What a Cozy Mystery Should Be

I have listend to and read quite a few cozy mysteries lately. While I don't pretend to be a leading authority on the genre, I can say with some degree of certainty what does and does not work in a cozy mystery, what distinguishes books that will be repeat reads from ones that I will not read again (or perhaps not even finish the first time.)

Here is my unsolicited advice on what constitutes a successful cozy mystery:

1. The heroine (because the lead characters are almost always female) must be likable. I don't need to want to be her BFF but I do want to enjoy spending 300+ pages or six-plus hours with her. Whiny heroines do not make for good companions.
2. The heroine will have plenty of challenges to overcome to solve the mystery and possibly survive to the end of the book. If her primary challenge is financial and she spends the entire book worrying about paying the rent, I'm probably not going to finish the book. The heroine doesn't have to be filthy rich but I don't want to worry about a fictional character being poor. I'm perpetually broke so I read and listen to escape some of those worries. Worrying about the heroine being broke only adds to my stress. There are plenty of challenges every character can overcome without the main one being financial.
3. Add some levity. I don't need the book to be a knee-slapper or be listed as a comic novel. Lighten it up when it's appropriate.
4. I understand every cozy mystery is going to have some sort of police force. Makes sense. But the trope of the police saying "Stay out of it" and the heroine blindly rushing right into the investigation is played out. If you're going to have to a police presence just so they can tell her to steer clear, don't include an active police presence. She can engage with them when she has something solid to tell them. She can suggest that Sue over on the next block never liked Bob who is now dead. She should not go to Sue's house by herself and ask Sue if she killed Bob. Who would do that? Especially if they have been repeatedly warned not to get involved?
5. Give her a friend, or two. There's going to be exposition that needs to be included. Talking it over with a friend is a great way to relay information that is important to the reader. It also gives the heroine someone to inform if she just has to go talk to Sue about whether or not she killed Bob. Heroines without friends and confidants are generally much whinier than those who have a support system. And whiny heroines are not popular with anyone.
6. Make sure the supporting characters have something to do. I just encountered one book (which I could not finish) with the mother's heroine in the same town. The mother didn't have a job, was a terrible cook, and a neighbor did the gardening. What did her mother do all day? Why was her mother even in the book? It was a wasted character.
7. The crime should not be gruesome. Murder is gruesome enough. Cozy mysteries should have their deaths off-screen and not described in any detail. Otherwise, they aren't cozy. 
8. The heroine needs to be smart enough to figure out the crime. Some of the heroines come across as so dumb I doubt they can dress themselves much less figure out who committed the crime. Make sure they are smart and self reliant. Yes, I want them to have a BFF but they need to have sense enough to get in out of the rain without being told.
9. The resolution of the crime should make sense. A last second suspect/clue/blood trail should not be discovered in the nick of time. As a reader, I should be able to figure out whodunit from the information provided. 
10. Make as many of the characters as possible likable. There has to be one or two villainous characters but they need to have a reason for their ugly behavior. The other characters should be people, who like the heroine, I want to spend time with. Stupid or useless secondary characters are a waste of my time. What do they add to the story? If they don't add anything, they should not be included.

Lowcountry Boil - A Cozy Mystery Review

The most recent cozy mystery I purchased from Audible is Lowcountry Boil: A Liz Talbot Mystery by Susan M. Boyer. While it follows the genre fairly closely, I found it overly complicated.

The main character is (as you might guess from the title) Liz Talbot, a private investigator. She returns home when her grandmother is killed. Although in most cozy mysteries, the protagonist is generally a woman with no formal investigative background, it worked for Liz to be a PI. The problem I had is one from which many cozy mysteries suffer - the police chief of her small coastal town is her brother. After the murder, her brother spends all his time telling her not to get involved in the investigation. Naturally, she doesn't listen. It wouldn't be a cozy mystery if she didn't try to find out who killed her beloved grandmother. It's the repetition of "Stay out of it," from her brother the chief with her response of "I am the only one who can solve this crime" that becomes annoying. She's is a private investigator after all. Why shouldn't he simply let her help? If the only conflict an author can provide is a false, unnecessary one then she might want to rethink her main characters and their motivation.

