30 Best Cozy Mystery Books: Charming Whodunits Without the Gore in 2026

Looking for the best cozy mystery books? This curated list features 30 titles spanning classic whodunits, culinary mysteries, bookshop cozies, pet mysteries, and more — all the charm and puzzle-solving without the graphic violence. Pull up a chair and a cup of tea.

Cozy mysteries are comfort food in book form. The genre follows a specific formula — an amateur sleuth solves a murder in a small, contained setting, usually with the help of a colorful cast of supporting characters — but within that framework, there’s an enormous amount of variety. You can find cozy mysteries set in bakeries, bookshops, yarn stores, English villages, Caribbean islands, and Victorian England. The murders happen offscreen or with minimal gore. The detective is rarely a hardboiled professional; more often, she’s a librarian, a baker, a cat owner, or a retired schoolteacher who happens to be very good at noticing things.

The appeal is straightforward: readers get the intellectual satisfaction of a puzzle without the emotional weight of graphic violence or bleak themes. Cozy mysteries trust that a whodunit can be gripping without being dark. The best ones deliver genuine surprises, well-constructed plots, and characters you want to spend time with book after book. It’s no accident that many cozy mysteries are part of long-running series — once readers find an amateur sleuth they love, they tend to follow her through dozens of cases.

This genre has seen a surge in popularity over the past few years. Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club brought cozy mystery to mainstream bestseller lists, and Nita Prose’s The Maid proved the genre could earn literary acclaim. Meanwhile, established series by Louise Penny, Alan Bradley, and Alexander McCall Smith continue to attract loyal readers by the millions. If you’ve never read a cozy mystery, now is a great time to start.

For more mystery recommendations, explore best mystery authors, best detective novel series for fans of crime books, authors like Agatha Christie, and authors like Ruth Ware.

Table of Contents

Classic Cozy Mysteries

These are the foundational titles — the books that defined the genre or that every cozy mystery fan considers essential reading. Many of them predate the formal “cozy mystery” label but established the conventions that the genre still follows today.

1. The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie (1930)

Agatha Christie invented the modern mystery novel, and The Murder at the Vicarage is the book that introduced Miss Marple — the quintessential cozy mystery detective. The vicar of St. Mary Mead discovers the body of Colonel Protheroe in his study, and just about everyone in the village had a motive to kill the universally disliked man. Miss Marple, an elderly spinster who knits and gossips, solves the crime by understanding human nature better than anyone else in the room.

What makes Christie’s Miss Marple books the gold standard for cozy mystery is the setting: St. Mary Mead is a seemingly placid English village where terrible things happen behind closed doors, and Miss Marple’s genius lies in recognizing that small-town life contains every kind of human behavior, good and evil. Christie’s plotting is tight, the red herrings are fair, and the solution, when it arrives, feels both surprising and inevitable. If you’re going to read one Miss Marple novel, this is the one to start with, though A Murder Is Announced and The Body in the Library are equally excellent.

“The worst is usually true.”

2. Still Life by Louise Penny (2005)

Louise Penny’s Still Life is the first book in the Chief Inspector Gamache series, set in the fictional Quebec village of Three Pines. When beloved local artist Jane Neal is found dead in the woods, apparently killed by a stray hunter’s arrow during bow season, Gamache suspects murder. The investigation draws him into the tight-knit community of Three Pines, where everyone has secrets and the line between accident and homicide is thinner than it appears.

Penny’s writing is warm, literary, and deeply humane. Gamache is one of the great fictional detectives — thoughtful, kind, and relentless in pursuit of truth. But what sets the series apart is Three Pines itself: a village populated by memorable characters — the poet Ruth Zardo with her pet duck, the bookseller Myrna Landers, the bistro owners Olivier and Gabri — who recur throughout the series and become as important as the mysteries themselves. Still Life won the New Blood Dagger Award, and the series only gets better from here. A Fatal Grace, the second book, is equally strong.

“Where there is love there is courage, where there is courage there is peace, where there is peace there is God. And when you have God, you have everything.”

3. A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny (2007)

The second Gamache novel, A Fatal Grace, takes place during a brutally cold Quebec winter. CC de Poitiers, a wealthy and thoroughly unpleasant woman, is electrocuted in broad daylight while watching a curling match on the frozen lake. Everyone saw it happen, but no one saw how. Gamache returns to Three Pines to investigate, and the case forces him to confront the darker currents running beneath the village’s charming surface.

