Mystery

Like romance, mystery is a plot device, and an entire genre, with subgenres, has grown up around it. SF stories frequently incorporate mysteries. Mysteries typically include a crime to be solved. In classical mystery stories, the crime is typically a murder. In SF, mystery plotlines form a core of many stories, although not necessarily revolving around murders. In Nicola Griffith's Slow Water, for instance, a mystery is at the core of the story.

Numerous writers slip across the line from mystery to SF and back and forth, including Mary Stewart, Elizabeth Peters, Sharyn McCrumb, Nicola Griffith, Sheri Tepper, and others.

A sub-genre of the mystery is the police procedural.