Let's Make a Detective!

Let’s create a detective!

This post is part of my Let’s Write a Murder Mystery! series. In my last post I wrote about the theory behind creating a detective, now it’s time to actually create the character.

Since the detective is SO important to our story, I’m going to split this discussion into two. In this post we’re going to brainstorm and grope our way toward our character. In the next post, we’ll build on the work we do here.

Keep in mind that I don’t have anything planned, no notion of what this detective is going to be like. So, let’s dive in and think about what kind of detective we want to create.

Note: I've included this material in my book: How to Write a Murderously Good Mystery: The Major Characters.

The First Step

The key to creating a realistic character is to rummage about within yourself—your own desires, hopes, fears, motivations and deep dark secrets—to find something you can bestow on your character, something you can infuse into them. It’s a little bit like how, in the Christian New Testament, God breathed the breath of life into Adam and he became a living soul.

Or, to use another analogy, creating a character is like using a starter culture to make yogurt. Yes, I’ve started making my own yogurt! How? By taking a tablespoon of yogurt containing an active culture (I use Activia yogurt), putting it in scalded milk that has been cooled to an appropriate temperature, and leaving the concoction in a warm place for 5 hours. That’s it!

I think something similar needs to happen for a character to come alive. Characters with depth aren’t randomly created, they are CULTURED. They are grown from bits of us, from our memories, dreams, desires, mistakes, goals, failures and successes. They are grown from those bits of our soul we choose to give them.

In what follows, I invite you to look inward. Answer these questions by looking into yourself at different angles, by daydreaming. Let your mind wander.

What is your detective’s name?

Don’t worry if your detective’s name doesn’t come to you right away. I find it’s the LAST thing that comes to me! And I’m not alone.

I talked about exaggeration in my last post. I find the most memorable names are often the most exaggerated.

For example, take the name Aloysius Pendergast. That is NOT a common name. It’s distinctive. As distinctive as the character himself: rail thin with blond-white hair, an accent hailing from the deep south, and charming old world manners.

Of course not all detectives have distinctive names (though Poirot does and, arguably, he’s still the most popular detective ever created!) But it is something to think about.

On a more practical level, google “baby names” and visit one or two of the sites listed. You don’t have to use any of the suggestions but it might spark an idea. Also, if you use Scrivener, you have a name generator. Just go to “Edit > Writing Tools > Name Generator” and there it is!

Start the Culture: Think about your favorite detectives.

Ideas aren’t born in a vacuum. We learn by studying the work of other writers, we learn by studying what has inspired us. So! Let’s study our favorite detectives. We’ll end up throwing various tags and traits into a crucible and (hopefully) transforming them into a detective of our very own.

My favorite detectives are Sherlock Holmes (especially as portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch), Hercules Poirot and Lieutenant Columbo. What are yours? Try to think of at least two.

Question: Who are your favorite detectives? What especially appeals to you about each? What is EXCITING or memorable about them?

I find it helps to reread the book your favorite detective was first introduced in since this is likely where the author spent a lot of time establishing the character.

In what follows I try to answer these questions for my own favorite detectives:

Sherlock Holmes

In a sense, Sherlock Holmes (and here I’m referring to Benedict Cumberbatch’s interpretation of Sherlock Holmes) is upside down. Whatever normal human reaction you’d expect from him, he gives you the opposite. This is from The Study in Pink:

Watson (to Holmes): A place like this must be expensive.
Holmes: Not really. I know the landlady, Mrs. Hudson. She owes me a favor. A few years back, her husband was sentenced to death in Florida. I was able to help out.
Watson: You stopped her husband from being executed?
Holmes: Oh, no, I ensured it.

This nicely establishes a couple of things. First, that Mrs. Hudson isn’t exactly what she seems, but it does the same for Sherlock. They are definitely characters from the Special World of the Adventure (i.e, inside out and upside down).

What stands out:
- Behavior: odd, quirky, surprising. Holmes says things that subvert one’s expectations.
- Distinctive overcoat (The Belstaff 'Milford' Coat).
- Deerstalker cap.
- Rumpled hair.
- Plays violin.
- Keeps decaying body parts in an otherwise empty fridge.
- Tends to use the walls for target practice.

Hercules Poirot

Poirot isn’t as dramatic as Sherlock, but his reveals ARE exciting. The key to Poirot’s drama, the key to his power, is TRUTH. He knows the truth. Sure, people have tried to deceive him, they may have laughed at him behind his back because of his antiquated clothes and manners, because of his accent, but at the reveal Poirot is King. This is HIS domain. Sure, the suspects tried their little deceptions, but now they are in HIS domain and he demands respect.

Uncovering the truth is Poirot’s superpower. It’s what he does and (in his fictional world) NO ONE is better at it.

What stands out:
- If Poirot had a tagline it would be: I do not approve of murder.
- His accent. How he makes himself seem more foreign to encourage folks to underestimate him.
- Poirot is almost always slightly overdressed.
- Patent leather boots.
- Cane.
- Pince-nez.
- a lapel vase with a boutonniere (a Tussie Mussie or “amphora”).
- Poirot does not appreciate the charms of the country.
- Poirot does not play physically exerting sports.

Columbo

I love it that Columbo appears rumply and unimpressive, unintimidating. In Dead Weight one of the character’s called him an unmade bed.

As a result the murderer usually underestimates him and lets his or her guard down. By the time they realize Columbo is crazy like a fox it’s too late. He’s got all the evidence he needs to arrest them.

What stands out:
- Rumpled beige raincoat.
- Cheap suit.
- Needs coffee in the morning, will drink it in any state even if it’s stale, black and cold.
- Columbo always has to pat down his coat because he can’t find his pen/cigar/match/unpeeled egg. If he can’t find something he will ask those around him until he finds it even if this makes him seem like a lunatic!
- Columbo smokes a very stinky cigar and is often told to put it out or take it away.
- In a few episodes Columbo’s boss says, “I knew you weren’t listening,” when they’re both at a crime scene together.
- Columbo often whistles “This Old Man.”
- Columbo’s car almost always has something wrong with it but the detective thinks it’s the best car ever.
- Flusters suspects by not acting how they expect him to.
- Columbo is fluent in Italian and a good cook.
- Columbo's dog is named "Dog."

I’m curious, which detectives did you pick? What are their three most compelling traits?

Your detective, a first look

Think of your detective. He or she is surrounded by mist. You can’t see them, you can only make out a shape, a silhouette. What does it look like?

Now the mist is clearing, they’re walking toward you. How are they walking? What is their gait like? Is he or she limping? Are they young or old, male or female? Don’t think too hard about it, just see it. What kind of clothes are they wearing? Formal evening wear? Casual wear? Workout clothes? What are they saying? Are they speaking to you? Can you hear their thoughts? Can you feel their emotions?

Write down what you’ve discovered about your character.

(If nothing has come through, I’ve included a character creation exercise at the end of this post.)

I find the process of character creation is different each time. One just needs to keep at it, approach the character from different directions and, eventually, you’ll ‘see’ them, they’ll come to you. As I mentioned, often the key is to put a bit of yourself into the character. Not ALL of yourself, but a part. An aspect. Sometimes this means that your detective will share your gender, sometimes not.

