What would have happened if Alaska, rather than Israel, had become the home for the Jewish Diaspora after the Second World War? This is the interesting starting point of Michael Chabon's ever so slightly left-field take on the crime genre. Add in Detective Meyer Landsmann, whose most memorable phrase is the nihilistic “nothing means nothing” and you have the ingredients of fantastic alternative reality crime fiction.

In this alternate history, a murder takes place in the grubby motel in which Detective Landsman lives. Divorced and drowning in the mixed misery of work and alcohol, Meyer quietly investigates the case - that of an Orthodox Jew now heroin addict who was once feted as a chess prodigy and possible new messiah for the Jewish people. Throw in a plan by orthodox gangsters to blow up a place of holiness for Muslims, a half Indian partner and an ex-wife who just happens to be his boss and you have a great read!

James Lee Burke has been writing fiction for around fifty years now, and you may expect someone to slow down a little by now. Not Burke, however! The Tin Roof Blowdown centers on the city of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and is generally acknowledged as his finest work to date.

The plot follows detective Dave Robicheaux through his latest case, which involves torture, murder. Mobsters, addicted priests, stolen jewels all appear and a psycho is thrown in for good measure too. On top of this there is the rage that Burke felt about the destruction of New Orleans by Katrina and this informs the tone of the novel. A stunning piece of work which explores the grey areas between the black and the white of everyday life, this deeply humane novel will have you gripped.

You may remember the detective Ezekiel Porterhouse Rawlins in the film Devil in a Blue Dress. Mosley published that novel in 1990 - and set it in the melting pot that was 1940s San Francisco. “Easy” had returned from the horrors of the Second World War and Mosley used him there as the foundation stone for what became a series of novels based around the character. As well as gripping crime stories, Mosley gives us an insight in to how issues of race and gender were dealt with way back then.

Cinnamon Kiss is set in 1966 and is the tenth in the series. In the aftermath of the Watt's riot, the novel finds Easy contemplating a robbery to fund his daughter's much needed operation. In the nick of time his old friend, the PI Saul Lynx contacts him for a case that will take the pair to San Francisco. This thrilling read combines the shocks you would expect with a social conscience - and a real understanding of our recent social history - that sets it apart from much crime fiction.

Not one, but three stories rolled together to make your summer vacation of one blood and gore - if only on the written page! In this, Ellroy introduces his gripping, flawed anti-hero, Detective Sergeant Lloyd Hopkins. Anti-hero is not quite the word! Hopkins is reactionary, he is racist and he is sexually obsessed. An unlikable protagonist, sure, but it is this character that drives the stories forward with a pent up fury that will leave you breathless on occasion.

This will be a good introduction to the works of Ellroy. Although not as suspenseful and substantial as his later LA Quartet series, this is a gentler introduction to the new reader. The LA setting - the noir city of noir cities - makes the thrill of the ride even greater. You will not like the character Hopkins, but that was never the intention - and by avoiding this he has created space for himself within the pantheon of great writers of crime fiction.

A feline sleuth by a female author, how very equal opportunities! Not so, this is not an inclusion of the “better had” school as Douglas stands out as a novelist because of the quality of her writing. However, her books take some beating in terms of their general silliness and believe me this is not a criticism!

I had better get this straight before I go on. The hero of this book is a twenty pound cat who goes by the name of Midnight Louie. Do I need to repeat that? His occasional owner, Temple Barr (geddit?) is a petite, cute, adorable redhead. Together they kookily solve crime in Las Vegas. Those of you who do not believe that this book itself is a crime against the genre will delight in its frivolity. Plus, it's the first of a series, so there's plenty more kitty for you to devour if you want more.

Fire Sale is, unbelievably, the twelfth novel featuring the Polish-American female Private Investigator PI Warshawski. Set on the mean streets of Chicago, don't worry if you haven't read the other eleven as this novel works perfectly well as a stand alone story. Astonishingly, considering the longevity of the character and the series itself, this is a very fresh and enjoyable read.

In this story, V.I takes over the coaching of the girls' basketball team at her old high school. Don't be fooled by the “Kindergarten Cop” premise - this is a gritty and solid read. Through one of the kids at the High School, V.I. becomes embroiled in a local plot to sabotage a local manufacturing plant. The human side of detective fiction, this multi-layered novel will have you sitting on the edge of your seat as you read!

If you like both historical and crime genres of novels, why not combine them both, which is exactly what Louis Bayard's brilliant The Pale Blue Eye does. Bayard's previous novel imagined Tiny Tim, the Dickens character from A Christmas Carol as a young adult. Here he does something similar, with Edgar Allen Poe as a West Point Cadet (true, in real life!) striding around!

The year is 1830 and Gus Landor, a retired New York City detective is retired and living in Hudson Valley. However, his peace and his (unspecified) sorrow are interrupted when he summoned to West Point to investigate a particularly brutal set of goings on. Is there some sort of satanic cult operating inside the famous military academy? Further horrors occur and Landor and Poe are left the only ones who can possibly solve the mystery.

I think of this novel as a kind of modern update of Oliver Twist, only without Oliver. Allow me explain. The central character is a young orphan called Lionel, one of four recruits to the detective agency of a certain Frank Minna. Minna was at one point in his life a hoodlum, but turned his hand to solving crime rather than committing it. SO he is the Fagin figure here, as it were!

When one of the four boys, the “Minna Men” as they call themselves, is murdered, Lionel determines to track down his murder. The twist to the story is that Lionel has Tourette's syndrome. The great thing for him, though, is that the majority of people think that he is stupid rather than simply the owner of a disability. This sounds as if the book may be a little exploitative, but it is not. Compassionate and affirming in turns, the novel is truly one of a kind.

Although written in 1925, The House Without A Key is still an iconic piece of crime literature, being as it is the book in which Charlie Chan makes his first appearance. Chan does not make too great an appearance in the book, possibly to do with the fact that he has a wife and fourteen (yes, fourteen) children to look after.

The plot centers on the murder of a member of Boston's elite society, who having live in Hawaii for a number of years, is murdered there. Queue the entrance of the nephew of the victim, a rather straight-laced young lawyer called John Quincy Winterslip. Chan and Winterslip work out who is the killer at the same time and it is Winterslip who gets the credit. This may be pandering to racial stereotypes of the time, but this novel is very progressive for its time. The visitors from Boston find it impossible to trust a Chinese-American detective, Biggers portrays Chan as very much an equal to his WASP contemporaries.

Murder, corruption and lies, what better elements for a ripping good read while on vacation? GM Ford, who wrote the Leo Waterman mystery novels, has written a tour de force in the novel “Fury”. He also introduces to not one but two new investigators - solving crime in the sound and fury of modern day Seattle.

Frank Corso is an ex-journalist who was sacked for supposedly making up the facts on a story while working for the New York Times. Photographer Meg Dougherty is his more than able (unpaid) assistant. When a woman admits to the fact that her testimony in a trial eight years previously was a pack of lies she turns to the pair to help. The person found guilty, Walter Himes is wanted dead by everybody and his execution is only six days away. This thrilling ride of a novel follows the pair can change public opinion - which resolutely seems not to want to be changed.