V as in Victim

"Originally published in 1945, V as in Victim was the first crime novel to feature ordinary cops as the main characters, launching the subgenre know as 'police procedurals' and earning Lawrence Treat [author] an important place in the history of mysteries (from the Introduction). Main characters are police detective 3rd grade Mitch Taylor and police lab tech Jub Freeman. At this point in time, ordinary police are skeptical of how a lab can aid in solving a crime, but Jub is an enthusiastic scientist and aims to prove the lab's value. Mitch is anxious to solve a big crime so he can get a promotion to 2nd grade. On one night, a hit and run results in a homicide and an interview of a possible witness leads the two men to a 2nd homicide. The book has rich footnotes that help explain police jargon and the specific circumstances of war time New York City.

The New York Times offers a brief review: "The police procedural has been a staple of crime fiction for almost 80 years; racial reckonings and real-life abuses haven’t altered this. It was strangely refreshing to go back to near-first principles with Lawrence Treat’s 1945 novel... Treat’s laconic style clearly foreshadows Ed McBain’s wonderful 87th Precinct series." Good Reads reviews are mixed, with some describing the writing as "reflective and witty" while others call it "dry and factual." Decide for yourself. 

A Line to Kill

As well as being a fan of  his "Foyle's War" and "Midsomer Murders" TV series, I have read 5 other stand-alone mysteries from Anthony Horowitz. In several, we get to see the author himself as a character in the story; this book is the 3rd entry in the "Hawthorne and Horowitz" series, following The Word is Murder and The Sentence is Death. In other books, we get a complete story within a story, e.g., Magpie Murders and Moonflower Murders. Beyond that, he has been a prolific writer with over a dozen books in his teen-targeted "Alex Rider" series alone.

Since I have tired of writing book summaries for now, I chose that offered by Booklist as a reasonable alternative:

"Great Agatha Christie's ghost! PI Hawthorne and novelist Horowitz (the fictional version) are trapped on an island with an eccentric group of writers. The oddly dynamic duo return for their third adventure (after The Sentence Is Death, 2019), and this time they travel together to Alderney, in the Channel Islands, for what is billed as an exclusive literary festival. Turns out, not all that exclusive. A popular blind psychic, a TV chef, an aging children's author, a somewhat tedious historian, and a suspiciously behaved (and plagiaristic) poet round out the talent, along with Horowitz and PI Hawthorne, about whom Horowitz is writing a true-crime book. They find a grim welcome from a place riddled with reminders of its WWII occupation by the Nazis, and also in turmoil over a hotly contested power line that will boost the island's economy but ruin the landscape. The man behind the development is the "uniquely offensive" Charles le Mesurier. When he turns up dead, no one is surprised. Or sorry. Horowitz is a master of misdirection, and his brilliant self-portrayal, wittily self-deprecating, carries the reader through a jolly satire on the publishing world." 

Publishers Weekly called this 3rd installment a "superior" mystery and concludes, "The often prickly relationship between the Watson-like Horowitz and the Holmes-like Hawthorne complements the intricate detective work worthy of a classic golden age whodunit. The author's fans will hope this series has a long run." And Kirkus says the book "reads like a golden-age whodunit on steroids."

Murder of a Lady

This murder mystery was published in 1933 by Anthony Wynne (pseudonym for Robert McNair-Wilson: 1882-1963), a pre-eminent and prolific author of "impossible crime/ locked room" types of mysteries.This book has been republished in the British Library's "Crime Classics" series.  

Physician Dr. Eustace Hailey has also gained some renown as an amateur sleuth with a record of solving tricky crimes and he is called upon while visiting a friend in the Scottish Highlands. The Procurator Fiscal calls upon his host late one night to say that Mary Gregor, the sister of the laird of Duchlan, has been murdered, but was found in a room locked from the inside and inaccessible any other way. Hailey makes a preliminary inspection but is displaced from participation in the investigation when Inspector Dundas is sent from Glasgow. What he does continue to do, however, is look into the life of Mary Gregor, who everyone claims is a saint. As it turns out, her sainthood had a dark side and many people had reason to hate her. That still doesn't explain how she was murdered, but when the first and then a subsequent inspector  are also murdered, Hailey undertakes a risky plan to reveal both the means and the person who committed the crimes. 

Booklist says the murder(s) are "cunningly concocted" and Publishers Weekly concludes, "Those who like black-and-white films, in which ladies and gentlemen dress for dinner and everyone has frightfully good manners, are in for a treat." Kirkus likewise lauds, "This classic British mystery, first published in 1931, has enough complex plotting and red herrings to win a new generation of fans for the largely forgotten Wynne."