One thing I’m struggling with is whether to make my detective male or female. The outline I’m creating will be for a murder mystery that’s a cross between a traditional detective story with elements of a cozy and, from my experience, those sorts of books generally have a female detective.

On the other hand, all three of my example detectives are male. And, for some reason, it FEELS as though he’s male.

So that’s something! Let’s say that he’s male and in his 30s.

How does your detective dress?

I see him in a black coat, something like what Neo wore in the Matrix but the bottom of the coat is more fitted. He wears jeans. New jeans. They aren't worn or scuffed. And a white shirt or maybe a white t-shirt. Not sure which it is at the moment.

He’s wearing black shoes and black leather gloves.

I’m seeing him how, at least a little bit. It’s a white shirt, not a t-shirt.

I thought he would be  more like Columbo, but he’s not. He’s particular about his appearance, especially his hair. It’s collar length and curly. As for color, it’s not black, but VERY deep brown.

What does your detective do for work?

At the moment, I’m not sure how much money my detective makes or what he does for a living. And that’s okay. It’s still early days. But let’s see if I can’t peer into the fog and see my character a bit more clearly.

I want this traditional murder mystery to be a bit like a cozy so perhaps he should own a business.

The rumor is that he used to be a stockbroker (or perhaps a banker) in London but left under mysterious circumstances. It’s difficult to know what his previous life was like, he refuses to talk about it and doesn’t suffer fools gladly.

As for the town, it lies somewhere in upstate New York. Currently, our detective only lives there during the summer months.

I still have no idea what kind of business he runs. During the Winter months he ... I’m not sure. Perhaps he travels. Perhaps he visits a monastery and meditates with the monks.

I think the detective is attracted to the mystical. Perhaps he has been influenced by certain ancient teachings. Perhaps his daily routine (meditations, etc.) have helped him locked the latent powers of his mind (cue Twilight Zone).

What is the detective’s business? Hmm ... Let’s see ... The murderer, Lydia, owns a large beer company that’s on the verge of bankruptcy. We want to contrast the detective and antagonist. I’m not sure it will be HIS business, but I could see him selling amaranth. Just up from where I live there’s a restaurant that specializes in pairing Amaranth with food. I’ve never been, but I love that idea. Amaranth and fine dying. (lol. I meant to write “dining” but it came out “dying”! Perhaps I’ll keep that in the back of my mind as a possible title. Perhaps “Murder and Fine Dying,” “Absinthe and Fine Dying”, “Fine Dying in Meadowmead”? Okay, perhaps not!)

Tentatively, I’ll say the detective owns a restaurant called Absinthe Cafe. The focus is on pairing exotic drinks with delicious food. The food is moderately priced and a good deal for what one gets.

Where does your detective live? What does his lair look like?

Here I’m thinking about Exotic Setting (see the last post).

Now that we know a bit more about the detective, this is easy: he lives above his restaurant! It’s a bit unusual, so that’s good. It’s memorable and it certainly ties in with the character’s occupation!

What’s exotic or unusual about the town? I like the idea of having a festival the town is organized around. For example, in their tip of the hat to Twin Peaks, Psych did a Cinnamon Festival episode.

Cupcake festival! It turns out that cupcakes are the detective’s favorite things in the entire world, a bit like Dean Winchester on Supernatural likes pie. At the moment he is passionate about chocolate cupcakes (the ones with sprinkles on top).

(Or perhaps it’s a chocolate festival. That way I could include interesting, quirky, recipes such as chocolate chili. The detective has a killer chocolate chili cupcake recipe!)

How does the detective’s work and digs add to her memorability? 

Gah! I’m writing “her” now. I didn’t mean to. Perhaps I’ll leave the door open to the possibility the detective is female.

In any case, how does the detective's work and accommodations affect his memorability?

I’m drawing a blank. Let’s approach this from another direction. How did Poirot’s apartment help make him memorable?

Order and method. How Poirot ARRANGED things in his apartment said something about his character, about how his mind worked. The modern, geometrical, art on the walls. The art is a prop, it gives Hastings a reason to ask, “Oh! Say that’s new, eh.” He cocks his head to the side, blinks, turns it to the other side. Poirot smiles, comes over, and enthusiastically explains the virtue of the straight lines and the pristine curves.

I think I’m going to hate myself a little bit, but I’m going to make the detective a neat freak. I’m thinking of Monica on the TV show, Friends. I’m going to give him my mother’s favorite expression: A place for everything and everything in its place. This is going to be one of the detective’s more irritating qualities.

I suppose I need to take my own advice and make the detectives predilection for order EXTREME. So—despite what I just said about ‘having a place for everything’—I have to go one of two ways: disorder or order.

Disorder. Columbo has a bit of the existentialist about him. Boundaries are artificial. This helps him escape the ordinary, false, conclusions that other, lesser, detectives settle on.

Order. But that expression, “A place for everything and everything in its place,” FEELS right. The detective is all about bringing order to chaos.

So we’re going for ORDER. That means I need to take the detective's neatness to an extreme, or at least make it memorable.

Now, I’ve said that the detective is attracted to the spiritual, the mystical. But he doesn’t follow any established religion, he has his own take on these things. He does not accept any one tradition whole hog, he picks a bit from this and that and weaves his own story.

So perhaps the order we’re talking about has to do with this mystical order.

“A place for everything and everything in its place” could have a double-meaning. It isn’t merely a matter of arbitrarily finding a place for something. Perhaps this ties into the idea of a memory palace. It isn’t that there is a preordained place for everything, but—given the way he has arranged his memory palace—there is. (Think Hannibal Lector or Pendergast.)

So not only will the detective’s lair tell us about his quirks, his tags and traits, it will tell us about his very MIND, perhaps even his soul (okay, maybe that last part is going a WEE bit over the top, but I’m leaving it in because it’s a little bit true).

That's it for today! In this post we:

• Thought about what the detective's name will be.
• Chose two or three detectives we can use as our own personal examples of what an awesome detective is like.
• Glimpsed the detective for the first time.
• Answered the question: How does your detective dress?
• Figured out what the detective does for work, or—in the case of a cozy—what kind of business he owns.
• Began developing the setting paying special attention to how the detective's work and home add to her memorability.

Next time we'll:

• Finish choosing a name for the detective.
• Develop a tagline.
• Get a start on the detective's character sheet.
• Look at how the detective is connected to the other characters.
• Start developing the the setting, especially the town, the detective's home (his or her lair) and their work.
• Determine the detective's characteristic action.
• Explore the character's strength as well as their weakness.
• Explore the character's psychological wound.
• Explore the character's motivation and goal. 
• Continue developing the character's backstory.
• Clarify what the murderer and detective have in common.
• Clarify the characteristics that make your detective awesome, the detective's special talent. What about your character is unique and interesting?
• What is the detective's unique edge on the murderer? What is it about the detective that allows him or her to defeat the murderer at the end of the story?
• What is the detective's hobby?

