27 Books Like Lestrade and the Ripper

There are few joys to match happening upon a fabulous book by accident. This was the case in Kate Summerscale's work. I knew nothing about it when I picked it up, but I liked the premise. I started to read it on the bus going home and finished it in two days.

This real 1860 murder inspired many writers, from Dickens to Conan Doyle, and I can see why. It contains all those elements so dear to the hearts of mystery lovers like me: a corpse, a detective, and a closed circle of suspects in a country manor. This is a book I will reread, probably more than once. 

I hate this book for all the reasons I love it: because it’s perfect.

It’s a perfect crime novel and a perfect mystery, with perfectly awful characters, set in a perfectly fabulous situation, and as a mystery writer I know I will never ever top Christie’s brilliance – but oh my, any chance I have, I fall into this story.

Romance. Deception. Murder. Shiny things.

Genius.

Forget the movie, pick up the real thing. Poirot at his best.

This book is close to my heart as it started my writing career. The Death of Lucy Kyte is the fifth book in the Josephine Tey mystery novels based on a true Suffolk crime dubbed The Red Barn murders. I loved the way the book weaved between past and present, and the skill employed by the author in creating a fictional work from an actual historical crime. Not only did it offer me a series of mystery books, which I loved, but it set me on the path to penning my own novels in a similar genre.

While technically a novella, this profoundly disturbing story takes inspiration from the notorious BTK killer of the 1970s. BTK, alias Dennis Rader, killed at least ten people, yet his wife of 34 years denied ever knowing anything about his murderous exploits. Stephen King develops the story to show what it would be like for a happily married wife to discover suddenly that her husband has a hitherto unknown, sinister hobby. A chilling and thought-provoking read.

This historical fiction is one of three novels set in London, the one featured is contemporary, and set upon the streets walked by Jack the Ripper. What I found compelling was the detailed presentation of the lives of ordinary, working-class women, that was gritty and most believable in presentation. The characters came alive and the story flowed; some working girls vanished, who would be next? This is not a story about Jack. It is a story about those nearby and affected by the beast.

I read this book in a single sitting, on a stormy Winter’s day and night, which is quite appropriate. I have read many of Porter’s books and loved Porter's take on the Jack the Ripper story, which was impressively different, with textual similarities to Conan Doyle and, perhaps more significantly, to RLS' approach to Jekyll and Hyde, another favorite book, although in a slightly different genre. I loved Porter’s method of conveying atmosphere–without which no murder or historical novel is worth reading. 

Central to the book is Jack the Ripper's journal, whose violent outbursts reach out on two levels—the images contained within the journal and the impact of the evil on the modern reader. I loved the connection between the 19th century and the reader, which was too powerful to deny.

I found the historical background fascinating, the embedded message intriguing, and the book itself compelling. A masterpiece.

Victorian serial killer Jack the Ripper and fictional detective Sherlock Holmes have squared off countless times on screen and in various novels to varying degrees of success, but for me, this is the best story pitting the still unidentified serial killer against the most famous of fictional detectives.

Steeped in an immersive Victorian atmosphere and detail that drew me in, Hanna also effectively breathes life into several historical figures associated with the notorious case while remaining faithful to Arthur Conan Doyle's overall spirit.

In my opinion, Hanna’s version of Holmes subtly suggests inspiration was drawn from the late great Jeremy Brett, arguably the finest screen Holmes, while also giving Dr. Watson his intellectual due.

I love comics, and here is the Master at the top of his game.

Ostensibly, it’s a reimagination of the Whitechapel Murders, how this narrative has been handed down to us, and a final dissection of and dismissal of its meaning. But like all his stuff, it’s brimful of ideas, notably an exploration of psychogeography, the effect of geography and architecture on behaviour.

Plenty of other London writers, like Iain Sinclair and Peter Ackroyd, also explore this, in greater depth, but Moore made me see it most clearly. Maybe because of the visual medium of the work? Perhaps. But the idea of a city that echoes and re-echoes with emotional triggers is really exciting. 

When I read this at 17, I bounced off it, surprising since I'd loved every previous Zelazny. It wasn’t until a reread in my thirties that it finally clicked, becoming a favorite book by a favorite author. In retrospect, I didn’t yet have the depth of experience to see beneath the surface simplicity to the brilliantly conceived complexity visible to the reader with a bit more knowledge and breadth of literary background.

Wit shines on every page, from dialogue to description to an offbeat chapter-a-day structure highlighting each night in a most singular October.

The wild includes plenty of murder and mayhem as a cast of sorcerers that includes Dracula, Rasputin, and Burke & Hare are all colliding in a struggle for the power to shape the world through the once-a-century Lonesome October.

The weird stretches from the story of a most sympathetic serial killer to the way it's told… show more.

A time travel book that is clever and fast paced. Spoiled Hollywood types.

A trip back to Victorian London and a fateful meeting with Jack The Ripper. What’s not to love? As a matter of fact, I loved the female lead, Madison Taylor, so much that I included her (with permission) as a cross-over character in my latest novel, Finding Jimmy Moran.

Enough said.