Ian Rankin’s Rebus to make another comeback

Will the dogged cop ever get a chance to enjoy his retirement?

Ruth Rendell in hospital after serious stroke

Publisher announces that much-acclaimed crime writer of the Inspector Wexford novels and many others is in ‘a critical but stable condition’

Curtain Call review – Anthony Quinn’s witty crime romp

The new Ripper is on the loose in 30s London in this engaging murder mystery, writes Viv Groskop

The 88 movies we’re most excited about in 2015

Think 2014 was a good year for film? Think again. This year is shaping up to be one of the classics. Here’s what’s on our radar

Potted Sherlock review – the whole Holmes is a little too elementary

It’s hard to see the joke in this ridiculous comedy if you know nothing of Conan Doyle’s many original stories, writes Lyn Gardner

Our family’s criminal past

Julie Shaw brings a unique perspective to the crime books she writes about the notorious Hudson clan – the main characters are her uncles. She talks about her family’s roots on the wrong side of the tracks

Reading group: Why The Maltese Falcon is built to last

Sam Jordison: The powerful prose and plot, the morality and the smouldering Spade … There are many reasons why Dashiell Hammett’s detective novel is such a classic

PD James remembered by Richard Coles

Richard Coles: the crime writer was courteous and perspicacious – and alert to the gap between what was said and what was done

The best thrillers of 2014

A murder mystery in a girls’ boarding school, the welcome return of Hercule Poirot and Philip Marlowe, and Lauren Beukes’s truly disturbing crime chiller. By Alison Flood

December’s Reading group: The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

Sam Jordison: This month, we’ll be investigating a book that is generally agreed to be a true classic. Will we agree?

PD James remembered by Nigel Williams

Author Nigel Williams remembers his friend, the queen of crime fiction, who died last week

PD James obituary

Crime writer whose poet-detective Adam Dalgliesh featured in a series of bestsellers

The 100 best novels: No 62 – The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler (1939)

Raymond Chandler’s hardboiled debut brings to life the seedy LA underworld – and Philip Marlowe, the archetypal fictional detective, writes Robert McCrum