Detective story lovers drink champagne today

Today, 20th April in 1841 Edgar Allen Poe`s story the Murders in the Rue Morgue was published. This tale is considered to be the first detective story.

Following the publication of Poe's story, detective stories began to grow into novels and English novelist Wilkie Collins published a detective novel, The Moonstone, in 1868. In Collins' story, the methodical Sergeant Cuff searches for the criminal who stole a sacred Indian moonstone. The novel includes several features of the typical modern mystery, including red herrings, false alibis, and climactic scenes.
The greatest fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, first appeared in 1887, in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel A Study in Scarlet. The cozy English mystery novel became popularized with Agatha Christie's Miss Marple series in the 1920s, when other detectives like Lord Peter Wimsey and Ellery Queen were also becoming popular. In the 1930s, sometimes called the golden age of detective stories, the noir detective novel became the mainstay of writers like Dashiell Hammet, Raymond Chandler, and Mickey Spillane. Tough female detectives such as Kinsey Millhone and V.I. Warshawski became popular in the 1980s. [via History.com]

I have to admit, I haven`t read any of Poe`s stories, but I have read almost all Doyle`s and Christie`s stories. I loved Sherlock Holmes, but I can`t say the same about Miss Marple, Erquile Puaro I liked much more. Although these are old stories I still think that those writers are one of the best detective writers ever. In modern detective stories I can usually guess the guilty person in first 50-100 pages, but in these old stories I`m kept in obscurity till the end pages.