Is it just me, or are mysteries getting entirely too cozy these days? The thought occurred while I was poring over the planned schedule of the 15th Annual Malice Domestic Mystery Convention held, as usual, during peak Spring foliage at a hotel conference center just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. Dozens of mystery authors and thousands of fans were to congregate amid the blooming azaleas and dogwoods for three days dedicated to the art of mystery writing. As a newly minted member of Mid-Atlantic Chapter of The Mystery Writers of America who calls the Virginia suburbs of D.C. home, this was my golden opportunity to hobnob with my fellow enthusiasts as well as attend a few mystery writing seminars.

There was only one little problem-I discovered to my dismay that Malice Domestic is strictly dedicated to those works written in the spirit of Agatha Christie. That essentially means no sex, no violence and no profanity in other words: the cozy end of the mystery genre. I realized right away that, to paraphrase Malice's official motto, this wasn't going to be my cup of tea.

It's been said that to be a good writer you must first know yourself. Well, one thing I know for certain about myself is that I'm a hard-boiled mystery writer. If you've perused "Traffic Court," my futuristic crime-story that appears in the first issue of Crime Scene (April/May 2003), you'll see that it repeatedly violates the second and third Thou Shalt Nots as defined by Malice Domestic. I wouldn't have it any other way. My ultimate goal is to someday find a way to break all three Malice commandments in the same paragraph-tastefully, of course.

I guess what really bothered me was that one of the mystery genre's premiere events was being held in my own back yard, but my own work wasn't welcome there. This led me to start thinking about how cozies dominate the marketplace these days to the point where it seems that hard-boiled writers (and readers) are being squeezed out.

An example of this trend can be seen Otto Penzler's annual Best American Mystery Stories anthology, where Penzler and his guest editor annually compile twenty or so mystery short stories from the previous year into a single volume. Penzler's criteria for a story to be included in Best American is merely that a crime or the threat of a crime be central to the plot, and for the story to have been previously published elsewhere. Short fiction being a particular love of mine, I eagerly devour Penzler's publication when it comes out.

Much as I love the series, however, my quibble is that many of the selections contain a dearth of what I consider vital to realistic crime stories namely the Malice Domestic Thou Shalt Nots. The 2001 edition (guest edited by none other than Lawrence Block, surprisingly enough) was particularly lacking in hard-boiled tales. This is not to say there weren't enjoyable stories in the volume, it is merely a lament that the selections appear to reflect of what is (and isn't) being published these days.

The dominance of cozies, and other less-than-gritty works is, pardon the pun, something of a mystery, especially considering how other forms of genre fiction are pushing the envelope of what is acceptable. The last couple of decades in the horror field have seen the rise of the so-called Splatterpunks, writers who pile on the gory mayhem with maniacal glee. Cyberpunks have become prominent in the world of science fiction, stretching the genre's boundaries with their high tech, apocalyptic world-views. Only in mystery writing does the trend seem to be heading in the opposite direction, away from the cutting edge, so to speak.

Once upon a time, it was mystery writers who tested the limits of what was acceptable. Legendary authors such as James M. Cain, Jim Thompson and yes, even Raymond Chandler shocked contemporary audiences while they entertained them. Mickey Spillaine became one of the best-selling fiction writers of the 20th century by ratcheting up the sex and violence quotient to a whole new level.

So where are their modern equivalents? Andrew Vachss appeared in the mid-1980s with a minimalist brand of prose darker and more graphically violent than any mystery writer before him, but his recent novels have become formulaic. Seasoned veterans like Lawrence Block and Loren D. Estleman produce works that are certainly gritty, but can't be defined as setting new boundaries.

What makes this trend even more baffling is how it flies in the face of what is going on in the rest of society. Movies and television become more extreme every year many would argue gratuitously so. I'm not advocating that mystery writers sensationalize their work merely for its own sake. Rather, D.C.'s own George P. Pelecanos is the prototype for what I have in mind. Pelecanos repeatedly violates all three Thou Shalt Nots of Malice Domestic, but never unnecessarily. For example, Pelecanos refuses to combine violence with humor, lest the violence be cheapened. I don't happen to agree with him on that point-I think Pulp Fiction is arguably the best crime movie ever made-but the popularity of his work is one of the few current rays of hope that truly hard-boiled fiction can still sell.

Let's face facts: criminals constantly swear, fornicate and devise horrible ways to maim their victims. Murder most foul is rarely, if ever, tidy in the real world. If mystery writing actually is crime writing, those of us who practice it need to make a better effort to put our collective ears to the ground and produce more realistic works. The gruesome aspects of crime can be rendered beautifully artful in the hands of a gifted wordsmith. It was said that Raymond Chandler wrote like a slumming angel. Too many of our modern angels write like they've never been outside of their undergraduate English Literature classes.

My conclusion is that there's a desperate need for an annual mystery conference dedicated to the hard-boiled an anti-Malice, if you will. No works with cutesy-pie plot lines or candy-ass amateur sleuth protagonists allowed. If those who enjoy unrealistic mysteries featuring house cats that solve crimes can exclude me, I can be just as exclusionary in return. I even have a suggested name for a gathering of lovers of the hard-boiled: The Bad Motherfuckers Roundup.

Thank you, Samuel L. Jackson.