The Holy Whodunit

March 28, 2026

Last month I talked about the niche, or sub-genre, of the crime-solving priest. Today, I am using a synonym of sorts that I recently came across and have been dying to use: holy whodunit.

       To start at the beginning, let’s look at the very first modern detective novel. It was Edgar Allan Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841). The detective used analysis and supportive evidence to prove that the murders of two women were committed by an escaped orangutan who was trying to imitate his master shaving.  

        Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892) solidified the genre.  His tales still fascinate: Deductive reasoning at its best!

        G.K. Chesterton wrote the first holy whodunit: The Blue Cross (1910). His protagonist, Father Brown, like Holmes, has survived many interpretations on TV and elsewhere. He uses intuition, compassion, and a mind schooled in moral reasoning.

         Of the many subsequent writers in the holy whodunit sub-genre, my favorite is Ralph McInerny. His protagonist,  Father Roger Dowling,  is a humble American priest with an inquisitive mind and a burning desire to correct injustices. In A Cardinal Offense (1994),  McInerny’s rendering of the mid-‘90’s American Catholic mindset is a telling antidote for a lot of present-day mush.

        Were Father Bob Desjardins, my crime-solving/holy whodunit priest protagonist, able to meet his fictional forebears, he would be in seventh heaven!

See you next month! Until then, be well and happy!

Margaret

P.S. If you have a question or a comment, please go to my ‘contact’ page at www.margaretmjoyce.net