictions
- Photographs or mug shots, of persons arrested
- Motor vehicle records
- Credit card records and bank statements
- Hotel registration cards
- Credit reports
- Answer machine messages

Court testimony

Unless a plea bargain forestalls the need for a trial, detectives must testify in court about their investigation. They must seem reliable and credible to a jury, and must not give the impression of personal vindictiveness or cruelty. A detective's background often comes into question in courtroom testimony. A famous example came in the murder trial of O. J. Simpson, when Detective Mark Fuhrman of the Los Angeles Police Department testified for the prosecution. Attorney F. Lee Bailey first asked Fuhrman if he had ever used the "n-word" (see Nigger). Fuhrman denied this. In court, Bailey produced taped interviews with Fuhrman using this offensive word.

Famous detectives

The detective story has been a popular genre in books, radio, television, and movies since the early 19th century. In many police drama series, detectives are depicted as being something of an elite, with most uniformed police officers deferring to them. Famous fictional detectives include:

Police detectives

- Detective Andy Sipowicz, played by Dennis Franz in the television series NYPD Blue
- Lennie Briscoe, played by Jerry Orbach in the television series Law & Order
- Sergeant Joe Friday, portrayed by Jack Webb and later by Ed O'Neill in the television series Dragnet
- Lieutenant Columbo, played by Peter Falk in the television series Columbo (and also some television movies)
- Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison, played by Helen Mirren in Prime Suspect.
- Detective Chief Inspector Morse, in the novels of Colin Dexter and played by John Thaw in Inspector Morse.
- Detective Inspector Jack Regan, also played by John Thaw, and Detective Sergeant George Carter, played by Dennis Waterman, in the television series The Sweeney.
- Thompson and Thomson, from the comic Tintin, created by Hergé

Private detectives

- Adrian Monk, played by Tony Shalhoub
- Auguste Dupin, created by Edgar Allan Poe
- Hercule Poirot and Miss Jane Marple, both created by Agatha Christie
- Jim Rockford, created by Roy Huggins and Stephen J. Cannell, and portrayed by James Garner in the television series The Rockford Files
- Thomas Sullivan Magnum, played by Tom Selleck in the television series Magnum P.I.
- Philip Marlowe, created by Raymond Chandler
- Sam Spade, created by Dashiell Hammett and portrayed on film by Humphrey Bogart
- Sherlock Holmes, created by Arthur Conan Doyle See Detective fiction and Crime fiction for more details.

External links

- [http://www.my-private-investigator.com/ Online Detective Tools]
- [http://www.detectivechoice.com Online Investigation Tools]
- [http://www.diydetective.com/ Do it yourself detective] Category:Law enforcement Category:Law enforcement workers
- Detective Category:Police officers ja:探偵

Foil (literature)

:For other uses, see foil. A foil character is either one who is in most ways opposite to the main character or nearly the same as the main character. The purpose of the foil character is to emphasize the traits of the main character by comparison or contrast. A foil is a secondary character who contrasts with a major character; in Hamlet, Laertes and Fortinbras, whose fathers have been killed, are foils for Hamlet. Or in The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Abby and Elizabeth Proctor. In Twelfth Night, Olivia has a foil named Viola, because they have both lost a sibling. An example in modern popular culture is Han Solo in Star Wars, who, in the first film of the series, is a stark contrast to Luke Skywalker. Also, in Hip-Hop, Flavor Flav serves as a comic foil to the eponymous Chuck D in the political rap group Public Enemy. Another example is in Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome. Zeena, Ethan's wife, acts a foil character who brings out the positive qualities of Ethan's secret lover, Mattie. In Gregory Maguire's book Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, the character of Elphaba Thropp (who will eventually become the Wicked Witch in question) is said to be a foil for the heroine of Dorothy Gale, from the original novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Reasonings to support this idea include that DOR-o-thy and EL-pha-ba are pronounced similarly, and their personalities and relationships with other characters contrast greatly. The "straight man" in a comedy duo is sometimes known as the comic foil. The humor in these partnerships derives from the uneven relation between the characters, who usually share many traits but have drastically different personalities. While the straight man portrays a reasonable and serious character, the other portrays a funny, dumb, or simply unorthodox one. Category:Literature Category:Stock characters

Audience surrogate

In the study of literature, an audience surrogate is a character who expresses the questions and confusion of the reader. It is a device frequently used in detective fiction and science fiction. In detective fiction, the audience surrogate is usually a minor character that asks a central character how he or she accomplished certain deeds, for the purpose of inciting that character to explain (for the curious audience) his or her methods. In science fiction, the audience surrogate frequently takes the form of a child or other uninformed person, asking a relatively educated person to explain what amounts to the backstory. Dr. Watson in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes may be considered an audience surrogate as would each of Doctor Who's many companions. A

Detective fiction

Whodunit?

The Private Eye Novel

Cosies

Police procedural

Other subgenres

Suspense - the core tenet of detective fiction

The unresolved problem of plausibility and coincidence

Famous fictional detectives

Amateurs

Private eyes

Police detectives

Medical examiners, etc.

Others

And for younger readers

Historical

In science fiction and fantasy

Other notable authors

Detective debuts and swansongs

Books

See also

External resources

Crime fiction

History of crime fiction

Categories of crime fiction

Crime fiction and mainstream fiction

"High art" versus "popular art"

The discrepancy between taste and acclaim

A re-assessment of critical ideals

Pseudonymous authors

Contemporary critical views

Film and literature: The case of crime fiction

Availability of crime novels

Quality and availability

Classic bestsellers

Forgotten classics

Revival of past classics

See also

Further reading

External links

Murder

Murder and other illegal killings

Mitigating circumstances

Country-specific murder law

United Kingdom

Canada

The United States

Felony murder statutes

Capital murder

Cultural references

Germany

The Netherlands

Finland

Israel

Vikings (8th to 11th centuries)

Other uses of the word

Murder demographics

Documentary Films

See also

External links

Detective

Detectives and their work

Becoming a detective

Organization of detectives

Techniques of detectives

Street work

Forensic evidence

Records investigation

Court testimony

Famous detectives

Police detectives

Private detectives

See also

External links

Foil (literature)

Audience surrogate