Discover 7 Thrilling Historical Crime Fiction Novels
In our current technological climate, it’s harder to get away with crimes than ever before. Imagine how easy it would have been before luminol, cell phones, or the internet, though: you could just tell someone a different name from your own, and they’d have almost no way to check it. If you weren’t seen at the site of a murder (or never confessed to it), they’d have, like, zero evidence to convict. Oh man, and if I have to watch another show where the entire plot could have been prevented with a simple text message, I’ll scream.
Still, the limitations of earlier technology make historical crime fiction sort of more fun—after all, with our new progressions (like DNA evidence, for instance), there’s much less mystery. So if you love a period piece or a historical crime drama, check out these books next:
In Victorian London, where traveling sideshows are the very pinnacle of entertainment, there is no more coveted ticket than Ashe and Pretorius' Carnivale of Curiosities. Each performance is a limited engagement, and London's elite boldly dare the dangerous streets of Southwark to witness the Carnivale's astounding assemblage of marvels. For a select few, however, the real show begins behind the curtain. Rumors abound that the show’s proprietor, Aurelius Ashe, is more than an average magician. It's said that for the right price, he can make any wish come true. No one knows the truth of this claim better than Lucien the Lucifer, the Carnivale's star attraction. Born with the ability to create fire, he's dazzled spectators since he was a boy.
When Odilon Rose, one of the most notorious men in London, comes calling with a proposition regarding his young and beautiful charge, Charlotte, Ashe is tempted to refuse. After revealing, however, that Rose holds a secret that threatens the security of the troupe's most vulnerable members, Ashe has no choice but to sign an insidious contract.
The stakes grow higher as Lucien finds himself drawn to Charlotte and her to him, an attraction that spurs a perilous course of events. Grave secrets, recovered horrors, and what it means to be family come to a head in this vividly imagined spectacle—with the lives of all those involved suspended in the balance.
Perhaps you heard of the Parisian apartment abandoned on the eve of the Nazi occupation and never opened for 70 years? The owner was a famous courtesan and socialite Marthe de Florain, who kept paying the rent on the place until she died at the age of 91. This book hinges on the secret romance and criminal activity of the urban legend… Susan lives in Boston, but after the deaths of her parents, she comes across a letter from Marthe de Florain to her grandfather about another ancestor’s murder. The book’s plot jumps from its past narrative in the 1930s to Susan searching for answers in present-day Paris… so if you’re a Francophile, you already have two books to add to your TBR.
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Mary Kay McBrayer is the author of America’s First Female Serial Killer: Jane Toppan and the Making of a Monster. You can find her short works at Oxford American, Narratively, Mental Floss, and FANGORIA, among other publications. She co-hosts Everything Trying to Kill You, the comedy podcast that analyzes your favorite horror movies from the perspectives of women of color. Follow Mary Kay McBrayer on Instagram and Twitter, or check out her author site here.