Penny deepens the world of Three Pines in this installment, and the winter setting adds an atmospheric chill that complements the mystery. CC is written as so genuinely awful that the reader feels guilty for not caring more about her death, which is exactly Penny’s point — the book asks us to consider whether some victims deserve less justice than others, and Gamache’s answer, delivered through his methodical investigation, is a quiet rebuke to our worst instincts. The plotting is tighter than Still Life, and the emotional resolution hits harder.

“Life is change. If you aren’t growing and evolving, you’re standing still, and the rest of the world is surging ahead.”

4. The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith (1998)

Alexander McCall Smith’s The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency is one of the most beloved cozy mystery series ever written, and it stands apart from the genre in almost every way. Set in Gaborone, Botswana, it follows Precious Ramotswe, who uses her late father’s inheritance to open the country’s first and only female-owned detective agency. Her cases are small-scale — missing husbands, dishonest employees, worried parents — and she solves them with common sense, empathy, and a deep understanding of human behavior.

McCall Smith writes with a gentle, observational style that captures the rhythms of daily life in Botswana with obvious affection and respect. Mma Ramotswe is a wonderful creation: large, practical, tea-drinking, and wise. The books don’t rely on murders or high-stakes plots; instead, they find drama and meaning in ordinary problems, which is refreshing in a genre that typically requires a body. The series runs to more than twenty books, and while the formula is consistent, the pleasure of spending time with Mma Ramotswe and her world never diminishes.

“The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was the only detective agency in Botswana. Mma Ramotswe was proud of that. She was proud, too, of her country.”

5. A Is for Alibi by Sue Grafton (1982)

Sue Grafton’s A Is for Alibi launched the alphabet series that would span 25 books (Grafton passed away in 2017 before writing Z). Kinsey Millhone is a private investigator in the fictional California town of Santa Teresa — no-nonsense, twice-divorced, and living in a converted garage. When Nikki Fife hires her to find the real killer of her ex-husband — a crime Nikki was convicted of and served eight years for — Kinsey digs into a case that’s colder than it should be.

Grafton’s prose is clean and direct, and Kinsey is a memorable narrator: smart, self-reliant, and drily funny. The series straddles the line between cozy mystery and hard-boiled detective fiction — there’s more grit here than in a typical cozy, but the small-town setting, the personal scale of the crimes, and Kinsey’s wry voice place it firmly in cozy territory. Reading the alphabet series in order is a pleasure because Grafton lets Kinsey age and change in real time across three decades of books. A Is for Alibi is a perfect starting point, snappy and satisfying.

“I’m a private investigator. I’m thirty-two years old, twice divorced, no kids. The day before yesterday I killed someone and the fact weighs heavily on my mind.”

6. The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (2009)

Alan Bradley’s The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie introduces Flavia de Luce, an eleven-year-old amateur detective with a passion for chemistry — particularly poisons — living in a crumbling English estate in the 1950s. When a dead bird with a postage stamp pinned to its beak appears on the family doorstep, followed shortly by a dead body in the cucumber patch, Flavia sets out to solve the mystery before the police can.

Flavia is one of the most original protagonists in cozy mystery. She’s precocious without being annoying, genuinely brilliant at chemistry, and completely fearless in the way that only an eleven-year-old who doesn’t fully grasp danger can be. Bradley writes the 1950s English countryside with loving detail, and the mystery is well-constructed — the stamp collecting subplot is surprisingly interesting, and the solution is both clever and fair. The series runs to ten books, and Flavia’s voice remains a delight throughout. It’s the kind of series that works equally well for adults and for younger readers who are ready for something more sophisticated than children’s fiction.

“I love the smell of a good poison in the morning.”

7. Aunt Dimity’s Death by Nancy Atherton (1992)

Aunt Dimity’s Death is the first book in a long-running series that adds a gentle supernatural twist to the cozy mystery formula. Lori Shepherd grew up listening to her mother’s stories about Aunt Dimity, believing the character was fictional. After her mother’s death, Lori discovers that Aunt Dimity was real — and has left Lori a substantial inheritance, along with a cottage in the English Cotswolds and a blue journal in which Aunt Dimity’s handwriting appears in response to Lori’s questions.

