What Happened?

You need to know that a brutal, sensational, seemingly senseless crime has just been committed. (I hope that’s not what you think about my writing.) Keep on reading to find out who did it and why. . . .

This is the thrilling premise and promise behind the nearly one million mysteries Canadians buy (and love) each year. In most of these books, a crime has been committed and must be solved — usually by a brilliant, sometimes hapless or maybe lucky detective who, ever since Sherlock Holmes, may suffer from a chemical dependency and a problematic domestic life.

A popular genre, mystery has long had friends in high and interesting places. One of the earliest supporters of detective fiction as a form worthy of literary appreciation, not simply entertainment, was none other than T. S. Eliot. When he wasn’t writing classics like The Waste Land, the high priest of modernist poetry regularly contributed unsigned reviews of detective fiction to The...