Five mystery novels that read like literary fiction

The son of two librarians, Mark Stevens was raised in Lincoln, Massachusetts. He worked as a reporter for The Christian Science Monitor in Boston and Los Angeles; as a City Hall reporter for The Rocky Mountain News in Denver; as a national field producer for The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour (PBS) and as an education reporter for The Denver Post. Stevens's fifth mystery to feature Allison Coil, The Melancholy Howl, is now out from Third Line Press. His standalone novel The Fireballer is due out on the first day of 2023.

At CrimeReads Stevens tagged five "favorite books that prioritize character and literary insights but can be all be found on the mystery shelves." One title on the list:

Missing, Presumed by Susie Steiner

Missing, Presumed is sip-and-savor tasty. The loss this year of British writer Susie Steiner, who died at a very young age, was tragic. And any brief sampling of her writing makes the loss even more painful. When I finished Missing, Presumed, I went right back to the opening chapters to see how Steiner slipped her funny, odd, curious detective Manon Bradshaw onto the page and then tangled her up in the impossible case of a missing college student.

There are sparkles in the caulking of Steiner’s prose, the nifty granular details and observations that both encourage and reward a careful read. And, finally, it’s a solid theme—right there on page one and right there on page The End. A basic yearning, an essential need for human connection.

Manon Bradshaw is a fascinating cop and person. Person first. For instance—she’ll sleep with a guy just to shut him up. She believes in sniffing—yes, inhaling—her men to discern their good points and bad. She reverts to her “mammalian self” and puts out on first dates to determine as quickly as possible if she’s plucked a good fish from the gene pool.

The story provides ample opportunity for commentary on power, authority, money, immigration, sexuality, race, and the concept of family. More than anything, it’s about family in all its various forms—official and unofficial. It’s about ties, bonds, connections, and finding a home. The final flip of clue-finding is a nifty one that gives Manon a chance to put two seemingly unrelated ideas together. Steiner deftly planted both disparate seeds.

Missing, Presumed is a wonderful, memorable read—first sniff to last.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Page 69 Test: Missing, Presumed.

My Book, The Movie: Missing, Presumed.

--Marshal Zeringue