Halloween Bingo: Vintage Mysteries

This is a newish square for 2021. There was a suggestion from fellow blogger and long-standing HB player, Themis-Athena for a Golden Age Mystery square, or a Queens of Crime square, to focus on Agatha Christie & some of her contemporaries. Vintage mysteries is a journey(wo)man square that can take on all of the roles above. In order to qualify, the mystery must have been published prior to 1975. 

I read so much vintage mystery that I have endless possibilities for this square:

Peril at End House by Agatha Christie is the Appointment with Agatha group read for the month of September, and Lord Edgware Dies is the group read for October, so either of those can stand in here.

In addition, I’ve been really into the Inspector Littlejohn mysteries recently, which are available through the Kindle Unlimited library, or possibly a Maigret. My library has what appears to be a complete collection of the new Penguin translations available as kindle books for online checkout. I have been reading one or two of these a month in no particular order. I also have a near complete collection of the 87th Precinct mysteries, by Ed McBain – I’m up to Give the Boys a Great Big Hand, first published in 1960.

While this is a new square, I have read a number of vintage mysteries in years past for other squares, including:

2016:

  • Death in the Tunnel by Miles Burton (Genre: Mystery)
  • Hallowe’en Party by Agatha Christie (Pumpkin)
  • The Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston Leroux (Locked Room Mystery)

2017:

  • Behold, Here’s Poison by Georgette Heyer (Cozy Mystery)
  • Hickory Dickory Dock by Agatha Christie (Terrifying Women)
  • The Moving Finger by Agatha Christie (Terror in a Small Town)
  • Brat Farrar by Josephine Tey (Murder Most Foul)
  • The Bride Wore Black by Cornell Woolrich (Classic Noir)

2018:

  • The Mystery of the Blue Train by Agatha Christie (Terrifying Women)
  • The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie (13)
  • Penhallow by Georgette Heyer (Country House Mystery)

2019:

  • The Cat Among the Pigeons by Agatha Christie (Dark Academia)
  • The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allen Poe (Classic Horror)
  • The Hollow by Agatha Christie (Country House Mystery)

2020:

  • Dead Man’s Folly by Agatha Christie (Country House Mystery)
  • The Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie (International Woman of Mystery)(yes, I apparently have read this TWICE for Halloween Bingo)
  • The Three Coffins by John Dickson Carr (Grave or Graveyard)
  • The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie (wildcard)
  • Corpse at the Carnival by George Bellairs (Creepy Carnivals)

If you didn’t already know, I am a huge Agatha Christie fan. Not only does she figure prominently in all of my past Halloween bingos (as she will again, I’m sure), but she is without question the author I have read the most throughout my life as a reader.

2 comments

  1. I like the Vintage Mystery label better than the Golden Age label. It nods to the age of the books and the generational differences and the longevity of their appeal without the implied they-can’t-write-them-like-that-any-more judgement.

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