I’m not fighting anything. I agree she was among the first cozy story writers. I just pointed out that they are different from most modern cozies in which the job of the person plays a major role. The wiki site you provided actually emphasizes that the sleuthhas a job that brings them in contact with the crimes. The busybody, nosy old woman is just what the police consider her, not that she is a nosy old woman.
While the cozy category is broad and fuzzy at the edges, lumping in Hamish MacBeth or Brother Cadfael as cozies seems to stretch the definition too far. Especially MacBeth, since he is a police constable.
Wiki says independent means, although also supported by her nephew. While she is apparently well educated, Wiki say she is not aristocracy or landed gentry, so I don’t know exactly what her social class would be. Does she live in a manor or estate? Maybe just rich parents since she never worked or married.
I’m clearly not British or a bookstore owner. I only recognize Michael Innes. Thanks for the list, I’m going to check those out.
This is actually an excellent description for the British stories I mentioned above that have an wealthy, club going, polo watching crime solver. To me these are quintessential British stories, with the focus on upper class people and their manners.
“Homemaker” is not a job in the usual sense. Neither is “cat fancier”. Sometimes it’s just hobbies that do the trick.
No, she’s definitely that.
Upper. She doesn’t have a job, so is definitely not middle class. She’s of the class I’d call “landless gentry”. Her nephew supports her only in later books , and it seems more an old age thing not a run-out-of-money thing.
IMHO, it doesn’t necessarily have to be a job in the sense of how the character earns their living; just that they have to have a role or identity other than “detective” or “police.”
The Brother Cadfael books are undoubtedly historical mysteries, but if that category can overlap with cozy mysteries, I don’t see why they wouldn’t qualify.
Sorry, I was referring to cozies in general, rather than just Miss Marple.
In the present day, can this refer to new money people or is it always people with old money?
Like I said, the edges are fuzzy and it’s probably been 25 years since I read a Cadfael book, but I don’t remember any particular light hearted or comedic elements to them. I recall them as straight out mysteries.
I don’t think cozy mysteries have to be comedic at all. (The Miss Marple stories aren’t, particularly). I think the Brother Cadfaels have a certain gentleness (for lack of a better word) that I expect to find more in cozies than in other mystery subgenres.
True, but the current surge in cozy stories of the last couple of decades, when cozy appeared on my radar, are all somewhat comedic in formula. Often the police act as the buffoon. I have no problem with people putting Cadfael in the cozy mix, I just don’t consider him to fit.
To show you how fuzzy the boundaries are, take the Confusing Case of Phoebe Atwood Taylor. She started writing her Cape Cod mysteries in 1931. (At 22!) The first half dozen or so are all narrated by an unmarried rich woman of 50 (or because of the Depression a formerly rich woman) who rents a large beach house (or is invited to one as a guest) in Wellfleet (a real place) as a getaway. Within 24 hours the house gets filled with people, a murder takes place, and half of Cape Cod are characters. Everybody drinks and smokes heavily, but these aren’t English: they’re American as all get out with wonderful, authentic atmosphere and the best female characters of any writer in the era. How much more cozy can you get?
But. The detective is Asey Mayo, the Codfish Sherlock, an American doppelganger who uses the 50-year-old woman as his Watson. He’s 60, went to sea as a cabin boy at 8, knows every port in the world, is so expert a mechanic that he helped build the car that started Porter Motors, which he used to win a 1903 race and still drives their new model like a maniac, is expert at any skill, quotes poetry despite no formal education, and is old friends with every native on the island, even though he’s been away for most of the last 50 years.
He doesn’t work, because of his Porter stock, he’s part of the community, and he’s not official, except when the local police deputize him. Yet he’s a superman, like Holmes. Can a cozy have a superman detective? I’d say no.
Taylor drops the Watson characters in the late 30s and takes what were already wild plots into true screwball comedy rivaling the best of Craig Rice (also a woman) who definitely wasn’t cozy. But if these aren’t proto-cozy I don’t know what are.
