No matter how much you may enjoy reading crime fiction, my guess is that you probably wouldn’t want to actually find a body yourself. It’s shocking and can even cause trauma, not to mention the challenges of being interviewed by the police, caught up in a court case, and so on. Well, ever civic minded, I’m here to give you some helpful tips (with the help of crime fiction) for staying clear of corpses.

Don’t walk your dog.

 I know, I know, dogs need to be walked on a regular basis, and many of them enjoy wandering around in parks, fields, and so on. But consider what happens in Margaret Truman’s Murder at the Kennedy Center. Georgetown University law professor Mackensie ‘Mac’ Smith is walking his dog one night not far from Washington DC’s Kennedy Center. He finds the body of a young woman and immediately contacts the police. It turns out that the dead woman is Andrea Feldman, a campaign staffer for Mac’s friend Senator Ken Ewald, who is running for the US presidency. Soon enough, the police suspect Ewald, and later, his son Paul, of being involved in the murder, and  Ewald asks Mac to help clear his name and that of his son. Now, Mac is drawn into a murder mystery that involves politics, intrigue, and money. And it’s all because he happened to be walking his dog.

Don’t attend weekend house parties.

 Oh, it can be lots of fun to be invited to a weekend party, especially when close friends and family are going to be there. And it’s always nice to have a bit of a getaway, especially if you’ve been stressed. But going to one of those getaways can get you drawn into a murder case. That’s what happens in Ruth Ware’s In a Dark, Dark Wood. Novelist Leonora ‘Nora’ Shaw is invited to a hen weekend for Clare Cavendish, whom Nora has known for a long time, but hasn’t seen in ten years. It’s odd that she’d be invited, but Clare’s friend Flo, who’s putting the weekend together, insists that Nora attend. So, Nora goes to the party, along with Flo and three other people. There’s some tension in the air right from the beginning, but there’s plenty to eat and drink, and everyone is hoping that the party will go well. It doesn’t. For one thing, the party takes place at a remote summer home belonging to Flo’s aunt, so the group is isolated. For another, some uncomfortable revelations are made that set everyone on edge. It all turns sinister and leads to tragedy. If only Nora had said, ‘No, thanks…’  You know what I mean, don’t you, fans of Gail Bowen’s The Wandering Souls Murders. You too, fans of Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None.

Don’t go out to dinner.

Meeting up with friends or family for dinner can be a really lovely experience, especially if the food’s delicious. But the fact is, dinner guests do find bodies and end up in murder investigations. Just ask Cathy Ace’s Cait Morgan. She’s a criminologist and academician with the University of Vancouver. When a colleague is sidelined by an injury, Cait is tapped to take his place at a professional conference in Nice. She’s glad to spend a few days in such a beautiful city and is happily relaxing after giving the paper. To her shock, though, she runs into a former boss, Alistair Townsend. She never liked him at all, but he insists that she attend his wife Tamsin’s upcoming birthday party. Cait reluctantly agrees and joins the party. During the meal, Townsend suddenly collapses and dies of what turns out to be poison. Now, Cait’s drawn into a case of murder that doesn’t even take place in her own country. Perhaps if she’d said ‘no’ to the party invitation…

Don’t go to work.

 I know all about the need to earn a living. Trust me. But here’s the thing. Bodies do turn up at people’s places of employment, and then there are all sorts of terrible complications for anyone who’s there. Dorothy L. Sayers reminds us of that in Murder Must Advertise. Pym’s Publicity Ltd. is a highly respectable advertising agency with not a breath of scandal about the place. Then one afternoon, copywriter Victor Dean falls to his death on a staircase at the company. It might be put down to a tragic accident, but Dean left a partially finished letter in which he said that someone at the company is involved in illegal activity. Now, the directors of the company think Dean was murdered. So, instead of the police, they hire Lord Peter Wimsey to go undercover as Dean’s replacement and find out who the killer is. Of course, with today’s remote work options, one’s a little less likely to get involved in murder. Still, I’m sure any employer would be glad to spare employees the stress of actually coming in to work and perhaps finding a body.

Don’t go off somewhere to canoodle.

It’s romantic to spend some ‘alone’ time with that special someone. Whether it’s an intimate picnic or something else, a lot of us probably have special memories of those moments when it was ‘just us two.’ But consider what happens at the very beginning of Peter May’s The Blackhouse. Uilleam and Ceit, two young people living on the Isle of Lewis, head off to a deserted boatshed for some privacy. To their shock, they find the body of Angus Macritchie. All thoughts of intimacy gone, they make their escape. It turns out that Macritchie’s death looks almost exactly like another murder being investigated in Edinburgh. So, police detective Fionnlagh ‘Fin’ Macleod is seconded to the Isle of Lewis to investigate. For him, it’s a homecoming, since he was brought up there. But it’s not a joyful time, as he had good reasons for leaving in the first place. Now, as he investigates, Fin will have to face his own personal ghosts as well as find a killer. If only that young couple had stayed in their own homes that night…

See what I mean? All sorts of things can put you at risk of finding a body, something you probably don’t want to do. But now you have some good guidelines for lowering the chances that that will happen to you. You’re welcome.

*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Cat Stevens’ Wild World.