When Cat Lovers Unite With Mystery Lovers

Based on the number of titles available, there is a relatively large mystery audience that combines love of detective/crime fiction with a love of cats. Felines have sauntered into a growing list of series: Black Cat Bookshop mysteries, Joe Grey mysteries, Magical Cats mysteries, Cat Who... mysteries, Cat in the Stacks mysteries, Midnight Louie mysteries, etc. But I would note that there also are cat-mystery creations outside the usual "cozy" corner. For a selection of crime stories featuring cats by leading authors, read Mystery Cats by Ruth Rendell, author of the classic A Dark-Adapted Eye. Her anthology includes authors such as Lillian Jackson Braun (Cat Who...series author) but also Patricia Highsmith, Edgar Allan Poe, Joyce Harrington, Patricia Moyes, Margaret Maron, Lillian de la Torre and Edward D. Hoch, plus Rendell herself. Or just go straight to a dark place with Edgar Allan Poe's classic The Black Cat, in which the alcoholic narrator describes his descent into madness, murdering his beloved black cat and then his wife, only to be haunted and his guilt exposed by another black cat. For those who prefer classic English mystery style, I'd try a cat lover's suggestion set in 1930s England: In The Norths Meet Murder, by Frances & Richard Lockridge, an unknown murdered man is found in the Norths' bathtub, and the only clues are the sooty footprints of their black cat. One of Japan's leading novelists, Haruki Murakami, often weaves cats into his novels. For example, he begins his gripping The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle with a man's search for his wife's missing cat, a search that blossoms into a detective story and an excavation of buried secrets of World War II. For feline-focused mystery series, see the Goodreads selection at https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/cat-mystery

Culinary Mysteries Make Murder Appetizing

The culinary mystery has become a popular subgenre, pleasing both crime-solving and foodie fans. Most of these nestle in the "cozy" mystery category, sport cute titles, include recipes, and form fictional series. Here's a quick taste (pun intended) of popular foodie mysteries: Ellery Adams writes the Charmed Pie Shoppe Mystery series, so begin with her debut Pies and Prejudice, in which heroine Ella Mae returns to her Georgia hometown to open a bakery shop and becomes entangled in the murder of her childhood enemy's fiance, with Ella Mae's rolling pin as the murder weapon. Jessica Beck offers more calories with her Donut Shop Mystery series; sample Glazed Murder in which the heroine proprietor of a donut shop tracks the killer of a customer. More baked goods come with Joanne Fluke's Hannah Swensen Mysteries; for example, Blueberry Muffin Murder has Hannah, owner of the Cookie Jar eat-in bakery, investigating the death of a cookbook author and cable TV star. Diane Mott Davidson pens the popular Goldy Bear Mystery series featuring caterer Goldy Schultz; in The Whole Enchilada, Goldy digs into the presumed overdose death of a friend and uncovers murder. It's not all baked goods and coffee; sometimes it's baked goods and tea. Laura Childs writes the Tea Shop Mystery series with entries like Death by Darjeeling, in which South Carolina tea shop owner Theodosia Browning seeks to solve a murder and salvage her reputation after a male guest is poisoned by her tea at a catered garden party. If you're not full and want to keep grazing culinary mysteries, get a more exhaustive list at http://www.cozy-mystery.com/blog/where-to-start-with-culinary-cozy-mystery-series.html

Sci Fi Meets Mystery: Detecting in Future Time

In previous posts, I focused on mysteries set in past historical eras, but some mysteries leap into the future, and this marriage of science fiction with mystery has attracted best-selling authors and awards. Start with sci-fi titan Isaac Asimov, who wrote Caves of Steel back in 1953 to prove to his doubting editor that mystery and science fiction were not incompatible genres. The result: On an overpopulated future Earth, a New York City police detective, who dislikes his arrogant Spacer superiors and their robotic companions, is sent to the Outer Worlds to track down the killer of a Spacer, aided by a robot partner made in the likeness of the murder victim. The Andromeda Strain, by best-selling Michael Crichton, is a techno-thriller rather than a who-done-it, but it's a great puzzle pitting a hero bacteriologist and his flawed team in a race to decipher clues and stop a murderous alien "biological agent" released by the crash of a military satellite before they are destroyed by a quarantining nuclear blast. Meanwhile, Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policeman’s Union is set in a “temporary” Jewish settlement in Sitka, formed after Israel's imagined collapse in 1948 and now about to revert to Alaskan control, where homicide detective Meyer Landsman investigates the murder of his neighbor, a former chess prodigy, and runs afoul of old forces of faith and evil. The City & The City, by China Mieville, is a police procedural involving a psychic journey across borders as two detectives in neighbor cities, one in the decaying city of Beszel and one in the vibrant city of Ul Qoma, are drawn by a woman's murder into an underworld of nationalists intent on destroying the rival city and unificationists seeking to combine them. Finally, Alfred Bester's The Demolished Man won a Hugo back in 1953 yet seems strangely apropos today: In the year 2301, guns are only museum pieces, and benign telepaths sweep the minds of the populace to detect crimes before they happen, so murder is virtually impossible--until Ben Reich, a psychopathic business magnate, devises a scheme to eliminate the competition and destroy the social order. There are just too many options to note here, so check out http://best-sci-fi-books.com/23-best-science-fiction-mystery-books/