The ghost-communication conceit could feel gimmicky, but Atherton handles it with a light touch that adds charm without undermining the mystery. The book is as much about Lori coming to terms with her mother’s death and her own sense of rootlessness as it is about solving any particular puzzle. The Cotswolds setting is gorgeously described, the supporting cast is warm and eccentric, and the series — which runs to nearly thirty books — has a devoted readership that returns as much for the atmosphere as for the mysteries.

“Death teaches us a great many things, none of which can be learned from books.”

Culinary and Food Cozy Mysteries

Some of the most popular cozy mysteries revolve around food — bakeries, restaurants, catering businesses, and kitchens. The combination of cooking and crime turns out to be irresistible, and many of these books include recipes.

8. Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder by Joanne Fluke (2000)

Joanne Fluke’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder is the first in the Hannah Swensen mystery series, set in the small Minnesota town of Lake Eden. Hannah owns The Cookie Jar, a bakery that’s the social hub of the town. When her delivery driver finds a dead body behind the shop, Hannah gets drawn into the investigation — partly because she found a clue the police missed, and partly because her mother won’t stop pestering her about it.

Fluke established the template that many culinary cozies still follow: small-town setting, amateur sleuth with a food-related business, a cast of quirky locals, a murder to solve, and recipes at the end of each chapter. The mysteries are straightforward puzzle-box affairs, and Hannah is a likable protagonist — sensible, a little sarcastic, and genuinely good at baking. The series runs to over twenty-five books, and while the later entries are formulaic, the first several are a genuine pleasure for readers who like their mysteries served with a side of sugar.

“The only thing better than a warm chocolate chip cookie is a warm chocolate chip cookie and the answer to a murder.”

9. Dying for Chocolate by Diane Mott Davidson (1992)

Diane Mott Davidson’s Dying for Chocolate is the second Goldy Bear culinary mystery and one of the best in the series. Goldy Schulz is a caterer in the Colorado mountains who has a talent for finding trouble. When she takes a summer job cooking for a wealthy family and one of the household members dies under suspicious circumstances, Goldy’s curiosity — and her access to every kitchen and gathering in town — makes her an unlikely but effective detective.

Davidson writes food with genuine expertise, and the recipes included in the books are legitimately good. Goldy is a well-rounded character whose personal life — she’s a divorced mother dealing with a violent ex-husband — adds depth beyond the mystery plots. The Colorado mountain setting is atmospheric, and Davidson balances the lighthearted tone of the cozy genre with moments of real tension. The Goldy Bear series spans seventeen books, and Dying for Chocolate is an excellent entry point because it establishes the series’ strengths without requiring any knowledge of the first book.

“In my experience, the person who says they have nothing to hide is usually sitting on the biggest secret in the room.”

10. Pies and Prejudice by Ellery Adams (2012)

Ellery Adams’s Pies and Prejudice is the first in the Charmed Pie Shoppe mystery series. Ella Mae LeFaye returns to her small Georgia hometown after catching her husband cheating and opens a pie shop where her baked goods have an unusual effect — they seem to enchant the people who eat them. When a local woman is found dead and the circumstances point to magic, Ella Mae’s special gifts make her both a suspect and the best person to figure out what really happened.

Adams adds a magical realism element that sets this series apart from standard culinary cozies. The Southern setting is vividly drawn, complete with Spanish moss, sweet tea, and family dynamics that run generations deep. The pies themselves are described in mouth-watering detail, and the recipes are included. The mystery is competently plotted, but the real draw is the world Adams creates — a small Southern town where magic simmers just beneath the surface and pie is the medium through which it’s expressed.

“There’s nothing in this world that a good pie can’t make at least a little bit better.”

11. Town in a Blueberry Jam by B.B. Haywood (2010)

Town in a Blueberry Jam is the first in the Candy Holliday mystery series, set in the coastal Maine town of Cape Willington. Candy Holliday and her father run a blueberry farm, and when a local beauty queen is found murdered during the town’s annual Blueberry Festival, Candy’s background as a former marketing executive gives her the analytical skills to investigate. The small-town politics, rivalries, and gossip make everyone a suspect.

