How Do You Like Your Mysteries Served?
Death Among the Stars
]The Genre in Between OR Choosing Your New Best Friend
Choosing the next book you want to read is, in many ways, like choosing the people you’re in the mood to hang out with. In fact, the protagonist you choose will, for a time, become your best friend. This person will invite you into her or his life, share daily activities her other friends probably don’t know about, let you in on their favorite breakfast, how they really feel about their house and community, and what drives them crazy about their spouse/parent/children/co-workers. You’ll find out what makes them laugh (if they do) and, likely, about their deep childhood traumas. Things you usually need to be friends with someone for years to discover.
Not only that, you’ll be invited to enter his or her world. Do you want to spend time in a dark world of secrets, where you don’t know who to trust, with stakes so high they’ll cause you sleepless nights? Do you enjoy outsmarting dangerous, unhinged folks (who can’t actually hurt you because they’re fictional)? Do you find it exciting or infuriating to discover the person you’ve been trusting to interpret the plot’s circumstances is unreliable? Or do you think, Not fair!
Some readers find this a good way to relieve the stress of these times. Others prefer cozy-type worlds, where the townsfolk are quirky and unique and very few of them are murderous—and even those who are, are fairly well-behaved and kill their victims when no one is looking. This is also an appropriate response to our current world situation.
More and more, I’m noticing a genre in between entertaining cozies and dread-powered mysteries, where the crimes protagonists seek to solve are a bit more…realistic? They swear if they step on a rake or find a dead body, but not in a constant stream. The bad guys aren’t just angry about second place in the pie-baking contest, they have some serious issues that need addressing, which will probably play out in a fairly dangerous confrontation with our hero.
And yet…to me the telling ingredient of genre is the tone of the book. So very many movies, television series and books now are very, very dark, portraying a world that, if not dystopian, is one where, even if the hero succeeds, they will be marked for good and undoubtedly have some form of PTSD.
The books I enjoy, and therefore the ones I write, are somewhere in between. They introduce a world laced with optimism, where friendships can thrive, where characters help each other and even grow from book to book. By solving the mystery, they restore their slice of the world to harmony, at least until the next adventure. Maybe that’s a defining word. I like books where the protagonists have adventures, in which they have agency and draw on internal strengths to right wrongs, not journeys into the darkness where their world remains darker, even if that day’s demon (using the word allegorically) is dislodged.
One reader described Death in Tranquility, the first book in the Bartender’s Guide to Murder series, as “squeaky clean with the exception of a couple of swear words.” That concerned me only because I was afraid folks might be expecting a series of light-hearted cozies. Even in that first book, some fairly deep issues are brought up and discussed. By book 2 (Death by Gravity), our heroine is dealing with characters damaged by abuse and sexual assault. Just because they don’t swear a lot doesn’t mean the books have breezy plots. It is true that Avalon Nash, the bartender protagonist, has an optimistic outlook on life—even though she has some issues to work through, herself. She uses humor as a defense, sees life’s absurdity, and is enjoys irony, but she will always give of herself to walk a dog or listen to how you can see ghosts or burst into a house where a murderer is holding a captive. She even ends up listening to the characters whose world outlooks she disagrees with.
And here comes book 3, Death Among the Stars, which one reader described as, “Another edgy and intriguing mystery by Sharon Linnea! I love the setting and the fast-paced story. Not your typical cozy! I love mysteries that include cupcakes and puppies but every so often you need a strong cocktail and a bit of murder.”
In any case, Avalon Nash is someone I’d like as a best friend. She’s funny and educated and interested and curious. If you prick her, she does bleed. She’s a bartender but is respectful of people who don’t drink. Her own actions and the actions of her friends affect her. She’s wounded when people she cares about are hurt or endure hard times. She is a master at deep listening, which makes her both a great bartender and a great sleuth. But on the deepest level, she thinks of life as an adventure. She also makes great cocktails—and includes the recipes in the books. My deepest hope, really, is that readers agree with one who said, “Some books you bounce off of and just can't get into. Other books, usually those from favorite authors, capture you from the first page, sort of like putting on a pair of comfortable slippers after a long day. For me, this book was the latter; I think I was hooked by the middle of the first page.”
Whichever tone of book a reader prefers, I bet that’s the author’s finest hope.
