Carrie Talick on Mashing Up Genres and Injecting Comedy into Murder Mysteries

Just when you thought thrillers and mysteries were the only place to find a body, along comes a small army of writers who love a good romance and a lot of laughter with their untimely deaths.

Lately, as I look through the stack of books I’ve read this year, it struck me that every single one has a mystery at the heart of it but also, comedy. The titles range from literary, like We Solve Murders by Richard Osman, thrillers like Sweet Pea by C.J. Skuse, to a romance, My Killer Vacation by Tessa Bailey, and even in Mystery, Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone by Ben Stevenson. Each one serves as an excellent example of crime meeting comedy.

I adore a little humor with my crime and I’m not alone. It seems that murder and hilarity are having a moment. Rewinding back to 2021 when Richard Osman’s brilliant The Thursday Murder Club series burst on the scene, I devoured every hilarious, excellently written word.

Here were geriatric protagonists in a quiet English retirement village solving murders with dry wit, aching humanity, and impeccable timing. It felt like someone had quietly unlocked a new door in the mystery mansion. Osman’s novels were suspenseful, yet incredibly warm, funny and moving. Since then, there has been a growing wave of published mysteries featuring comedy and love with their fair share of murders, mayhem and heists.

What a bright and rich new playground for writers to play in and how fun that it seems to be changing some of the rules. Mysteries traditionally have ironclad beats that a reader expects. Romance novels as well share a certain well-trodden path. Readers find the tropes and familiar beats comforting, but this new hybrid genre is messing with those old patterns and rules and readers are coming along for the ride.

To delve deeper into why we enjoy this intersection between crime, humor, and romance, we need only to look toward brain science. Bet you didn’t expect brain science education today, but here I am, full of surprises!

Comedy and mysteries share a common storytelling DNA when it comes to our brain chemistry. We like the same psychological rhythms that these genres deliver. There is a cadence to a joke, a romance and a mystery. In each genre, there is a set-up, clues that lead us to believe in a suspect and/or love interest, information gaps, the puzzle appeal, and they all hinge on the element of surprise. All three exploit our curiosity, the need to solve, the promise of justice, a laugh, or discovery of the killer or love at the end. All provide the same kind of dopamine hit.

So, it seems damn near brilliant to combine these storytelling dynamics to create genre-bending, highly satisfying stories. In fact, it seems inevitable.

I don’t know about you, (although I suspect it is all of us) but I am overwhelmed with the stress and intensity of the world today. In an era where the daily news and social media deliver a fire-hose-style stream of cortisol-spiking stories, I welcome a little laughter in the middle of a murder investigation in my fiction.

The seductive suspect and the hardened detective have sizzling dialogue and a romantic spark? I’m here for it. A Cornish village where seven murders have taken place starring a wry, witty vicar who has secrets? Let me pour a cuppa! A sleepaway camp in northern Maine where a snarky teenager is found dead and a wise-cracking camp counselor solves the case and falls in love with the Archery instructor? Sign me up.

Life is absurd. Perhaps mysteries and romances can acknowledge a little of that.

That’s what I tried to do in my new novel, The Alibi Club. At its heart it’s a locked-room mystery. But it’s also a romantic comedy about six strangers who are trapped together on a group blind date that rises to the level of calamity while a crime unfolds around them and someone at the table may be responsible. Writing characters with questionable pasts who not only misbehave but have fun while doing it? Most fun I’ve had as a writer so far.

If a novel and its characters make me giggle, snicker, or snort with laughter while keeping me glued to the page, if an author gives me a moment of levity in the face of peril, then they have won my reading heart forever.

This, of course, is not new.  But it has been rare. This comedy/crime territory only has a few authors who have dared tread (and a precious few publishers who have dipped an audacious toe into this new genre mashup) but the ones who did now have armies of fans.

Elmore Leonard, the master of dark, off-beat humor to name one master. Dave Barry and Carl Hiaasen, both columnists who turned Floridian crime stories into brilliantly hilarious novels are two more who are on the case. And the irreverent, laugh-out-loud powerhouse that is Janet Evanovich is another shining example.

When I read books by these authors, what I realize is, they were writing what they wanted to write, genre be damned, and audiences found them.

The best stories are not about a murder. They’re not about a romance either. They’re about people trying to connect when life gets messy.

Genres aren’t prisons. They’re playgrounds. They’re meant to evolve. After all, when you don’t seem to fit in, maybe it’s time to blaze a new path for something completely different. The sandbox just got a whole lot bigger. And there might be body buried under there. Go ahead, have a little fun.

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