Despite his deep passion for mystery, UNF British Romanticism professor Michael Wiley decided to put the genre aside to focus on more serious literature.

But within the past six years, around the time he began his family of five, he revisited his love for the genre and found mystery writing to serve as a release and a form of relaxation, he said.

The professor began writing at a very young age, dabbling in freelance and fiction writing, until he decided mystery was what he enjoyed the most. He delights in using language to explore and create effects, he said.

Wiley published “The Last Striptease,” a murder mystery in 2007, followed by “The Bad Kitty Lounge” two years later. “A Bad Night’s Sleep” was delivered as the third in the series June 21.

“A Bad Night’s Sleep” follows a Chicago private investigator, Joe Kozmarski, that finds himself in a sticky situation after running into a burglary crew. He kills one of the thieves, only to learn the burglar was actually a crooked Chicago cop. Since the shooting looks bad on Kozmarski’s end, he joins the crew and works as an inside agent for an old friend of the police department.

Kozmarski learns the foul ways between Chicago’s street gangs and the crooked cops but as the book takes some unheralded turns, not even Kozmarski can distinguish the good from the bad. The mystery continues to unravel and uncover new plotlines, gripping the audience with each chapter until the end.

Rona Brinlee, owner of the Bookmark in Neptune Beach, said Wiley is excellent at dialogue. She said dialogue can be difficult to master especially in a fast-paced novel.

Already planning to release a fourth in the series, Wiley has built up quite a following, Brinlee said. Many are anxiously awaiting its completion.

“I’m always writing,” Wiley said.

He has several manuscripts his editors are reviewing, he said, and he’s presently working on another novel based in Jacksonville.

“I feel like I always have room to improve, and to me, that’s the best place to be because I want to get better,” he said. “If I already know how to do everything, it wouldn’t be as interesting.”

A firm believer in revising works at least four times, Wiley said his work stands up to a lot of other contemporaneous published works — better than some but not as good as others.

Although he’s only been publishing the past few years, Wiley has been teaching at UNF for nearly 14 years. He grew up in Chicago and completed graduate work in New York before calling Florida home in 1998.

Outside of teaching and writing, Wiley is an extremely committed family man, which is his prime time and energy commitment outside of teaching, he said.

A good mystery is a treat to find, Brinlee said, and Wiley has not disappointed with any of his novels.

His books are available as hard covers, audiobooks and Kindle editions. The books can be purchased from Barnes & Noble, Indie Bound, Amazon, and Audiobook.