Update: Link to part 2 of 2: Let’s Make a Detective, Part 2 of 2

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Today I'm recommending: The Great Courses: Building Great Sentences: Exploring the Writer's Craft. I listen to one of The Great Courses every couple of months or so. The presenters are top notice, the material is revelatory and it's easy to find a format that suits your needs. I prefer listening to audiobooks because it allows me to multitask as I walk to the store or do housework. Try one, you'll like it!

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Writing Exercise

Your detective’s tags and traits:

Write down the names of two or three of your favorite fictional detectives. For each detective, write down as many of their tags and traits as you can. Now imagine the detective WITHOUT each of the tags/traits, alone or in combination. When you take away the tag/trait, are they still the same person? This exercise can help you figure out which tags/traits are the most important to the character’s identity.

Writing a Murder Mystery: 7 Tips for Creating an Interesting Detective

This post is part of a series of articles on how to write a murder mystery. I plan to write an article about each character type: the murderer, the detective, the detective’s sidekick, the police representative, the first victim, the suspects, and the experts.

For the last couple of days we’ve been examining how to write a murderer your readers will love to hate (to see an index of these posts see How To Write A Murderously Good Mystery).

In my last post I said that, arguably, the murderer was the most important character in the story. That’s because it’s the antagonist that makes us root for the detective. After all, if the detective had no obstacles to overcome, if there was no pressure, no ticking clock, the story would be dull. Without the antagonist—the murderer—there would be no entertainment. No excitement. Why? Because the protagonist wouldn’t be TESTED. He wouldn’t be put through a crucible, be transformed and come out the other side with the tools, the ability, to solve the mystery.

The detective IS the most important character in a murder mystery because this is the character your reader needs to love, or at least love reading about. This is the character the reader needs to identify with (and, also, with the detective’s helper, but more on that later).

If you plan on writing the story from the first person perspective there are really only two choices for your viewpoint character: the detective or the detective’s sidekick. If you choose the detective then your readers will be even more likely to identify with the detective.

Keep in mind that in a murder mystery the main focus is on entertaining your reader. So let’s ask ourselves, what characteristics should the detective have to make folks love reading about him or her?

Note: I've included this material in my book: How to Write a Murderously Good Mystery: The Major Characters.

7 Characteristics Every Detective Should Have:

Everything in this post stems from this: THE DETECTIVE SHOULD BE MEMORABLE. Why? Because a memorable character has nearly all the needed characteristics of a lovable character. What is needed, in addition, is to SHOW the reader the kind of person the detective is, to expose their character. This is done mostly in sequels, but I’m not going to go over that today. Here we’re confining ourselves to characterization and setting.

I like examples, so let me list a few characters I think are memorable: Sherlock Holmes, Hercules Poirot and Mr. Monk.

(For more about how to make memorable characters see: Crafting Interesting Characters.)

Most of the time, dramatic equates to memorable. We know drama when we see it, but what creates drama? What characteristics make a detective interesting?

7 Characteristics That Make a Detective Interesting

1. Exaggeration

A dramatic character is a memorable character. Think of Carrie from Stephen King’s story of the same name. Carrie White, a traumatized young girl, is pushed too far, snaps, and kills half her town. Carry isn't just telepathic, she's the most powerful telepath who ever existed!

That's extreme.

Or take Lee Child's hero, Jack Reacher. Reacher is 6'5'' tall, has a 50-inch chest, and weighs about 250 pounds. He’s a physical wrecking machine.

That's extreme.

Mr. Monk is scared of a lot of things and some of these we can understand. It is a rare (and perhaps slightly odd) person who has never been the least scared of heights. But I don’t know anyone who is scared of the sheer number of things Mr. Monk is. They’re in the hundreds! But the key thing isn’t JUST that Monk is just scared of many things most normal folks aren’t (milk for instance!), it is that he is scared of them to an insane degree.

That’s extreme.

All of these characters are popular and, as you can see, quite memorable. While I can’t guarantee that any memorable character will be a popular character, I CAN guarantee that if your character ISN’T memorable they won’t be popular.

Why does exaggeration work? Two reasons:

a. Wish fulfillment.

Humans crave excitement. Most folks would rather read about a mercenary who is a 6'5'' mountain of man-muscle than about a man who makes a good wage, has 1.6 kids, takes a vacation a year and for whom a speeding ticket is a major event.

b. Exaggerated traits are memorable. 

An exaggerated, extreme, over-the-top trait captures one's imagination. It’s memorable.

As I’ve said, this quality of being memorable is critical. If your readers can’t remember your character they won’t ever feel emotionally attached to her. The more a reader remembers about the characters we create the better the chances are of them turning the page.

• Without going overboard, think about what is exciting about your character? What characteristic of his makes you smile, what do you especially like about him?
• Are your character’s tags and traits memorable? What makes them memorable?

2. Exotic Setting

Exotic setting, as the name suggests, has to do not only with the character but the PLACE/SETTING and the character’s OCCUPATION.

PLACE/SETTING. Instead of living in an unexceptional apartment on an unexceptional street in an unexceptional town give the character a living space that’s exotic. Of course what’s exotic to me may not be exotic to you so here the writer must be guided by their own tastes. (A trip to Hawaii would be exotic for me but not so much to folks who already live there!)

Batman had his Batcave, Superman had his Fortress of Solitude, Sherlock Holmes has 221b Baker Street, Lieutenant Columbo had his car, and Poirot had his (fastidiously arranged) London apartment.

• Where does your detective live?
• What is exotic about your detective’s lair?
• What does your detective’s lair say about him? How does it do this? What characteristics make it representative of the detective?

OCCUPATION. All things being equal it's more interesting for a character to be a wizard or a CEO or even an archaeology professor than to be an ordinary dad or mom with an ordinary job.

Also, start thinking about what the setting is going to be for the Special World of the Adventure. An exotic resort? Small English Village? Plane in flight? Wherever you decide to place the lion’s share of the story keep in mind that the primary job of the setting is to CREATE CONFLICT and REVEAL CHARACTER.

(To read more about the Special World of the Adventure see: The Structure of Story)

• If your detective isn’t a professional, what does she do for work? How does this add to her exoticness, to her memorability?
• Where will the lion’s share of your story take place? How will this help to create conflict between the detective and his allies?
• How will the setting reveal the detective’s character?

3. Active Introduction

What we do—how we behave—is just as much a part of who we are as how we dress or what we think. So it should come as no surprise that how we introduce a character has an enormous impact on the reader. How we introduce a character will go a long way to determining whether your reader will remember the character as well as HOW he or she will be remembered.

In the character’s active introduction you want to do something CHARACTERISTIC, UNIQUE and MEMORABLE.

a. Characteristic Introduction

We can make a character's introduction characteristic by using MEMORABLE tags and traits. Determine which tags and traits are most important to the telling of your story. These are the ones you want your readers to remember so these are the ones that should be showcased when introducing the character.

For example, think of ...

Columbo. He loves his shabby raincoat, can never find a pencil, and always lulls the murderer into a false sense of security. He always gets his man/woman.

Hercules Poirot. He has a very old-fashioned, exaggerated, mustache that he fusses over endlessly. He is fastidious. He dresses in a suit, the cut of which is outdated and old-fashioned. He appears (especially when he wants to) excessively foreign. And he is brilliant.

