Hadn’t a Clue

Many years ago, I created an online dating profile that eschewed potential mates who read mysteries. I was in my twenties, living alone in Toronto, and working a low-rung job in journalism while dreaming of more illustrious roles: foreign correspondent, Europe-based art critic, anything that might land me in New York City. The exact wording of my post is lost in the digital ether, but it went something like “Need not apply if your favourite book is The Da Vinci Code.”

This cringey declaration from my past floated into my present when my oldest friend recommended Louise Penny’s detective fiction and I said, point-blank, “I don’t read murder mysteries.” The statement was true, but this time I had to wonder: What was I afraid of? Not violence or blood, which I consume ravenously in television and podcast form. No, what scared me, as a writer, was the possibility of bland prose, formulaic plot, and troubled, unreliable narrators. The Escher-like sub-genres...