THE MYSTERIOUS BOOKSHOP PRESENTS THE BEST MYSTERY STORIES OF THE YEAR 2024

Nineteen of the year’s best stories highlight the healing power of crime fiction.

In his introduction, editor Horowitz—whose works range from the English village–set Midsomer Murders television series to James Bond novels based on unpublished material by Ian Fleming—advances the surprising proposition that what unites crime fiction is its ability to offer “kindness, decency, justice, and truth in a world that increasingly seems to have none.” A remarkable number of the year’s choices in this venerable series focus on the redemptive power of families. In Shells Legoullon’s “The Backwoods,” Peter W.J. Hayes’ “El Paso Heat,” and Archer Sullivan’s “Good Harvest,” parents take extraordinary measures to shield their children from danger. Sometimes, it’s left to a grandparent or even a sibling to save a child, as in Fleur Bradley’s “How To Teach Yourself To Swim” and Cameron Sanders’ “Billowing Down the Bayou.” Public servants fill in when families fail in Dan Pope’s “Snow Over Hartford” and Annie Reed’s “Dead Names,” while Victor Methos offers a tale of two good Samaritans who join forces to reunite a family torn apart by a shocking incident in “Kill Night.” Parents struggle to make peace with their adult children in Ace Atkins’ “Stunts,” Leonardo Padura’s “A Family Matter,” and Andrew Welsh-Huggins’ “Wonder Falls.” And a son struggles to avenge his father’s death in Nils Gilbertson’s “Lovely and Useless Things.” Even nephews have their moment in Michael Bracken’s “Beat the Clock.” Like the arc of history, Horowitz says, these tales bend toward justice “at a time when it has never mattered more.”

Fans tired of meaningless violence should welcome this showcase of the redemptive side of the genre.