Why Mysteries?

Over the past year and some, I’ve gotten into reading mysteries in a way I never was before.  I was vaguely aware that mysteries could be good – my mom used to listen to them on tape a lot when I was little, because they were exciting and entertaining for car rides.  But last summer for a class, I had to read a “hard-boiled” mystery and one other.  I opted for an Agatha Christie, discovered “cozies,” and have never looked back.

I started with The Body in the Library for class, but loved it so much I immediately picked up another Miss Marple mystery – Murder at the Vicarage – and Murder on the Orient Express, my first introduction to Hercule Poirot.  I devoured these in a day or less each (partially because I launched into the second two while on vacation.)

While I love many books for many reasons – I am particularly drawn to character and world-building – there is nothing like a mystery to keep the pages turning.  Whether I’m reading a mystery or something else, the feeling of being so drawn into a book that I can’t wait to stop whatever I’m doing and start reading is almost as fantastic as the feeling of actually getting to stop what I’m doing and start reading.  And that’s certainly the biggest appeal of mysteries for me – that constant need to find out more, and see what happens, and the satisfaction of getting to follow this need to the end.

Miss Marple as played by Joan Hickson

But there is more that appeals to me about mysteries, especially cozies, especially series mysteries.  Take the Miss Marple books, for instance.  Miss Marple herself is a fantastic character – a bit smug and gossipy, but also a crazy smart and tough old lady.  She is surrounded by a wonderfully realized world, that of small town England, decades ago.  So not only do these mysteries have the plot to keep me dying for more, but also the character development and world-building that I love.  Not only that, but these cozies tend to be a little lighter on the violence, and a little heavier on the puzzle aspect than many other mysteries.  Now, I have no problem with book violence in many contexts, and not every mystery needs to be a puzzle.  But after reading a few hard-boiled detective stories, I find that the violence makes them significantly less comfortable to read, and leads me to want a break sometimes (as opposed to a cozy mystery, which I generally want to read in one sitting.)  And I really love getting to an end of a mystery and seeing how all the pieces fit together, how the solution was already in the pages of the text.  Granted, I have only ever guessed the murderer correctly on one occasion, and that mostly because the jacket description was a little spoiler-y, but I love the possibility that I could guess it.  Rather than a procedural, for instance, where dogged detective work pays off, but rarely are the clues the reader needs to fully solve the mystery embedded in the story ahead of time.

So for me, good cozy mysteries are the perfect blend of plot, character, world-building, and really, really difficult brain teaser.  And the latest author to sweep me away is P.D. James.  Because holy cow, that woman can write, and she can write an outstanding mystery.  Her main character, Adam Dalgliesh, is a fantastically realized character.  He grows and develops in each book, and reading multiple books has given me more insight into his character.  Each of James’ novels that I have read so far features, as a good cozy should, a well-realized and well-populated small community of suspects.  Each of these characters are, again, fully developed and interesting.  And the mysteries are creepy, exciting, surprising, and always keep me guessing until the moment everything finally clicks into place.  And this woman really is a brilliant writer.  Tell me this opening sentence doesn’t make you want to read Unnatural Causes: “The corpse without hands lay in the bottom of a small sailing dinghy drifting just within sight of the Suffolk coast.”  And for a more poetic passage shortly following that sentence, “It was early afternoon in mid October and the glazed eyes were turned upwards to a sky of surprising blue across which the light south-west wind was dragging a few torn rags of cloud.  The wooden shell, without mast or row locks, bounced gently on the surge of the North Sea so that the head shifted and rolled as if in restless sleep.  It had been an unremarkable face even in life and death had given it nothing but a pitiful vacuity.” 

So I hope I have convinced go pick up a cozy mystery (or heck, a hard-boiled or procedural, if that’s more your style) and prepare to be sucked in.