Detective books set in London - suggestions needed quite urgently please?

[WandaWitch]

My elderly Dad is on his own and is stuck in more at the moment due to the weather/cold. He likes reading, but has a very limited type of book that he likes which is only murder/detective stories set in London. He's read all the Peter James, all Kimberely Chambers, all Kath Staincliffe, J Jackson Bentley, all Kim Hunter, all Jesse Keane and all of Lynda La Plante (the only non London author he likes). He has now finished his latest book and is without anything to read and it is getting him down, he gets quite low when his routine is out - he sits to read every evening, his day is very structured, it's the way he copes with being on his own. I have tried a whole range of other suggestions, of books/authors but they're not right. He won't read thrillers just crime/detective and it has to be set in and around London. He's just been on the phone to me again, getting quite upset over this. I know it sounds extreme but it really is a big deal to him, he's never been diagnosed etc. but I suspect he is on the Aspergers spectrum, as there is no flexibility there. He has a kindle, which is on my account so I can buy books and send them to his kindle as he lives a couple of hours away from me, so if anyone can come up with anything I can get it onto there before this evening which fits the criteria I would be eternally grateful?

One of the best crime novels I've ever read is Tiger in the Smoke by Margery Allingham. That's set mostly (but not entirely) in London. It was published in 1952. Most of her books are set at least partly in London, but as they are classics he may already have read them.

I take it he's read all of Conan Doyle? Most of the Sherlock Holmes short stories are set in London. Not modern, of course!

There's a whole list of crime fiction in London here - I see Rumpole is at the top of the page.

Your dad might like The Murder Bag by Tony Parsons. Set mostly in London and also in a large public school near London. Contemporary setting.

Come to that, there's Call for the Dead, John Le Carre's first novel, which is set entirely in London and the outer suburbs. Does he stretch to spy fiction? It's really as much of a whodunnit as a spy novel.

Me back again! Elizabeth George - Linley novels. (went off towards the end imnotsoho)

What about the four Sarah Caudwell books? Thus was Adonis Murdered etc.

Christopher Fowler's Bryant & May series

Yy to "Thrones, Dominations" - it feels less old because it was published and completed in the modern era by a modern writer.

Try this link. These are books (crime novels) all set in London that I have brought together www.tripfiction.com/find-a-book/?location=London&title=Title...&bauthor=Author...&genre=Crime&order=rating You have got some great suggestions from everyone.... hope you find something suitable.

Bryant and May are elderly detectives in London. Can't remember the author

There is also the Ben Aaronovitch series. It's definitely detective, definitely in London, but it's also fantasy so may not be quite his taste. They would offer a slightly different slant, and the London references and descriptions are very evocative - I always want to go back when I read them (want to go back anyway! miss it sooooooo much!). Here

Oh, and then there's Dissolution and that series, by C J Sansom. Again detective, mainly London, but Tudor times, Henry on the throne etc. They are fantastic.

Ah, should have refreshed the thread! I see that Aaronovitch has been suggested, and historical won't do.

Could he maybe write his own London detective stories? Plotting one out, at least geographically, could keep him occupied!

You might find this list useful

www.goodreads.com/list/show/28529.Best_London_Mysteries

The Inspector Coffin series by Gwendoline Butler: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwendoline_Butler