After months of preparation, it was on a rainy morning on May 4 (and we’re talking rain from California to London, folks, with a soggy Pennsylvania in-between!) that three mystery nerds scholars gathered together, albeit virtually, to play a game that would determine which titles from the Golden Age of Detection were, according to Sergio, Nick and Brad, the greatest of all time!!! Did we come up with a definitive list?!?

Well . . . no, not really. But has that ever stopped anyone from trying to make a “Best of” list??? And can anyone say, when they gaze upon the finished product, that we didn’t select some damn good books?

HERE’S HOW WE DID IT . . .

We borrowed the structure of the film podcast The Big Picture by creating a grid of categories particular to the Golden Age of Detecdtion.  We chose thirteen categories because thirteen seems like an appropriate number when you’re talking about mysterious things. The object was for each of us to draft a list of thirteen greats; the order of how we would draft was determined randomly and ended up thusly: Drafter One was Brad, Drafter Two was Nick, and Drafter Three was Sergio. We followed this order: A-B-C-C-B-A-A-B-C-C. . . and so on, until all thirty-nine titles were placed. (At the end of this post, you can see the order in which each book was drafted.)

Ultimately, each list depended upon the taste and reading experience of each drafter. The three of us have certain interests in common and certain places where we diverge. Each drafter’s objective was to create the BEST LIST OF THIRTEEN CLASSIC MYSTERIES among the group. The strategy of the game comes from which category drafters choose to select during the game. If, for example, there is a particular title or author that seems a shoo-in for a certain category, a drafter might select that category early in the game.

We were limited by two rules:

1. Once an author was placed in a category, no other books by that author could be placed in the same category. (Other places on the list were fair game.)
2. Once a title was placed on a list, it could not be drafted again in a different category.

PERFECTION ELUDED US BECAUSE . . .

We’re going to acknowledge this right away. And here is why:

1. The response to any work of art is personal. Trying to convince all of you that our list encompasses the best of GAD fiction is impossible – we couldn’t even agree with each other!

• Our list is limited by so many things, not least of which was the limited number of categories and slots (only thirteen per person) that we had to fill). Sometimes you may look at a title and agree that it certainly represents the best of its category. Other times you’ll scratch your head: when that happens, you’re simply dealing with a clash in taste.

• Our rules gave us structure, but they also limited our selection of the best. Let’s take, as one example, the category of Locked Room Mystery. The author who immediately comes to mind, of course, is John Dickson Carr. Among the seventy novels he wrote, you might expect to find at least a dozen on any “Best Locked Room Mystery” list. We all knew that, and we all came up with ideas for titles we would like to put in our slot.

However, the rules state that an author can be placed in any given category only once. The first person to place Carr on the list will be the only person to do so. Fortunately, we found four other categories where he could be placed, and so you will find five Carr titles on the list. However, in the end we had to acknowledge that some of the very best Carr titles were nowhere to be found on our list.

• We were limited by our personal tastes and reading experiences, by our supposition of what the others would play, and by our subjective views of what constitute “the best.” Often, we substituted “favorite” for best; hence, there is admittedly too much Christie on the list. How I wish I could have found a place for Erle Stanley Gardner. But Perry Mason fits best in the Legal Mystery category, and Cool and Lamb are hardboiled. But there was no Legal Mystery category, and there was no way A.A. Fair was going to supplant my choice for Best Hardboiled Private Eye.

How poised was I to put a Tey – either Miss Pym Disposes or The Franchise Affair in, respectively, the Eccentric Sleuth and the Village Mystery categories. Franchise, particularly, is an excellent example, showing the dark side of village life when natives stand against outsiders. But I had to do what I did.

Okay, enough build-up. Here, then, is our final list, Brad’s, Nick’s and Sergio’s Top Thirteen placed side by side by side:

In the end, we had a fun-filled few hours talking about the books we had picked (and mourning a few titles we had to leave off). Sergio, in particular, is a font of information about certain authors. By the end, Nick was committed to giving Raymond Chandler a try, and I felt the same way about Georges Simenon. I’d like to think that each of our lists gave the others some great future reading material!

And, of course we all wondered what you all would think of the list as it stands. Vote in the poll above for YOUR favorite drafter, and in the comments below, we would love to hear your general thoughts. Which titles are you happy to find here, and which are you shocked to find missing? And – best of all, because that’s really what we’re doing here – which book do you think you might pick up in the near future? Even if you hate all the lists, we’re excited to get a conversation started!

