Classic "whodunit" mystery writers like the immortal Agatha Christie reveled in highly acclaimed tales of diabolical murders investigated and solved by cunning heroes who were often seemed least likely to unravel such cleverly concealed crimes.

The 1970s television networks offered the droll and unassuming Columbo, who never carried a gun while sandbagging seemingly superior suspects into being exposed.

This genre is timeless, and so is the appeal of characters such as Nancy Drew, Miss Marple and the Hardy Boys. Such sly sleuths had the advantage of being foolishly underestimated by their cocky suspects.

Now, here in 2018, local novelist Shari Randall has put pen to parchment and created her own brand of daring detective thrillers. Her latest, "Curses, Boiled Again," is set right here in Mystic.

Originally from Meriden and a graduate of Platt High School, Randall attended Connecticut College in New London, graduating in 1983. She then returned to Meriden where she worked initially as a newsroom assistant for her hometown paper, the Record Journal.

Randall soon moved on to writing features. Having met her future husband who was a cadet at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy while she attended Conn, Randall eventually relocated to southern Virginia where her husband was stationed after graduation. She became a librarian there at the Kingstown Library in Fairfax County and, surrounded by a virtual universe of books, her career as a fiction writer began.

Randall recalled how teachers over the years had often remarked that she had displayed keen writing skills.

"I had always really thought of myself more as an editor," she said while relaxing over a cup of coffee at Washington Street Coffee House in New London. "But even my mother insisted I had a knack for fiction writing when she found some stories I had written as far back as third grade."

Vivacious, and with eyes that sparkle with an eager child's flair for discovery, Randall revealed how her path to publication took its initial steps via a Virginia writers' group called Sisters in Crime.

A longtime devotee of murder mysteries, Randall had ingested those crafty tales of daring detectives who would find and assemble the puzzle pieces that ultimately built a total picture, unseen previously by everyone else.

"I believe the 'Gateway Drug' for mystery lovers is Nancy Drew," she said. "And from Nancy Drew, I went straight to Agatha Christie — the founding mother of the cozy mystery."

Randall describes the "cozy mystery" in terms that are refreshing, given the amount of violence, gore and vulgarity that has marked both cinema and literature for some time now.

"These stories depend more on the proverbial unraveling of scattered puzzle pieces the hero must sort out and fit together, leading to the eventual restoration of justice and the ensuing healing of a community," she said. "It's those hidden details and the uncovering of it all, bit-by-bit, that holds the appeal for readers of this particular genre. It's the kind of storytelling where I feel most at home."

The Sisters-in-Crime writing group helped put Randall on her path to publication. When she heard, through her position as a librarian, of a writing contest sponsored by a magazine that put out an anthology called "This Job is Murder," she submitted a story and wound up winning.

After publishing a few more stories in the anthology, she was referred to a literary agent in New York.

In reviewing Randall's style and her penchant for colorful characters caught up in unique conflicts within the mystery genre, the agent asked her to compose one that would be set against a backdrop no one had yet utilized. And since Randall and her husband and two children had recently moved back to New England — she is now a New London resident — she was the ideal candidate for the task.

Where whodunit murder mysteries take place traditionally in English country settings or in gloomy old mansions and the like, here was a prominent publisher of the genre calling for one of these vintage tales to draw its dark jigsaw puzzle essence from ... a New England lobster shack?

"Sometimes it's just amazing how the universe works," said Randall. "There I was, standing out in my yard and staring literally at a lobster shack, when my friend and fellow mystery writer, Sherry Harris, called and told me about this opportunity!"

The agent contacting her was doing so on behalf of one of the most prestigious publishing houses in the business: St. Martin's Press. It's a career starter for sure if she could pull it off.

"I put together a proposal that included the first 30 pages of the story and submitted it. The publisher picked mine out of the other writers who had also been invited to submit," Randall said. "That was two years ago. I was then assigned to write the book, which was published and received solid reviews."

Randall's main character contains some of the more recognizable and endearing traits of a whodunit hero: unassuming in comparison with stock police detectives; an uncanny sense for noticing vague clues and concealed evidence; a flair for rattling suspects who had previously felt secure, and a diligence that finally exposes a culprit's guilt when all others had stopped investigating.

In "Curses, Boiled Again," Randall not only sets us up in what appears to be just another prosaic food festival in a quaint old seaport village, she then unleashes an unthinkable poisoning of an aged, has-been celebrity. The killing casts suspicion on an eccentric but beloved chef who is horrified to learn she has been deemed the possible culprit.

And who exactly is the unassuming amateur sleuth to unravel the tangle of puzzle pieces and reassemble them to prove not only this eccentric cook's innocence, but also help snag the true venomous killer? Why, none other than the poor suspect's 27-year-old niece, a former professional dancer sidelined by injury, and now relegated to working retail in her aunt's lobster house.

Allegra (Allie) Larkin is left seeking the means of clearing her zany but beloved older relative's good name, while also trying to track down a murderer who (as always) is as elusive as a ghost.

Randall, who recently made an appearance at Bank Square Books in Mysic, has created in Allie a main character who transcends the traditional role of a whodunit detective. Normally it's enough simply to solve a complex mystery, but Randall's heroine must also work with the added burden of her previously broken career hanging over her head.

"I was amazed to learn how much that affected readers and how Allie's sense of resilience was reflected so positively in the reviews," said Randall. "With dance having meant so much to her, and how empty she had felt in being stripped of her passion, it gave Allie more appeal because she acted so unselfishly on someone else's part."

Randall immerses us so completely into this charming heroine's mind, and into the rustic culture of the oldtime New England village, we become willing participants not only in solving the crime, but in Allie's personal quest.

"I really love and admire my main character!" said Randall.