Will Salvo Montalbano solve this puzzling case?

A great ‘whodunit’ never loses its page-turning appeal, and some of the greatest detectives ever created are from our own European shores – from the suave Sherlock Holmes to the dour Wallender. So let’s look at some classic works and contemporary bestsellers to uncover the best sleuths in fiction from across Europe.

The Shape of Water - Andrea Camilleri

This comical and fast-paced tale is a must-read for all mystery aficionados. It begins with a man’s body being found in a car in the ‘Pasture’ – the red light district of a fictional Sicilian town called Vigata. The victim, Silvio Luparello, was a politician on the brink of success and Inspector Salvo Montalbano is the detective faced with this puzzling case. Andrea Camilleri, one of Italy’s most successful authors, came to writing relatively late, publishing his first book at the age of 52 in 1978. The Shape of Water (or La Forma Dell’acqua) – the first Camilleri novel featuring Montalbano – was released in 1994. Now both he and the infamous Inspector are household names in not only Italy but across the continent.

The Mystery of the Yellow Room – Gaston Leroux

The Mystery of the Yellow Room (or Le Mystère De La Chambre Jaune in French) was published in France as a book in 1908 by Gaston Leroux – a multi-talented French author who also wrote the legendary Phantom of the Opera. The book was the first in an acclaimed series to feature a wily sleuth called Joseph Rouletabille and was universally praised for its originality on its release. It is generally seen as one of the pioneers of the ‘locked room’ mystery genre. Leroux once worked as a reporter, covering criminal cases, which obviously fired his imagination when it came to creating Rouletabille, his crime-solving protagonist.

Faceless Killers – Henning Mankell

A bleak but brilliant tome, Faceless Killers was the first of the hugely popular crime novels featuring Inspector Kurt Wallander (there are now ten in the series) by Henning Mankell – the revered Swedish novelist, playwright, theatre director and children’s author. Wallander is called to a remote farmhouse after an elderly couple is found following a brutal attack. With the husband dead, the wife survives for a few brief moments and manages to gasp the word ‘foreign’ before dying, leading Wallander and his colleagues to believe one of the local asylum seekers might be behind the attacks. When the public finds out, violence erupts but all is not as it appears.

Hercule Poirot features in An Appointment with Death

Appointment with Death – Agatha Christie

In Appointment with Death, the best-selling English writer Agatha Christie crafts a superb riddle and psychological thriller, featuring everyone’s favourite fictional Belgian detective, the mighty Hercule Poirot. This novel is a classic mystery, set in the 1930s, which finds Poirot investigating the murder of an old and repugnant American widow during a trip to Petra. The prolific Christie wrote over sixty-six crime novels, as well as several short stories and numerous screenplays. With her work being translated into more than one hundred languages, she is widely seen as the single most popular mystery writer of all time.

Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow -  Peter Hoeg

Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow is only reclusive Danish author Peter Hoeg’s second novel, but became an internationally acclaimed bestseller on its release. Opening in Copenhagen and set over one long cold winter, it follows Miss Smilla’s journey to the truth after her six year old neighbour, Isaiah, falls from the roof of a local warehouse to his death. Thrilling and haunting, such was the interest in this book, it was later turned into a Hollywood film. Hoeg has admitted the novel drew largely on his experiences of growing up in an underprivileged suburb of Copenhagen, which was heavily populated by impoverished Inuit.

Knots and Crosses -  Ian Rankin

Detective Inspector John Rebus was first introduced to his (now huge) legion of readers in this 1980s novel. Written by Scottish crime writer Ian Rankin and set in his home town of Edinburgh, Knots and Crosses opens with the disappearance and brutal murder of two young girls, while the fate of a third hangs in the balance. When sinister ritualistic messages – the knots and crosses of the title – start to appear, Rebus knows that the case is becoming personal. An intense and gripping tale to the very final page, Knots and Crosses also sets the scene for the following Rebus novels, introducing themes and characters which reappear throughout the series.

Friends in High Places – Donna Leon

Friends in High Places, by Donna Leon, features a genial but cynical Venetian cop Commissario Guido Brunetti and is a wickedly dark piece of crime fiction covering murder, corruption, loan sharks and bureaucracy. American-born Leon has lived in Venice for many years and writes evocatively of a seedier underside to her adopted hometown. Such is Leon’s popularity, she not only published her nineteenth Venetian crime novel last year – entitled About Face – but a companion book for fans entitled Brunetti’s Venice: Walks Through the Novels has also been released by Leon’s friend, the author Toni Sepeda.

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Arthur Conan Doyle

A mysterious case featuring a werewolf in the alps

Originally published in 1892, Sherlock Holmes comes to life in this wonderful collection of short stories by celebrated Scottish writer Arthur Conan Doyle. Possibly the world’s greatest fictional detective, Holmes uses his uncanny skills to catch the villains stalking the streets of Victorian London and all fans of crime fiction will find something to enjoy in Conan Doyle’s work. Struggling to make a living as a physician in Edinburgh when he created Holmes, the great sleuth was inspired by Conan Doyle’s mentor at medical school, Dr Joseph Bell, who allegedly was able to figure out a patient’s illness simply by looking at them. By the end of Conan Doyle’s life, he had written science fiction and spiritualism books, but no other work ever came close to the success of the much-loved Sherlock Holmes.

Seeking Whom He May Devour – Fred Vargas

Seeking Whom He May Devour is the second novel in Fred Vargas’ bestselling Chief Inspector Adamsberg series. First published in French in 1999 and then in English in 2004, Vargas crafts a surprising, almost medieval, tale where a werewolf appears to be stalking a part of the French Alps. Fred Vargas was born Frédérique Audouin-Rouzeau in Paris in 1957, but adopted the pen name Vargas from the Ava Gardner character, the Spanish dancer Maria Vargas in The Barefoot Contessa. Vargas, who is also a respected historian, eminent archaeologist and voracious political campaigner, began writing over twenty years ago and continues to produce absorbing thrillers to the delight of her multitude of readers.

The Moonstone – Wilkie Collins

In The Moonstone, the late great British author Wilkie Collins tells the story of a valuable jewel theft and the subsequent quest to recover it with Scotland Yard’s finest, Sergeant Cuff, leading the way. The Moonstone is a compelling read, told from the viewpoint of several major characters. The heroine and victim of the theft is a confident young Englishwoman called Rachel Verinder, who follows in the Collins tradition of strong, self-assured female protagonists. London-born Collins wrote over thirty novels in his lifetime, but his masterpiece is largely acknowledged as The Moonstone (1868), which the respected writer T.S. Eliot called the ‘first and greatest of English detective novels’.