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They Do It With Mirrors, Part 1: A suite of character studies
Welcome back to our series on the art of literary adaptation, using the Miss Marple series as a guide. For those of you who are new, I’ve been re-reading the adventures of my favorite spinster sleuth, and comparing the novels with both the BBC and ITV adaptations. It’s been a fascinating way to see how…
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Cozies, fantasies, and more: the most exciting books of 2023
Happy New Year! We just finished a roundup of some of my favorite books of 2022, and it’s time to look ahead to the new year. While I do my best to vary my reading diet and not only take in new books, there are a few I’m particularly excited to get on my shelf.…
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TCO Reviews: Death Comes to Marlow by Robert Thorogood
In addition to mystery novels, I am also an avid fan of word games. I particularly love crossword puzzles: I regularly race my friends to complete the New York Times crossword, and got into cryptic crosswords over the pandemic. I’m still terrible at them – I can’t solve anagrams to save my life – but…
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The Cozy Owlet’s favorite 2022 reads, Pt. 3: Fantasy
Happy New Year’s Eve! And welcome back to my end-of-year roundup of my favorite books of the year. Today, we’re taking a look at fantasy novels – a genre I hope to write about more in 2023 – and highlighting my favorite book of the year. My favorite fantasies: holding up a magic mirror to…
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The Cozy Owlet’s favorite 2022 reads, Pt. 2: Mystery & crime
Welcome back to my end-of-year roundup of my favorite books of the year. Yesterday, we covered one of my favorite voyeuristic, meta-fictional genres, the epistolary. Today, we’re going to dive deeper into my “home base” genre – mystery and crime novels. These are: My favorite mystery & crime novels: clever protagonists making sense of our…
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The Cozy Owlet’s favorite 2022 reads, Pt. 1: Epistolary novels
It’s the end of the year, which means it’s time to spend a moment reflecting. 2022 has been such a whirlwind of events – the war in Ukraine, Roe v. Wade, the Iranian protests, Elon Musk (sigh), a memorable midterm election… And it’s been a memorable year for me personally – in the last 12…
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Breaking cover: a celebration of 2022’s most exciting book covers
You’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, but I just can’t help myself. There are times when you look at a book and think to yourself, “I need that on my shelf.” These are book covers that tantalize, that intrigue, that promise adventure and emotion. They are the covers that get me…
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Wrapping the Advent of Mystery: one final bow
We have made it through a week of Golden-Age murder mysteries together. I hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as I have. This has been the most ambitious series I’ve created so far, and it’s been such a treat to read and write. I started this series hoping to find some new authors and stories,…
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Advent of Mystery, Day 7: Hercule Poirot’s Christmas by Agatha Christie
And so we’ve made it to Christmas Eve, to Nochebuena. Later today, my family will be gathered around the Christmas tree, sharing cocoa and buñuelos and laughing as the family unwraps my husband’s prank gift boxes, But before we get there, it’s time for one last Christmas mystery to wrap up 2022. And of course,…
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Advent of Mystery, Day 6: An English Murder by Cyril Hare
As we’ve read through Christmas mysteries this week, things have stayed on the reasonably light-hearted side. (At least, as light-hearted as you could expect with murder in the mix). Because house parties often involve friends and family, the genre is a great way to explore family tension. most of these stories limit their suspect pool…