Mr. Monk. The man was scared of ... well, nearly everything. Even milk! He was a germaphobe. He had trouble leaving his home unattended. If even the smallest thing was out of place he obsessed over to the point he became paralyzed. And he was the best detective in the world because he noticed all those little things others didn’t. As Mr. Monk always said: It’s a gift ... and a curse.

You get the idea. In each of these cases there are a few characteristics that fix the character in your mind and, afterward, act to bring the character back to life in your imagination.

The trick is to take the character’s tags and traits and use them to introduce the character in a way the reader will remember. (I’ll have more to say about this later.)

A couple of things to keep in mind:

Unique 

In order for an action to be characteristic it must be unique to the character. For example, if white-blond hair is one of a character's tags then no other character should have white-blond hair.

Similarly, if one of your character's tags is their beaten up leather jacket, then no other character should have a beaten up leather jacket. (That said, another of your characters could have a pristine leather jacket, this would help to compare and contrast the two people, who they are, their characters, their values.)

Memorable

Although just about anything can serve as a tag, it needs to be memorable (something exaggerated, fun, or linked to a significant event in the character's life). So, for instance, Jim Butcher has made Harry Dresden's staff one of his tags, as well as his shield bracelet. Then, to make extra sure his readers will remember, he links these tags to significant events in the character's backstory.

• What are your detective’s UNIQUE, MEMORABLE tags and traits?
• How will you introduce the detective? How will you introduce him or her to your readers for the first time such that a) the introduction reflects the character’s essence and b) readers will remember them?

b. Characteristic Action

We've seen that each character should have a few memorable qualities which are captured by their tags and traits. We need to use the character's introduction to indelibly inscribe the essence of that character in our readers' minds. (No pressure or anything! This is why I HATE writing openings.)

All things being equal, the character should do something that only they can do, something that is exaggerated, over the top. Something that will allow the reader to grasp—and remember!—the essence of this character. Jim Butcher does this with his wizard, Harry Dresden.

In the 6th book of his awesome Dresden Files series, Blood Rites, Harry Dresden is in the midst of fighting monkey demons trying to save a litter of ... can you guess? That's right, puppies! Can it get cuter than that?! Talk about pulling one's heartstrings. The book is a terrific read even if you haven’t read any of the other books in the series.

If you haven't read Butcher's Harry Dresden novels, think James Bond. If you've never heard of James Bond, the opening sequence of the movie will tell you everything about him you need to know. Curvy young women wearing barely enough to clothe a toothpick swoon over him, he is suave, a skilled fighter, a stone cold killer and Britain’s last, best, hope.

In general, you want the reader to be able to think, afterward, "Yes, that was SO them." Like Harry Dresden nuking a huge demon-monkey in the opening pages of Jim Butcher's Blood Rites.

• What are your detective’s characteristic actions? What could he/she do that would be both unique to them AND completely awesome?

4. True to Life: Verisimilitude

Unbelievable characters are boring characters.

So far we’ve focused on exaggeration to help us make our character’s traits, tags, and actions memorable. Now let’s make sure they’re believable.

As we make tags and traits more exaggerated we need to keep in mind that our character still needs to seem true to life or at least plausible. This is the difference between, say, DCI Tom Barnaby (from Midsomer Murders) and Superman. Superman requires a certain suspension of disbelief that Barnaby doesn’t. After all, Barnaby doesn’t have super-strength nor can he fly!

Part of how we make sure a character seems true to life EVEN THOUGH she has several exaggerated traits that lifts her above the mainstream is to show her emotions to the reader. And how does one do THIS? Two ways: Mini-sequels and (as I’ve already mentioned) tags and traits.

Mini-sequels

Don't worry about this too much right now, but the best way to give readers the sense that your character is a real person is to show the emotions, reactions and decisions that he has in response to, for example, a disastrous setback.

First, we need to show his EMOTIONAL reaction.

Second, we need to show how his emotion is followed by thought, by REFLECTION. We need to show him considering what occurred, trying to figure out what went wrong, what he should have done differently. Perhaps show him regretting his choices.

Third, we need to show him asking himself the question: "What now?" That is, spinning out various possible PLANS for future action.

Finally, the detective CONSIDERS the courses of action open to him and chooses what he thinks is the best one.

In the next scene we show readers the detective implementing his choice by ACTING in a believable way unique to them.

Note: For more on sequels see my article: The Structure of Sequels.

• If you have a chapter or two already written, look through them. Do they contain a sequel or at least one mini-sequel? If your characters don’t jump off the page, think about beefing up either the number of sequels or their length.

Tags and Traits

Let’s take each of these in turn.

Tags

What is a tag? Think of Hercule Poirot. His large, obvious, antiquated mustache that he is inordinately fond of is a tag. His old-fashioned clothes are a tag. His fastidiousness, however, is a trait (we’ll look at traits, below).

You want to have two or three tags per significant character, more if you like. You use these tags when you introduce the character for the first time and, after that, every time they are reintroduced after being off-stage for any significant period of time.

It’s important that each character’s tags be unique (otherwise the characters won’t be as memorable). So, for example, you only want one character with bleach-blond hair IF you’re using that as a tag.

How does your character talk? What sort of expressions do they use? People born in the south tend to use different expressions than do people from the north, etc. This could be a tag. The WAY a person talks can be a tag. If a person teaches at the university they might use long sentences and unnecessarily long words.

In general, anything that separates your character from another character can be a tag. Does your character tend to run their fingers through their hair or blink rapidly when they’re nervous or shuffle their feet? Those could be tags.

Is your character optimistic? Pessimistic? Do they love playing practical jokes? Those could be tags! Vizzini in The Princess Bride continually misusing the word "inconceivable" was a tag because it uniquely differentiated him from all the other characters. Also, it helped reveal the essence of his character.

When you’re thinking about tags, think of what differentiates your character in terms of: appearance, speech and mannerism. (For more on this see Dwight V. Swain and his excellent book Techniques of the Selling Writer.)

Traits

Traits (at least, this is the way I think of them) are behavioral dispositions, attitudes or habits. Is your character proud? Funny? Vain? Fearful? Are they a golf fanatic? Do they dote on their children? Are they fanatical about classic cars?

Remember that the essential thing here is (like tags) to use the trait to a) express character and b) differentiate this character from every other character.

• What are the detective’s tags and traits? Try to come up with at least two tags and one trait. You’ll likely add more later but this will get you started.

5. Empathy

The ultimate goal of character creation is to get your readers to empathize with your characters. You want to be able to be able to create characters your readers will love as well as those they’ll hate. If you can consistently do this then you’ll have a lucrative career as a writer!

• What tags and traits would dispose readers to like your character?

6. Relationships

Tags and traits define a character but so do their relationships with others.

Each character has a goal and these goals conflict with each other. Also, these goals should get in the way of the main character—the detective—achieving their goal: solving the murder.

Additionally, characters and their interrelationships provide an excellent way to 'hook' characters into the story's setting.

