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A Companion to Crime Fiction
Edited by Charles J. Rzepka and Lee Horsley
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Book Presentation:
A Companion to Crime Fiction presents the definitive guide to this popular genre from its origins in the eighteenth century to the present day
• A collection of forty-seven newly commissioned essays from a team of leading scholars across the globe make this Companion the definitive guide to crime fiction
• Follows the development of the genre from its origins in the eighteenth century through to its phenomenal present day popularity
• Features full-length critical essays on the most significant authors and film-makers, from Arthur Conan Doyle and Dashiell Hammett to Alfred Hitchcock and Martin Scorsese exploring the ways in which they have shaped and influenced the field
• Includes extensive references to the most up-to-date scholarship, and a comprehensive bibliography
About the authors:
Charles J. Rzepka is Professor of English at Boston University, where he teaches and writes on British Romanticism, popular culture, and detective and crime fiction. His publications include The Self as Mind (1986), Sacramental Commodities (1995), Detective Fiction (2005), Essays, Inventions, Interventions (2010), and most recently, Being Cool: The Work of Elmore Leonard (2013; pbk 2017). Lee Horsley is a retired Reader in Literature and Culture at Lancaster University, where she taught two specialist crime courses. Her publications include Political Fiction and the Historical Imagination (1990), Fictions of Power in English Literature 1900-1950 (1995), Twentieth-Century Crime Fiction (2005), and an expanded paperback edition of the 2001 publication The Noir Thriller (2009).
Press Reviews:
"Including a helpful introduction by Rzepka and conclusion by both editors, the volume is a welcome addition to the impressive "Blackwell Companion to Literature and Culture" series and to scholarship on crime and detective literature. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals; general readers. " (Choice, 1July 2011)
"Whilst the editors admit that the collection is not entirely representative (there is no mention of Japanese manga, for instance, or any consideration of hybrids of crime and science fiction), this companion offers an encyclopaedic account of crime fiction and its generic cross-fertilisations, and is an essential guide for students and scholars alike." (Routledge ABES, 2011)
"This substantial and informative book covers a wide variety of themes within the genre and also a long time span from the eighteenth century to the present . . . It will give all aficionados of the genre hours of enjoyment. It is indeed a trusty companion that will entertain and add to our knowledge." (Reference Reviews, 2011)
"It will give all aficionados of the genre hours of enjoyment. It is indeed a trusty companion that will entertain and add to our knowledge." (Languages & Literature, 2011)
"Several of the contributors praise books and authors long out of print. Hopefully, this companion will encourage readers and librarians to hunt them down and enjoy." (Book News, 1 March 2011)
"In all, despite its shortcomings in terms of narratology and a few logical inconsistencies, Rzepka and Horsley's Companion to Crime Fiction offers a broad-ranging and well-argued introduction to this field of popular culture. Beginning students will certainly profit from its thematic diversity and wide historical reach." (Kult Online, 2011)
"A Companion to Crime Fiction goes into enormous detail but is reasonably easy to read. It is not an academic-styled book but a guide to how crime fiction has developed over time to accommodate an increasingly demanding audience/reader. With essays from some of the most educated scholars in this field of research, the reader gains a greater understanding in terms of a general overview of the genre, individual authors and producers of film, the blurred lines between crime fiction and other genres and an in depth, well researched analysis of crime fiction itself." (M/C Reviews, November 2010)
See the publisher website: Wiley-Blackwell
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