I’m a bit ashamed to admit it but, yeah, I do like cozies. There’s something intriguing about them. They tend to go against everything I’ve learned about writing. Short, choppy sentences. A near total lack of description. Murders galore but little or no blood, muted violence and no emotion:

“Jack, I’m so sorry to have to tell you your wife has been murdered.”

“Oh, my, how horrible. Would you like some tea?”

And yet they work, sucking you in and keeping you turning the pages to the end. One of these days I’m going to figure out how that happens.

In my humble opinion, there are two great cozy writers: Lilian Jackson Braun of The Cat Who fame and M. C. Beaton (Marion Chesney) of Hamish Macbeth and Agatha Raisin fame. I’ve read pretty much all The Cat Who books and nearly all the Agatha Raisin books. It wasn’t until I saw a BBC presentation of a Hamish Macbeth story that I started reading that series.

I recently finished Death of a Chimney Sweep, a Hamish Macbeth cozy from M. C. Beaton. I started it several weeks ago but events in March kind of screwed things up for awhile and I set it aside. I picked it up again yesterday and finished it in one sitting.

Pretty typical for a cozy, as noted above. Quite a number of deaths in this one, all bloodless and muted but still … A lot of author convenience as regards clues and plot but that’s pretty typical of a cozy as well. After reading several Hamish Macbeth cozies, one begins to suspect that Hamish must be psychic the way he picks up on things so quickly. I do like the fact that Hamish shows a bit more emotion than most cozy characters, especially where his critters are concerned.

Did I like this one, you might ask? Yep, sure did. Will I read more Hamish Macbeth? Yep, sure will. Wish I could say why. Wish I knew why they grab me so. C’est la vie, I guess. I’ll just keep reading them and maybe one day I’ll figure out the why.