Every Saturday morning when I was a little girl, my mother brought me to the public library and settled in with a book of her own while I made my way to the Hardy Boys shelf. She understood, the way reading people do, that browsing is not something you rush.
I belonged to that shelf. I knew every spine. I knew which ones I had read and which ones were still waiting for me. I’d settle in with the whole morning ahead, no clock pressing anywhere, the two of us quiet in our separate corners of the same world.
After the library, we’d stop at the grocery store. I’d spend my entire allowance on Archie comics without a second thought. Then we’d ride home in our pink Cadillac — which felt, to a girl who loved stories, like the height of glamour — and I’d carry my stack out to the pecan tree and read until supper.
That was my whole plan. Every Saturday.
I wrote about that memory not long ago for my other newsletter, ::: sixth generation, in a piece about childhood reading and what happens when life quietly takes your reading life away from you. I didn’t expect what came next.
I went down the rabbit hole.
I started thinking about those Hardy Boys mysteries. About what it was that had me so completely hooked as a child. It wasn’t just the adventure. It was the puzzle. The clues. The slow accumulation of detail that finally, if you paid close enough attention, told you something true.
That rabbit hole eventually led me here.
Introducing A Likely Story Mysteries
A Likely Story Mysteries™ is a cozy mystery brand built for readers who love the genre and want more of the world it creates.
The articles w cover everything from real cold cases and vanished towns to the history of mourning jewelry, the psychology of small-town secrets, travel destinations that belong in a mystery novel, and honest book recommendations. No gore. No graphic crime. Just the parts of mystery culture that make it one of the most enduring genres in fiction.
The puzzle books are already in motion.
The novels are coming.
But first, let me tell you what’s already out the door.
Suspect Search™ — A New Kind of Word Search
Suspect Search™ #001 is live on Amazon now. (Grab it here!)
Here’s how it works. Instead of one word search with a list of words to find, you get four interlocking puzzles on a single page. Each grid gives you one piece of the case. Solve all four and you’ll know the victim, the location, the killer, and the weapon.
You’re not just filling in a grid. You’re solving a murder.
The first book has a 1950s nostalgia theme — the era of tail fins and drive-ins and diner stools and the particular kind of small-town life that always seems to be hiding something underneath the surface. It’s the first in a series, and I can’t wait to hear your feedback.
What’s Coming Next
There’s a second puzzle format in development right now. It’s called Chapters & Clues™, and it works a bit differently. You read a short story chapter first — an actual mystery with characters and setting and a plot that moves. Then, as you work through the chapters, you solve word search puzzles to uncover the clues that identify the killer.
The story comes first. The puzzle follows. You’re a reader and a detective at the same time.
That one will debut within the next few weeks.
Beyond the puzzle books, I’ve been writing cozy mystery novels. Each series I have planned is set in a different corner of the South and built around characters I hope you’ll love. More on all of that as it takes shape.
For now, the game is afoot.
Something suspicious is always happening around here and you’ve just been handed the case file.
A FEW INTERESTING TIDBITS
- The Hardy Boys series has sold an estimated 70 million copies worldwide. Worth verifying the current figure from a confirmed source, but it remains one of the best-selling series in children’s publishing history.
- The cozy mystery genre takes its name from the tradition of mysteries where violence happens off-page and community and character are foregrounded over graphic crime.
- Word search puzzles were first published in the 1960s. The format has remained almost entirely unchanged since its debut, which may be part of its enduring appeal.
- The 1950s setting of Suspect Search™ #001 coincides with what many readers consider the golden era of the American small town — a world that cozy mysteries have been revisiting ever since.
What’s the mystery book or series that first got you hooked? Tell me in the comments. I’d genuinely love to know.