What are some good crime/mystery novels?

And the list is a bit skimpy on the the Donald Westlake/Richard Stark oeuvre. I would put his relatively recent book The Ax, about a downsized chemist who conspires to kill all of his potential rivals in the job market, in the top 5 best all-time mystery books. Also, many of James Lee Burke's excellent early books did not make the list. read more

A Dark-Adapted Eye by Ruth Rendell - I confess that this is one of the most beautiful titles in mystery fiction. The good news is that the book lives up to the title. It is intricate, with genuinely surprising revelations, and the depth of the characterizations makes a major contribution to the novel’s suspense. read more