Haywood captures the feel of a New England coastal town with affection and specificity — the fog, the lobster boats, the seasonal rhythms of farming and tourism. The blueberry farming details are interesting in their own right, and the mystery is a solid whodunit with enough suspects and red herrings to keep readers guessing. Candy is practical and determined, the kind of protagonist who inspires confidence. The series runs to multiple books, each tied to a different seasonal event in Cape Willington.

“In a small town, everyone’s business is everyone’s business, especially when someone turns up dead.”

Bookshop and Library Cozy Mysteries

For book lovers, there’s a particular pleasure in mysteries set among shelves of books. These cozies combine the joy of reading about reading with the satisfaction of solving a puzzle.

12. The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman (2020)

Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club is arguably the book that brought cozy mystery to the broadest audience in decades. Set in a luxury retirement village in Kent, it follows four retirees — Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim, and Ron — who meet every Thursday to investigate cold cases for fun. When a real murder happens at their doorstep, they have a new case to solve, and their collective decades of experience in intelligence, psychiatry, trade unions, and nursing give them an impressive toolkit.

Osman writes with warmth, wit, and genuine affection for his elderly protagonists, never condescending to them or treating their age as a punchline. Elizabeth, a former intelligence operative, is particularly brilliant — sharp, manipulative in the best way, and consistently underestimated. The mystery is well-plotted with satisfying twists, but the real pleasure is the voice: Joyce’s diary entries are laugh-out-loud funny, and the friendship between the four leads feels authentic. The book became a massive international bestseller and spawned sequels that maintain the quality.

“You only get one go at this life, and you are the very best person in the world to live it.”

13. The Maid by Nita Prose (2022)

Nita Prose’s The Maid took the cozy mystery world by storm, becoming a #1 New York Times bestseller and a Reese’s Book Club pick. Molly Gray is a hotel maid who takes enormous pride in her work. She’s socially awkward, takes things literally, and struggles to read other people’s emotions and intentions — traits that make her an unreliable narrator in the most sympathetic possible way. When she discovers a wealthy guest dead in his room, Molly becomes the prime suspect, and she has to figure out who really committed the murder before the police pin it on her.

Prose writes Molly’s voice with extraordinary care — she’s endearing without being infantilized, and her unique perspective on the world makes familiar situations feel fresh. The mystery is well-constructed, with enough twists to satisfy genre fans, but the book’s emotional core is Molly’s relationship with her deceased grandmother, whose advice and wisdom Molly carries with her like a talisman. The hotel setting is richly described, and the supporting cast — from the kindly doorman to the suspicious head of security — fills out the world convincingly. It’s a cozy mystery that also works as literary fiction, which is a rare achievement.

“A maid is like a nurse — or a doctor. Our first duty is to do no harm.”

14. The Cat Who Could Read Backwards by Lilian Jackson Braun (1966)

Lilian Jackson Braun’s The Cat Who Could Read Backwards launched one of the longest-running cozy mystery series — 29 books over four decades. Jim Qwilleran is a newspaper reporter assigned to the art beat who moves into a building where the cranky art critic George Bonifield Mountclemens lives with a remarkable Siamese cat named Koko. When artists connected to Mountclemens start dying, Qwilleran investigates with Koko’s peculiar help — the cat has an uncanny knack for pointing his nose at important clues.

Braun essentially created the cat cozy mystery sub-genre, and Koko remains one of fiction’s most famous feline detectives. The art world setting of the first book gives it a sophistication that’s different from the small-town cozies that dominate the genre, and Braun writes about painting, galleries, and the politics of art criticism with genuine knowledge. The Qwilleran-Koko dynamic is charming, and the mystery is solidly plotted. Later books in the series move to a small town called Pickax, and the quality varies, but the first several are consistently enjoyable.

“Koko always knew. Koko always knew before anyone else.”

15. Murder Is Binding by Lorna Barrett (2008)

Lorna Barrett’s Murder Is Binding is the first in the Booktown Mystery series, set in the fictional village of Stoneham, New Hampshire — a town that has reinvented itself as a haven for bookshops. Tricia Miles owns Haven’t Got a Clue, a mystery bookstore, and when the owner of the neighboring cookbook store is found murdered, Tricia becomes a suspect and an amateur detective simultaneously.

