Yes. That's what I thought too. Hence, my novels blend fantasy with whodunnit mysteries. It opens up so many possibilities.

Yaetherim would love to go back to being a forest protector. But his village council won't allow it, as they're worried about the 'scars on his soul' from him nearly being killed several months earlier.

So he becomes a private detective instead.

In 'Embers of Doubt', the murderer serves burnt coffee to a witness who can connect him to the crime. But the killer is an expert in water elemental magic, so he has no reason to have burnt the coffee.

This is what tips off the detective that the coffee is poisoned, as it would hide the taste.

I use software called Plottr. It uses scene cards, with tagging, on a timeline.

From page 31 of 'Embers of Doubt'. Yaetherim is posing as a caterer, while apprentices present their credentials for the job of mage.

Karis doesn't approve of Yaetherim's methods. But she does have to admit it gets results.

In the end, yes. The first edit removed a contrived coincidence and replaced it with detective work.

The second set things up much better for the rest of the series.

Nope, despite all the planning. Some stuff evolves over time. But both my novels so far have had one significant rewrite. For the first one, I removed a scene that I later reused as the inciting incident of the second.

For the second, I had to rework the fairy politics subplot twice.

Mine's simple, and exactly what it says on the box. The Rychilla Cases - a series of mysteries in the Kingdom of Rychilla.

(Think Sherlock Holmes but as a snarky plant elemental fairy.)

I've got a 'core cast' of 7 characters, who I'll usually pick as the perspective character for a story.

There's another dozen or so recurring secondary characters, some of whom are set up in earlier books, to be the murderer in later ones.

Indeed. It opens up all sorts of extra possibilities.

I mainly chose it as I needed magic that would leave evidence behind when used - as it's for fantasy murder novels. So if someone's drowned in the middle of the forest, it's probably a waterkind and so on.

It also affects fairy physiology. After they get their magic, they transform to match it.

Usually when I'm plotting it. If not then, it'll be a sentence when I'm writing it.

E.g. 'A Pinch of Distrust' came from a scene where Yaetherim was talking about hollow assurances, and that he had to take things with "a pinch of distrust."

(He likes cooking as a hobby.)

Yes. I find my imagination works best when I 'change gears' every couple of weeks. So I alternate between the full-length novels, and novellas that fit in between the novels, story-wise.