The Medieval Mystery: Death and Pageantry

The violence and pageantry of the Medieval world, from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Renaissance (5th through 15th centuries), has been a popular backdrop for fantasy and romance fiction, but murder mystery writers also like the period. Crime-solving set in castle, monastery and walled town pairs archaic suspects, such as lords, serfs, knights, maidens, monks, minstrels and lepers, with the evergreen motives for mayhem. That the quest for moral justice must navigate a feudal society torn by war, plague and intolerance enriches the plots. The literary world first embraced the Medieval mystery with Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose. Young Brother William of Baskerville investigates the bizarre deaths of monks at an Italian monastery in a complex novel pitting Aristotelian logic against theology as the hero tries to decipher secret symbols and coded manuscripts. Those who find Eco's opus too philosophically dense may enjoy Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael mysteries instead, in which a 12th century Benedictine monk tackles local murders with psychological insight and primitive forensics. Other series include Caroline Roe's Isaac from Girona mysteries about the sleuthing of a blind doctor in mid-1300 Spain; Kate Sedley's Roger the Chapman mysteries featuring a peddler in Medieval England; Bernard Knight's Crowner John mysteries about a former Crusader knight serving the king's justice in 12th century England; Ian Morson's William Falconer series with crime-solving by a 13th-century Oxford University Regent Master; Philip Gooden’s Chaucer Tales, relying on Geoffrey Chaucer, future poet and diplomat, to put together the clues; and Susanna Gregory's Matthew Bartholomew mysteries, in which a teacher of medicine investigates murders in 14th-century Cambridge. Paul Doherty is another Medieval mystery leader with multiple series (Brother Athelstan mysteries for one), but try his Satan in St. Mary for a fun read about a real murder in 13th century London. If you're bored by Medieval males, check out Peter Tremayne's Sister Fidelma mysteries, with a 7th century Irish nun as detective, or read Ariana Franklin's Mistress of the Art of Death, where an ahead-of-her-time 12th century woman doctor investigates. For historical mystery options, regardless of time period: http://bestmysterybooks.com/best-historical-mystery-books.html

Victorian Mysteries Debut Modern Crime-Solving

Looking to escape back in time with your next mystery? England's Victorian era is a favorite setting because it can combine old-fashioned moral certitudes with relatively modern crime-solving thanks to the era's policing and forensic science advances. Indeed, the Victorian period ushered in the first true detective fiction, such as Charles Dickens’ Bleak House, Wilkie Collins’ The Woman in White, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes tales, and Edgar Allan Poe's three seminal detective stories (The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Mystery of Marie Roget and The Purloined Letter). If you want to sample other British Victorian mystery masters, try Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon, unique for its contemporary portrait of a daring, ruthless woman. Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu was famed for his Victorian Gothic mysteries, and a good example is Uncle Silas about a sinister uncle threatening a plucky heroine. But many modern writers are carrying on the Victorian mystery tradition--sometimes borrowing from the masters. For example, a series by Laurie R. King pairs an aging Sherlock Holmes with clever teen Mary Russell, starting with The Beekeeper's Apprentice. Lynn Shepherd's The Solitary House has two Charles Maddoxes, a private detective and his "thief taker"great uncle, solving a mystery involving the cast of Dickens' Bleak House. Meanwhile, The Asylum by John Harwood is inspired by Wilkie's structure and atmosphere as a young woman awakens in an asylum under a name she denies and repudiated by relatives. Among the modern Victorian-era mystery series are those penned by Anne Perry, with The Cater Street Hangman as the first entry of her popular Thomas Pitt London mysteries. While "Victorian" connotes England, the same time period has inspired great mysteries set in the U.S. One of the best is Caleb Carr's The Alienist about 1896 child mutilation murders in New York, with an investigative team made up of a New York Times crime reporter,  his "alienist" (psychologist) friend, and then NYC Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt. Victoria Thompson's Gaslight Mystery series also is set in Victorian-era New York but is notable for its female sleuth, midwife Sarah Brandt, first introduced in Murder on Astor Place. For more Victorian mystery ideas: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/new-titles/adult-announcements/article/56604-victorian-crimes-mysteries-2013.html