This is a great question and I am happy to start off a discussion on this with my Cozy Crime Collective friends.
Cozy Mysteries used to have one standard template. Small town amateur sleuth, usually a woman and often featuring an animal, particularly on the cover. No overt sex or graphic violence and no bad language. Good clean fun. Traditionally, they were almost always written by women, which makes sense since the overwhelming audience for this genre is women.
But those traditions are changing. That’s good for me since I am currently a man… hey you never know, things can change, and I have been slotted into the cozy mystery category. By Amazon and by many readers who have found that yes, Virginia, men can write good, clean, cozy-like material. All That Glitters, the latest of 13 Sgt. Windflower Mysteries, was recently ranked #1 Best-Selling Cozy Mystery. It lasted about a week at that level. Enough to make me giddy, but far from rich.
I know why cozy mystery readers like this series. It has a kind and likeable protagonist who puts his family and community first. It is also set in a small town with colourful characters and great food. And yes, it has a cat and a dog. Both rescues who end up playing their own helpful roles in assisting Windflower solve a crime or just relax. I do adhere as well to the cire principles of keeping the violence and language subdued and appropriate for the gentle cozy readers.
So, yes, I am bending some of the conventions of the cozy mystery genre. In more ways than one. But I stay within the agreed upon boundaries, mostly. The murders in Sgt. Windflower Mysteries are generally off-scene and there is little blood to startle the squeamish. There are no ‘adult’ situations but a fabulous romance that have led from courtship to marriage and now two children. And the two pets.
My biggest cozy stretch might be that Sgt. Windflower is a Mountie, an RCMP officer. But leading a detachment in a small town. And he may or not stay a police officer. Stay tuned. That small town, Grand Bank, is a real and charming location. In many ways, the community and the weather are main characters in the story. It may not be the American south, but it is a cozy town, for sure.
If it sounds like I am making a case to stay in the cozy mystery milieu, you would be correct. And these views are mine and mine alone. I’m sure my fellow Cozy Crime Collective friends will have lots more to say. So can you, in the comment box below.
Mike Martin is the author of the Award-Winning Sgt. Windflower Mystery Series. The latest book All That Glitters is a #1 Best-Selling Cozy Mystery.
For more great Cozy Mystery Writers visit our Cozy Crime Collective Facebook Page
Sgt. Windflower Mysteries 
Great discussion topic, Mike! I’m so happy to be part of the Cozy Crime Collective, and to bring discussion like this to our readers.
I think, like everything, there is change afoot and the rules have evolved and will continue to evolve. I wrote A Diet of Death as part of my Open University Creative Writing Module a few years ago, and made sure to ‘tick the boxes’ and follow the cozy rules – I have a small village community, a likable (but human and flawed) protagonist, who happens to be a woman. I have my killings mostly off-screen, with low or no on-screen gore or violence. No sex, so big swears… I live in Ireland so that last one was hard for me, and an odd ‘b**ger’ or ‘sh*t’ may slip on through because swearing is almost the national language here, but I edited out anything stronger in deference to the Cozy audience. When I was writing this book, I studied the genre conventions and paid attention, but even with that, I don’t recall all the points you make. For example, I don’t recall ‘Main character should be a woman’ or ‘must have a pet’ kind of rules – if we count Agatha Christie as the queen of Cozy, we have to consider that Poirot is neither a man nor a pet owner – but I did notice some other fun stuff that I have followed. I noticed that many (if not all) of the cozy mysteries I read while studying the genre referenced other cosy mysteries or cosy authors (eek, see me slipping out of American ‘cozy-with-a-z’ into Brit-talk!), and this is something I picked up and ran with in my series – I challenge my readers to keep count of how many other cozy mysteries I give nod to in A Diet of Death alone, and this will be something I continue to do throughout my series, because it’s such FUN. And that leads me to the main takeaway for me: whatever we do with our cosies, they should, ultimately, be fun. And I mean fun to write as well as fun to read, because if I’m not having fun while I’m writing it, why would I expect my readers to have fun reading?
My biggest cozy stretch is that A Diet of Deeath came in BIG – a ‘larger than average for genre’ 90,000 words. I can only say that’s because I was having fun with it.
Love, Jinny x
You can find more about my cosy Irish village with dog-owning female protagonist here: http://www.jinnyalexander.com or https://www.facebook.com/JinnyAlexanderAuthor/
A Diet of Death will be available from September, with its first sequel hot on its heels in October. Sign up for my newsletter (link on website) to get extra subscriber goodies!
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Excellent comments, Jinny. Our differences with this Cozy community really are our strengths.
Mike Martin
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Well said Mike! Men are definitely part of the genre!
In my Travel Writer Cozy Mystery series, my professional detective is a big part of the solving of mysteries, and by the spin-off Travel Writer Day Trips series, he has retired and started his own private investigation company. Who knows, another spin-off could be in the future.
That said, we write what we know, and I’m a woman with no intentions of changing that. 😉
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Absolutely. We write what we know. Or wish to find out
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