The Lesbian Private Eye: A History

By Megan Casey

This is the definitive study of the lesbian private eye novel. It includes a list of every known mystery featuring a lesbian private investigator from the first appearance of Helen Keremos in 1978 through 2020. The book includes a brief discussion about each PI as well as 100 full-length book reviews by the author.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Megan Casey
• Release date: Jun 18, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463643587

Megan Casey

Megan was born in Canada but moved to the Pacific Northwest as a child. An English major as an undergrad, she was trained as an editor and worked for several minor publishing houses before going back to school. She received her MA in Library and Information Management from the Portland, Oregon campus of Emporia State University. In Portland she was exposed for the first time to lesbian literature, but it was more than a decade later before she decided to make the lesbian mystery novel her intellectual specialty. She is currently retired and lives on a small ranch outside Billings, Montana.

Book preview

The Lesbian Private Eye is both a guidebook and a database. Because of this it is—and always will be—a work in progress. Currently, there are over 300 novels that I have identified as mystery novels featuring lesbian private eyes by almost 100 authors. Tomorrow, there will be more. I will attempt to identify each book as it is published and add it to this database.

This is not an attempt to bilk the buyer of this volume by charging for each new revision. Quite the contrary. I am encouraging readers to purchase this book on Smashwords, which has a policy that I don’t think you can find anywhere else. On Smashwords, when you buy one edition, you also own all future revisions with no extra payment. This is as it should be.

And you can help. I am only one person. If you find titles or authors that I have not included, please let me know. Likewise, feel free to inform me of any wrong information or even typos or grammatical errors I may have missed. My email address is on the last page of this book.

Quickly, here is what you will find in these pages.

1. A few introductory pages about various aspects of the lesbian private eye novel.

2. A list of over 300 private eye novels with lesbian sleuths.

3. A list of all lesbian private eyes, along with a discussion of all of their authors and a list of the books in which they are featured.

Introduction

This book is for anyone interested in reading and studying novels featuring lesbian private investigators. The information here has been sifted from my larger volume, The Art of the Lesbian Mystery Novel, but changed slightly. I have attempted to list every book ever written that has a lesbian private eye as its protagonist, along with information about its author. But let’s step back for a moment and discuss in a little more detail what I am talking about.

What Is a Lesbian Mystery?

The majority, if not all, of the titles I mention in this book will

1. be full-length novels (more than 50,000 words) or volumes of short stories featuring the same main characters.

2. feature a protagonist who is either a lesbian or bisexual female in a same-sex relationship.

3. feature a protagonist who earns a living—or at least part of a living—as a private investigator.

4. fit into the Mystery genre; that is, the protagonist must either investigate a crime or solve a puzzle or mystery. It does not have to be a murder.

5. offer the reader a glimpse into some facet of the lesbian lifestyle or experience.

Authors can be male or female, straight or queer as long as the books adhere to the 5 stipulations above.

Who Writes Lesbian Mysteries?

Here is a curious fact: Most male gay mysteries are written by women. A lot of these—but not all—are written under male pseudonyms, like Josh Lanyon. If this is true—and it is—then shouldn’t we expect most lesbian mysteries to be written by men? It would be logical, I guess, to think that, but we would be wrong. Not only are most lesbian mysteries written by women, but they are written by lesbian women. I find this comparison between gay and lesbian mystery writers to be fascinating. It is one of many topics in this book that are worthy of further study.

A Question of Pseudonyms

Popular lesbian author Lori L. Lake has an interesting essay on pseudonyms and why writers choose to use them. Oddly, she fails discuss the use of pen names in lesbian mysteries—a very important discussion. The omission is even more unusual because Lori L. Lake is, in fact, itself a pseudonym.

Lake’s reason for using a pen name is unknown—she is a very well-known, out lesbian—but a number of other lesbian writers are simply afraid to be outed, either at work or with their families. Nikki Baker is one of these, as is current superstar Lee Winter. Then there are other writers who use pseudonyms for reasons unknown: Kate Allen, Radclyffe, Jae, Rose Beecham, Ellen Hart, and on and on. I’m sure that all of these women have good reasons for using false names to write under. But think of how different the reasons must be for a man.

For instance, as far as I know, Laurence Moore, who writes the excellent Kina McKevie series, is the author’s real name. But if that is true, it puts him in a very small category. My research shows that only a few other male writers of lesbian P.I. mysteries use their real names: David Galloway, Thomas A. Burns, Matt Doyle, and Bill McGrath.

