P. D. James: A Crime Reader's Guide to the Classics | CrimeReads

Labeled "the greatest contemporary writer of classic crime," "the best practitioner of the mystery novel writing today," and "a craftsman with a poet's vision," she was often said by critics to have "transcended" the genre. I have never liked that phrase myself. I've always felt that crime fiction has done quite nicely all by itself, thank you very much, with no need to be "transcended." What is true, though, is that James took the detective novel and helped to refine it, deepen it, amplify it. She liked to compare the form of the traditional detective novel with that of the sonnet-no one claimed that the fourteen lines and strict rhyming scheme of the latter constrained it from becoming great poetry; likewise there was nothing in the contours of the detective novel that kept it from becoming great literature.