The declining tally of new female mystery writers

One of my favorite activities is looking through the Mystery Writers of America submission lists, and not just to faint dead away at the sheer number of books published in a calendar year (for those on the Best Novel committee: how the hell do you do it? Obviously, not all those books are getting read. It cannot be done.)  Because I’m also very interested in debut novels, I tend to focus in on that list, which isn’t quite as long (a mere 117 entries to begin with) but still daunting.

Of that master list–which will have to be culled somewhat as there are pseudonymous authors who have written several books already, a couple of books which were actually published in 2003, and vanity presses which (sorry) don’t count–there are 37 women. Subtract those that are disqualified for the above reasons or because they aren’t actually mystery novels (Elizabeth Brundage’s THE DOCTOR’S WIFE? Um, no) and the list is pared down to 26. Which, while not gender-equivalent, is still a higher figure than I expected. Because of those 26, there are only a handful of female writers whose books a) I had actually heard of or b) had earmarked for reading or wanted to read in the first place.

I had a recent conversation with Laura Lippman about the topic, and we started to name female writers who’d introduced their work in 2004. Unfortunately, we got stumped pretty early–maybe only 3 or 4 came to mind. And 2003 yielded about the same number of names, too.

Now, this is based on supposition, subjectivity and purely anecdotal evidence, but what’s going on here? Why aren’t more women writers present among the newcomers, and is this going to be a continuing trend?

First, let’s look more closely at the debut list. Of those 26 writers I mentioned, the following 16 books had some sort of buzz, review coverage, or at least a compelling reason for me to take notice of them:

Balzo, Sandra, UNCOMMON GROUNDS
Compton, Jodi, THE 37TH HOUR
Dumas, Margaret, SPEAK NOW
Hillhouse, Raelynn, RIFT ZONE
Hirahara, Naomi, SUMMER OF THE BIG BACHI
Hoffman, Jilliane, RETRIBUTION
Hyzy, Julie, ARTISTIC LICENSE
Kandel, Susan, I DREAMED I MARRIED PERRY MASON
MacLean, Anna, LOUISA AND THE MISSING HEIRESS
Matturro, Claire, SKINNY-DIPPING
Myers, Beverle Graves, INTERRUPTED ARIA
Patrick, Jennifer, THE NIGHT SHE DIED
Pickens, Cathy, SOUTHERN FRIED
Richards, Linda L., MAD MONEY
Silbert, Leslie, THE INTELLIGENCER
Smiley, Patricia, FALSE PROFITS

Naturally, not all of them had positive word of mouth (although in the case of Ms. Hoffman, it doesn’t seem to be affecting her standing with the publisher, if not with unsuspecting readers.) Also not surprisingly–considering the subgenre is generally written by women for women–most of these entries are in a cozier vein, and several writers are trying their hand at romantic comedy in tandem with mystery.

It would be very handy to have access to previous years’ worth of submission lists, because even with current data available, I can’t really go beyond supposition. However, the nominees and winners database does show some interesting patterns. Last year, when Rebecca Pawel won, she was one of two female nominees. But the previous time there were more than a single female nominee was 1998 (Lisa See & Suzanne Berne, both of whom are more “crossover” than conventional mystery novelists) and the last time there were more women nominated than men was 1995–the year Carol O’Connell, Janet Evanovich, and Barbara Parker began their careers. All of whom are bestsellers now, too.

Taking a longer view, several women have made a name for themselves in the last five years. Julia Spencer-Fleming, Denise Hamilton, Pawel, Karin Slaughter, Carol Goodman, and Libby Hellman are just a few of those writers. But it remains to be seen how many of the new breed will be writing steadily in five years’ time. And whether there will be that many more who will break into the field.

What does 2005 hold for debut female crime novelists? Hard to tell, of course, but considering I’m not hearing that much about new books at all, it’s probably even less encouraging for my gender…

So am I off base? Is this a trend that’s actually happening or simply in my head? Because I’m very curious to hear more.