by Miko Johnston

A diva actress infuriates everyone with her demands. A rich businessman takes pride, even joy, out of snookering his customers. A domineering tycoon sets ultimatums for his relatives lest they be cut out of the will. They’re spoiled, stingy, slick, or just plain mean, and the next thing you know, they’ve been murdered. News spreads, often through a small town filled with quirky folks, and soon a person with no experience in criminology (beyond, perhaps, reading or writing mystery novels, or selling them in their charming bookshop) takes an interest in the murder and decides to investigate. They may not have access to the minutiae of crime scene investigations or forensic reports, but thanks to a police force with little skill or interest in solving the mystery, they unmask the perpetrator.

Welcome to the world of cozy mysteries, where life can be pleasant, eccentric, and even humorous in the face of death. Where someone’s humdrum existence can be invigorated by a murder.

A sub-genre of cozies takes crime more seriously, dealing with social issues such as addiction, abuse, homelessness, and trafficking, however peripherally. Others feature amateur sleuths who partner with the real investigators – police detectives – sometimes literally; many have spouses on the force.

Bearing those exceptions in mind, please don’t hate me for what I’m about to say – I do not, and will not, read cozy mysteries that involve murder, for one simple reason: the punishment rarely fits the crime.

People kill or get killed for a variety of reasons. Some killings are justified, as in self-defense or on the battlefield. And don’t confuse the broader legal term, homicide, with murder, as the former includes the accidental and the justifiable killing of another. The law defines murder as a deliberate act, targeting a person with the “intent to kill,” “cause grievous bodily harm,” or “a depraved indifference to human life”. This does not sound very “cozy” to me. Nor does killing someone simply because they’re not nice, or did something mean-spirited or even ruinous (short of murder) sound justifiable.

Some cozy murders occur “off the page”. I’ll grant the more grisly details of murder can be the exception to the “show, don’t tell” rule, but even so a murder has been committed. I’ve also heard cozy murders described as bloodless, or even “painless”, but is there such a thing? Any police officer who’s been to a crime scene, or EMT who tried unsuccessfully to save the victim, will tell you NO. Most poisons cause pain, convulsions and organ collapse. And what about other methods, such as strangulation, drowning and suffocation? I feel miserable when I’m congested with a cold. I can’t accept being deprived of oxygen as anything less than cruel and unusual. Even if the crime is violent, such as a gunshot, the description sidesteps the gory details. Really? Please tell me how a gunshot wound wouldn’t be gruesome to an average person. And don’t get me started on humorous murder mysteries. I’ve seen farces that involve a dead body where the death occurred from natural causes, or an accident due to the victim’s stupidity, silly but harmless. However, a murder victim’s body crosses the line for me.

I have two other reasons for not reading cozies. I lived in New York during the crime-riddled seventies. I knew two people who had dear ones murdered. A co-worker’s boyfriend was shot to death in a case of mistaken identity, and a gang of robbers murdered my friend’s nineteen-year-old cousin as he was unloading a delivery truck. Fifty years may have passed, but I still recall the anguish in their faces, the tremble in their voices when they told me what happened. They never witnessed the crime in progress, nor saw the bloody crime scene, but from the moment the police notified them, their lives changed. Forever.

I get it. A mystery can be enjoyable without forensic-level descriptions of crime scenes, as is trying to put the clues together and solve the puzzle. Of course, if that’s what readers want, then there’s no reason to include murder, rape or kidnapping – a non-violent crime would allow the reader to solve the case along with the sleuth. Why does it have to be murder? Apparently, having a cozy revolve around a high crime raises the stakes, and the level of interest, beyond lesser crimes. Making the victim as unsympathetic as possible makes us feel less guilty as we focus on the clues and not on the tragedy.

This is just my opinion, and I don’t expect others to share it. Yet I can’t help but think no matter how horrible, difficult or mean the victim is, and even if the characters in your story aren’t upset by the murder, somewhere in the world beyond your pages is someone who will care, who’ll mourn the loss and be devastated by the cruelty of it.

