The Cozy Mystery List Blog

Good grief! I feel like saying “We interrupt your schedule with this breaking news about Cozy Mystery television viewing!” I feel like I have to hurry up and tell you about this, so you can set up your DVRs or rearrange your schedules in order to make sure you’re in front of your televisions this coming Sunday night!

It looks like we are in for a Cozy Mystery television movie treat! A new mystery series will be starting up soon >>> this time another entry in the PBS Masterpiece Mystery! series. Grantchester will begin airing starting this Sunday (January 18, 2015), with a total of six weekly episodes airing through the rest of January and February. Starring Masterpiece veterans James Norton as young vicar Sidney Chambers and Robson Green as Inspector Geordie Keating, Grantchester looks like it’s going to be good Cozy Mystery fun!

From the Cozy perspective, Grantchester looks very promising >>> it’s got a lot of the standard Cozy Mystery hallmarks – such as being set in an idyllic village with a surprising number of dark secrets, amateur sleuthing, and best of all >>> it’s British! It’s based on the Grantchester Mysteries written by James Runcie.

In the New York Times Sunday Book Review, James Runcie’s first mystery in his Grantchester Series (Sidney Chambers and the Shadow of Death) was said to be “the coziest of cozy murder mysteries … set in a quaint English village during the 1950s and featuring a young Anglican vicar who finds spiritual inspiration in criminal investigation.”

I’ve not yet had time to read it. Well, now I’ll at least be able to enjoy the TV adaptation!

So, as I mentioned above, go set your DVRs! Right now!

So, I recently got messages from Donna Mc and Alfred, and rather than just respond to them in the comments I thought I’d share their messages and my own response as it’s own post, since it seems like such big news for Cozy Mystery lovers!

From Donna Mc:

… did you hear that the Hallmark Channel is producing a series based on the Joanne Fluke cookie mysteries AND that a gorgeous blond is portraying Hannah? That is wild! But apparently true! Excited about the show, puzzled about the gorgeous blond.

From Alfred (40 minutes later):

… Allison Sweeney … it looks like they are going to be doing a mystery series featuring Joanne Fluke’s Chocolate Chip cookie mystery series on Hallmark – thought you might like to make a column out of it.

Thank you , Donna and Alfred! I rely on Cozy Mystery readers like the two of you to get wind of this fantastic Cozy Mystery news. I did some searches and found out that the good news doesn’t stop there! Apparently as part of Hallmark Movie Channel’s transition into Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, Hallmark is going to be putting out a whole bunch of Cozy Mystery movie adaptations, all of them set to air some time in 2015! I can’t wait!

As Donna and Alfred mentioned, one of these is going to be the adaptation of Joanne Fluke‘s Hannah Swensen Mystery Series, starting with Sugar Cookie Murder – though other sources have reported that the first movie will be Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder. Either way, the movies will star actress Alison Sweeney, 13-season veteran of Days Of Our Lives as well as a host of The Biggest Loser.  Admittedly, Hannah is supposed to have very curly red hair, not blonde – but I suppose every movie adaptation will need to make whatever changes they think are necessary. (Also, as those of us who follow Hannah’s sleuthing adventures know, Hannah is not slim, and rarely wears makeup…)

But as I said this is just the start of the good news! Two other Cozy movie adaptation series have been announced! The first is an adaptation of Charlaine Harris‘s Aurora Teagarden books, starring Candace Cameron Bure. I’ll admit, I’ve already got high expectations since the Teagarden series holds a very special place in my heart. I followed the series and was very disappointed when Charlaine Harris moved on to newer series, though those are also very well written. Some of you may remember Candace Cameron Bure from her days as Donna Jo “D.J.” Tanner from the long-running sitcom Full House. Well now she’ll be playing librarian Aurora Teagarden!

The third is an adaptation of Peter King‘s Gourmet Detective Mystery Series, starring Hallmark movie regular Dylan Neal. As with Sweeney, most viewers are likely to recognize Neal from soap operas – specifically his 119 episode run on The Bold and the Beautiful. Neal will be playing food consultant Goodwin Harper. Dylan Neal has been a cast member of the (regular) Hallmark channel’s Cedar Cove series.

It’s looking like this might be a really good year to be a fan of Cozy movie adaptations of some of our popular Cozy Mystery series! So, I guess now I’ve got a question for all of you – of these three terrific mystery series, which are you most looking forward to seeing a movie adaptation? Please make sure to leave a comment below!