Barrett’s series is tailor-made for bibliophiles. The concept of a town built around bookshops is irresistible, and Barrett populates Stoneham with characters who are passionate about books in different ways — cookbooks, history books, mysteries, rare editions. The mystery is competent, and Tricia is an engaging protagonist whose bookish knowledge occasionally helps her solve crimes. The series runs to more than a dozen books, and the bookshop setting provides a cozy framework that never gets stale. If you enjoy reading about independent bookstores, this series is practically a love letter to them.

“There’s nothing quite like the smell of old books — unless it’s the smell of a freshly solved mystery.”

16. The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella (2005)

While technically more of a comedic novel than a straight cozy mystery, Sophie Kinsella’s The Undomestic Goddess has a cozy mystery sensibility that earns its place here. Samantha Sweeting is a high-powered London lawyer who makes a catastrophic professional error, panics, takes a train to the countryside, and accidentally gets hired as a housekeeper by a wealthy couple who assume she’s answering their ad. She can’t cook, clean, or iron, and the mystery she’s trying to solve is what went wrong at her law firm and who set her up.

Kinsella’s humor is broad and physical — Samantha’s attempts at domestic tasks are genuinely funny — but the book also works as a workplace thriller, with Samantha gradually uncovering the truth about the financial discrepancy that derailed her career. The cozy elements are strong: the English village setting, the colorful neighbors, the slow-building romance with the gardener. It’s lighter than most entries on this list, but it’s the kind of book you read in a single sitting with a grin on your face. If you’re working on your own writing, whether fiction or professional documents, getting the tone right matters enormously — a tool like Grammarly can help catch the kind of errors that pull readers out of a story.

“I’m a lawyer. I don’t do mashed potatoes.”

Cat and Pet Cozy Mysteries

Animals and cozy mysteries go together like catnip and cats. Whether the pet is a clue-finding feline, a loyal dog, or something more exotic, these books add an extra layer of charm.

17. A Cat in the Manger by Lydia Adamson (1990)

Lydia Adamson’s A Cat in the Manger is the first in the Alice Nestleton mystery series. Alice is a struggling New York actress who supplements her income with cat-sitting jobs. When she takes a holiday gig cat-sitting in a rural Connecticut town, she stumbles onto a murder in a local stable. Her theatrical instincts — reading people, noticing performances — translate surprisingly well to detective work.

Adamson brings a theatrical sensibility to the cozy mystery form that feels distinctive. Alice’s perspective as an actress gives her a unique lens for evaluating suspects: she’s trained to spot when people are performing emotions rather than feeling them. The cats in the series are present without being anthropomorphized to an absurd degree, and the New York theater world that forms Alice’s background is interesting territory for a cozy. The series runs to over twenty books, and while not every entry is a knockout, the first several are solid cat cozies with a metropolitan flair.

“Cats see everything. They just don’t feel the need to tell you about it.”

18. Dog Days by Elsa Watson (2013)

Dog Days takes an unconventional approach to the pet cozy: a body-swap premise where a woman and a dog switch places during a thunderstorm. Jessica Sheldon wakes up in a dog’s body, and the dog wakes up in hers. Jessica has to solve the mystery of how to reverse the swap while navigating the world from a canine perspective, and the dog — now walking around in Jessica’s body — causes chaos in her personal and professional life.

Watson writes with humor and genuine affection for dogs, and the body-swap premise allows her to explore what it means to see the world the way a dog does — all smells and immediate sensations. It’s lighter fare than most entries on this list, more comedy than mystery, but the puzzle of reversing the swap and the complications that arise from the dog’s behavior in Jessica’s body are engaging. It’s the kind of book that dog lovers will find irresistible and that works perfectly as a palate cleanser between heavier reads.

“You don’t really understand loyalty until you’ve lived in a dog’s body.”

19. Curiosity Killed the Cat Sitter by Blaize Clement (2004)

Blaize Clement’s Curiosity Killed the Cat Sitter introduces Dixie Hemingway (no relation to Ernest), a former deputy sheriff turned pet sitter on Siesta Key, Florida. When she arrives to feed a cat and finds the cat’s owner murdered, Dixie’s law enforcement training kicks in — but so does her PTSD from a personal tragedy that drove her out of police work in the first place.

