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- Subclass of
- crime literature
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- Category:Crime novels
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- Crime fiction
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Encyclopedic overview
Sherlock Holmes (foreground) oversees the arrest of a criminal; this hero of crime fiction popularized the genre.
Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, crime novel, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives or fiction that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, often a murder. Most crime drama focuses on criminal investigation and does not feature the courtroom. Suspense and mystery are key elements that are nearly ubiquitous to the genre.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “crime novel” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.