Dr. Deadly's Book Club

Our aunties want the best for us. They look after us – sometimes like stalkers. They know all our flaws – and comment on them – but their affection is unwavering. We’re safe in the company of our aunties. No matter what plagues us in the outside world, we can come to them and be assured by their words of wisdom and their very presence. In that warm haven, we feel the wisdom of a most vulnerable auntie described below, Vera Wong: why so drama? Everything will be just fine.

Is there a difference, you ask, between an auntie and an aunt? Why do I focus on a multicultural version of the role? My parents and their siblings emigrated to America from Greece, so it was the version I knew firsthand. Homegrown American aunts may be exactly the same! But throughout my life I’ve met other children of immigrants, and we’ve bonded over eerily similar family situations-from-another-nation, including aunties supplying us with food and advice and protection, sometimes to eye-popping extremes. (An auntie once stamped me all over with a burning hot cup, to save me from the evil eye…that could be worthy of a whole separate post.) Aunties weren’t even always blood relatives. They were older women in your community who cared for and about you.

But for now… crime fiction and aunties. At first glance, not a match. But look again! In my last post on why we love serial killers, I talked about the ways crime fiction helps fans neutralize fear of the world’s bogeyman. Aunties in crime fiction represent that neutralization in fantastic ways. Nothing will get past them, bring them down, or throw them off the scent. And they’ll have you laughing when you least expect it. Aunties are born bogeyman-busters.

If you haven’t met any immigrant aunties of crime fiction, you’re missing out on your dose of medicine for those ills from the outside world. Allow me to introduce you to three of the newest aunties in the crime fiction universe:

VERA WONG

Say hello to the aforementioned Vera Wong, adoptive auntie to young San Franciscans in need. Jesse Q, Sutanto’s 2023 novel, Vera Wong‘s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers, introduces Vera, and I recently read her 2025 Vera Wong’s Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) and loved it even more than the first. Vera has a way of drawing troubled people together after a murder and sussing things out like only an auntie can. Most characters start out as your suspects, but with enough of her creative interference, strongly-worded advice, and mouthwatering, home-cooked meals, they become family.

MISS HORTENSE

Miss Hortense, of Mel Pennant’s 2025 novel A Murder for Miss Hortense, is an auntie who solves mysteries for her Jamaican immigrant community in Birmingham, England. For those who enjoy stealthy, James Bond-light undercover maneuvers, Miss Hortense – a retired nurse with a bag full of literal and metaphorical tricks – won’t disappoint. Miss Hortense illuminates the pride and the indignities of building a life in a foreign land, and reflects on the values of “patience, sacrifice and reward” that make it possible. Readers are drawn into the details of life in the community Miss Hortense safeguards; if you don’t already know what a Pardner is, you’ll be intrigued to follow Miss Hortense and find out.

KAUSAR KHAN

Kausar Khan is another brand new auntie on the scene introduced in the aptly named 2025 novel Detective Aunty. This first installment in a planned series is the origin story for this particular detective auntie. When Kausar’s daughter is accused of murder, she leaves her comfort zone to rush to her aid, and finds new relationships and others to help along the way. Readers will cheer on Kausar – who left India to marry and raise a family in Canada – as she transitions from a grieving widow and mother who “accepted that the best she could hope for was a few quiet decades” to a heroine who uses her keen observational powers to save the day.

If you know and love any other crime fiction immigrant aunties – or crime fiction aunts of any background! – please share in the comments below. And Dr. Deadly can’t help but wonder whether there are any uncles out there in the land of crime fiction? If not… do you think they’d make good detectives? As always, Dr. Deadly welcomes your thoughts!