Cosy crime (or "cozies", in the American spelling) is a genre of mystery fiction featuring amateur detectives, bounded settings and puzzle-driven plots. It eschews gore, sex and profanity. Villains are always caught, justice is served and order is restored.
The genre traces to the inter-war masters: Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers and Georges Simenon. Christie, its grande dame, is the bestselling fiction writer of all time, with more than 2bn novels sold. Alexander McCall Smith's "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency" series, set in Botswana, has sold more than 20m copies across 26 books.
Cozies usually take place in a bounded area—a village, small town, locked room or defined corner of a city. At their centre is a puzzle that the investigator solves and readers try to follow back at the end to see what they missed. Deus ex machina and sudden revelations are frowned upon. Police are usually portrayed as hidebound and indifferent, especially to older or female protagonists.
The protagonist is often a young woman not in law enforcement who falls into sleuthing because the police are not doing an adequate job. Settings frequently revolve around food or hobbies: authors have written series centring on soul-food restaurants, noodle shops, doughnut shops, embroidery, coupon-clipping, apiculture and orchard-keeping.
The genre is enjoying a resurgence in the 2020s, driven by Richard Osman's "Thursday Murder Club" series. One explanation is that as romance novels became more explicit, readers who prefer their books without lots of bonking turned to mysteries. Another echoes the genre's first flourishing during the turbulent inter-war years: when the world is troubled and uncertain, people want art that provides succour and stability.
Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.