This book explores the three aspects of deviance that contemporary crime fiction manipulates: linguistic, social, and generic. Gregoriou conducts case studies into crime series by James Patterson, Michael Connelly and Patricia Cornwell, and investigates the way in which these novelists correspondingly challenge those aforementioned conventions.

Shortlisted for Mystery Writers of America Edgar Awards 2008 (Category: Critical/Biographical)

Shortlisted for the Anthony Award for Best Critical Work of 2007

'Connecting the threads of textuality, context, theme and significance, this is a masterful account of crime fiction, and it stands as a model for the expansive, smart, multidisciplined and integrated literary scholarship that the future demands.' - Peter Stockwell, Professor of Literary Linguistics, University of Nottingham, UK

Autorentext
CHRISTIANA GREGORIOU is currently a Lecturer in English Language at the University of Leeds, UK. She is the author of English Literary Stylistics (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008) and has published several articles on deviance in crime fiction.

Inhalt
Preface Acknowledgements Introduction: Narratology and Deviance Contemporary Crime Fiction: Constraints and Development Linguistic Deviance: The Stylistics of Criminal Justification Social Deviance in Contemporary Crime Fiction Generic Deviance in Contemporary Crime Fiction Conclusion References Index