Last Act in Palmyra

Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalises crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from... mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred. It has several sub-genres, including detective fiction , legal thriller, courtroom drama and hard-boiled fiction. While the archetype for a murder mystery dates back to "The Three Apples" in the One Thousand and One Nights, crime fiction began to be considered as a serious genre only around 1900. The earliest known crime novel is "The Rector of Veilbye" by the Danish author Steen Steensen Blicher, published in 1829. Better known are the earlier dark works of Edgar Allan Poe , " The Mystery of Marie Roget " , and "The Purloined Letter" . Wilkie Collins' epistolary novel The Woman in White was published in 1860, while The Moonstone is often thought to be his masterpiece. French author Émile Gaboriau's Monsieur Lecoq laid the groundwork for the methodical, scientifically minded detective.
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