fiction

Cozy Mysteries.  

For comfort reading at the moment I'm going through the Agatha Christie Poirot novels in order. They're a blast, I highly recommend. I also recently watched the third Knives Out movie, "Wake Up Dead Man". The Knives Out movies are cozy mysteries, heavily influenced by Christie in general, and the character of Poirot specifically, but with a layer of intentional cultural commentary that's mostly missing from Christie. I loved the first movie, hated the second one, and loved the third one. If you dropped off after the second one, give it a chance, it's a surprising, delightful return to form.

In that movie, they mention the book "The Hollow Man" aka "Three Coffins", a celebrated novel by the master of the "locked room" mystery, John Dickson Carr. I've read one other Carr novel that I remember being clever, but not much else.

It's interesting to feel the difference in style and tone between Christie and Carr, who were writing in the same genre at the same time and surely read each other. Carr is much more dramatic, theatrical, exciting, much more interested in suspense, peaks and valleys, spectacle, things like that. But as a result, it's sometimes hard to understand what's happening. Like, you will be told that a character spoke, but you won't be told what they said, and instead it will explore the reactions and implications, and then maybe go somewhere else completely, before returning in a later chapter to reveal what was actually said. But that whole time, you're wondering, wait, did I miss something? Was I supposed to understand this?

Christie, on the other hand, has this absolutely transparent prose. It's a marvel. There's nothing extra, nothing confusing, you never lose track of her for a second. It's perfectly clear. You understand everything that's happening in the story exactly when she wants you to, and you're never worried that you didn't understand anything.

Which makes the reveals at the end so satisfying. Like a magician wearing a short sleeved shirt, doing everything very slowly, right in front of your eyes.

It's also SO cozy. If you don't read murder mysteries, the idea of the "Cozy Murder Mystery" might sound like an oxymoron, and obviously like, actual murder is not cozy or fun or anything like it. But Christie's world is so calm and pleasant, and so nostalgic for me. 

This is aided by the fact her murders are also unnaturally bloodless. I just read one where someone took the knife out of the victims neck and was touching the point to see how sharp it is, with no mention of the fact that, were someone actually stabbed in the neck, the knife would be covered in blood. It's a weirdly dissociated version of violence, where the actual violent act is completely abstracted, completely symbolified.

Juries still out on the Carr book. I'll finish it, but my guess is I'll be going right back to Christie afterwards.

I came here to say something else, only tangentially related to all this, but that's enough for today. I'll have to say it another day.

P.S. In the vein of the cozy mystery, but also in the vein of short daily puzzle: I recommend Clues By Sam. It's a very high quality daily logic puzzle that seems to be actually improving my working memory.

https://cluesbysam.com/

Let me know if you try it, or if you're already playing it.

P.P.S. The difficulty ramps through the week, peaking on the weekend and resetting on Monday, so if it's too hard for you today, try again on Monday.