Older money, I’d say. Marple is sometimes contrasted with nouveau riche people like actresses, City businessmen or the like and they’re clearly of a different milieu, whereas she slots in well socially with actual gentry…
What a strange end to that list. These are the only three on your list whom I know, but I’ve read a lot of their books. When I think Michael Innes, I think of Inspector Appleby, who is obviously a senior police officer, but I see Innes has lots of other books - maybe some of those are cozies? And Crispin’s Gervase Fen is indeed an amateur sleuth, but the tone is very much clever, literary Oxford. Gilbert? I’ve read a bunch of police procedurals of his, and I don’t think there’s a single thing cozy about them.
I wonder if some people expanded “cozy/cosy” to books with a strong degree of English-ness, regardless of context.
Although these are all elements of the popular mystery books subgenre called “cozy mysteries,” they could also refer to the crime drama television series from the United Kingdom, Midsomer Murders, which is basically one, long cozy mystery that has been running since 1997.
But I admit, usually the “detective” is a woman(middle aged or more, but that varies), and not a LEO, altho often her husband or friend or someone is.
And yes- set in a village, not a big city, and few gruesome details.
Hmm, are the Asey Mayo mysteries cozy? There are an occasional gun shot and quite a bit of “boffing” and etc, but Asey is not a professional LEO, altho he does have a glove box full of “honorary” police badges. I would say so. And Phoebe Atwood Taylor was writing hers about the same time as the Miss Marple mysteries. More or less a tie for first popular series. 1930. The ones done in the WW2 period are fascinating.
He does work, he is often away at the Porter plant.
Sorry, no actual law enforcement can solve a cozy mystery. If you stretch the definition that far, there is no reason for the category of cozy, they would all just be mysteries. We went over this quite a bit in the other thread I linked to.
However, I concur that that is a generality. Midsomer Mysteries may be an exception. Not much of a “police procedural”.
There are many other “rules”- village, not city. Almost no explicit violence, the murder is “off screen”, etc-
They agree with you, except they qualify the “Although the cozy mystery sleuth is usually not a medical examiner, detective, or police officer , …” with that usually.
How about Asey Mayo? Not a woman, and is a “Honorary police officer”?
I totally agree, but that’s what she wrote. Mostly it serves to illustrate how different the idea of cozies were at the time.
It might be my memory but in the earlier books I was referring to, his work is just a casual reference to explain his background. It becomes a much bigger deal during the war when travel becomes so difficult.
More or less. Basically his work is just to explain why he is away sometimes, or he is off fishing. True, during WW2 he was really busy when Porter started making tanks. Other than that he was certainly not a 9-5 40 hour a week man, but instead some sort of advisor and test driver.
How about “Midsomer Murders could be considered to be a sorta cozy.” Right setting, usually right sort of secrets, and usually right sort of victim. Not a police procedural at all.
Pretty much what is said here - generally light, if not actually comic; Normal people, usually women, usually stumbling across a crime; if there are police involved, they are more for romantic interest and to tell the woman to stay out of things; violence is off screen or if the main character gets into a deadly situation, she rescues herself by a hairsbreadth, possibly saving someone else in the process.
I thought an animal was almost necessary, but apparently not
The series that sparked this question is the Virginia Holmes Cozy Mystery series.
The narrator is a writer that stumbles across a body when she’s at a hotel on a writing break where she meets a retired detective who proceeds to take the narrator under her wing so she can train the narrator in observation.
Why I didn’t think it was a cozy - only one mystery is solved where the two live. After that, they travel to Las Vegas, France, Iceland, the Galapagos and Montana.
Pretty good, but this thread has reinforced my opinion that it is not cozy, no matter how many times the narrator says it is.
Unmarried (because of WW1) daughter of a well-off family (I don’t think any background is given, but presumably a father successful in a profession or business or maybe military, rather than “big house” landed gentry), left enough inheritance for the cottage and a “modest competency”, not enough to employ more staff than a (young, to be trained up) maid of all work, but not so little as to need to have sought paid work herself (as maybe a governess or “lady’s companion”). An echo of Jane Austen’s world.