• How does the detective’s goal conflict with the murderer’s goal? In general, they conflict in the sense that the detective wants to identify the murderer and expose him to the community and the murderer wants to NOT be identified, but what I’m after here is something more specific. Why, other than fear of punishment, does the murderer wish to hide his crime? For example, is there someone he cares about he doesn’t want to alienate? Does he care about his position in society and how that would be jeopardized? Does the detective care about these kind of things as well?

7. The detective should live a life the reader will want to learn about.

What kind of life are your readers interested in learning about?

I think that, to a large extent, this is up to you. What sort of detectives, do you like reading about? Where do they live? When they’re not detecting what do they do? (Poirot cooks, takes urban walks, and goes abroad on vacation; DCI Tom Barnaby tries to eat his wife's inedible cooking, goes to see his daughter's latest play, and tries to take his family out to dinner so they can enjoy a delicious meal!)

A tip: something about your detective’s life should be EXOTIC, DIFFERENT. Perhaps he has a quirky hobby and plays the violin during thunderstorms. Perhaps he has an exotic vice like fine whisky.

What you don’t want is for the detective to be ORDINARY. Even Murdoch (Murdoch Mysteries) is so ordinary he’s extraordinary.

• This is a more global question. What about your detective’s life stands out as unusual? For example, Sam and Dean on Supernatural are vagabonds, traveling around the country hunting evil. It’s not the life for everyone—or anyone!—but it stands out. It grabs the imagination. It’s different. EXOTIC!

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Every post I pick something I love and recommend it. This serves two purposes. I want to share what I’ve loved with you, and, if you click the link and buy anything over at Amazon within the next 24 hours, Amazon puts a few cents in my tip jar at no cost to you. So, if you click the link, thank you! If not, that’s okay too. I’m thrilled and honored you’ve visited my blog and read my post.

This isn’t the first time I’ve recommended The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins and I’m sure it won’t be the last! If you enjoy a good British mystery, try it! I predict you won’t be disappointed.

From the blurb: “The Girl on the Train has more fun with unreliable narration than any chiller since Gone Girl.”—The New York Times

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Murder Mysteries: Open vs Closed

One of the fundamental distinctions between murder mysteries is whether the plot is open or closed. Today I explore this distinction, breaking it down into its constituent parts and focusing on its significance for the writer.

Open vs Closed Mysteries

Whether a mystery is open or closed depends on when the reader discovers the identity of the murderer.

If the identity of the murderer is unveiled at the beginning of the story without the reader having to do any work to figure out his identity—that is, if the identity of the murderer wasn’t a part of the puzzle for the reader—then the mystery is said to be OPEN. In most open mysteries the reader knows MORE than the detective for much of the story.

On the other hand, if the identity of the murderer is unveiled at the end of the story and if the murderer’s identity was the main mystery—the main puzzle for the reader—then the mystery is said to be CLOSED. In most closed mysteries the reader knows LESS than the detective (though the detective may draw conclusions from the evidence, conclusions he doesn’t immediately share with the reader).

Open Mystery

Lee Goldberg, scriptwriter for Diagnosis Murder and author of many of the Mr. Monk books, advises that if you write an open murder mystery make sure that both the murderer and the reader believe the perfect crime has been committed. What they read for, what pulls them through the story, is watching the detective find all the tiny—or not so tiny—flaws you didn’t notice.[1]

The knowledge gap: Notice that through much of the open mystery there is a knowledge gap. The detective mulls over clues the reader knows MORE about. This knowledge gap occurs because the reader knows everything the murderer does. What no one knows at the beginning of the book is what mistakes the murderer made. This is what the detective figures out by the end of the book, it’s what reveals the murderer’s identity.

The question: From what the reader already knows of the murder, and from the clues the detective uncovers throughout the story, will she be able to figure out where/when/how the murderer slipped up before the detective figures out the identity of the murderer?

The suspects: The detective interviews suspects but the focus is different because, often, the detective has a pretty good idea early on who the murderer is. The problem is proving it.

Closed Mystery

If, on the other hand, a closed mystery is more to your liking make sure the crime is confounding to both reader and detective. The clues don’t seem to single out any one person. In this case what pulls the reader through the story is watching the detective come to understand the connections—connections between clues, connections between people—that aren’t immediately obvious.[1]

The knowledge gap: Through much of the story there is no knowledge gap: the reader knows as much as a detective. Everything the detective discovers the reader also knows AND the detective is the reader’s only source of information, the reader doesn’t get to peek over the murderer’s shoulder as he does the deed. That said, the detective will know more than the reader after around the two-thirds or three-quarter mark, but this is only because he has drawn inferences from the clues he has found, inferences he doesn’t have to divulge to the reader until the denouement very end.

The question: Can the reader figure out the identity of the murderer before the detective does?

The suspects: The detective searches for clues that will help him determine each of the suspects MEANS, MOTIVE and OPPORTUNITY. The detective looks for inconsistencies between what he knows about the suspects—the available clues—and what any particular suspect has told him.

Examples of Open and Closed Mysteries

Open mystery:

- Columbo.
- Diagnosis Murder (some episodes).

Closed mystery:

- Agatha Christie’s stories.
- Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories.
- Mr. Monk (some episodes).

Note:

1. To read more about open vs closed mysteries I recommend Lee Goldberg’s article: How to Write a Murder Mystery.

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Every post I pick something I love and recommend it. This serves two purposes. I want to share what I’ve loved with you, and, if you click the link and buy anything over at Amazon within the next 24 hours, Amazon puts a few cents in my tip jar at no cost to you. So, if you click the link, thank you! If not, that’s okay too. I’m thrilled and honored you’ve visited my blog and read my post.

The books I’m recommending today are Lee Goldberg’s Mr. Monk books. It has been a few years, but I’ve read each one of these and loved them! If you liked the Mr. Monk TV series and you love murder mysteries, give these a try!

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That’s it for today! Have a great weekend and I’ll talk to you again on Monday. Till then, good writing!

Murder Mystery: The Victim

Let's talk about the victim and her importance to a murder mystery. In a sense, she is the central character. Of course the victim isn't the protagonist—the detective is—but without the victim there would be no story! Today I look at what information the detective needs to uncover about the victim, the what, where, when, why and how.

The Victim Injects Passion into the Narrative

I think of the victim as the heart of the story. After all, she was killed. Murdered! That’s passionate. Someone stole her life. And it usually isn’t an act of passion, it’s planned. The murderer intended to snuff the victim out, knowing the stakes, knowing that if he was caught he would be killed or spend the rest of his life in prison. (I’ll talk more about motivation when I discuss the killer.)

Most of the time the passion comes from the victim, not the detective. Think of it: the detective is engaged in solving a bloodless puzzle, deciphering clues to identify the murderer. Myself, I like passionless puzzles! But there is no denying that emotional engagement helps build suspense.

How does the reader discover all this passion? Through the detective. Details of the victim's life are a bit like buried treasure the detective must unearth. The detective strips away layers upon layers of the victim's life, her psyche.

The relationship between the detective and the victim is peculiarly intimate and one-sided. The detective is laser focused, at least in the beginning, on the first victim, on why she was killed, on why the murderer ran such a risk.

The detective is the victim’s champion. Because of the nature of the crime, of murder, the victim no longer walks among us. Nevertheless, it is the detective who must, in a sense, bring the victim back to life until justice has been served.

