English Classic Mystery Literature

Meets the requirement for one High School English credit.

This 30-week course for grades 9–12 helps students strengthen their reading, thinking, and writing skills by studying classic mystery novels and short stories.

Using The Lively Art of Writing, students will learn how to form clear theses, select strong evidence, and craft logical, well-organized arguments. The course emphasizes understanding purpose, audience, and tone so students learn to communicate with clarity and confidence.

Through close reading and guided discussion, students will learn the basics of literary analysis as they examine how classic mystery writers build plots, develop characters, and use clues and red herrings. Class conversations will also explore questions of justice, moral choice, and human nature, helping students engage thoughtfully with the ideas presented in the literature.

Students will write a five-paragraph essay every three to four weeks, each based on a newly assigned novel or collection of short stories. Class time will center on discussion of the readings, collaborative idea development, and practicing essay-writing techniques.

Novels and short stories will be chosen from the list below based on student interest and proficiency. We will NOT read all of the novels/stories listed below.

Agatha Christie

  • 4:50 From Paddington

  • And Then There Were None

  • Death on the Nile

  • Murder of Roger Ackroyd

  • Murder on the Orient Express

  • The Mysterious Affair at Styles

  • The Secret Adversary

Wilkie Collins

  • The Moonstone

  • The Woman in White

Arthur Conan Doyle

  • A Study in Scarlet

  • The Hound of the Baskervilles

  • The Sign of the Four

  • The Valley of Fear

  • Selected short stories

Edgar Allen Poe's short stories

  • The Murders in the Rue Morgue

  • The Purloined Letter

  • The Mystery of Marie Rogêt

  • The Tell-Tale Heart

  • The Black Cat

  • The Cask of Amontillado

  • William Wilson

  • The Fall of the House of Usher

  • Ligeia

  • The Masque of the Red Death

G K Chesterton

  • The Innocence of Father Brown

  • The Man Who Was Thursday

  • Selected short stories

A A Milne

  • The Red House Mystery

Dorothy L Sayers

  • Gaudy Night

  • Murder Must Advertise

  • Whose Body?

Josephine Tey

  • The Franchise Affair

Gaston Leroux

  • The Mystery of the Yellow Room

Various Authors of The Detection Club

  • The Floating Admiral

Required materials:

-Access to the novels and short stories. Most are available at your local library. Several are available as free ebooks on Apple Books, Kindle, and Project Gutenberg.

-Students must have access to a computer, a printer, and the internet, including Schoology.

Homework: A writing assignment will generally be due each week. We will read a new novel every three to four weeks, with short stories spread throughout.

Thursday

Time: 10:45-12:15
Grades: 9-12
Cost: $400
Supply Fee: $50
Tutor: Auburn Giberson