YOUR NEW MYSTERY READS FOR FALL! by Yvonne Saxon

What is it about autumn that makes reading a mystery just so . . . perfect? The season of spooky with its earlier twilight and chilly nights begs for curling up with a "whodunnit." Whether you're a fan of hard-boiled detectives or cozy amateur sleuths, there's a recently released mystery for your "to be read" pile. Check the following titles out!

The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder by C.L. Miller  A former antique hunter investigates a suspicious death at an isolated English manor, embroiling her in the high-stakes world of tracking stolen artifacts.

IS THIS A MYSTERY OR IS IT SUSPENSE? by Maria Hudgins

Question: The book you are reading has a murder on page twenty. Is it  a) mystery b) thriller c) suspense  d) adventure. Answer: It's a mystery.

I bet most of you got it right without even thinking about it. I remember a mystery conference I attended where a well-known mystery writer said, "I try to have a dead body on page one if I can." I think that's going a bit too far. It puts a cramp in your scene-setting plans. But the idea is fairly sound. Mysteries are about figuring out what happened. Suspense stories build up to something that happens.

This week, the third week in July 2024, is both. I have been glued to my laptop for more on the happenings in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. In November we will have a coast-to-coast event that will involve all of us.Are we in a mystery, a suspense drama, or, as Joe Rogan suggests, a simulation? The events in Butler, Pennsylvania have left me with unanswered questions about what happened and why. Mystery. What will happen between now and our November election? Suspense. What are the odds something unexpected will happen between now and then? A denouement? A clash of philosophies? A meeting of minds?

The story I am writing now is morphing back and forth in my head between mystery and suspense. I am wondering if I have to stick with one or the other, or if I can sort of straddle the two. I haven't finished my outline, but I have already written the first chapter. I think this may be the problem. I should first do the outline. Then start writing.

There is a book I know will help me and I already have it on my bookshelf. It's Carolyn Wheat's How to Write Killer Fiction. She talks about "The Funhouse of Mystery" and "The Roller Coaster of Suspense." In a mystery the main character, the sleuth, is mentally challenged to figure something out, and the reader is, too. In a suspense story the main character, the hero, is emotionally, if not also mentally and physically, challenged to overcome a daunting problem. 

I have a slight problem with writing suspense. I love my main character and I hate having to put him or her through the coming challenge. But I have to steel myself against the misery and do it for the sake of the story. No misery, no story.

 Writing a mystery is more comfortable because the challenge is mainly mental. The problem here is that I have to keep it from becoming a dry mental exercise that nobody wants to read. Here's where the first-or-third person choice may help. I often choose first person because we can know what the main character is feeling as well as what he is thinking and you don't have to worry about head-hopping when it's all coming from one head.

And speaking of our current national challenge to choose a political leader, I am grateful to be the fly on the wall who observes the suspense and thinks about the challenge, but doesn't have to personally enter the fray. Thank goodness for TV and YouTube. 

A CLOSED CIRCLE OF SUSPECTS by Maria Hudgins

One of the most popular schemes employed by mystery writers can be described as "A Closed Circle of Suspects." This fairly well describes the story I'm working on right now. The setting for my story is a Health Spa Resort in a foreign country. But this isn't a truly closed circle because the characters can come and go if they want to. They aren't captives. I'm fully expecting someone to level this charge at me at some point. But I've learned something important about this business of categorizing fiction, especially mystery fiction. It doesn't matter! There are no rules that can't be broken; this isn't a matter of rules anyway. At most this is simply a way of looking at a story and seeing its possibilities and limitations before you start writing. 

The "Closed Circle of Suspects" category is surprisingly flexible, and successful stories certainly number in the hundreds, if not thousands. All you need is a setting that encloses a definite group of people so that, when a crime (usually murder) occurs, you know the perpetrator has to be one of that group. It would be cheating, I think, to bring in a long-lost heir to the victim's fortune in the last chapter. "Hi! I'm Malaria von Hatchet. Am I too late for Grandfather's funeral?" The suspects are well defined and don't usually number more than about eight. That's another reason my story is not a true closed circle. There are more than a hundred residents at the resort at any one time. They can't all be suspects.