Information the detective uncovers about the victim:

WHO was the victim?

What was the victim's strongest desire? How did this desire translate into a concrete goal? What were the obstacles to this goal? Where was the victim in his journey toward this goal? Had he, perhaps, denied his greatest desire all his life and then, just before death, decided to follow his dreams?

If the victim pursued his passion who would it have impacted? Whose lives would have been changed? How?

What was the victim’s profession? How did the victim earn his money? Through legal means? Illegal? Was it a profession others admire (doctor) or did it make them feel vaguely uncomfortable (used car salesmen)?

Did the victim have family? Were they married? Single? Did they have children? Were they close with their family (mother, father, siblings, uncles, aunts) or had they drifted apart? What was the victim's last Christmas like?

Perhaps most important of all, how did the other characters feel about the first victim? I've found it works best if the first victim is either loved or hated by most of the suspects. The victim could be hated by everyone except one person (as in Agatha Christie's wonderful mystery, Appointment with Death) who loves them blindly, devotedly; to such an extent one wonders: It can't possibly have been real ... can it?

WHAT about the victim motivated the crime?

It’s often easier to look at what the murderer needed than to ask what characteristics the victim had that motivated the crime, but let's try.

Was the victim wealthy? The child kills parent for her inheritance.

Was the victim hated? Did they set up a ponzi scheme that robbed folks of their life savings?

Was the victim killed to frame someone? The murderer may have had nothing against the victim, the only reason she is dead is that the killer was setting someone else up to take the fall. And so on.

WHY was the victim killed?

Knowing what about the victim motivated the crime is only half the story. The other part of the equation can only come when we know the killer's motive.

For example:
- The victim was wealthy.
- The murderer was poor.
- The murderer was in the victim's will.

So far so good, but it's still not enough. There needs to be some sort of catalyst. Perhaps the murderer's daughter needs an expensive operation or she'll die, and she needs it soon. (I'll talk more about motivation when I discuss the murderer in a later post.)

WHERE was the murder committed?

The WHERE of the murder is often closely linked to the HOW. If your victim is to die of poisoning and the poison needs to be introduced into a bitter liquid (such as coffee), then that helps narrow the field. Perhaps an intimate picnic breakfast for two in a local park is called for or (even better!) breakfast in bed.

Of course the most important thing about the crime scene is that it must create a dividing line between those who COULD have done the murder and those who could not.[1] A blizzard could have cut a group of people staying at a bed and breakfast off from the rest of the world, it could have occurred in a small English village (or, possibly, Cabot Cove Maine!), and so on.

Speaking of the crime scene, the same rules of thumb apply to this setting as to any other. Is it unique? Exaggerated? Memorable?

WHEN was the murder committed?

Generally murderers attempt to trick the detective when it comes to time of death. Corpses are frozen or draped with electric blankets, anything to mask the time of death so the murderer can set up his perfect alibi. (I'll talk about this in more detail, later, when I go over the murder method.)

HOW was the murder committed? 

This should, ideally, have something to do with both the murderer and the victim. It can’t always be done, but I like it when the murder method is matched to the reason for the crime. For instance, a billionaire buys an old, family owned, winery intending to turn it into a parking lot. The day after the purchase the billionaire is found, drowned, in a vat of merlot.

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Every post I pick something I love and recommend it. This serves two purposes. I want to share what I’ve loved with you, and, if you click the link and buy anything over at Amazon within the next 24 hours, Amazon puts a few cents in my tip jar at no cost to you. So, if you click the link, thank you! If not, that’s okay too. I’m thrilled and honored you’ve visited my blog and read my post.

Cruising for Murder: A Myrtle Clover Cozy Mystery (Myrtle Clover Cozy Mysteries Book 10), by Elizabeth Spann Craig.

From the blurb: When “a fellow passenger disappears, Myrtle realizes she must seize the helm and find the killer...before more souls are lost.”

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That’s it! I’ll talk to you again on the weekend. Till then, good writing!

Notes:

1. There needs to be a dividing line between those who could have done the murder and those who couldn't, but there is a subset of mysteries—a variant of a locked room mystery (e.g., Death in Paradise)—where it seems no one had the opportunity to commit the crime. Normally, means and opportunity are known and it is the motive—the psychology of the murderer—that needs to be revealed.

How Murder Mysteries Differ from Other Kinds of Stories

I’ve been writing about murder mysteries quite a bit lately. I PROMISE I’ll write about something else for the next post! (If you’d like me to talk about a particular topic please let me know! Leave a comment, tweet me at @woodwardkaren or send an email. I would love to hear from you!)

High Stakes & High Tension

The following is true regardless of genre: Your story should have high stakes and lots of tension/conflict. But exactly how you cash this out in a murder mystery presents it’s own unique challenges.

High Stakes

The stakes need to be high for both the detective and the murderer; they must both stand to either gain and lose a lot. The same with the murderer. Let’s cash this out.

Detective

First, there’s the obvious: The detective’s goal is to identify the murderer just as the murderer’s goal is to evade detection. Notice that if the detective achieves his goal the murderer can’t and vice versa. That’s the structure we’re looking for. If the detective succeeds the murderer will, at the very least, go to jail. If the detective fails, his reputation will be in tatters, perhaps he’ll even lose his job.

But there are less obvious stakes. The detective might own his own business and solve puzzles on the side. Perhaps he has developed a reputation for solving murders that stump the police. How would his business fare if his customers came to see him as incompetent?

Or it could be that some suspicion has been cast on the detective. He must solve the crime to clear his name. If, for instance, the detective owned a bakery and the victim was killed with poison, that would NOT be good for business!

Or it could be that the detective is a lawyer. He needs to exonerate his client (who happens to be his aunt’s favorite nephew) and the only way to do that is by identifying the real murderer. If he fails Aunt Petunia will hate him forever and he’ll lose most of his clients!

There are MANY possibilities.

Murderer

Again, there’s the obvious: The murderer’s goal is to evade detection, to commit, as the saying goes, the perfect murder. If he fails, then he could be killed or spend the rest of his life in prison.

But there are less obvious stakes. Even if the murderer is never sent to prison he could lose everyone and everything he cares about: his job, his wife, his kids, his espresso maker, not to mention the cute Pomeranian that licks his toes in the morning. Life, as he knows it, would be over.

It’s important to mention the stakes for both the protagonist and antagonist at the pinch points, to remind the reader of what the detective is up against, how desperate the murderer is, the lengths to which she will go.

High Tension

As we have seen, the detective has a goal as does the murderer. The detective wants to identify the murderer by way of investigating clues. The murderer wants to remain free!

High stakes help CREATE high tension. How? High stakes drive characters to do things that take them out—way out!—of their comfort range. It is the push and pull between characters, especially between antagonist and protagonist, that drives a story forward.

Every scene, no matter who is in it, has two important characters.[1] These characters are working toward different clearly defined goals that are mutually exclusive. If one character achieves his goal then the other character cannot and vice versa. Sometimes these two characters will be the protagonist and antagonist (or, in our case, the detective and murderer), but not always. In fact, in a murder mystery, a reader won’t be able to tell whether the person in the scene with the detective is the murderer! In that respect, murder mysteries really are quite different from other genres: readers don’t even know who the antagonist is until the very end!

