Draft:Outline of crime fiction

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to crime fiction:

Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, often a murder. Most crime drama focuses on criminal investigation and does not feature the courtroom. Suspense and mystery are key elements that are nearly ubiquitous to the genre.

Crime fiction can be described as all of the following:

• Fiction – Narrative with imaginary elements.
  • Genre fiction – Fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre.
• Genre – Category of creative works based on stylistic and/or thematic criteria.

• Detective fiction –
  • police procedural –
  • Puzzle mystery –
• Cozy mystery – sub-genre of crime fiction in which sex and violence occur offstage, the detective is an amateur sleuth, and the crime and detection take place in a small, socially intimate community.
• Historical whodunit – Also a subgenre of Historical fiction.
• Legal thriller – crime fiction genre that focuses on the proceedings of the investigation, with particular reference to the impacts on courtroom proceedings and the lives of characters.
• Caper story – subgenre of crime fiction in which the story involves one or more crimes (especially thefts, swindles, or occasionally kidnappings) perpetrated by the main characters in full view of the reader.
• City mystery –
• Domestic Noir –
• Girl detective –

• Chinese crime fiction
  • Gong'an fiction
• Kenyan crime fiction

• List of police television dramas

History of crime fiction

• List of crime writers
  • List of Asian crime fiction writers
  • List of detective fiction authors