She gave birth to a child in 1924 while still unmarried and arranged for it to be raised by a cousin. She later married Oswald Arthur “Mac” Fleming (they later adopted her son; but he never lived with them.) She was acquainted with C. S. Lewis and his circle, including J.R.R. Tolkien, and on some occasions joined Lewis at meetings of the Socratic Club. She died of a stroke in 1957.
Source: Wikipedia
Biographybase.com
Other Great Mystery Reads: The Old Bailey to Zebra Drive
If you like the drama of the detective story but want to skip serial killers and the more shocking brutality common today, try some of the novels from the “golden age” of mysteries, such as Margery Allingham’s Robert Campion series. In the “cozy” category you must read G.K. Chesterton’s Father Brown series and Ellis Peters’ Brother Cadfael stories. And if you haven’t yet met Rumpole of the Bailey and his beloved wife Hilda (“she who must be obeyed”) you are in for a hilarious treat from John Mortimer. A mystery novel that stands on its own, in the same class as The Moonstone, is The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco. Eco is so brilliant that this is the only novel of his that I understand, and I love it for that reason alone!
The Mystery Writers of America recently compiled a list of the hundred best mystery novels, and out of those I would recommend twenty that I particularly love. Cozy and detective mysteries both figure in this list, and most of these are part of a series by a truly talented author so you have lots of reading in store.
Following the mystery list, I’ll include a list of Pulitzer Prize winners for literature over the last fifty years. The Internet now makes it possible to find almost any book, even those that have been long out of print. Instead of browsing the bestseller lists, browse these award winners and find some great new books. Enjoy!
Twenty Great Mystery Novels
(in random order)
The Complete Sherlock Holmes, A. Conan Doyle
The Moonstone, by Wilkie Collins
Death in Holy Orders, P.D. James
Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
The Complete Father Brown, G.K. Chesterton
Murder on the Orient Express, Agatha Christie
Clouds of Witnesses, Dorothy L. Sayers
One Corpse Too Many, Ellis Peters
The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco
Rumpole of the Bailey, John Mortimer
The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, Laurie R. King
The Third Man, Graham Greene
A Thief of Time, Tony Hillerman
Crocodile on the Sandbank, Elizabeth Peters
Judgment in Stone, Ruth Rendell
Time and Again, Jack Finney
The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett
The Face of a Stranger, Anne Perry
Dancers in Mourning, Margery Allingham
The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Alexander McCall Smith
Pulitzer Prize Winners
2005 Gilead: A Novel by Marilynne Robinson
2004 The Known World by Edward P. Jones
2003 Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
2002 Empire Falls by Richard Russo
2001 The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
2000 Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
1999 The Hours by Michael Cunningham
1998 American Pastoral by Philip Roth
1997 Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser
1996 Independence Day by Richard Ford
1995 The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
1994 The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx
1993 A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler
1992 A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley
1991 Rabbit At Rest by John Updike
1990 The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos
1989 Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler
1988 Beloved by Toni Morrison
1987 A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor
1986 Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
1985 Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie
1984 Ironweed by William Kennedy
1983 The Color Purple by Alice Walker
1982 Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike, the latest novel in a memorable sequence
1981 A Confederacy of Dunces by the late John Kennedy Toole (a posthumous publication)
1980 The Executioner’s Song by Norman Mailer
1979 The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever
1978 Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson
1977 (No Award)
1976 Humboldt’s Gift by Saul Bellow
1975 The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara
1974 (No Award)
1973 The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty
1972 Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
1971 (No Award)
1970 Collected Stories by Jean Stafford
1969 House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday
1968 The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
1967 The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
1966 Collected Stories by Katherine Anne Porter
1965 The Keepers Of The House by Shirley Ann Grau
1964 (No Award)
1963 The Reivers by William Faulkner
1962 The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O’Connor
1961 To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
1960 Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
1959 The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor
1958 A Death In The Family by the late James Agee (a posthumous publication)
1957 (No Award)
1956 Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor
1955 A Fable by William Faulkner
1954 (No Award)
1953 The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
1952 The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
1951 The Town by Conrad Richter
1950 The Way West by A. B. Guthrie, Jr.
1949 Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens
1948 Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener
(From 1917-1948, the award was given as the Pulitzer Prizer for Novel)
1947 All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren
1946 (No Award)
1945 A Bell for Adano by John Hersey
1944 Journey in the Dark by Martin Flavin
1943 Dragon’s Teeth by Upton Sinclair
1942 In This Our Life by Ellen Glasgow
1941 (No Award)
1940 The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
1939 The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
1938 The Late George Apley by John Phillips Marquand
1937 Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
1936 Honey in the Horn by Harold L. Davis
1935 Now in November by Josephine Winslow Johnson
1934 Lamb in His Bosom by Caroline Miller
1933 The Store by T. S. Stribling
1932 The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
1931 Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes
1930 Laughing Boy by Oliver Lafarge
1929 Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin
1928 The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
1927 Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield
1926 Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis
1925 So Big by Edna Ferber
1924 The Able McLaughlins by Margaret Wilson
1923 One of Ours by Willa Cather
1922 Alice Adams by Booth Tarkington
1921 The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
1920 (No Award)
1919 The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington
1918 His Family by Ernest Poole
Table of Contents
Getting Back to the Best Books: A Novel Idea
Chapter One Family First
Chapter Two Growing Pains
Chapter Three Boys to Men
Chapter Four Road Trips
Chapter Five True Romance
Chapter Six Action Fi
gures
Chapter Seven Through the Eyes of a Child
Chapter Eight Nobody’s Perfect
Chapter Nine Chick-Lit for Grown-ups
Chapter Ten A Good Man is Hard to Find
Chapter Eleven Fantasyland
Chapter Twelve The Mystery Makers
Back to the Best Books Page 26