J.T. Langdon and R.E. Conary are also men, but as far as I know, they use their real initials and their real last names.

A pertinent two-part question is this: how many male writers of lesbian mysteries use female pseudonyms, and why? The answer to the first part is ‘I don’t know,’ and I may never know. But the answer to the second is obvious. Anyone who has read more than a handful of reviews knows 1. that most readers of lesbian mysteries are not only women, but also lesbians and 2. that many—not all and maybe not even most—lesbians want to read books by lesbians about lesbians. Period. They would pass up a lesbian mystery written by a man without even reading the blurb. Truth, folks. Although I have not done research into this, I suspect that the same is true of lesbian romances, although not so much for fantasy or sci-fi with lesbian protagonists.

In other words, there is no reason why men can’t write good lesbian fiction, but if they want to be rated based on their talent rather than their sex or their gender identity, they may think it wise to write under a female pseudonym.

Writing the Other

Tying in to the discussion of pseudonyms is a subject that has gained popularity lately: Writing the Other means having a main character that is not part of the culture of the author. A man writing about a lesbian, for instance, or even a straight woman writing about a lesbian. Much has been made of a recent literary novel, American Dirt, whose author describes a woman from a Latin culture to which she does not belong.

Taken to its extreme, this stigma about Writing the Other could extend to a stricture against women writing from a male perspective or a man from a woman’s. Goodbye Madame Bovary, Princess Casamassima, and the like. The truth is this: a good book is a good book. Furthermore, novels, especially lesbian private eye novels, are fiction. Just because a character doesn’t act like most other characters in a genre or in real life doesn’t mean that someone just like them doesn’t exist somewhere. After all, one of a writer’s jobs is to create unique and interesting characters.

But just because it’s okay by me to write—and read—about The Other, it has to be written well to be interesting, realistic, or important. That’s where we as critics come in. No intelligent reader—and especially a lesbian reader—could read David Galloway’s Lamaar Ransom, Private Eye with a straight face. Everything about Lamaar cries out This is a man! And of course Galloway is not the only one who gets things wrong. But having read over 300 novels in this genre, it is by far the exception and not the rule. For instance, Samuel Steward’s brilliant characterizations of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas in his two lesbian mysteries are both enjoyable and historically important.

My conclusion—and my suggestion—is to read the books and judge them on their merits rather than who they are written by. A god book is written by a talented author and that’s the end of it.

In other words, don’t judge books by their authors; judge the authors by their books.

Having said that, if you still decide to read only books written by lesbians, you’re in luck; most of them are.

The Importance of Sex in Lesbian Mysteries

To go into this topic, we need to look at the basic difference between queer and straight After all, many lesbians wear the same styles of clothing as straight women, apply the same makeup, eat the same foods, drive the same cars. Both can be fat or thin, rich or poor, black or white, American or Japanese. The fact is that—unless there is a lesbian gene, which is so far unproven—the only thing that differentiates a lesbian from a straight woman is her choice of sexual partner, even if that choice is only in her head. A lesbian is attracted to women and not to men.

So if a novel features a protagonist that neither sleeps with women, is attracted to women, or questions he sexual identity, it is not a lesbian novel. Right? If, in the same novel, the author revises a few passages to have the protagonist realize that she has feelings for women and not for men, then it magically—and marginally— turns the novel in to a lesbian novel, although probably not a very good one.

One of the most controversial subjects in the study of lesbian private eye mysteries is whether A Reason To Kill, published in 1979, can be called the first mystery featuring a lesbian private detective. The protagonist, Helen Keremos, does not reveal her sexual identity, nor does she have sex with or date anyone at all. It is not until the second book in the series, Work for a Million, which was published eight years later, that her sexual preference is revealed.

So how important is sex in lesbian mysteries? I suppose it depends on who you are. There are scads of Lesbian Mysteries with no sex scenes at all. After all, they are not totally necessary as long as the main character is identified as a lesbian and lives somewhat within the lesbian lifestyle—even if her particular lifestyle finds her in the closet. The fact is, though, that a great number of lesbian readers—and straight male readers if the truth be told—prefer to have a fairly explicit sex scene or two An interesting subject someone might one to take on is the percentage of Lesbian Mystery readers who enjoy fairly explicit sex scenes versus straight readers reading novels with straight protagonists.

