FAILED TO COMPLETE

The Smooth Criminals 2012 Challenge, hosted by Ben at Dead End Follies is a mystery reading challenge with an edge. Participants are required to read only eight books this year, one in each of the following categories.

For those unfamiliar with the tougher mysteries, the distinctions between genres can be fine. One of Ben’s goals was to make us do some research – and that’s what I did.

So the categories and my choices are:

1. Hardboiled Classic (Wikipedia: Hardboiled crime fiction is a literary style, most commonly associated with detective stories, distinguished by the unsentimental portrayal of violence and sex.): One Lonely Night by Mickey Spillane

2. Noir Classic (Wikipedia: Noir fiction is the name sometimes given to a mode of crime fiction regarded as a subset of the hardboiled style. (…) In this sub-genre, the protagonist is usually not a detective, but instead either a victim, a suspect, or a perpetrator. He is someone tied directly to the crime, not an outsider called to solve or fix the situation.): Mildred Pierce by James M. Cain

3. You Got Nothing Coming: Notes From a Prison Fish by Jimmy Lerner

4. Book written by a writer who did time: The Big Gold Dream by Chester Himes

5. A book with a Psychopath protagonist: In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

6. Classic Gothic fiction: The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

7. Non-Crime Book where the plot revolves around crime: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

8. The “Why the hell am I doing this to myself?” book: Promise Me Eternity by Ian Fox