Five Fabulous Fictional Female Sleuths

Since Edgar Allan Poe kicked off the genre in 1841 with "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", mystery stories have featured, for the most part, male detectives from the Golden Age to the pulp fiction of the 30's and 40's all the way to the present day.

But there have been several wonderful examples of female sleuths that forged new ground and graced the printed page. Here are just a few...

Miss Marple (author Agatha Christie)

Agatha Christie first introduced Miss Jane Marple in the short story, "The Tuesday Night Club" in December 1927. Her first novel was "The Murder in the Vicarage" in 1930 and her last was "Sleeping Murders" in 1976.

At first, the character was a fussy busybody who took a dim view of most people (and was right most of the time) and was not well-liked, but over the span of her novels and short stories, she grew into a more benevolent and helpful character. Miss Christie liked Miss Marple much better than her other series character, Hercule Peroit, who she grew to detest and by 1960 called him "an egocentric creep".

All of Agatha Christie's works can be found on her Amazon Author page here.

Nancy Drew (various authors writing under the pen name "Carolyn Keene")

Nancy Drew was created by Edward Stratemeyer in 1930 as a counterpart to his highly successful "Hardy Boys" series. Four titles were published in 1930 and were an immediate success. Fortune magazine noted in 1934:

"Nancy is the greatest phenomenon among all the fifty-centers. She is a best seller. How she crashed a Valhalla that had been rigidly restricted to the male of her species is a mystery even to her publishers."

The original Nancy Drew of the early books was authoritative and frequently outspoken. Most of these stories were written by Mildred Benson and the feisty spirit she imbued Nancy with was much to the chagrin of Stratemeyer, who thought she was "much too flip, and would never be well-received."

Not only was she well-received, she has endured to the present day in countless books, comics, TV shows, movies and computer games.

Nancy Drew books can be found on Amazon here.

V. I. Warshawski - Sara Paretsky

Sara Paretsky was born in Ames, Iowa and moved to Kansas in 1951. She graduated from the University of Kansas with a bachelor's degree in Political Science and eventually got her Ph.D from the University of Chicago in History.

All but two of her twenty-one novels feature V.I. Warshawski and are typically set in Chicago. Paretsky is credited with transforming the role and image of women in the mystery genre, who beforehand, were mainly seen as either vamps or victims.

Warshawski is an intelligent, sarcastic and outspoken person, who doesn't shy away from physical confrontation, relying on her knowledge of karate and her skill with a Smith and Wesson semi-automatic. She is drawn to cases usually involving white collar crime, particularly if she feels the victims are being bullied in some way, by Chicago's powerful and elite.

Sara Paretsky's books can be found on Amazon here.

Kinsey Millhone - Sue Grafton

Sue Grafton wrote the popular "Alphabet" series featuring former police officer turned private investigator Kinsey Millhone. Born and raised in Kentucky and relocated to California, Grafton used a fictionalized version of Santa Barbara, CA, that was called Santa Teresa.

She wrote in a hard-boiled style reminiscent of Ross McDonald, whom she admired. Kinsey was generally disinsterested in her appearance, but was very invested in her fitness, jogging three miles a day. Intelligence and independance were packed into her 5 foot two frame and she made the most of it, relentlessly investigating her cases until they were resolved.

Her adventures span several short stories and 25 novels. The 26th and last novel in the series, "Z is for Zero", was unfortunately never written. Miss Grafton passed away before she could begin writing it.

Precious Ramotswe - Alexander McCall Smith

Alexander McCall Smith was born in Zimbabwe and now lives in Scotland. He is a very prolific writer, having written 21 in his "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency" series so far and it being only one of the other seven series he writes. He was also, until 2006, a professor of medical law at the University of Edinburgh. He now devotes all his time to writing.

The first novel of the series introduces Precious Ramotswe, who begins the first detective agency in Botswana, after her father dies. She hires a secretary and solves cases for her clients. The books are not sure much about solving mystries as they are the adventures and foibles of different characters. The books are filled with deceptively simple writing, but which carry a lot of insight and wisdom.

All of Alexander McCall Smith's books are available on Amazon here.

Bonus : Kimber Cassidy - Kevin Plumb

As a bonus entry, I would like to mention my entry in the female detective genre. A series now comprising of two books so far, the Kimber Cassidy Mysteries have garnered many five-star reviews.

Kimber resides and solves crime in the midwestern town of East Alton, as a private eye. Her father, having been killed in the line of duty when Kimber was sixteen, heavily influenced her and she works constantly to make him proud.

Big, beautiful and brilliant, she can also be impulsive and perhaps a little reckless, but no matter what, she works with determination to bring justice to whatever case she's working on.

The Kimber Cassidy Mysteries can be found on Amazon here.