There were a lot of characters wandering through the pages and I felt like I needed a scorecard to keep them all straight. I don't mind meeting a whole cast of fictional characters but when there are so many to keep track of, it becomes more confusing than entertaining. When I'm quilting, I don't want to need to stop and make a list of who is who and who killed which bad guy. The story could have been streamlined with fewer murders and fewer suspects. By the end of the story, I wasn't sure who had died and who had killed them. Worse, I realized I didn't really care. I can get heavily invested in the lives of fictional characters if I'm given enough room to get to know them. But if I have a cast of thousands to get to know, I can't know any of them well enough to care.

I give Lowcountry Boil two quills. The rating would be higher if the story was a little shorter and a little less complicated. I may give the next book in the series a listen but not right away.

Audible and Quilting for the win!

Because I am lucky enough to work from home, I need the sound of a voice other than mine to fill the house. Audible is perfect for that!

I've had a subscription to Audible for about two years and only recently discovered the wonders of the genre called cozy mysteries. I don't know why it took me so long to find these gems. As described by Goodreads,

Cozies very rarely focus on sex, profanity or violence. The murders take place off stage, and are often relatively bloodless (e.g. poisoning), while sexual activity (if any) between characters is only ever gently implied and never directly addressed.

The cozy mystery usually takes place in a small town or village. The small size of the setting makes it believable that all the suspects know each other. The amateur sleuth is usually a very likeable person who is able to get the community members to talk freely about each other. There is usually at least one very knowledgeable, nosy, yet reliable character in the book who is able to fill in all of the blanks, thus enabling the amateur sleuth to solve the case.

I started listening to cozy mysteries without realizing it when I downloaded books from the Murder She Wrote series. I enjoyed the TV show and figured the books would make good companions. They are easy listening and don't require my full attention. I can quilt and listen without losing my place on either endeavor.

After listening to several Murder She Wrote books, Audible automatically began to recommend other books related to the type. That led me to the Southern Sisters series by Anne George. These books are absolutely wonderful. They feature Patricia Anne, the narrator, and her sister Mary Alice who live in Birmingham, Alabama. The things they get themselves mixed up in are hilarious, heartwarming, and highly entertaining. If you like mysteries that don't include a lot of gore or violence, these books are the perfect fit. The first in the series is entitled Murder on a Girl's Night Out. I give it four enthusiastic quills!

Southern Sisters Mysteries Book 1

Made in North Carolina Awards - wish me luck

Our State magazine is sponsoring "Made in North Carolina Awards" and I decided to enter. I'm not sure I made the right decision in entering but the very worst that can happen is that I don't win (which is what I believe will be the outcome) and I'm not out anything.

I entered my Bicycle Wall Hanging because it's my favorite quilt I've made so far. I especially like the fact that I designed the appliqué so it's a completely original creation.

The official contest website is Enter the Made in North Carolina Awards. Their official description of the awards is:

Help us celebrate the astounding talent that North Carolina has to offer with Our State’s inaugural Made in NC Awards. We’re searching for the highest-quality items produced across the state in four categories: Food & Drink, Style, Craft, and Home.

Show us what you’ve got, North Carolinians.

I entered my wall hanging in the Craft section. The strange thing is that you only submit a photo. I don't mind not surrendering my wall hanging to them but do photos really do any craft justice? Wouldn't it be better if they accepted preliminary photos, narrowed those down, and requested the chosen craft(s) be submitted in person? The rules state that the item being entered can be delivered to the contest location but, again, I'm not thrilled about turning it over to them. Surely the people who submit Food & Drink have to submit the actual items. How can you judge apple butter based on a photo?

Well, come August 24, I'll have confirmation that my quilt wasn't chosen for an award. And I'm okay with that.