10 of the best crime novels from the Booker Library

In 2010, British academic, author and two-time Booker Prize judge John Sutherland (1999 and 2005) said that submitting a crime novel for the prize was ‘like putting a donkey into the Grand National’. Whether a throwaway quip or an observation on the publishing industry’s prejudices, Sutherland’s comment was likely referencing the long-standing division between so-called ‘literary’ and ‘genre’ fiction, with the latter often dismissed as airport fiction at best – all pace and plot, but supposedly lacking depth.  

But those days are, hopefully, behind us. Not only is crime fiction now the most popular genre among book buyers in the UK, according to Nielsen BookData; but genre boundaries in fiction have become much more fluid. This year alone, two crime-tinged novels – Wild Houses by Colin Barrett and Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner – appear on the longlist.  

In fact, throughout its history, the prize has recognised many novels with criminal themes. The 1972 shortlist included The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith by Thomas Keneally, a tale of one man’s violent killing spree. More recently, 2013’s winning novel, The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton, revolves around a series of crimes, while in 2022’s winning book, The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka, the titular character is tasked with solving his own murder. 

Over the decades, the Booker and International Booker Prize have celebrated numerous novels that venture far into the shadowy corners of human experience, from high-voltage thrillers to psychological noirs and novels that use nefarious events to explore wider societal issues. The list below offers 10 books with both suspense and substance, and reveals just why they captured the attention of Booker Prize judges – and why they’ll linger in your own thoughts, too.  

Snap by Belinda Bauer

A chilling real-life case known as the ‘Riddle of the M50’ – in which 22-year-old Marie Wilks was abducted and murdered in 1988, leaving her young children stranded by a motorway – inspired Belinda Bauer’s harrowing thriller Snap. 

Bauer, hailed as ‘the true heir to the great Ruth Rendell’ by the Mail on Sunday, was haunted by the case and used it as a springboard for her novel. Snap delves beyond the initial tragedy to explore its aftermath, blending fact with fiction, as 11-year-old Jack and his sisters are left waiting in a broken-down car for their mother, who never returns. Three years later, Jack is still in charge, grappling with the trauma of the past while searching for the truth.

The novel made the longlist in 2018, but its inclusion was not without controversy. ‘It’s the sort of commercial fiction that tends to outsell the rest of the longlist put together but which Man Booker judges are supposedly too snotty and set in their literary ways to consider,’ wrote Johanna Thomas-Corr in the New Statesman – but clearly the judging panel did not agree, calling it ‘an acute, stylish, intelligent novel’ that is ‘expertly paced’. Such criticism didn’t prevent the novel from becoming a Sunday Times bestseller and winning the Crime & Thriller Book of the Year at the Specsavers National Book Awards. 

His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet

A series of ‘found’ historical documents form the backbone of Graeme Macrae Burnet’s blood-soaked novel, which pieces together a 19th-century triple murder in a remote crofting community in Scotland. Through court transcripts, medical reports, police statements, and newspaper articles from 1869, we learn about the brutal killing of Lachlan Mackenzie, the tyrannical constable of Culduie, by Roderick Macrae. 

Burnet toys with unreliable narration, offering multiple perspectives that challenge the reader’s perception of truth and justice. The novel, which was shortlisted in 2016, skilfully questions the subjectivity of storytelling, asking us to consider how much we can ever really know about the past.

‘True to the best of crime writing, the genius lies in the story and the way in which the characters react. It may not be a conventional thriller, but it is no less thrilling for that,’ wrote Eileen Battersby in the Irish Times, adding that the author’s ‘gleeful wit frequently surfaces in exchanges between characters that live off the page in a work which conveys not only a sense of period but also of place’. 

Elena Knows by Claudia Piñeiro, translated by Frances Riddle

Growing up in Burzaco, a small town in the province of Buenos Aires, Claudia Piñeiro often witnessed the removal of bodies from the bell tower of the local church, where they had hanged themselves. This haunting image informed the opening of her novel Elena Knows, where an apparent suicide sets off a gripping narrative. The story centres on Elena, an elderly woman crippled by Parkinson’s disease, who refuses to accept the official explanation for her daughter Rita’s death. Although the police deem it a suicide, Elena is convinced it was murder. Determined to uncover the truth, she embarks on a tense and painful journey across Buenos Aires, despite physical limitations.

Piñeiro, who is often hailed as Argentina’s ‘Queen of Crime’, is known for her sharp, socially conscious narratives that explore the underbelly of society. Elena Knows is no exception, offering a psychological depth that has earned her comparisons to the greats, including Alfred Hitchcock. The novel was originally published in Spanish in 2007, and was translated into English by Frances Riddle. It was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize in 2022. 

Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

Based on the crimes of Soviet serial killer Andrei Chikatilo who murdered over 50 children, Child 44 transports readers to the heart of Stalinist Russia in 1953, amid a society where the State insists that crime doesn’t exist. Leo Demidov, an ambitious secret police officer, finds himself in a moral crisis when he uncovers evidence of a child killer at large. To expose the truth, he must risk everything, placing himself in grave personal and professional danger as the regime he serves becomes his greatest threat.

Tom Rob Smith’s novel is not for the faint of heart: expect graphic depictions of both torture and murder. Yet Child 44 is more than just a gory thriller with a psychological edge. It’s a vivid exploration of life under the oppression of post-war Communist Russia, where totalitarian control pushes society to the brink. An international bestseller, Child 44 sold over two million copies, was translated into over 30 languages was longlisted for the Booker in 2008. It went on to win multiple awards, including the ITW 2009 Thriller Award for Best First Novel, and the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award. 

The Light of Day by Graham Swift

Seven years after he bagged a Booker for Last Orders in 1997, Graham Swift turned his pen to The Light of Day, a psychological exploration of a private detective, wrapped up in a murder mystery of sorts. The novel is narrated by George Webb, a former police officer turned detective, whose story unfolds through a fragmented monologue. On a brisk November morning in Wimbledon, we follow George as he sets out to visit Sarah – the love of his life who just happens to be in prison. Presented as a day-in-the-life narrative, the novel gradually reveals the destructive events of two years earlier that led to Sarah’s crime of passion: the murder of her husband’s lover – a crime in which George bears a degree of responsibility. 

Longlisted for the prize in 2003, The Light of Day is not a typical crime novel or murder mystery; it is deliberately slow-paced and pared back. It drip-feeds details of the crime across a non-linear structure, while gradually teasing out the motivations behind it.