There are various degrees of sex in the lesbian mystery novels discussed in this book. Some, like Eve Zaremba’s, A Reason To Kill, Caroline Shaw’s Cat Catcher, or Dolores Klaich’s Heavy Gilt, are pure whodunits—totally concerned with plot—and contain no explicit sex scenes. Others, such as Peta Fox’s surprisingly intelligent novels about Jen Madden, can be rough and often venture fairly deeply into BSDM with the mystery an important thread tying things together.

But these are the extremes. In between we have Romantic Mystery. I am using the word romantic in its best sense here, meaning that the protagonist meets her future girlfriend and they go through the rituals of courtship and love as puzzles are solved and cases cracked. Good examples of this are in Iza Moreau’s The 5, Liz Bradbury’s Angel Food and Devil Dogs, Amelia Ellis’s The Fourth Aspect, and many other books—especially if they are the first in a series. The relationships help drive the novels. The sexual activity—which ranges from fairly explicit to off camera (the old afterwards, we lay there recovering chestnut)—helps define the characters and their relationships.

Another category would be Erotic Mystery, which Kelli Jae Baeli’s Also Known as Armchair Detective falls into. The ebook version of this novel that I read had almost a dozen pages of What Others Are Saying quotations, almost all of which described the sex scenes in the book as titillating and among their favorite parts of the book. Peta Fox’s scenes are even wilder, but written with (maybe more than) a touch of tongue in cheek. J.T. Langdon’s For I Have Sinned is another example.

Finally we have what might be called Porn Mystery—a step or two beyond erotica. I suspect that people who read books in this category read them primarily for the sexual stimulation and pay little attention to the mysteries involved. This may also be true of their authors. Fortunately or not, these books usually fall somewhere just outside the purview of this book, either because of the storyline or the ineffective writing. You’ll have to search these out for yourself.

My preference? Well, I like character-driven books, so it's Romantic Mystery (not to be confused with Romantic Suspense, which are rarely true mysteries) for me. More than two or three sex scenes seem gratuitous to me. Not that I don’t like to read sexy scenes—I do! But I judge a book on how well the sexual component fits into—or redefines—its purpose. A mystery book’s purpose is to solve mysteries, not to count orgasms or to describe the various ways our fingers and lips can cause seismic responses to the bodies of our lovers. If a novel has rabbit-like activity going on every few chapters, I get the feeling that the author may be pandering to a readership that might very well be happier reading straight erotica. And, of course, it detracts from the mystery as mystery. And from the story as story.

Author Inga Simpson (see References) is of the opinion that the amount of sex and romance in lesbian mystery fiction often negatively affects not only the plot and character development, but also the potential for higher sales. Although I agree that this is usually the case, I don’t think it has to be. Certainly one of the purposes of this book is to champion those works that manage to balance relationships and plot.

In an interview no longer available on the web, author Tracey Shellito was asked what lesbian mysteries need. Her answer according to Lori L. Lake (see References again) was, More sex! Seems to me we're wimping out by getting the readers all hot and bothered then not delivering the goods.

What is inescapable is the fact that the lesbian detective novel is a sub-genre all its own—one in which sex between women is almost a given. And this is not just because writers of lesbian detective novels have sex on their brains, but because many of their readers demand it.

My Rating System

Lesbian Mystery literature is my special subject and reviewing the books in this genre is something I spend a lot of time on.

I also read a lot of reviews, both on Goodreads and on the sites of ebook retailers like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, and Apple. I have noticed that my own ratings are often lower than average. Maybe this is because I have a background in literature or maybe I just have different likes and dislikes than most readers. Much of it, though, has to do with the fact that I neither add nor subtract points because the book is about lesbians. I have seen a book given a 1-star rating simply because it contains descriptions of lesbian sex. I have also seen 5-star ratings for a book that would seem to have nothing else. Neither is a valid basis for a rating.

My schooling in literature certainly impacts my final rating. That is not to say that I judge each lesbian mystery writer on how she compares to George Eliot or Edith Wharton, but the novels of classic literature are in my consciousness. I also consider the word average to be subjective. Its meaning is often understood as "neither good nor bad’ and this is appropriate. Yet for some reason, I consider the average book to be a 3 rather than 2.5 as would seem logical. It does, though, if zero stars is not an option.

Like on Goodreads and Amazon, I give ratings between 1 and 5 stars. I also, however, give fractions of stars that further indicate the book’s level of professionalism. 4.4 will be an excellent book, but not quite good enough to get the 5 stars that Goodreads would round it off to.

