2012 Reading: Classic detective stories from around the world. Suggestions, please?

Title says it all. I'm going to try to read good detective literature from as far across the planet as possible. I'm not very interested in "gripping" "action-thrillers" or really grim au courant mutilation fetish stuff. So no Steig Larsson, no Henning Menkells, none of the current crop of "hard-boiled" American TV-influenced pedo-rings and cynical corruption neo-noirs.

I've recently enjoyed reading Patricia Highsmith (tons), and I generally like traditional fare a la Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, Edgar Allen Poe, Daphne Du Maurier. I want to know who their analogues are in non-English speaking countries, more cerebral than action-packed. African? Asian? Australian? South American? A (very few) Europeans?

What do you like?

i have nothing to offer but this is an awesome idea for a thread and i look forward to taking advantage of it for my own reading purposes

You might like Maurice Leblanc's Arsène Lupin stories, and Fantômas by Marcel Allain. Not at all up to the level of Doyle or Christie, but totally fun to read.

http://www.sohocrime.com/frontlist.php

http://www.sohopress.com/backlist.php

I'd suggest a Maigret or 20 ... maybe someone else can make more specific recommendations, I haven't read them all.

Maigret checklist, even more out of control than I remembered

Maigret's very good.

Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Martin Beck series is enjoyable. It's police procedural rather than classic detective fiction, really, but it captured an interesting late-60s / early-seventies vision of Sweden.

I remember loving Leo Malet's Nesta Burma books, particularly The Rats Of Montsouris.

Sebastian Japrisot had some good mystery books. I liked La Dame Dans l'Auto Avec des Lunettes et un Fusil - i can't recall what the English title is.

These are all Euro, though. I'll have to have a think about further afield.

Hopkins to thread! For some reason I feel like all of this is his thing.

I can't recall reading much of his work but it might be worth checking out Edogawa Rampo for Japanese detective fiction. He was heavily influenced by Poe ("Edogawa Rampo" / "Edgar Allan Poe") and is seen as central to the development of mystery stories in the country.

The Devotion of Suspect X, by Keigo Higashino

^ just read that one yesterday and really enjoyed it ... sort of old-fashioned, but more suspenseful and engaging than, say, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Martin Beck series is enjoyable.

better than enjoyable, even. you might like Jan Willem Vanderwetering's
Amsterdam Cops series. easily the most cerebral detectives I've encountered.

Can anyone recommend any German language detective stories? I've been learning German and have gotten to the stage where I can read novels without too much trouble. I've read a handful of crime novels, but either they don't quite fit here or aren't worth even suggesting.

However, I am aware of two German language authors I can suggest, if not exactly recommend, as these are still on my to-read list.

It seems like Friedrich Glauser is one of the earliest German authors of note of a detective series. At least some of the Sergeant Studer series is available in translation on Amazon. (Free German e-book versions can be found here: http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Free_eBooks-de/de).

The other author that I have flagged as noteworthy is Friedrich Dürrenmatt, who has a couple also available in translation on Amazon.

Perhaps I'll read some of these soon, and then actually be able to recommend something.

i've peeked at durrenmatt after having read him in english, and 'der richter...' seemed really quite doable with my weak german at the time. i'd go for it.

Another vote for Martin Beck.

Will no one else rep for Inspector Montalbano, that Sicilian combination bloodhound and chowhound?

Talk of German detective stories reminds of a very popular, much translated novel for children that was written in 1929, Emil and the Detectives, by Erich Kästner, which at one point was standard reading in second year German class

Burned by the Nazis! A favorite of Maurice Sendak!

<333 Emil & the Detectives

That's another on the to-read list! I a copy of Kästner's Fabian, but that was a bit hard for me to get into.

Over the last few days, I've read what I could find by Edogawa Rampo. It's surprising so little of his work is available in English; he seems to be kind of a key figure in Japanese popular culture, with a persona somewhat comparable to Hitchcock's as a presiding avuncular presence in the realm of the criminal and creepy.

His detectives and detection are too old school for me, but his horror and fantasy stories are wonderfully twisted -- like Kyoka Izumi, but with a stronger modernist turn. Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination includes some of his best stories in translations he helped to prepare.

added to queue, thx for suggestion.