THE MYSTERY ABOUT MYSTERIES…

I am beginning to wonder if there exists out in the world, a mystery novel that is clean (like, rated G or PG at the worst) that doesn’t involve sex or dead bodies. Although I am an Agatha Christie fan, as well as Lillian Jackson Braun, still there is the dead person (Lillian is nice enough not to pretend that only really hateful people are ever killed). I’d like to read some mysteries (you know, the NON predictable kind) where no one has to die, and no one has to sleep with someone they aren’t married to, and the vocabulary is decent enough to let my kids read.

One thing I tend to get frustrated with in television and movie mysteries is that I can almost always figure out who done it and why before the first hour is up (sometimes in the first few minutes), I suppose that is why I never liked Columbo much. But I always liked Perry Mason (he appealed to my adolescent idea of a REAL man) even though he almost always pulled someone out of the crowd that you didn’t even know existed and pinned the murder on them. But he wasn’t predictable, and you had to search the crowd with him.

Meanwhile I search through books and wish I could find Something! Granted, Agatha knew her stuff and you never were quite sure until she finished, and Lillian makes it possible for you to figure it out with Qwill if you just pay enough attention to Koko. And they are both rather clean, except for the sex (implied) and the body (sometimes graphic). But I’ve read all Lillian’s stuff, and I am kind of bored with Agatha’s, sometimes hers seem like a Hardy Boys formula mystery. I guess I’m ready for something “modern”, but afraid of what I’ll come across because I really don’t know the authors. I suppose I could ask the Librarian…