Here then is how I determine the number of stars I give.

5 Stars

The very best of the genre. These are books with wonderful characters, fascinating relationships, successful pacing, interesting and exciting plots, and something special. What that something special is depends on the book. It might be a wonderful self-attitude; subjects important to the history of LGBT society, brilliant inner dialogue; or a juxtaposition of darkness and innocence. Something outstanding and unique. It is not difficult to give 5-star ratings; masterpieces are obvious. It is just difficult to find them.

4 Stars

Excellent, but not great. These are books that you wish you had written because you would have been able to perfect them—to push them just a little farther toward greatness. They are books that, like 5-star ones, you would recommend to any reader, but with perhaps a small caveat. The smaller the caveat, the more likely you will be to award them a 4+ rating: 4.1 to 4.4. It is more difficult for me to give a 4 than a 5.

3 Stars.

These are average books; books that you would recommend only to aficionados of lesbian detective stories. Instead of saying that they are ‘pretty good,’ you would probably describe them as ‘not too bad." They may contain sizable flaws in the plot and writing that does not give you the thrill of anticipation in turning its pages. This is by far the most common rating, so I often use fractions to differentiate. If 3 means ‘not too bad,’ then 3.4 might mean ‘almost good.’

2 Stars

Not good. These are books that you would not recommend to anyone. The flaws are greater, the pacing worse, the characters bland, and the story boring or silly.

1 Star

I almost never give a single star rating because most if not all 1-star books are bad enough to throw across the room after a few chapters. And I never rate a book I have not read from cover to cover. Bad writing, numerous typos, formatting problems, and the like. These are books for the author’s friends and family only.

0 Stars

An impossibility because of what I said above. A zero-star book can’t—and shouldn't—be finished. Nor should it have been published—even by the author or the author’s family.

Read the First Book First

The list of lesbian private eye authors in this volume numbers over 80. Because most of these authors are writing books in a series, how should we decide which book in that series to read first? Sounds like a no-brainer and it is; read the first one first.

Okay, there might be some people who say, "Well, I’m going to start with the one that has the highest overall rating. That way, if I don’t like it, I won’t have to worry about reading the rest. Good point, but I don’t necessarily trust reviews, especially about writers who have relatively few. There are too many friend reviews, troll reviews, or reviews based on bogus criteria. For instance, for one of the books I had just finished reading, I discovered a review that consisted of the words, Eww, lesbian sex!" The rater (or hater) gave the book, which I thought was excellent, one star. A first novel by another author on our list—one I didn’t like—received a number of 5-star ratings by fans who raved about the sex scenes, of which there were many, and little else. So which to choose? I say again: begin with the first one in the series.

From a literary standpoint, the first novel in a series should be the best. I know this sounds counterintuitive. After all, the first book in a series is often the author’s first foray into publishing. Isn’t a first book expected to be a little raw? Sure it is, but it also is going to show the author’s voice and individuality. Having a little rawness doesn’t have to mean that the whole book is bad. In fact, in these days of electronic publishing, a bad first novel doesn’t have to remain a bad first novel. It can be re-edited, re-written, and re-uploaded to Smashwords or Amazon or any self-publishing venue that offers print-on-demand publishing.

The first book is the one that sets the scenes, introduces the characters, shows the author’s style and tone, and, just as important, begins and develops any relationship that might be ongoing. The Wombat Strategy, the first book in Claire McNab’s enjoyable Kylie Kendall series, introduces Kylie to Ariana. Blood Guilt, Lindy Cameron’s entry into the field, sets up the attraction between P.I. Kit O’Malley and the beautiful Alex Cazenove

The first novel in a series should be the most complete. It sets everything up for future novels, such as describing the protagonist’s kitchen and giving complete backstories of most of the characters. In the follow-up novels the author has to struggle to find those 20,000 words she already wrote in the initial book.

The first novel in a series should hook you like the first chapter in a single novel. If it doesn’t, you might want to move on. And a smart author will often offer their first book—at least in ebook form—for a reduced price. Those are the authors who feel strongly about their first book and are actually daring you not to buy it. Good for them.

Another reason for reading the first novel in a sequence first is that the sequels often are short on background for the very reason I stated above—the work has already been done. The second and third books—unless very carefully and intelligently crafted—might be a little light on description. One series I read a few years ago spent about 20 pages of each book in the series describing the cute antics of the protagonist’s