The best mysteries on (and off) the tracks

The classic, the best. Nobody does it better than Dame Agatha, who wrote in her autobiography, “To travel by train is to see nature and human beings, towns and churches and rivers - in fact, to see life.” Hercule Poirot travels on the Orient Express from Istanbul. One of the passengers, an unpleasant American tycoon, tries to hire Poirot as his bodyguard. But Poirot refuses. Then an avalanche traps the train and the passenger is discovered dead, stabbed multiple times in his compartment, which is locked from the inside. Murder most foul. The Belgian detective must interview over a dozen suspects, using all his little grey cells to discover how, who, and why.

Another Christie, out of a handful of books Dame Agatha wrote set on trains. Much as I like Poirot, I love Jane Marple, the quiet spinster from St. Mary Mead who knits, knows everyone, and is well-schooled in human nature and foibles. Talk about powers of observation. In this classic, Miss Marple’s friend Mrs. Elspeth McGillicuddy is traveling by train. At a moment when two trains are traveling side by side on different tracks, she looks out the window of her compartment and sees a man strangling a woman. The railway authorities don’t believe her—quelle surprise! With no other witnesses, no suspects, and no corpse, who will believe her? Jane Marple, of course, who has a plan to out the killer.

Another British mystery by a British author, this one with Carola Dunn’s resourceful and determined sleuth, the Honorable Daisy Dalrymple, who sleuths in the 1920s, when England is just recovering from the Great War. Daisy makes a living writing magazine articles but she keeps stumbling over dead bodies, much to the chagrin of Scotland Yard’s Detective Inspector Alec Fletcher. In this book, early in the series, Daisy boards the Flying Scotsman, heading from London to Edinburgh. Then Belinda Fletcher shows up. The detective’s daughter is on the lam from her difficult grandmother. Then someone gets murdered on the train and Daisy once again finds herself a suspect and reluctant sleuth.

A crowded troop train is heading across a desolate stretch of tracks through the Rocky Mountains. It’s the dead of winter 1873 and you can almost feel the chill seeping into the railcars. The troops are headed to Fort Humboldt to relieve the cholera-stricken garrison. In addition to the troops, the train’s passengers include a powerful governor, the daughter of the fort’s commander, and a US marshal escorting an outlaw prisoner. But people and their stories aren’t what they seem. A passenger is murdered. Time is running out and a lot of people are going to wind up dead before the end of the story. A masterful thriller by MacLean.

Something different here, a contemporary mystery set in Denver, Colorado, featuring Sydney Rose Parnell and her K9 partner Clyde. Both are Iraqi War vets and now they work for the railroad. Sydney is a railroad police special agent and she’s brought into a murder case by the Denver police. She finds herself sleuthing amid the community of homeless rail riders. A gripping thriller that’s the first in a series.