Hilfer offers convincing evidence that the crime novel should be regarded as a genre distinct from the detective novel, whose conventions it subverts to develop conventions of its own.

Part of the "Longman Literature in English" series, this text examines American fiction between 1940 and 1991. Amongst the areas covered are the emergence of African American Fiction, Southern Fiction, Jewish American Fiction, postmodernism as Black humour and fiction by women.