Clear as mud? Let me give you an example. Let’s say our detective wants to get a witness, Mrs. Lawson, to tell him what she saw the night of the murder. The main character in the scene is the detective and the character opposing him is Mrs. Lawson. The detective has to find out WHY Mrs. Lawson doesn’t want to tell him what she saw—is she afraid or is she covering for someone she knows?—and convince her to do something she doesn’t want to do. If he does, he achieves his goal. If not, he loses.

Is Mrs. Lawson the murderer? Probably not but who knows. In an Agatha Christie murder mystery the less suspicious someone is the greater the likelihood they’re the murderer!

It is the reader’s knowledge of what the main characters in any specific scene have to gain and lose that pulls the reader through it. Will the detective (or perhaps the detective’s helper) get the clue they need to solve the next part of the case, the next piece of the puzzle? Ultimately, they will have to face their darkest fears to achieve their goals.

One thing that’s different about mystery stories in general (I’m including thrillers in this category) is that the protagonist—and usually the reader—doesn’t know who the murderer is. Perhaps we have a smattering of scenes where we see the murderer anonymously do a number of bad things, or plan to do a number of bad things, but we don’t know who this person is until the end. So the antagonists we have are going to be the cranky boss, the obnoxious co-worker, even the weather!

For example, the detective and his sidekick must visit someone who is in the hospital, scheduled to have a risky operation, and they need to question her. But there’s a storm brewing. Then it breaks, turns the roads to mud and the sleuth’s car gets stuck. And so on. Each scene must have something who ACTS as an antagonist, something that opposes the goal of the main character in that scene. The antagonist doesn’t have to be a person though. In this example it was the storm. More broadly, the antagonist can be a person, place, thing, idea—it can be the main character themselves! I don’t know about you but I’ve sabotaged myself a time or three.

Reader Involvement

Finally, a murder mystery involves the reader in a unique way. Sure, ANY kind of story involves the reader but in a murder mystery the reader doesn’t know who the antagonist is and is ACTIVELY engaged in trying to guess their identity. In a sense, the writer is playing a guessing game with the reader (for more about books that play games see: How To Write A 'Choose Your Own Adventure' Story.)

UPDATE:

I've received some wonderful feedback regarding the detective's stakes. Adaddinsane mentioned that in many excellent murder mysteries the stakes for the detective are low. For instance, this is true in many of Agatha Christie's mysteries and she is one of the best selling novelists of all time!

I've noticed this tendency toward low stakes as well and wrestled with it. Personally (and this could just be my own preference) I like it when the sleuth has something personal riding on the outcome. It could be something humorous (an ill-advised bet he's made) or it could be something more substantial (the failure of his business). I find this adds more conflict, more tension, and helps pull me through the book.

K.M. Idamari (over on Google+) mentioned that Murder Mysteries have a social dimension. The murder breaks the rules of society. Identifying the murderer is about writing a wrong, it's about justice.

Very true! Yes, this is something I meant to speak about then it slipped my mind. Thank you!!

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Every post I pick something I love and recommend it. This serves two purposes. I want to share what I’ve loved with you, and, if you click the link and buy anything over at Amazon within the next 24 hours, Amazon puts a few cents in my tip jar at no cost to you. So, if you click the link, thank you! If not, that’s okay too. I’m thrilled and honored you’ve visited my blog and read my post.

An Autobiography, by Agatha Christie.

Read about Agatha Christie's life in her own words. From an Amazon reviewer: "Agatha Christie's autobiography will keep the reader interested in knowing a little bit more about her life as wife, mother, and author."

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Notes:

1. I say “characters” but these needn’t be people. For instance, a tornado could be an antagonist. However in the case of a murder mystery the antagonist does have to be an agent since they have to try and avoid detection.

The Structure of a Murder Mystery in 5 Acts

What follows is a structure—one-among-many—a murder mystery could have. If you would like to read about a general story structure head over here: The Structure of a Great Story: How to Write a Suspenseful Tale!

Below, I’ve broken a murder mystery into six main events stretched over five acts.

A Murder Mystery in Six Events

1. A Crime
2. 1st Murder
3. Crime solved
4. 2nd Murder
5. Sleuth’s Trap
6. Reveal & Wrap Up

I'll discuss each of these in more detail in what follows.

Again, I want to stress that I’m not saying this is how all murder mysteries are structured, simply that this is one way a murder mystery could be structured.

A Murder Mystery in Five Acts

Act One: The Crime, Murderer Introduced and the 1st Body Found

Opens with: The Crime.

The Crime. In the first act a crime occurs and is the inciting incident for that act (not the main story). The crime is not the first murder. It could be blackmail, common assault, burglary, vandalism, etc. Your detective could investigate this crime or someone else might. For instance, if your detective works as a homicide detective this would be outside her purview. Or if your detective runs a bake shop this particular crime might involve those close to her, but not involve her directly.[1]

The Murderer is introduced. The murderer doesn’t have to be introduced in Act One, but I think it’s a good idea. If you don’t introduce the murderer here try to at least have one or more of your characters mention him or her in conversation.

The 1st Body. At the end of Act One we have the Inciting Incident for the main arc of the story: The first body is discovered. This event draws the detective into the story.

Close with: Finding the 1st body.

Act Two: Detective Introduced and Led Astray

Opens with: The detective. Perhaps the detective is at the crime scene or at the morgue. Generally I think it works best if the detective is introduced with the victim since it was the victim who, in a sense, called him into the story. It is the victim the detective seeks justice for.

Detective Introduced. The detective and her sidekick/helper are introduced and interview the suspects. They will likely also talk to one or two experts over the course of the story.

Led Astray. Initially, the murder leads the detective astray. Gives them a red herring. As a result of this, the murderer gains the upper hand. (The detective likely won't realize this is the case until after the second body is found.)

2nd body found. The detective feels he is partially responsible for this person’s death. Perhaps he suspected this person wasn’t telling him everything but he didn’t press her because she seemed frail and elderly, or perhaps the sleuth and this person had a relationship.

Closes with: The second body is discovered.

Act Three: Crime Solved and the Detective Knows Who the Killer Is

Begins with: The detective at the crime scene or in the morgue. He discusses with his helper/sidekick how the death changes things, his current theory of the crime, and so on. This is a low point for the detective. The murderer has the upper hand.

New information sets the sleuth on the right track. We’re at the midpoint now and this storyline should resolve and loop back into your main arc. This will have the effect of giving the detective a major revelation into either the circumstances of the first murder or the murderer himself/herself. At this point the detective gets information that gives him a whole new perspective on the case.

Crime Solved. The detective uses the information, his increased knowledge, to solve the initial crime. The detective is back on his game and the murderer is nervous.

Detectives figures out the identity of the murderer. Detectives figures out the identity of the murderer. This act ends with the detective at a high point. He has solved the initial crime and this resolution combined with something his sidekick says (it doesn't have to be this, though it often is), allows him to identify the murderer. The detective also, often, knows how the murderer pulled it off, he just doesn't have any proof.