Miko Johnston, a founding member of The Writers in Residence, is the author of the historical fiction series, “A Petal in the Wind”, as well as a contributor to several anthologies including the recently released “Whidbey Island: An Insider’s Guide”. Miko lives in Washington (the big one) with her rocket scientist husband. Contact her at mikojohnstonauthor@gmail.com

Guest Post by Sally Carpenter*

An interviewer once referred to my stories as “retro-cozies.” I liked the term and use it to describe my work.

A retro-cozy is an amateur sleuth mystery with no graphic gore, violence, sex, or language, and occurs in the past. What defines “the past” is up for grabs—I’d say any time before the 21st century. My Sandy Fairfax series is set in 1993. The protagonist, a former teen idol, often refers to his TV show, which was filmed in the 1970s. My newer series, the Psychedelic Spy, takes place in 1967.

Why do I use a time machine when I write? For Sandy Fairfax, I had no choice. I wanted to write about a ‘70s teen idol because of the culture of that time when teen idols were promoted through TV shows. I like the melodic songs from the era, the cheesy clothes, and the drama that often took place behind the idols’ innocent façades. \

Sandy was 18 when his TV show started, so if I set the books in today’s world, he would have aged up to 61 or so. But I wanted to write about a younger man who could still do his own stunts and would be making a comeback, not plans for retirement. The year 1993 places Sandy at age 38, still agile but facing a midlife crises.

For the second series, the ‘60s is a ripe era for storytelling: war protests, civil rights and women’s movements, the generation gap, influence of Eastern religions, and the Cold War. I love the culture of the age, the bright colors, pop art, rock music, movies, mod clothes and hairstyles. Let’s face it, women’s clothing styles in 2018 are—dare I say it—drab and ugly.

I like the simplicity of past times. I use a computer, but I’m out of touch with today’s technology. I don’t even own a cell phone (gasp!). I gave up trying to figure out streaming services, podcasts, YouTube videos, Twitter, social media and whatnot.

If a contemporary protagonist gets in trouble, all she has to do is whip out her cell phone and call for help. Ho hum. But my protags have to think and fight their way out of their predicaments. If my protags need information, they can’t Google or ask Alexis; they have to put in the legwork. They need hard evidence, not just a DNA sample. With fewer crime fighting tools at their disposal, my heroes work harder.

People who stare at their phones or computers all day bore me. Characters who talk face-to-face are more interesting than those who send texts. Modern technology is helpful in real life, but it’s a story killer. When I read for pleasure, I want to escape into another world, away from the commotion of modern times. Writing a retro-cozy lets me, at least in my mind, take a break from today.

In “Flower Power Fatality,” Noelle McNabb is an actress at a Christmas-theme park in Yuletide, Indiana. Her drab routine is interrupted when a stranger shows up on her porch with a bullet in his chest. Then, a super-secret spy agency recruits Noelle to find missing microdots along with veteran agent Destiny King. As Noelle goes undercover, she finds herself dancing in sleazy nightclubs and chasing bad guys at night while wondering who is going to feed her pet cat.

My next project is putting my first book, “The Baffled Beatlemaniac Caper,” back in print. Washed-up pop star Sandy Fairfax, in a desperate move to get his career back on track, takes his only job offer—a guest appearance at a disorganized Beatles fan convention in Evansville, Indiana. What look like an easy gig turns deadly when a member of the tribute band is killed and the police finger Sandy as the prime suspect.

“Beatlemaniac” will include a new cover art, new forward, updated author’s bio, re-edited text and a bonus short story, a brand new Sandy Fairfax adventure, “The Deadly Disco Caper,” in which the 1970s get skewered. Yowzah, yowzah, yowzah!

306141_347563052028408_642323995_n(2) Sally Carpenter was born and raised in southwest Indiana but now lives in Moorpark California, leaving the land of rain and snow for wildfires and earthquakes. She has a master’s degree in theater from Indian State University. She also has a master’s degree in theology and a black belt in tae kwon do. She’s also “mom” to two black cats.

Her first book, “The Baffled Beatlemaniac Caper,” was named by Left Coast Crime as a 2012 Eureka! Award finalist for best first mystery novel. She penned chapter three of “Chasing the Codex,” a group mystery written by 34 authors with Cozy Cat Press and has stories in three other anthologies. She’s a member of Sisters in Crime/Los Angeles and blogs monthly at https://ladiesofmystery.com/ .