A common Closed Circle mystery is the English Country House Mystery. Examples include The Mysterious Affair at Styles, The Mousetrap, both by Agatha Christie, and The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. But it doesn't have to be English. How about Knives Out? It's in a country house, but it's set in the USA

A Closed Circle mystery can also be set in many places other than a country house.

    A ship- Death on the Nile, The Woman in Cabin 10.

    An Island - And then there were None, The Lost Island

    A Plane - Death in the Clouds, The 12:30 from Croydon.

    A Train - Murder on the Orient Express, Strangers on a Train

You get the idea. The advantage of mystery stories with closed circles is that the list of possible perps is limited. This gets one variable under control and simplifies things a bit. So the story is usually concerned with opportunity, (Who had access to the gun cabinet? Who left the dining room before dessert?) or motive (money, jealousy, fear, etc.)

The kind of mystery I most like to read is the police procedural. I enjoy reading them because they are so different from what I write, I don't connect them with my own work. If I did, I would be constantly comparing the book with my own. In police procedurals you almost always have a a huge area, like a city, in which to find and trap your killer. It takes the skill and training of a professional sleuth to deal with the possibilities.

Many cozies are, to some extent, Closed Circle stories, like the village of St. Mary Mead. Donna Andrews's bird-themed books are set in Yorktown, VA.  Rita Mae Brown's Mrs.Murphy books are set in Crozet, VA. Crozet is such a small town, it almost qualifies as a Closed Circle. 

So. Whereas my current WIP is not strictly a Closed Circle, the story does concentrate on one particular group of guests at the spa resort. I guess that makes it An Almost Closed Circle of Suspects.

‘TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE MURDER by Penny Hutson

 ‘Twas the night before murder when all through the book,

Not a character was plotting, not even the crook.

Reading page after page and absorbed with delight,

Every chapter expecting a murderous sight.

There I sat nestled all snug in my chair,

Reading my mystery book without care

My husband lay snoring aloud on the couch,

As I continued to read in a deepening slouch.

 

VACATION FUN: BEAUTY, HISTORY, AND MYSTERY! By Angela G. Slevin

The throne room

      Summer always puts me in mind of vacations and travel. This year, I’m thinking of two places, one I’ve been to many times and where I have family, and the other a place I’ve always wanted to go. Surprisingly to me, they have a connection.

     The island of Crete, Greece, sits in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and is huge in comparison to the other Greek isles. Crete measures 160 miles wide from west to east, and varies in width from 7.5 to 37 miles from north to south, making its area 3,218 square miles. Crete was an independent nation from 1898 until 1913, when it joined modern Greece.

PICK YOUR POISON: TIPS FOR A "PLANT BASED" MYSTERY! by Yvonne Saxon

 

You see "plant-based" options everywhere: in grocery stores, in restaurants, even in fast food establishments. But unless you want to end up as a real-life victim, you'll want to pass on the following plant-based offerings and use these tips in a mystery instead!

1. Don't eat your vegetables! Did you know there's such a thing as "death by lima bean"? Raw lima beans contain extremely high levels of cyanide. How you get your character to ingest them is up to you, but for those you're keeping alive, thoroughly cook the beans, uncovered, so that the poison escapes as gas. Drain the cooking water too, unless you're "offing" more characters!

HOW DO YOU LIKE YOUR MYSTERY, BLACK OR WITH CREAM AND SUGAR? by Yvonne Saxon

 

Choosing a mystery to read is like going into a coffee house and starting at the big board of coffee drinks: there are a lot of choices! Which one do you choose? What do those names even mean? Because mysteries are as varied as coffee drinks, why not choose you next mystery like you’d choose a coffee? How? By looking at the “menu” and the “ingredients”!

Let’s start with the basics. To make a good cup of black coffee, you need the right ratio of boiling water to high quality beans. Whether dripped, poured over, or pressed through, the right amount of water to beans will produce a satisfying cup. The right ratio of crime to be solved and interesting characters to solve it will produce a satisfying mystery.