Spring, 1997
Volume 2, No. 2 In spring an author's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of kindlier, gentler mysteries. Oddly enough, all four of us write about amateur sleuths—even Kali O'Brien, the attorney in Jonnie's second series, approaches her fact-finding differently than a private investigator would. Though we don't have police detective or PI narrators in any of our books, we don't consider our books all that "cozy," either. So how to pigeonhole our particular brand of Malice Domestic? We call it:
Valerie Wolzien Why an amateur? Freedom. Freedom from the structure an official investigation must take. Freedom from the need to collect evidence, then put it in some sort of order. Freedom not to report progress (or the lack of such) to anyone. Freedom to act alone—or to choose one's own companions. This is, I think, part of the amateur sleuth's charm. She can run from place to place, chat with people, do what my mother would call snooping, and it's just fine. She is, after all trying to find a murderer. And, of course, we, as readers, can snoop right along with her. With the amateur sleuth, we can peek into the neighbor's medicine cabinet, wonder about the value of the newly remodeled house in the neighborhood, try to find out if our friends are happily married or if they are involved in an illicit relationship. And we can do this while eating in wonderful restaurants, playing tennis at the club, or remodeling a Victorian bathroom, rather than sitting in a dingy interrogation room at the local police station. Valerie has a new mystery out this month. Permit For Murder is the second in the Josie Pigeon series. In it, Josie remodels a version of Valerie's own home. Valerie wishes it were as easy to do as it was to write about!
Lee Harris I happen to love private eye novels. I read them all the time. But I never wanted to write about one myself. I wanted a sleuth whose life was not totally involved in solving murders. Chris Bennett was exactly the right person for me. As a nun she had worked with and for other people in her community, but she had an independent life besides. She studied, went away to get a degree, visited her aunt every week, something that needed the approval of the Superior of the convent. When she needs information, she knows how to dig for it. And in choosing an amateur, I don't get involved in the problem of carrying a gun—and perhaps using it. An amateur isn't bound by the rules that govern a police officer's behavior or a licensed PI's. She can use her head and her instincts and that's the way I like it. Lee Harris's most recent book is The Valentine's Day Murder.
Jonnie Jacobs Kate Austen is a true amateur sleuth, Kali O'Brien an attorney—but both get involved in solving crimes that touch them personally. And both series focus less on the violence of crime than on the tensions and broken relationships that lead up to it. As a mom living in the suburbs, Kate has knowledge about the community that an investigator would not. In Murder Among Friends, for example, Kate knows her friend's habits well enough to suspect murder rather than suicide. She's also able to pick up on clues that police aren't privy to. Kali is more an outsider. In Evidence of Guilt she defends a sullen and uncooperative man charged with the murder of a woman and her young daughter. But the story evolves and clues emerge not so much through courtroom revelations as through Kali's efforts to understand her client and the victims. I like to think of mysteries as a framework on which we hang the human drama that is the essence of all good story telling. And since I can't tell a .38 from a water pistol and feel faint at the sight of blood, I've chosen to tell my stories from the softer end of the spectrum. Evidence of Guilt is available in hardcover and Shadow of Doubt, the first Kali O'Brien book, is now available in paperback. Jonnie's third Kate Austen book, Murder Among Us, will be out in early 1998.
Lora Roberts I used to get irked when people spoke of my book as being cozy. Though written from an amateur sleuth viewpoint, the stories have an edge. Some readers shy away from the more realistic details of how Liz lives by her wits in an indifferent society, and other readers are disappointed in the relatively low body count. And both kinds of readers describe the kind of book they like as cozy! I loved Miss Marple and Lord Peter and Mr. Campion (still do) and all those tea-swilling progenitors of the current amateur sleuths. But though they didn't wholesale blood and guts, those classic mysteries had their dark side. The smiling village, the white-haired spinster—Allingham and Christie and Sayers could use them to make your blood run cold. It is my contention that even the coziest of these books is not, particularly. So watch out for the amateurs. They're free, as Valerie says. They can poke and pry and look at the dynamics of people's relationships, as Jonnie says. And they don't pack heat, as Lee says—they get creative about their weapons. And they're different from each other—as different as an ex-nun is from a vagabond writer, as different as a female contractor is from an attorney. Lora Roberts' latest book, featuring Liz Sullivan, is Murder Bone by Bone. She's currently in the death throes of finishing the fifth Liz book, Murder Crops Up.
©2005-07 by Lee Harris, Jonnie Jacobs, Lora Roberts and Valerie Wolzien. |
