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mystery

(Encyclopedia)mystery or mystery story, literary genre in which the cause (or causes) of a mysterious happening, often a crime, is gradually revealed by the hero or heroine; this is accomplished through a mixture o...

mystery play

(Encyclopedia)mystery play: see miracle play.

detective story

(Encyclopedia)detective story: see mystery.

mysteries

(Encyclopedia)mysteries, in Greek and Roman religion, some important secret cults. The conventional religions of both Greeks and Romans were alike in consisting principally of propitiation and prayers for the good ...

Dexter, Colin

(Encyclopedia)Dexter, Colin (Norman Colin Dexter), 1930–2017, English mystery novelist, b. Stamford, Lincolnshire. He as a classics teacher in secondary schools until deafness forced him to find a new career; he ...

Rinehart, Mary Roberts

(Encyclopedia)Rinehart, Mary Roberts rīnˈhärt [key], 1876–1958, American novelist, b. Pittsburgh. A graduate nurse, she married Dr. Stanley M. Rinehart in 1896. The first of her many mystery stories, The Circu...

Macdonald, Ross

(Encyclopedia)Macdonald, Ross, pseud. of Kenneth Millar, 1915–83, American novelist, b. Los Gatos, Calif. He was educated in Canada and at the Univ. of Michigan. Macdonald's mystery novels center on the tough but...

Francis, Dick

(Encyclopedia)Francis, Dick (Richard Stanley Francis), 1920–2010, English novelist. He was a champion steeplechase jockey (1946–57) and a racing writer for a London newspaper (1957–73). Francis parlayed his k...

Spillane, Mickey

(Encyclopedia)Spillane, Mickey (Frank Morrison Spillane), 1918–2006, American mystery writer, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. After contributing stories to comic books and pulp magazines, Spillane wrote his first novel, I, the...

James, P. D.

(Encyclopedia)James, P. D. (Phyllis Dorothy James White, Baroness James of Holland Park), 1920–2014, English mystery novelist, b. Oxford. From 1964 to 1979 she worked in the forensic science and criminal law divi...