Goodbye, Maisie

This week I was reminded of a question that every fiction series writer must answer: Will the characters grow older?

During the past two decades, I’ve enjoyed reading Jacqueline Winspear’s fine mystery series, featuring a detective / psychologist called Maisie Dobbs who lived in the United Kingdom during the two World Wars.

When I read reviews of Winspear’s most recent novel, The Comfort of Ghosts, I was surprised to learn that it would be the final book in her series.

Winspear reports that Maisie herself made the decision and passed it along: “That’s enough. You’ve told my story—it’s time for us both to move on.”

At first I was disappointed. But as I thought about it, I realized there was a rightness to the decision, which Winspear certainly was entitled to. I also was reminded of other series that have characters who do or don’t age.

Henning Mankell’s series of Kurt Wallander mysteries, which take place in Sweden, show Wallander’s year-by-year struggles with crime, as well as with his own demons.

The Three Pines series by Louise Penny, whose books feature mysteries in Montreal, depict Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and his family growing older with each new volume.

By contrast, Sue Grafton chose to age her detective Kinsey Millhone just a month or two per book, allowing Grafton to attempt an entire alphabet series. Sadly, Grafton didn’t make it, getting only as far as Y Is for Yesterday.

I had my own brush with a mystery series and had to decide the issue. There were just two books in the series—Sizzle & Splat and Second Fiddle—and I chose to avoid aging the characters at all, showing the trumpeter and tuba player as college-aged musicians in both.

I have to admit, though, a series of two books was enough for me. By the end of the second, I was ready to move on to something different—in my case, comedy and then historical fiction—and can understand Jacqueline Winspear’s desire to do the same.

Goodbye, Maisie. Best wishes, Jacqueline.