Jason Goodwin & Barbara Cleverly

[Doug]

I've enjoyed the books I've read by these authors -- those by Goodwin of the Turkish Investigator Yashim, set in the 1830's as the Ottoman Empire moved further along on its decline, and those of Cleverly's Inspector Joe Sandilands, which initially were set in 1920's India, before shifting to Europe (I'm particularly fond of the ones set in India). Does anyone have any recommendations for other mysteries set in the 19th or early 20th centuries, in the Near East or India?

Doug

[annis]

If you like Holmes, I can think of a couple of Holmesian hist mysts set in India - Laurie King's The Game and Vithal Ragan's Holmes of the Raj

Just remembered Michael Pearce's mysteries- they might appeal.

[Doug]

Thanks -- I do like Holmes, but I pale in that regard before my wife, who loves Holmes stories. I'll have to check those out.

[Margaret]

I really enjoyed Goodwin's latest, The Bellini Card - very stylish writing (see review).

Jenny White has three books out in a mystery series that is also set during the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the "Kamil Pasha" series: The Sultan's Seal, The Abyssinian Proof and The Winter Thief. I haven't read them, so can't give them a thumbs-up or thumbs-down, but they're probably worth checking out if you're into this setting.

[Leena]

I liked Barbara Cleverly's The Tomb of Zeus, set in Crete, after WWI. The character in this book is a woman archaeologist, Laetitia Talbot. I'm very interested in the Minoans and have done a lot of research on them, so I was very happy to see how well Cleverly stuck to what is known about the Minoans.

And, of course, I like Joe Sandilands.

[Village]

I really enjoyed Goodwin's Yashim mysteries. One thing that bugged me with his last one (Evil Eye) was the explosion in the amount of cooking that went on. I get that Yashim's "thing" is cooking and Goodwin really brings the food off the page in his descriptions but in the first novels they were small paragraphs used sparingly to spice a moment's plot recap or allow Yashim to gather threads in his mind, by Evil Eye they had taken on a life of their own (and I notice are now sold as a separate book "Cooking with Yashim")- it feels like a publisher's instruction to include them, rather than a serious plot device.

Rant over, I really should say that apart from that, I loved all Goodwin's books.

[Peter Hancock]

Ellis Peters' Cadfael books are fun if you like Holmesian-type mysteries, though they're set in the Middle Ages.