Clement gives Dixie more psychological depth than most cozy mystery protagonists. Her backstory — the loss of her husband and young daughter — is genuinely tragic, and her transition from cop to pet sitter is driven by grief rather than whimsy. The Siesta Key setting is sun-drenched and appealing, and Clement writes about animals with the detail of someone who knows them well. The mystery is tightly plotted, and Dixie’s investigative skills give her a competence that makes her a more credible amateur sleuth than most. The series runs to nine books before Clement’s death in 2011, and they’re consistently strong.

“I used to carry a gun and a badge. Now I carry kibble and a lint roller. Some days I’m not sure which job is more dangerous.”

20. Mrs. Murphy series: Wish You Were Here by Rita Mae Brown (1990)

Rita Mae Brown co-credits her cat, Sneaky Pie Brown, as co-author of the Mrs. Murphy series, and Wish You Were Here, the first book, sets the tone. Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen is the postmistress of the small Virginia town of Crozet. When residents start receiving postcards with cryptic messages and then turning up dead, Harry investigates — with help from her cat Mrs. Murphy, her corgi Tee Tucker, and the local cat Pewter.

Brown alternates between the human perspective and the animals’ perspective, and the animal chapters are written with a dry wit that’s surprisingly entertaining. Mrs. Murphy and Tee Tucker observe things their human counterparts miss, and their commentary on human behavior is consistently amusing. The mystery itself is solid — the postcard gimmick is creative, and the small-town Virginia setting is well-realized. Brown is a skilled writer (her literary novel Rubyfruit Jungle is a classic), and that craft shows even in the lighter cozy mystery format. The series spans nearly thirty books.

“If only humans could see what was right in front of their noses, Mrs. Murphy thought, they’d solve their own problems.”

Craft and Hobby Cozy Mysteries

Knitting, quilting, scrapbooking, gardening — if it’s a hobby, someone has written a cozy mystery about it. These books appeal to readers who love both crafts and crime-solving.

21. Knit One, Kill Two by Maggie Sefton (2005)

Maggie Sefton’s Knit One, Kill Two is the first in the Knitting Mystery series. Kelly Flynn returns to her hometown of Fort Connor, Colorado, after her aunt Helen is found strangled with one of her own hand-spun yarns. The police rule out robbery because nothing was taken — except a strand of rare mohair. Kelly’s investigation takes her into her aunt’s knitting world, and she joins the knitting group at the House of Lambspun yarn shop to figure out who had a motive.

Sefton was a knitter herself, and the yarn and knitting details are authentic. The House of Lambspun is modeled on a real yarn shop, and the knitting group provides a natural framework for the kind of gossip and information exchange that cozy mysteries run on. Kelly is a practical, business-minded protagonist — she works in accounting — and she approaches the investigation with methodical logic. The Fort Connor setting is pleasant, and the series builds a warm community of recurring characters over its sixteen-book run. Each book includes knitting patterns, which is a nice touch.

“There’s something about working with your hands that frees the mind. Knit and purl, and the answers come.”

22. The Quilt Before the Storm by Arlene Sachitano (2007)

The Quilt Before the Storm is the first book in the Harriet Truman/Loose Threads quilting mystery series. Harriet runs a machine-quilting business in Foggy Point, Washington, and when a fellow quilter is found dead, the Loose Threads quilting group finds themselves tangled in the investigation. The quilting world provides cover for gossip, alibis, and clues hidden in fabric and patterns.

Sachitano writes about quilting with genuine expertise, and readers who quilt will appreciate the technical details. The Pacific Northwest setting — foggy, green, and slightly mysterious — suits the cozy mystery atmosphere well. Harriet is a capable protagonist who uses her quilting connections to access information and suspects. The series has a smaller readership than some entries on this list, but quilting enthusiasts have embraced it warmly, and the combination of craft and crime is executed with care.

“A quilt tells a story in every stitch. Sometimes the story is darker than you’d expect.”

23. Pushed Too Far by Ann Voss Peterson (2012)

While not strictly a craft cozy, Ann Voss Peterson’s Pushed Too Far fits the hobby cozy mold — its protagonist is a former police chief turned yoga instructor in a small Wisconsin town. Val Ryker left law enforcement after a personal tragedy and now teaches yoga classes. When a student is murdered, Val’s police instincts pull her back into investigation mode, and her yoga studio becomes both a sanctuary and a hub for information.

