the 4 queens of crime - when women ruled murder mysteries

Growing up I consumed a lot of Agatha Christie novels - but I met my favorite author from the "locked room mystery" genre when I was a junior or senior in high school - Ngaio Marsh.

She was born in New Zealand and split time between there and London. She wrote 32 crime novels and was considered along with Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, and Margery Allingham one of the "Queens of Crime." Women novelists dominated the genre in the 20s and 30s. (They don't do too bad today either.)

Marsh's most famous character was Inspector Roderick Alleyn. Circling back to read A Man Lay Dead took me back to a different era of entertainment, when even murder was polite and almost wholesome! Alleyn was smart and witty but didn't have the noire edge of a Spade and Marlowe "across the pond" as mysteries and all genres became more "modern" and heroes were shown with all their flaws.