Another Mysterious Collaboration: A Look at The Floating Admiral

Cozy Cat Press recently celebrated the publication of its 100th book, Chasing the Codex, which came out on November 19, 2015. Chasing is a collaboration between an astonishing twenty-four authors. Its chapters are filled with the adventures of a book-loving amateur sleuth, kidnappings, confusing characters, and bewildering clues—in short, all of the “coziness” that fans of Cozy Cat Press and its authors have come to love and expect.

Chasing is not, however, the first time authors have come together to write a mystery. One of the more famous examples (more famous for the prestige of some of its contributors) is The Floating Admiral, published in 1931 and written in the same round-robin style as Chasing by fourteen members of the Detection Club, of which G.K. Chesterton, writer of the prologue, was first president.    

Each author was required to write consistently with the chapters before as well as write with a definite solution in mind to prevent adding needless complications. Published during the Golden Age of detective fiction, its central mystery surrounds the discovery of a body that may or may not be a local admiral’s, and, similar to Chasing, misunderstandings and secrets abound. At the end of the book, readers are presented with each author’s solution and invited to look back for themselves to put the pieces together.

It’s an interesting and challenging read, and the authors of Chasing followed The Floating Admiral’s own guidelines fairly closely. Find Chasing the Codex on Amazon to read for yourself!

 Order your copy now, as 50% of all pre-Christmas sales will go to Pets for the Elderly, a national charitable organization devoted to helping senior citizens acquire and pay for animal companions.