Meanwhile, we’re already toying with ideas for what draft the three of us will do next. In the summer, we might tackle a certain classic TV favorite. And in January, we’re looking to celebrate the centennial of a famous – and famously controversial – detective.

Now we’ll leave you . . . in suspense!!!

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ADDENDUM: THE DRAFT ORDER

Believe it or not, this was a strategy game. I can’t go into every move – frankly, I was too busy writing things down and making some last-minute decisions of my own to take notes on everybody’s reasoning. As an example, however, I began with the Queen title because I knew that this would be at least one other drafter’s first choice (turns out it was both!) Nick stole Green for Danger from me – but then it allowed me to draft one of the lesser-known (but truly wonderful) titles on my list. And Sergio was the lucky cuss to play Archie Goodwin as the best Watson (well, he is!), but it gave me a chance to do something rather clever with the “Watson” category.

Anyway, the draft order follows:

1. Brad picked Cat of Many Tails as Serial Killer Mystery
2. Nick picked The A.B.C. Murders as Serial Killer Mystery
3. Sergio picked My Friend Maigret as Mystery Solved by a Policeman
4. Sergio picked The Bishop Murder Case by S. S. Van Dine as Big House Mystery
5. Nick picked Green for Danger by Christianna Brand as Wartime Mystery
6. Brad picked Crooked House by Agatha Christie as Big House Mystery
7. Brad picked Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett as Hardboiled Mystery
8. Nick picked The Hollow Man (a.k.a The Three Coffins) as Locked Room Mystery
9. Sergio picked The League of Frightened Gentlemen by Rex Stout as Watson Mystery
10. Sergio picked Death Walks in Eastrepps as Village Mystery
11. Nick picked The Case of the Constant Suicides by John Dickson Carr as Comic Mystery
12. Brad picked The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie as Watson Mystery
13. Brad picked The Honjin Murders by Seishi Yokomizo as Locked Room Mystery
14. Nick picked Double Indemnity by James M. Cain as Hardboiled Mystery
15. Sergio picked The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler as Hardboiled Mystery
16. Sergio picked The Screaming Mimi by Fredric Brown as Twist Ending
17. Nick picked Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie as Eccentric Sleuth Mystery
18. Brad picked And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie as Mystery by a Queen of Crime
19. Brad picked The Burning Court by John Dickson Carr as Twist Ending
20. Nick picked The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers as Village Mystery
21. Sergio picked The Red Right Hand by Joel Townsley Rogers as Wild Card
22. Sergio picked The Moving Toyshop by Edmund Crispin as Eccentric Sleuth Mystery
23. Nick picked Death of a Ghost by Margery Allingham as Mystery by a Queen of Crime
24. Brad picked A Murder Is Announced by Agatha Christie as Village Mystery
25. Brad picked Swan Song by Edmund Crispin as Best Comic Mystery
26. Nick picked The Siamese Twin Mystery by Ellery Queen as Watson Mystery
27. Sergio picked Death from a Top Hat by Clayton Rawson as Locked Room Mystery
28. Sergio picked Murder Must Advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers as Mystery by a Queen of Crime
29. Nick picked Towards Zero by Agatha Christie as Mystery Solved by a Policeman
30. Brad picked Death of Jezebel by Christianna Brand as Eccentric Sleuth Mystery
31. Brad picked The Birthday Murder by Lange Lewis as Mystery Solved by a Policeman
32. Nick picked Final Curtain by Ngaio Marsh as Big House Mystery
33. Sergio picked Nine and Death Makes Ten by John Dickson Carr as Wartime Mystery
34. Sergio picked X. vs. Rex (a.k.a. Mystery of the Dead Police) by Philip MacDonald as Serial Killer Mystery
35. Nick picked Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie as Twist Ending
36. Brad picked Blue Murder by Harriet Rutland as Wartime Mystery
37. Brad picked The Poisoned Chocolates Case by Anthony Berkeley as Wild Card
38. Nick picked He Who Whispers by John Dickson Carr as Wild Card
39. Sergio picked Case for Three Detectives by Leo Bruce as Comic Mystery