The best mystery books featuring female sleuths with personality to spare

Claire DeWitt is a troubled detective hired to solve a disappearance in post-Katrina New Orleans.

She learned her craft by studying the teachings of an elusive French detective, and was set on her career path after failing to find her missing friend as a teenager. She is haunted by disappearances of all kinds, and through this fascinating main character Gran weaves an atmospheric, compelling mystery.

The first time I read this book a hidden door in my writing brain unlocked—detective novels can be more than the classic setup of a talented sleuth following the clues. They can be messy and enigmatic and unsettling—in fact, Gran convinced me that they should be.

Stevie Bell is a student of true crime and frighteningly good at solving cold cases—making her perfect for the elite Ellingham Academy in Vermont, the site of a famous unsolved crime.

The combination of Stevie’s compelling personality, the boarding school setting, and the deft unraveling of the mystery had me flying through pages. Johnson has created an addictive narrative using a compulsively readable style and a wonderful cast of characters, but the jewel here is Stevie.

It’s a YA novel but I don’t think I’ve ever related to a teen more. (We’d both rather hide inside our comfy black hoodies rather than face difficult conversations.) This series reminded me of the immersive feeling of falling in love with reading as a kid, wanting to live alongside these characters and be one of the gang.  

Flavia de Luce is a know-it-all pre-teen, but Bradley pulls off the trick of making her fun to read.

She lives in a small 1950s English village prone to suspicious deaths, in a crumbling mansion called Buckshaw, where she likes to tinker in her uncle’s old chemistry lab. Somehow Flavia is both heartbreaking—her mountain-climbing mother disappeared years ago, and her older sisters are total brats—and delightful.

I want to give her a hug, and even more, I want to write a character with equal parts heart, smarts, and sass that readers will fall in love with. She might not be a professional detective, but she’ll give Miss Marple a run for her money, pedaling along on her trusty steed Gladys (who is a bicycle). 

Claudia Lin is lying to her family. They want her to have a steady job and marry a nice Chinese man—but Claudia’s interests don’t lie in either direction.

Instead she secretly takes a job at an online-dating detective agency, verifying the profiles people post on dating sites. This premise had me from page one, and as I read, Claudia and her journey turned out to be just as compelling. Readers will come for a good plot hook, but they’ll stay for a satisfying character arc—this was the biggest takeaway for me here.

Claudia is looking for truths, about both the book’s central mystery (investigating the death of one of her clients) and about herself.

Constance Kopp was a real person, one of the first female deputy sheriffs in the United States, and the inspiration for this book.

I love how Stewart plays off brief mentions in the historical record and brings her fully to life. Constance doesn’t fit the expectations of a proper lady in 1914 New Jersey—she’s too outspoken, too tall, too independent. This is a feminist story, a finding-your-purpose story, and a wonderful historical snapshot.

The next book in the series is called Lady Cop Makes Trouble, and if you haven’t figured it out yet, I love women who make trouble.