Friday, September 6, 2024

Genre Expectations: Writing Classic Mystery and Cozy Mystery


by A.C. Williams @ACW_Author

It’s no mystery what the top-selling fiction genre is: Romance. Even if you didn’t know that for sure, you probably could have guessed. But did you know that mystery is also one of the highest selling genres?

I’m not sure if these statistics are accurate, but if you can trust WorldMetrics.org, romance novels make up 23% of book sales in the United States. And the next most popular genre is mystery at 19%. 

So if the mushy stuff isn’t your favorite, take heart. Instead, try writing something about murder. 

Here’s the catch: There are as many types of mystery genres as there are romance genres. So today we’re going to chat about the expectations between the two most popular mystery options: Classics and Cozies. 

But first, let’s do a quick review of the genre expectations we’ve discussed so far: 
  • Romantic Fantasy and Fantasy Romance
  • Fantasy and Space Opera
  • Steampunk and Gaslamp
  • Magical Realism and Contemporary Fantasy
  • Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance
  • Suspense and Thrillers
  • Dystopian and Apocalyptic

That brings us to mysteries, everyone’s favorite. When I was young, I devoured every mystery I could find. Nancy Drew. Hardy Boys. Dana Girls. Trixie Belden (the best). When I got older I read Mary Higgins Clark and Agatha Christie. And, of course, I watched all the episodes of Columbo, Murder She Wrote, Inspector Morse, and Inspector Lewis (also the best).

But writing mysteries is more than just slapping together a haphazard chain of clues and developing an engaging detective to follow them. Our approach to writing a mystery needs to be determined by what audience is going to read them, and for the purposes of this article, we’re just going to talk about two variations: The Classic Mystery and the Cozy Mystery. 

The “cozy” genre has skyrocketed in popularity across the board, even venturing into traditionally “not cozy” genres like science fiction and fantasy. But the cozy genre began with mysteries, so that’s where we’re going to park.

As a whole, the mystery genre is extremely formulaic, but formulas exist for a reason. They work. And no other fiction genre relies on its formula more completely than mystery, so it needs to be respected. 

But unlike other genres that we have studied so far this year, the mystery genre has the same expectations no matter what its subgenre. 

Every mystery, regardless of its subgenre, must include:
  • a crime, 
  • a detective character, 
  • a villain, 
  • a trail of clues, 
  • misleading evidence, 
  • and a satisfying ending. 

If you skip any of those elements, you may not have a mystery (or at least you may not have a mystery anyone will read). How the author portrays these elements establishes which subgenre best suits the story. 

So what’s the difference between a cozy mystery and a classic mystery? Well, I’m far from an expert (definitely still learning about this genre myself), but what seems to be the dividing line between the classics and the cozies is the tone of the story. 

Of course there are other differences, but primarily a classic mystery is written more along the lines of a suspense novel. There’s action. There’s tension. There’s drama and danger and peril. And in a cozy mystery, there is less of all of that. It’s not that there isn’t tension (every story ever told has tension). But the point of a cozy isn’t to keep a reader on the edge of their seats while they are reading; the goal for a cozy is to be charming. 

A cozy may include all the same elements of a classic mystery, but most of them will take place off screen. There’s rarely a lot of violence shown in a cozy mystery. Children and animals are never harmed. The humor is always good natured. Usually the story is set in a small town or in a location where everyone knows each other. And usually, the sleuth in a cozy mystery has never solved a mystery before. They are a baker or a librarian or a housewife. 

Compare those expectations to a classic mystery where a hardboiled, sometimes unlikeable detective has to face threats and perils unknown to solve a grisly murder (sometimes shown on the page). 

It’s not that there isn’t violence in a cozy. I’ve read several that classify as cozy where there are fights and chases and even some danger, but the intent of the story isn’t to disrupt the reader or leave them uneasy.

Classics are thrilling and heart-pounding and dangerous; cozies are charming and wholesome and feature cuddly animals or homemade baked goods.

Which one do you like better? 

TWEETABLE


A.C. Williams, also known as Amy C. Williams, is a coffee-drinking, sushi-eating, story-telling nerd who loves cats, country living, and all things Japanese. Author of more than 20 books, she keeps her fiction readers laughing with wildly imaginative adventures about samurai superheroes, clumsy church secretaries, and goofy malfunctioning androids; her non-fiction readers just laugh at her and the hysterical life experiences she’s survived. If that’s your cup of tea (or coffee), join the fun at www.amycwilliams.com.


Posted by Edie Melson at 1:00 AM
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1 comment:

  1. Kay DiBiancaSeptember 6, 2024 at 11:16 AM

    Good article, A.C. My understanding of the definition of cozy mystery is: a mystery with no explicit violence and no explicit sexual content. Usually there's no profanity, but if there is, it's mild. Lately, the "cozy" label tends to be associated with lighter-themed stories, but it doesn't have to be. It's a very wide genre, and there are plenty of cozies with more serious content. As a matter of fact, Agatha Christie's books are actually cozy mysteries.

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