Why Mysteries?
When I set out to write my first novel, I knew without question that I would write a mystery. As a teen, I remember coming home from the library with stacks of Agatha Christie books and tearing through them within a week. Part of me loved escaping to the far-flung settings of the Golden Age mysteries, but I also enjoyed the way the investigation brought me into the story—not only as an observer, but as an active participant. I got to look over the shoulder of Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple as they interrogated witnesses and checked alibis.
But even more than the cognitive challenge of who did it, I’ve always been drawn to the psychology of why they did it. Like the detectives, I searched for motives. I wanted to understand why people would commit such seemingly illogical acts. What series of events brought them to that point? As an adult, it’s a question I still find myself asking on a daily basis.
As much as I tell myself not to, I can’t help but watch or read about the twisted crime stories that make the news. I promise I’m a happy, fairly positive person, so what draws me to this darker side of life? I think it’s the need to understand the ugly realities most of us would like to keep at bay. Judging by the popularity of mysteries, suspense, true crime, and crime dramas, I’m not alone. Michael Connelly once advised authors to “write about what you never want to know.” Whether we’re reading or writing it, crime fiction gives us the opportunity to have the best of both worlds. We delve into aside of the human experience that we want to understand but would prefer to view from a healthy distance. It’s like seeing a shark—exhilarating, as long as we’re watching safely from the other side of some nice, thick aquarium glass.
Along with giving us a day pass to the seedier side of life, mysteries present character studies in disguise. Beneath the layers of intrigue and suspense lie complex characters, driven by greed, revenge, love, or twisted rationales. And, often, the detectives are nearly as troubled by the criminals. Whether it’s a hopeless, hard-drinking private investigator or the cop haunted by a cold case, the job takes its toll. Unlike the reader who can put the book down, detectives must immerse themselves in the morass of a psychopath’s logic and, thus, take the brunt of the damage. Through the detective, we make controlled contact with the taboo and explore the sides of people’s personalities they’ve spent their lives concealing.
My own mystery, Hidden Rooms, contends with the inaccessible sides of people’s personas and the secrets they keep hidden even from close family and friends. Although my book is set in a small town where everyone knows their neighbors, the drama centers on the characters discovering how little they actually know about one another. My protagonist, Riley, has spent her life quite happily accepting the shiny surfaces her friends and family present. It’s only when a disaster tears their lives apart, that she’s forced to question what they’ve kept hidden beneath their idyllic exteriors.
My mystery—and the genre as a whole—is about trying to understand the people around us, and that’s why I love them. Crime fiction captures the thrill of the unknown and reveals it to us page by page.
Hidden Rooms
Long-distance runner, Riley Svenson, has been fighting various bewildering symptoms for months, from vertigo to fainting spells. Worse, her doctors can’t tell her what’s wrong, leaving her to wonder if it’s stress or something more threatening. But when her brother’s fiancée is killed—and he becomes the prime suspect—Riley must prove his innocence, despite the toll on her health.
As she reacquaints herself with the familiar houses and wild woods of her childhood, the secrets she uncovers take her on a trail to the real killer that leads right back to the very people she knows best and loves most.
Buy Links
Amazon, Gathering Volumes, Bookshop.org, or CamCat Books
Kate Michaelson’s debut novel, Hidden Rooms, won the 2022 Hugh Holton Award for best unpublished mystery by a Midwest writer and was released in April of 2024. As a curriculum developer and technical writer, she has created educational content on everything from media literacy to cybersecurity awareness. She is active in several writing groups and participates in causes that support those with disabilities and chronic illness. In her free time, she loves hiking, traveling, napping and anything else that takes her away from her laptop. She grew up in Greenwich, Ohio and now lives in Toledo, Ohio with her husband and pets.
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Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/40269182.Kate_Michaelson
Website: http://www.katemichaelson.com
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