Peterson brings her thriller-writing background to the cozy mystery format, and the result is a book with more tension and pacing than a typical cozy. Val is a more physically capable protagonist than most cozy heroines — her police training hasn’t gone anywhere — and the yoga studio provides an interesting setting where people let their guard down and share things they might not share elsewhere. The small-town Wisconsin setting is well-drawn, and the mystery has enough twists to keep experienced genre readers guessing.

“Breathe in. Breathe out. And try not to think about who might be a murderer in your Tuesday night class.”

24. A Biscuit, a Casket by Liz Mugavero (2013)

Liz Mugavero’s A Biscuit, a Casket is the second book in the Pawsitively Organic mystery series, combining pet cozies with culinary cozies. Kristan “Stan” Connor left her corporate job to start an organic pet treat bakery in the small Connecticut town of Frog Ledge. When a local farmer is found dead and Stan’s business rival becomes a suspect, Stan gets pulled into the investigation.

Mugavero bridges the gap between food cozies and pet cozies in a creative way — Stan bakes for animals, not humans, which gives the culinary element a fresh angle. The small New England town setting is charming, and the cast of recurring characters — including Stan’s various rescue animals — adds warmth. The mystery is straightforward but satisfying, and the organic pet treat business provides an unusual and interesting backdrop for the investigation. Recipes for pet treats are included, which is a fun addition for readers with dogs and cats.

“In my experience, pets are better judges of character than people. If my dog doesn’t trust you, neither do I.”

Modern Cozy Mysteries

These books push the cozy mystery genre in new directions — fresh settings, updated sensibilities, and protagonists who reflect a wider range of experiences.

25. The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune (2020)

TJ Klune’s The House in the Cerulean Sea is technically fantasy, but its cozy mystery sensibility — a contained setting, a found-family community, a secret to uncover, and a gentle tone — puts it firmly in cozy territory. Linus Baker is a caseworker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth who is sent to evaluate an orphanage on a remote island. The children are classified as “extremely dangerous,” and the orphanage is run by the enigmatic Arthur Parnassus. Linus’s investigation into the orphanage — is it safe? are the children being cared for? — is the mystery, and the answer he finds changes everything he believes.

Klune writes with enormous warmth, and the found family at the heart of the book — which includes a child who is literally the Antichrist — is irresistible. The book is a quiet rebellion against bureaucracy, prejudice, and the fear of difference, wrapped in a story that feels like a warm blanket. It won the Alex Award and has become a word-of-mouth sensation. Calling it a cozy mystery is a stretch by strict genre definitions, but the reading experience — gentle, comforting, surprising — is exactly what cozy mystery fans are looking for.

“Don’t you wish you were free? I do. All the time.”

26. Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto (2023)

Jesse Q. Sutanto’s Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers is one of the freshest cozy mysteries in recent years. Vera Wong is a sixty-year-old Chinese American tea shop owner in San Francisco who discovers a dead body in her shop one morning. Instead of leaving the investigation to the police — who she considers incompetent — Vera takes it upon herself to solve the murder, using her tea shop as a lure to draw suspects in and interrogate them over cups of oolong.

Sutanto writes Vera with such vivid personality that she leaps off the page. Vera is opinionated, interfering, and absolutely certain she knows best — about tea, about murder, and about the personal lives of everyone she meets. Her habit of giving unsolicited advice to the suspects she’s investigating is both hilarious and, occasionally, genuinely helpful. The book is funny, warm, and culturally specific in ways that feel authentic, and the mystery — while not the most complex on this list — is satisfying. Vera is the kind of character who makes you want to immediately read everything else the author has written.

“The problem with the police is that they do not understand tea. If they understood tea, they would understand people, and if they understood people, they would solve more crimes.”

27. The Appeal by Janice Hallett (2021)

Janice Hallett’s The Appeal is a cozy mystery told entirely through emails, text messages, letters, and chat logs. A small-town amateur theater group is staging a production of All My Sons while simultaneously running a fundraising appeal for a sick child’s medical treatment. As the documents accumulate, it becomes clear that someone has been murdered and someone else has been wrongly convicted. Two law students are given the documents and asked to determine who really did it — and so is the reader.

