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Title details for The Female Detective by Andrew Forrester - Available

The Female Detective

by Andrew Forrester
Gabrielle de Cuir
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available

"Literary ancestor to Miss Marple, Lisbeth Salander, and Nancy Drew."—The Guardian (London)

First published in 1864, decades before there were official female detectives or female police officers in Britain, The Female Detective features the original lady detective: the determined and resourceful Miss Gladden, known as "G." She examines crime scenes incognito, tracks down killers, and solves mysteries employing all manner of skill, subterfuge, and charm to achieve her ends while attempting to conceal her own identity from others.

Miss Gladden's deductive methods and energetic approach anticipate those of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and she can be seen as beginning a powerful tradition of female detectives in these seven short stories. The Female Detective is sure to enchant a new generation of crime fiction fans.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    January 12, 2021

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781799928300
      • File size: 281698 KB
      • Duration: 09:46:52

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      December 16, 2013
      This republication of an 1864 mystery by Forrester (the pseudonym of James Redding Ware), with a heroine "usually regarded as the first professional female detective to appear in fiction," according to Mike Ashley's introduction, has some intriguing elementsâsuch as the discussion of the significance of a dog not barkingâbut these are relatively few. Modern readers may struggle a bit to get through the accounts of seven cases the female PI relates, especially the first and longest one, "Tenant for Life," which centers on the identity of the heir to an estate. Dialect-soaked dialogue can be an obstacle (e.g., "I could not rersist that there thutty poun', bein' at that identkle time werry hard up"), as well as pronouncements by the sleuth that will elicit more head-scratching than awe (e.g., she comments "for that which is not white may fairly be guessed to be of some other colour"). And her prejudices also stand in the way of her being considered astute. In one case, she concludes that a murder must have been committed by "foreigners" because the "percentage of deaths from the use of the knife" by English people is so minimal as to not bear consideration. Many will find that comment, intended to showcase her wisdom, as evidence of the exact opposite: her closed-mindedness.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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