Morrissey the 23rd
Banned
Series: Top 10sPrevious | Next | Index Toby Litt's top 10 crime novelsguardian.co.uk, Monday March 20, 2000
Article history
Toby Litt is the author of several books, including Beatniks, Corpsing and deadkidsongs.
Read an extract from Corpsing at the Penguin site
Giving away plots is something I never do, so these may be a tad gnomic. Also, I have problems with the ultra-ultra-hardboiled - case in point: James Ellroy. Now, I got, and digged, Dick Contino's Blues. But reading White Jazz is like decoding telegrams from the compiler of a dictionary of 50s cop slang; for the moment at least, it's got me beat. Here, however, is a wide selection of recent, decent reads.
1. A Study In Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Holmes meets Watson. Holmes mainlines some cocaine. Holmes and Watson go off to solve not particularly foxing crimes. You know the rest. Or maybe you don't...
2. Dead Clever by Scarlett Thomas
The first Lily Pascale novel - feisty heroine, or what? If there's a dark, scary corridor, Lily will go down it. (Don't!) If there's a killer on the road, Lily will make him squirm like a toad. (Do!) And the little darling lives in deepest, darkest Devon. Emmets (or is it grockles?) beware.
3. The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson
Everybody knows Thompson is weird. But if you get to the end of this - and I guarantee that if you start it, you will - you'll find he's outweirded even himself. Rule-breaking is what he does - sometimes you wonder if he even knows there are rules.
4. The Big Lebowski by Ethan and Joel Coen
A bit of a cheat this one, but the screenplay just about edges in as a book. One of the most recent takes on Chandler/LA noir, and the use of Dylan's 'The Man In Me' on the soundtrack was inspired.
5. A Philosophical Investigation by Philip Kerr
A really interesting attempt to do high and low in one go (compare my new novel, Corpsing.) A super-literate villain with a weakness for Wittgenstein (the title's no accident) thinks he can easily outplot the plods.
6. Double Indemnity by James M. Cain
Extraordinary plotting, and the storytelling voice is just exquisite: "All I saw was a living room like every living room in California, maybe a little more expensive than some, but nothing that any department store wouldn't deliver on one truck, lay out in the morning, and have the credit OK ready the same afternoon."
7. Cruel and Unusual by Patricia Cornwell
Before the decadence of overproduction set in. This, I think, is the best of the Scarpetta novels - the last one, I couldn't even get started with.
8. Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
The opening is about as thrilling as Greene ever got - but then, it's about as thrilling as almost any English writer ever got. Razor boys in Brighton, a meditation on the nature of Divine Grace - what more could you want? (Footnote: Inspired Morrissey's last decent song, 'Now My Heart Is Full'.)
9. The Ipcress File by Len Deighton
Harry Palmer's first Burberryed and bespectacled outing. The self-conscious cool of Deighton's writing has dated in the best way possible; bear in mind that the man was almost single-handedly responsible for bringing coffee culture to the British Isles. Stone-cold Cold War classic.
10. The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark
Short and very, very sweet. Spark is wonderful on the little details of a woman's perversion. Read this and foreign travel will never seem quite the same again.
Article history
Toby Litt is the author of several books, including Beatniks, Corpsing and deadkidsongs.
Read an extract from Corpsing at the Penguin site
Giving away plots is something I never do, so these may be a tad gnomic. Also, I have problems with the ultra-ultra-hardboiled - case in point: James Ellroy. Now, I got, and digged, Dick Contino's Blues. But reading White Jazz is like decoding telegrams from the compiler of a dictionary of 50s cop slang; for the moment at least, it's got me beat. Here, however, is a wide selection of recent, decent reads.
1. A Study In Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Holmes meets Watson. Holmes mainlines some cocaine. Holmes and Watson go off to solve not particularly foxing crimes. You know the rest. Or maybe you don't...
2. Dead Clever by Scarlett Thomas
The first Lily Pascale novel - feisty heroine, or what? If there's a dark, scary corridor, Lily will go down it. (Don't!) If there's a killer on the road, Lily will make him squirm like a toad. (Do!) And the little darling lives in deepest, darkest Devon. Emmets (or is it grockles?) beware.
3. The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson
Everybody knows Thompson is weird. But if you get to the end of this - and I guarantee that if you start it, you will - you'll find he's outweirded even himself. Rule-breaking is what he does - sometimes you wonder if he even knows there are rules.
4. The Big Lebowski by Ethan and Joel Coen
A bit of a cheat this one, but the screenplay just about edges in as a book. One of the most recent takes on Chandler/LA noir, and the use of Dylan's 'The Man In Me' on the soundtrack was inspired.
5. A Philosophical Investigation by Philip Kerr
A really interesting attempt to do high and low in one go (compare my new novel, Corpsing.) A super-literate villain with a weakness for Wittgenstein (the title's no accident) thinks he can easily outplot the plods.
6. Double Indemnity by James M. Cain
Extraordinary plotting, and the storytelling voice is just exquisite: "All I saw was a living room like every living room in California, maybe a little more expensive than some, but nothing that any department store wouldn't deliver on one truck, lay out in the morning, and have the credit OK ready the same afternoon."
7. Cruel and Unusual by Patricia Cornwell
Before the decadence of overproduction set in. This, I think, is the best of the Scarpetta novels - the last one, I couldn't even get started with.
8. Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
The opening is about as thrilling as Greene ever got - but then, it's about as thrilling as almost any English writer ever got. Razor boys in Brighton, a meditation on the nature of Divine Grace - what more could you want? (Footnote: Inspired Morrissey's last decent song, 'Now My Heart Is Full'.)
9. The Ipcress File by Len Deighton
Harry Palmer's first Burberryed and bespectacled outing. The self-conscious cool of Deighton's writing has dated in the best way possible; bear in mind that the man was almost single-handedly responsible for bringing coffee culture to the British Isles. Stone-cold Cold War classic.
10. The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark
Short and very, very sweet. Spark is wonderful on the little details of a woman's perversion. Read this and foreign travel will never seem quite the same again.