The epistolary format is brilliant for a mystery. You’re reading the same evidence the characters are reading, piecing together timelines and motivations from scattered communications. Hallett perfectly captures how people write differently in emails versus texts, how they perform for certain audiences, and how lies look in written form. The amateur theater setting is rich with petty rivalries, personal grudges, and outsized egos, all of which make excellent suspects. It’s interactive in a way that few mysteries manage — you genuinely feel like you’re solving it alongside the characters.

“I’ve learned more about human nature from a local amateur dramatic society than I ever did in law school.”

28. The Maid already covered above, so let’s talk about The Mystery Guest by Nita Prose (2023)

Nita Prose followed up The Maid with The Mystery Guest, and it delivers everything fans of the first book loved. Molly Gray is back at the Regency Grand Hotel, and this time the death is a famous author found in the tearoom during a book launch event. The investigation hits close to home when connections to Molly’s beloved late grandmother surface, and Molly has to confront painful truths about the past while solving the present-day mystery.

Prose deepens Molly’s character in this sequel, giving her more agency and confidence while keeping the voice that made the first book special. The mystery is more complex than the first book’s, with a cold case element that adds layers. The hotel setting remains vivid, and the new supporting characters — including the dead author’s entourage — are well-drawn. It’s a rare sequel that lives up to its predecessor, and Prose handles the difficult task of developing Molly while keeping what readers love about her.

“People leave traces of themselves everywhere they go. You just have to know where to look.”

29. The Windsor Knot by SJ Bennett (2021)

SJ Bennett’s The Windsor Knot has a premise so outlandish it loops back around to brilliant: Queen Elizabeth II is a secret amateur detective who solves crimes from behind the scenes while her staff thinks she’s simply being nosy. When a young Russian pianist is found dead in a Windsor Castle guest room, the Queen quietly investigates while the official inquiry goes in the wrong direction.

Bennett writes the Queen with affection and wit — she’s sharp, observant, and underestimated by everyone around her, which gives her the perfect cover for detective work. The palace setting is fascinating, full of protocols, hierarchies, and restricted spaces that add unique obstacles to the investigation. Bennett clearly did extensive research into royal routines and palace geography, and the details feel authentic. It’s a high-concept premise that could easily have been a gimmick, but Bennett’s writing and plotting are strong enough to make it work. The series continues with All the Queen’s Men and A Three Dog Problem.

“One of the advantages of being Queen was that people didn’t expect you to be listening, so they said the most extraordinary things.”

30. Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson (2022)

Benjamin Stevenson’s Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone is a fiendishly clever cozy mystery that’s also a love letter to the genre. The narrator, Ernest Cunningham, is a mystery writer who attends a family reunion at a snowy Australian mountain resort. When a body is found in the snow, Ernie realizes that, as the title states, everyone in his family has killed someone — and one of them is a current murderer.

Stevenson plays with the conventions of mystery fiction throughout, with Ernest breaking the fourth wall to address the reader directly, promise that he’s playing fair with clues, and reference the “rules” of detective fiction established by Ronald Knox and others. It’s metafictional without being annoying, clever without being smug, and the mystery itself is genuinely well-constructed — all the clues are there, and the solution is both surprising and fair. The Australian setting provides a fresh backdrop for what is essentially a locked-room mystery, and the dysfunctional family dynamics are darkly funny. It’s one of the best cozy mysteries of the past five years.

“I should mention that everyone in my family has killed someone. Some of us more than once.”

Where to Start

If you’re new to cozy mysteries, your entry point depends on your taste. For the purest expression of the genre, start with Agatha Christie’s The Murder at the Vicarage or Louise Penny’s Still Life. If you want something more modern, The Thursday Murder Club and The Maid are both accessible and addictive. Culinary cozy fans should try Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder, and readers who want their cozies with a literary twist will love Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone.

The beauty of cozy mysteries is that they’re designed to be read in quantity. Once you find a series you love, you have dozens of books waiting for you — each one delivering that same satisfying combination of puzzle, community, and comfort. These are books you can read in a weekend, recommend to your grandmother, and return to when you need something that reminds you the world isn’t all bad. A murder happens, a clever person figures out who did it, and order is restored. There’s a reason the genre has been popular for nearly a century, and there’s no sign of it slowing down.

For more mystery picks, check out best mystery authors, best detective novel series for fans of crime books, and authors like Agatha Christie.