Well, the finalists have been decided in the 'World's Favourite Detective' tournament that has been running for the past few weeks on Jen Forbus's excellent blog Jen's Book Thoughts.As I noted on Tuesday, the semifinal round had come down to Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch vs Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and Raymond Chandler's Phillip Marlowe up against Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot.
So we had the detective who first popularised the genre, the detective who lead the way during the 'Golden Age' of British detective fiction, the detective who led the way for the US hardboiled genre, and the modern day detective who perhaps best epitomises modern US crime fiction. What a final four!
But now, only two remain. And it's Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot...
... who've fallen by the wayside!
The championship round for the World's Favourite Detective, which has seen anywhere from 700-900 crime fiction afficianados voting each week, will be between Hieronymous "Harry" Bosch and Phillip Marlowe; two gritty detectives who prowled the mean streets of LA, a half-century apart.
As I noted on Tuesday, it was the final I predicted, although not the one I voted for.
Who's your favourite? Who should win? Thoughts and comments welcome.
It's actually Bosch and Marlowe who will be facing off on Monday. Bosch has 78% of the vote compared to 22% for Holmes and Marlowe beat Poirot by a narrower margin, 56% to 44%.
ReplyDeleteMack - that's what he said - that it's Bosch and Marlowe.
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ReplyDeleteAnon 4:29,Yikes, you are right. I read the post several times and missed the comment that it is Holmes and Poirot that were removed. Somehow the Holmes vs Poirot in bold was all that registered what I actually read notwithstanding. I'll leave my dumb comment up as a an example to everyone. Sorry Craig.
ReplyDeletehee hee - sorry Mack - I did that on purpose so as not to give the result away in the title of the post. Perhaps I was being too tricky though. Oops.
ReplyDeleteOh - I almost made the same mistake...
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting example of how perception can be bent. Interesting even if it is at my expense. I saw the Holmes vs Hercule on FriendFeed then the heading here then the statement "But now, only two remain. And it's Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot..." and the second half - ".. who've fallen by the wayside!" - didn't register at all. You Kiwis are a crafty lot and obviously not to be trusted. :)
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