Characters Who Need Caring For by Edith Maxwell/Maddie Day

Many crime fiction protagonists don’t have to take care of anyone except themselves. They are single, divorced, or widowed. Some are young and haven’t found anyone to start a family with. Others are older, or jaded, or have lost what family they had. 

Being single makes the sleuthing life of an amateur – or a PI or criminal justice professional – a lot easier. If they miss a meal or pull an all-nighter, the pain is only on them, not on anyone they live with. If a criminal tracks them to their residence, nobody’s in danger except the sleuth.

Many sleuths don’t even have a pet at home. If they do, as in a number of cozy mysteries, it’s often an independent-minded cat who can take care of itself for many hours at a time as long as it has dry food and water available. If a detective or an amateur owns a dog, it has to be walked and played with and its neediness assuaged.

In my mysteries, my protagonists are always women, many with cats. My sleuths also usually have romance in their lives, as people do, and I seem to like to write solid, gentle, loyal men as their partners, men who cook and don’t need someone to take care of them. In my long-running Country Store mysteries, Robbie Jordan falls in love with Abe O’Neill a few books in. They end up marrying. They end up conceiving a much-wanted child, and I wrote two books in which she’s pregnant and has to be extra careful as she tracks down a murderer.  

Robbie is the chef-owner of a popular country store breakfast and lunch restaurant as well as a few B&B rooms upstairs. She gives birth at the very end of Scone Cold Dead, book #13. Did I want to start writing books where she has to breastfeed and care for her baby while still working and catching criminals? For many reasons, I decided to send her out on the high note of giving birth and end the series there, much to my fan’s disappointment.

On the other hand, in Murder at the Toy Soldier, protag Mac Almeida and her husband Tim have gone from child-free to suddenly adopting two little ones after his sister’s unexpected death in book seven. This is my eighth Cozy Capers Book Group mystery, and it’s out on Tuesday! But how does Mac cope with caring for a ten-month old son and a nearly four-year old daughter along with running her bike shop and solving crimes with her book group?

For one thing, see “solid, gentle, loyal” and self-sufficient as mentioned previously. Tim is one of those, in spades, and he and Mac split the parenting tasks. He’s a baker and gets up wicked early to get to work, so Mac takes the morning shift at home. Both kiddos are in day care/preschool. She gets them fed, dressed, and delivered before heading to her bike shop. Her parents, who live nearby, sometimes take Ella after school, and Tim picks up both kids and feeds them dinner. 

The couple makes it work. So far neither child has been endangered in the pursuit of justice, and I plan to keep it that way.

In my newest series, Ruthie Drew is in her seventies and single. Her granddaughters are teens and don’t live with her. I’m back to the sleuth who doesn’t have to take care of anyone else except one cat and occasionally one of her close women friends, all seniors. Look for Ruthie Drew Cleans up coming in 2027.

Readers: Share favorite fictional sleuths who care for others and pull it off!

MURDER AT THE TOY SOLDIER

Cape Cod bike shop owner Mac Almeida is extra busy during a cold, wet February as she and Tim do their best as working parents of a preschooler and a baby. With Ella’s fourth birthday approaching, Mac uses her lunch break to shop for a gift at the Toy Soldier. Behind the counter is Zia Carven, a young woman Mac recognizes. Mac finds a gift Ella will love and Zia offers to gift wrap it. Mac plans to pick it up after work, but when she returns, she finds Zia slumped over the counter, dead, with dried blood on a toy rifle nearby. 

Mac’s mother, Astra, confides that she’d been trying to help Zia, and now the police want to speak with her, which worries Mac. Then Mac discovers that Zia had been in town searching for her birth mother, which only multiplies the questions—and the suspects. One thing is certain: Mac and the Cozy Capers book group will have to double down to find a killer who isn’t playing around . . .

https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Soldier-Capers-Group-Mystery/dp/1496759427/ 

Maddie Day writes the Cozy Capers Book Group Mysteries, the Cece Barton Mysteries, and the Dot and Amelia Mysteries. As Agatha-Award winning Edith Maxwell, she writes Agatha Award-winning historical mysteries and Agatha-nominated short crime fiction. She’s a member of MWA and a proud lifetime member of Sisters in Crime. Day/Maxwell lives north of Boston with her beau and their cat Martin, where she writes, cooks, gardens, wastes time on Facebook, and delights in Grammy duties. Find Edith and Maddie at mysteryloverskitchen.com  and at edithmaxwell.com.