Addresses and Abodes, Famous
Detective fiction is known for its world-famous sleuths; many of them have homes that are equally vivid, inspiring devoted readers to visit their probable or known real locales. The most ...
Adler, Irene
Although she appears in just one story in the Sherlock Holmes Canon, Irene Adler is perhaps the most famous woman in detective fiction. The only woman to dupe Holmes, Adler ...
Adventurer and Adventuress
An adventurer is a thrill seeker who engages in dangerous and exciting experiences or a person who is willing to take risks to make (sometimes unscrupulous) gains. Courageous thrill seekers ...
Albert Campion
Originally envisioned as a secondary character, Albert Campion arrived somewhat inadvertently as the hero of Margery Allingham's detective fiction. The intended hero of The Crime at Black Dudley ...
Anna Katharine Green
(1846–1935), American author, frequently denominated as the “mother of the detective novel.”Green was born in Brooklyn Heights, New York, to a family that traced colonial New England forebears on ...
anti-hero
A central character in a narrative or drama who lacks the admirable qualities of fortitude, courage, honesty, and decency that are usually possessed by traditional heroes. Examples include Alex in A ...
Archetypal Characters
“Archetype” has historically referred in common usage to an original pattern such as one used by an artisan as a model for reproduction. Adopted by the psychoanalyst Carl Jung as ...
Armchair Detective
Is a phrase that describes a type of fictional detective who solves crimes solely on the basis of secondhand information, rather than through personal observation of evidence. The first example ...
arson
N.The intentional or reckless destruction or damaging of property by fire without a lawful excuse. There are two forms of arson corresponding to the two forms of criminal damage in the Criminal ...
Art and Antiques Milieu
Many authors have found the art and antiques milieu appealing because of the opportunity it can offer for the use of a historically rich setting; thus, Timothy Holme draws upon ...
Arthur B. Reeve
(1880–1936), American writer of mystery novels, short stories, and screenplays, principally about Craig Kennedy, a character often referred to as “the American Sherlock Holmes,” a professor of ...
Arthur Conan Doyle
(1859–1930),is chiefly remembered for his creation of the amateur detective Sherlock Holmes, whose brilliant solutions to a wide variety of crimes began in A Study in Scarlet (1887) and continued ...
Arthur Morrison
(1863–1945),novelist, whose ‘realist’ tales of East End life in London were first published in Macmillan's Magazine and later collected as Tales of Mean Streets (1894). He is chiefly remembered for ...
Atmosphere
When the physical attributes of a place are selected by a writer to depict or mirror a psychological environment, atmosphere is created. In order to establish the atmosphere, or surrounding ...
audience participation
1. Any active involvement of audience members in a live public performance, whether or not planned as part of the performance.2. The involvement of audience members in a broadcast programme—primarily ...
Aviation Milieu
Powered heavier-than-air flight dates only from 1903, about the time Sherlock Holmes retired from active practice. It did not take long for aviation to appear in the pages of crime fiction.[...]
Baker Street Irregulars
The gang of street urchins who appear in three of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and who are used by Holmes for carrying messages and maintaining surveillance on suspected persons; Holmes lived at 221b ...
Canon
The sixty published cases of Sherlock Holmes, written by Arthur Conan Doyle, comprise a body of work known to fans and scholars as the Canon. Four of the works are novels and fifty-six are short ...
characterization
The representation of persons in narrative and dramatic works. This may include direct methods like the attribution of qualities in description or commentary, and indirect (or ‘dramatic’) methods ...
Charlie Chan
Fictional Chinese-American detective working for the Honolulu police force, created by the American writer Earl Derr Biggers (1884–1933).
