Bring your ancestors to life with this webinar! Author Nathan Dylan Goodwin will teach you the basics of how to write your own genealogical crime mystery. He will cover outlining a story, creating believable characters with realistic dialogue and show how to incorporate genealogy into your story.
Discount code: webtember25 (valid at Familytreewebinars.com)
Valid through: September 30, 2025
The final Webtember writing webinar featured acclaimed author and genealogist Nathan Dylan Goodwin, who shared practical guidance on crafting genealogical crime mystery stories. Blending genealogy with mystery and crime, this niche genre offers a unique way to turn family history into compelling narratives. Goodwin, best known for The Forensic Genealogist and Venator Cold Case series, walked attendees through the fundamentals of building a story from scratch—covering themes, characters, research, and writing techniques. His insights highlighted how genealogists can transform real-life discoveries into rich, fictionalized accounts that both entertain and preserve the essence of family history.
Key Takeaways from the Webinar:
Core Ingredients of the Genre: A genealogical crime mystery typically involves uncovering past crimes or secrets through genealogical methods. Central themes such as adoption, illegitimacy, false identities, missing persons, hidden crimes, and family secrets drive the narrative and ensure genealogy plays a central role in solving the mystery .
Building Authentic Characters and Settings: The protagonist is usually a genealogist, often with a personal backstory that intertwines with the case. Writers are encouraged to create well-rounded, believable characters with everyday lives, hobbies, and flaws, as well as carefully researched settings that reflect authentic historical detail .
From Research to Storytelling: Just like genealogy itself, strong stories are grounded in research. Goodwin emphasized balancing factual accuracy with engaging storytelling—using census records, photographs, obituaries, and newspapers to add authenticity while weaving in dialogue, tension, and dramatic arcs that keep readers invested .
This session demonstrated that genealogical crime mysteries are not just for professional authors—anyone passionate about genealogy can experiment with this form to share family secrets, mysteries, and discoveries in a captivating way.
To fully benefit from Nathan Dylan Goodwin’s expertise, genealogists are encouraged to watch the complete webinar. The step-by-step examples, brainstorming exercises, and practical tips will help transform family history into vivid storytelling. Additionally, the accompanying syllabus offers extended resources for research, writing techniques, and genre exploration—perfect tools for anyone ready to begin their own genealogical crime mystery journey.
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Syllabus
Really enjoyed Nathan’s presentation. I have just the mystery in my family genealogy. Thank you for triggering my writing impulses to get this done. This was very helpful.
Excellent presentation Nathan. Thank you.
Enjoyed very much. Love that Nathan has so many books published.
A fun & interesting presentation! Thank you! Great writing topics! Very inspiring with new ideas to continue with my ancestor’s bios. Many thanks for WEBTEMBER! Look forward to the presentations week!
Fantastic webinar! Loved the walk through Nathan shared on his process of building his storyline into a book. A concept we can use to write out our ancestors stories even if we don’t write an entire book.
Fantastic webinar…My husbands grandmother was adopted, and after 55 years , the scenarios I have had in my head seem like a mystery, that Nathan was speaking about. I doubt I will ever be able to solve the mystery of her parentage, but it is certainly worth writing a genealogical crime mystery. Hmm…..maybe I will.
That was an amazing webinar. It would be hard to say that you learned more at any other seminar. So much really useful information, actually necessary information for writing a book. Most of us think we could write a book but clearly we couldn’t unless we go through all the steps we learned from Nathan this afternoon. Many thanks. I will be watching this again as I missed the first 15 minutes.
This was the best webinar of Nathans. Amazing to see inside his thought process of writing. Also a THEME DAY is absolutely the best way for Webtembers. Love this way of learning.