01 /
People who know the genre.
A clue that arrives too late. A suspect nobody believes. Sometimes it helps to talk to someone who reads the same books. That’s the kind of connection we want to make.
For the writers who love a good mystery.
Stone Lyon Society
For the mystery you want to write.
You carry a half-finished mystery in your head. Maybe it’s half-drafted. Maybe it’s just the itch that won’t quit. We’re here to connect mystery writers with people who know the genre.
Join the listThe Society is taking a pause. You can still leave your name.
Our mission
More good books on bookstore shelves.
For the people who read Penny and Osman and Horowitz and want to write what they love. Who pick up Christie or Sayers, or French or Atkinson, and feel the form still has more to give.
Cozy mystery. Traditional whodunit. Literary crime. The sub-genres have different rules. The craft is the same.
We want to connect writers who love this genre with the working authors who came before them. To honor the puzzle. To give the village and the reveal the attention they deserve. There are readers waiting for these books. We’re trying to be useful in that work.
02 /
The work on the page.
Plot and structure matter. So does the paragraph. The sentence. The work of opening a blank document and getting the first words onto it.
03 /
Your voice is the work.
The strange turn of phrase. The way your sleuth thinks in fragments when she’s nervous. The edge that makes a manuscript yours. That’s worth keeping.
The vision
A couple of writers working it out.
A place to find another mystery writer when you’re stuck. Someone who knows why the clue matters. A working author whose experience might save you a few wrong turns.
That’s what we’d like the Society to become. We’re taking time to work out what would help. There’s no new course to announce and no date to circle yet.
A note from Patrick
I love to read.
And that’s where it all starts, isn’t it?
I wasn’t always a voracious reader. I loathed reading for the better part of my childhood. The right book at the right moment, with the right teacher, turned that around in high school. I never looked back. I even majored in English Literature.
I wrote three full novels while I was an undergrad. Three horrendous, wandering, mixed-genre novels that should never see the light of day. And I love them whole-heartedly.
I carried on to an MFA in Writing for Film and Television. I wrote screenplays and directed film sets. A few of those scripts have placed in competitions, most recently in 2026. Life took me into higher education administration, then business. I kept teaching writing on the side. I never lost the itch.
I read every night before bed. A book typically sagging from my hands and down to my belly as my head lulls in my rocking chair, in the corner of my primary bedroom. I always have a mystery in hand or on deck.
Maybe it hit me in that rocking chair. Maybe earlier, somewhere I’ve forgotten. I want to see more mystery books on the bookshelves. More options than the few series I’ve personally fallen in love with. Richard Osman has taken part of my year, every year, recently.
What if I built a place where aspiring mystery writers could learn from the working authors who came before them? More good books on bookstore shelves. More writers writing the genre I love.
That’s what Stone Lyon Society is meant to do. I’m here to keep my own writing alive and well, alongside yours.
Oh, and the name.
Stone Lyon Society is named for two families who settled in northern New Hampshire and reportedly didn’t get along. The Stones and the Lyons, somewhere in the mountains around Lancaster, not far from the Canadian border.
New England’s modest answer to the Hatfields and McCoys, by all accounts. Probably with fewer firearms. Probably more politely worded grudges.
I’m descended from both. I didn’t learn that until my fortieth year, after I’d moved back to the region where the families originally settled, and I started pulling at the thread. The investigation is ongoing. Quebec is involved. Europe before that. There’s more to find.
Now, let’s go write our way into a corner and see if we can’t get out of it.
Patrick Hayes
Founder, Stone Lyon Society
Until then
Leave your name.
I’ll write when there’s news of the Society. No weekly promise. You can also email me if there’s something you’d like to see here.
By signing up, you agree to occasional updates from Stone Lyon Society. Your details stay with us, and you can ask to leave the list at any time. Privacy & your details