Lyndsay Faye is an American novelist and Sherlockian. She is known for her works of historical fiction, which draw variously on mystery and classic literature. Her novel The Gods of Gotham, published in 2012, was named "the yearâÂÂs best mystery novel" by the American Library Association, and was nominated for the Edgar Award for Best Novel.
Her Sherlockiana includes Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson and The Whole Art of Detection: Lost Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes.
Having discovered Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes when she was 10, she is a member of both The Baker Street Irregulars and Baker Street Babes. Faye described Conan Doyle's influence on her writing: "You canâÂÂt escape Sherlock Holmes as a mystery writer. You simply cannot."
Faye attended R. A. Long High School.
Faye's debut novel, Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson, was published in 2009. Caleb Carr said of this book: "At long last, an author of rare talent combines a thorough, enthusiastic knowledge of the Sherlock Holmes canon with truly rigorous research into, and respect for, what remains one of the greatest and most horrifying unsolved murder cases in modern history: the Jack the Ripper killings."
Faye's Timothy Wilde series includes three books: The Gods of Gotham, Seven for a Secret, and The Fatal Flame. Set in New York City in the 1840s, the trilogy's protagonist, Timothy Wilde, is a 27-year-old former bartender who is a policeman in New YorkâÂÂs newly formed police force.
2016's Jane Steele "reimagines Charlotte BrontëâÂÂs heroine as a killer." The Paragon Hotel, published in 2019, is set in 1921 in Portland, Oregon. Publishers Weekly called The King of Infinite Space, published in 2021, an "enthralling riff on Hamlet, set in contemporary New York City."
Faye has written book reviews for The New York Times.
Faye served as a mentor with Girls Write Now. She also chaired the annual Baker Street Babes auction to benefit the Disabled American Veterans Charitable Service Trust.