The best crime mysteries with an extra twist of character

This wasn't the first crime mystery novel I read, but The Big Sleep hooked me on Philip Marlowe as a character and the genre as a whole. Raymond Chandler created one of the most striking and engaging narrative voices in the superbly cynical and sharp-tongued Private Investigator. Marlowe's dialogue and observations have a poetic grittiness about them that reflect his toughness and the seedy world he’s steeped in, and yet, through his interactions with other characters and the values he espouses, I warmed to him as a big-hearted and sensitive character who is hard not to admire and want to see more of—so much so that I read all of Chandler's books.

While I sometimes find Dickens' characters overdrawn and his endings too tidily wrapped in his other novels, I love these qualities in Great Expectations and how the specific setting in which we meet a character shapes our (and Pip’s) assumptions. The Gothic decadence of Miss Havisham's wedding feast and the monstrous spectre of Magwitch appearing among the graves are fabulous scenes for this. But what I like most is how Pip changes in response to the manipulations and ambitions of the supporting cast; how he's shaken out of impoverished innocence into a world of expectations, and his trajectory as a flawed character into conceit and arrogance, until he finally comes good—battered and bruised, but ultimately redeemed.

Lisbeth Salander is, for me, one of the most kick-ass characters in crime mystery fiction and, ever since Stieg Larsson wrote her, clones have been popping up everywhere in books and film. I like that she is seen as a misfit and an outcast, victimised and brutalised by the establishment, who is often misjudged as being stupid, worthless, weak, but who is in fact, acutely intelligent, insightful, and someone not to be messed with—a gutsy fighter who refuses to quit. For me, it's Salander who makes the Millenium trilogy such a dynamic series, and the first time I came across her it was absolutely refreshing to meet such an empowered female character in crime fiction.

This crime mystery stands out as a favourite not only because it's unique in being told through the voice of a 15-year-old boy who it's assumed is autistic, but because the entire form of the novel is convincingly shaped by the way Christopher thinks and perceives the world. I love the way that maps, infographics, facts, and even the use of primary numbers as chapter headings, help us understand and appreciate his character at the same time as propelling the story forward. I was totally won over by the logic and honesty of a boy who struggles to understand emotions - by the difficulties these qualities get him into—and yet who, with a nod to Sherlock Holmes, is determined to solve a crime.

This laugh-out-loud crime mystery has a special place for me because I read it not long after migrating to Australia and, through the lead character, Murray Whelan (a political staffer who spends his time digging himself in and out of holes), I was not only introduced to Australian humour but also to a new way of viewing Melbourne, its politics, establishments, and suburbs. In Stiff, as with Shane Maloney's other books in this series, the city landscape is as much a character as Murray Whelan himself, and this sense of place adds a richness to the story that would be missing if it were merely treated as a backdrop.