How do you know you have a great editor? Easy. If within two books, you’ve learned to go back and lop off the first few chapters—you know, the ones you really love where you wallow around with characters who’ve become your “friends” in your favorite cozy coffee shops. Unless you can stick a critical mystery element into those lovely chapters, such as stumbling upon a body or a meeting a suspicious character, first chapters are working against, rather than for your cozy mystery.

I know about beginnings. I’ve been writing them for decades. I coach people to write better ones. But, in general, I’ve been following the path of the hero’s journey where you really need a glimpse of the character’s ordinary world before you shove them into adventure. You absolutely need to ground the reader in your cozy mystery world. But the cozies that grab me (and my editor) stumble, race, or plummet out of the ordinary world and into a mysterious muddle that makes me want to turn pages. Here’s to more of those cozies!