About

100 American Crime Writers and 100 British Crime Writers are a pair of  reference books profiling the life and work of the best American and British writers of crime and detective fiction. Each will feature an extensive and detailed introduction to crime writing from the respective countries and traditions, followed by 100 entries of 500, 1,500, and 2,500 words in length.

Writers included are from the nineteenth century to the present day and are all born in or naturalised to either the United States or the United Kingdom. They cover the full range of crime writing, from “locked room” mysteries, to golden age murders, to pulp fiction, private eye novels, and police procedurals. The aim is to provide readable, up to date, but also fully referenced and authoritative guides to the best in the genre. The arrangement of entries in chronological rather than alphabetical order brings an interesting historical perspective.

The books will be published by Palgrave Macmillan in its Crime Files series in 2011. The editors are Chris Routledge and Esme Miskimmin.