]The Genre in Between OR Choosing Your New Best Friend
Choosing the next book you want to read is, in many ways, like choosing the people you’re in the mood to hang out with. In fact, the protagonist you choose will, for a time, become your best friend. This person will invite you into her or his life, share daily activities her other friends probably don’t know about, let you in on their favorite breakfast, how they really feel about their house and community, and what drives them crazy about their spouse/parent/children/co-workers. You’ll find out what makes them laugh (if they do) and, likely, about their deep childhood traumas. Things you usually need to be friends with someone for years to discover.
Not only that, you’ll be invited to enter his or her world. Do you want to spend time in a dark world of secrets, where you don’t know who to trust, with stakes so high they’ll cause you sleepless nights? Do you enjoy outsmarting dangerous, unhinged folks (who can’t actually hurt you because they’re fictional)? Do you find it exciting or infuriating to discover the person you’ve been trusting to interpret the plot’s circumstances is unreliable? Or do you think, Not fair!
Some readers find this a good way to relieve the stress of these times. Others prefer cozy-type worlds, where the townsfolk are quirky and unique and very few of them are murderous—and even those who are, are fairly well-behaved and kill their victims when no one is looking. This is also an appropriate response to our current world situation.
More and more, I’m noticing a genre in between entertaining cozies and dread-powered mysteries, where the crimes protagonists seek to solve are a bit more…realistic? They swear if they step on a rake or find a dead body, but not in a constant stream. The bad guys aren’t just angry about second place in the pie-baking contest, they have some serious issues that need addressing, which will probably play out in a fairly dangerous confrontation with our hero.
And yet…to me the telling ingredient of genre is the tone of the book. So very many movies, television series and books now are very, very dark, portraying a world that, if not dystopian, is one where, even if the hero succeeds, they will be marked for good and undoubtedly have some form of PTSD.
The books I enjoy, and therefore the ones I write, are somewhere in between. They introduce a world laced with optimism, where friendships can thrive, where characters help each other and even grow from book to book. By solving the mystery, they restore their slice of the world to harmony, at least until the next adventure. Maybe that’s a defining word. I like books where the protagonists have adventures, in which they have agency and draw on internal strengths to right wrongs, not journeys into the darkness where their world remains darker, even if that day’s demon (using the word allegorically) is dislodged.
One reader described Death in Tranquility, the first book in the Bartender’s Guide to Murder series, as “squeaky clean with the exception of a couple of swear words.” That concerned me only because I was afraid folks might be expecting a series of light-hearted cozies. Even in that first book, some fairly deep issues are brought up and discussed. By book 2 (Death by Gravity), our heroine is dealing with characters damaged by abuse and sexual assault. Just because they don’t swear a lot doesn’t mean the books have breezy plots. It is true that Avalon Nash, the bartender protagonist, has an optimistic outlook on life—even though she has some issues to work through, herself. She uses humor as a defense, sees life’s absurdity, and is enjoys irony, but she will always give of herself to walk a dog or listen to how you can see ghosts or burst into a house where a murderer is holding a captive. She even ends up listening to the characters whose world outlooks she disagrees with.
And here comes book 3, Death Among the Stars, which one reader described as, “Another edgy and intriguing mystery by Sharon Linnea! I love the setting and the fast-paced story. Not your typical cozy! I love mysteries that include cupcakes and puppies but every so often you need a strong cocktail and a bit of murder.”
In any case, Avalon Nash is someone I’d like as a best friend. She’s funny and educated and interested and curious. If you prick her, she does bleed. She’s a bartender but is respectful of people who don’t drink. Her own actions and the actions of her friends affect her. She’s wounded when people she cares about are hurt or endure hard times. She is a master at deep listening, which makes her both a great bartender and a great sleuth. But on the deepest level, she thinks of life as an adventure. She also makes great cocktails—and includes the recipes in the books. My deepest hope, really, is that readers agree with one who said, “Some books you bounce off of and just can't get into. Other books, usually those from favorite authors, capture you from the first page, sort of like putting on a pair of comfortable slippers after a long day. For me, this book was the latter; I think I was hooked by the middle of the first page.”
Whichever tone of book a reader prefers, I bet that’s the author’s finest hope.
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