Meny

Sample of literary figures

  • John Rebus

    Male

    Rebus is a Scottish detective who usually works in Edinburgh where most of Ian Rankin’s novels about him are set. Rebus is a loner with cooperation issues and he is not always popular with his superiors. He has a drinking problem, he was born in Cardenden, Fife, in 1947 and he has no interest in politics. Rebus eventually retires from his job, but returns to join a cold case team.

    Further reading

  • John Madden

    Male

    Scotland Yard detective John Madden suffered from an explosion during the First World War, but nevertheless in 1921 still solves the murder of four persons in the Surrey countryside. After that, he and his wife, Dr Helen Blackwell, settle as farmers in Surrey, but for various reasons Madden nevertheless takes part in investigations of several brutal murders in England during the Thirties and Forties in a suite of novels by Rennie Airth.

    Further reading

  • Anna Holt

    Female

    Anna Holt is a police officer, later commissioner of police, in Stockholm. She is the creation of authors Jan Guillou and Leif G.W. Persson who wrote the screenplay for a series of television episodes about her in the 1990s. Over the years, she has featured in some of the novels each has written independently. Holt is a complex woman, a determined and inventive investigator and a skilled interrogator.

    Further reading

  • Thomas Carnacki

    Male

    English private detective who has certain similarities with Sherlock Holmes. Thomas Carnacki (his first name is rarely mentioned) doesn’t, however, only chase ordinary criminals, but also ghosts and other supernatural beings. He tells some friends about his cases while he keenly smokes his pipe. William Hope Hodgson only wrote nine short stories about Carnacki, but that sufficed to make the character classic.

    Further reading