2017 book-reading happiness, at least for me: traveling back through time once again

from The Lilly Library at Indiana University, Bloomington

2017 is going to be a fun year for me, at least in terms of reading crime fiction.  In and around current crime novels, and books that have been sitting on my shelves for ages, the big focus this year is on crime fiction/mysteries written up to the beginning of World War I. I'll be including a few crime-fiction precursors here and there, for example, gothic novels, sensation novels, penny dreadfuls, and then move on to full-blown mystery and detective fiction.  I've been scouring all kinds of resources to come up with a list of titles that, in addition to the majority of novels that have been written by male authors, includes early women writers, translated early crime novels, African-American writers, and other diverse authors who contributed to the genre up to the onset of  World War I. There's absolutely no way I can hit every single book, but I'm very happy with my choices so far.

Sit back, relax, and feel free to suggest titles.  And if anyone's tbr pile happens to increase from my reading choices this year, well, then, I'm delighted.