The AARP Bulletin a while back had a small piece about the increasingly popular mystery genre – what best-selling thriller author Harlan Coben calls “geezer lit” – which features the 70 plus sleuth.
One of the hottest new series features 75-year old Gladdy Gold, Florida’s oldest private eye.
We meet Gladdy in Getting Old is Murder, the first title in a series of by Rita Lakin.
When Gladdy’s neighbor Selma dies, she is sad, but not shocked. Then when her best friend Francie dies, she begins to be suspicious since both women died around the time of their birthdays.
When the police won’t listen to her Gladdy starts investigating on her own with a gang of fellow Fort Lauderdale retirees.
The sassy Gladdy – whom author Carolyn Hart calls “Miss Marple in Yiddish” – returns in her fifth case this winter in Getting Old is a Disaster.
Perhaps Gladdy should check out New York City P.I. Morris Weiss – author Ayelet Waldman calls him “a mensch of a detective” – who is working with his nephew Max on a case that has disturbing parallels to one that he worked on over half a century ago in Isidore Haiblum’s New York Confidential.
Mike Befeler’s recently released Retirement Homes Are Murder features Paul Jacobson, an octogenarian sleuth who suffers from short-term memory loss.
But Cynthia Riggs must indeed have the most senior protagonist in the character of Victoria Trumbull, an astute 92-year old Vineyard native and deputy police officer, in Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts.
I am happy (and envious) that Nancy Drew gets to stay sixteen forever, but I am also happy to know that as I advance toward inevitable geezerdom myself that I will be in such good company when I get there.
I wonder how old Jessica Fletcher is by now?