Ends with: The detective solving the crime.

Act Four: Third Body Found; Sleuth Lays a Trap for the Killer; The Reveal

Begins with: The sleuth puts into action a plan to trap the killer.

Act Four begins with a sequel. We need to all be on the same page. The sleuth is about to keep something from Watson, which means he’s going to keep something from the reader. We need to be sure not to trick the reader, not to keep anything back. All the clues need to be on the table at this point.

The Third ‘Murder.’ There really is no third murder. This is a trap the detective lays for the killer. Perhaps the murderer wants to kill the sleuth and the sleuth fakes his death. Perhaps the sleuth gets an accomplice to blackmail the killer and the killer takes the bait and appears to murder the blackmailer (or perhaps the murderer is apprehended before he or she can do the deed; if this is the case then it also serves as The Reveal).

The Reveal. The murderer thinks he’s in the clear, he’s gotten away with it. Everyone is in the library sipping brandy and pulling a long face. The detective says, “Well, at least I now know who committed the crimes.” The real killer thinks the detective is a fool and plays along.

The detective begins to lay out all the clues, explaining things as though he is still fooled by the murderer. Then he explains why the person the murderer was framing couldn’t have done it.

This makes everyone nervous. What is the detective talking about? What he’s suggesting is impossible! We know the victims were murdered, but the detective has ruled everyone out!

Then the detective says: No. The killer was clever, yes, but he was up against me, the great one! He never had a chance. The detective then goes on to explain what the real killer's plan was, what his motives where and how he did what he did.

The killer now feels like a cornered animal, fighting for its life. He passionately denies everything. "No, this is impossible! This is outrageous!"

But then comes the final detail, the final twist. The third victim isn’t dead! It had been a trap all along! The killer, panicked, springs up ready to run but is overpowered by the detective’s helper and the rest of the suspects.

Ends with: The reveal. The detective reveals the killers identity.

Act Five: The Wrap Up

Begins with: The detective explains how he discovered the identity of the murderer and ties up all the loose ends.

Finish explaining the clues. The first part of the wrap up deals with any unresolved details, any unanswered questions from the reveal. You can take a bit of time here.

Resolve the relationship arcs. The second part of the wrap up deals with relationship arcs, resolving them and tying them off. Make sure the detective and his sidekick, their conflict, is resolved right before the end.

Ends with: The detective, having wrapped up all the relationship arcs, goes back to his ordinary life.

* * *

I want to stress again that this is just one of thousands of possibilities for how you could structure a murder mystery.

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Every post I pick something I love and recommend it. This serves two purposes. I want to share what I’ve loved with you, and, if you click the link and buy anything over at Amazon within the next 24 hours, Amazon puts a few cents in my tip jar at no cost to you. So, if you click the link, thank you! If not, that’s okay too. I’m thrilled and honored you’ve visited my blog and read my post.

Witness for the Prosecution, by Agatha Christie.

This is, hands down, one of the best plotted stories I have ever read! If you’ve never seen it before—I believe it started out life as a play—read it! Or, if you like, watch the 1957 movie of the same name. Don’t let anyone tell you the ending, though! It’s one of the best endings of a mystery story, ever!

From the blurb: “When wealthy spinster Emily French is found murdered, suspicion falls on Leonard Vole, the man to whom she hastily bequeathed her riches before she died.”

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That’s it! I have another post nearly finished, one that picks up some of these same themes. In the meantime, good writing! :-)

Notes:

1. Above, I suggested beginning your murder mystery with a run-of-the-mill crime but there's another way to approach this, a way that can increase the stakes and start things off with spine-tingling excitement: Show the murder happening. The body, though, is still found at the end of the first act.

English vs American Murder Mysteries

Sorry this post is late! I’ve been working on my next book. This post is sort-of, kind-of a rough draft of a chapter for that book. So—as always!—your feedback is most welcome. :-)

I’ve been mulling over the question of what distinguishes an English murder mystery from an American one.[3] So, while I have a few ideas of my own (I’ve been a voracious reader of murder mysteries since the 9th grade), I did research.[5]

I LOVE Margaret Atwood’s writing, it’s so fluid, so alive. So I’ll let her take center stage and sum up some of the differences between an English and an American murder mystery:

“Their [American] world was fast-paced, sharp-edged, and filled with zippy dialogue and words I'd never heard pronounced—slang words like "gunsel", fancy words like "punctilious." This was not the Agatha Christie sort of story—there were fewer clues, and these were more likely to be lies people told rather than cuff buttons they'd left strewn around. There were more corpses, with less importance bestowed on each: a new character would appear, only to be gunned down by a fire-spitting revolver.”[4]

Yes!!! I love Atwood’s writing, it has bite. You feel it, it’s rhythm.

Another person who has weighed in on the basic difference between English and American murder mysteries is W.H. Auden. In his wonderful essay “The Guilty Vicarage: Notes on the detective story, by an addict,”[2] Auden defined the whodunit as:

“The basic formula is this: a murder occurs; many are suspected; all but one suspect, who is the murderer, are eliminated; the murderer is arrested or dies.”

I’ll come back to this in a moment. Right now let’s look at what, according to Auden, is the progress of the major events in a murder mystery:

Peaceful state before murder

Murder

False clues, secondary murder, etc.

Solution

Arrest of murderer

Peaceful state after arrest

Let’s Talk Character

And, while we’re at it, here (see below) is how Auden thinks of the progress of events that pertain to characters who are NOT the murderer. They may be guilty of something, but it’s not the murder under investigation.

False innocence

Revelation of presence of guilt

False location of guilt

Location of real guilt

Catharsis

True innocence

In other words, at the beginning of a murder mystery the innocent seem guilty (and the guilty seem innocent).

In addition, there is what Auden calls a “double reversal.” Have you ever read a murder mystery where you’re sure someone—call them Dan—committed the murder then something happens, the detective discovers some clue, one that makes it SEEM as though Dan couldn’t have done it? Then, at the end of the book, in the big reveal, it turns out Dan is the murderer? That’s a double reversal and, when done right, can be very satisfying for the reader.

I’ll come back to this progression later, perhaps in another post, but I wanted to include it here because I think it could provide someone with a valuable framework.

Now let’s continue our discussion of what an English murder mystery is and what it isn’t.

What an English Murder Mystery Is Not

As Auden points out, his definition excludes the following kinds of stories:

A. Readers Know Who the Murderer Is

In some murder mysteries readers know the identity of the murderer from the outset. For example, one of my all-time favorite murder mystery TV shows was Columbo. (It seems the writers of Columbo called it a “howcatchem” rather than a “whodunit” or “howdunit.”)

Not that no English mystery can be a howcatchem, but I believe it would be odd for a certain kind of English murder mystery—the cozy—to be a howcatchem, and I'm focusing on cozies. I’ll also, in a later post, discuss what I see as a subgenre of the murder mystery, the locked room mystery.

B. The Identity of the Murderer Isn’t the Focus of the Story

This point often applies to thrillers and caper stories. Recall that in a thriller the identity of the murderer often isn’t the focus of the story. Yes, there is an investigation, yes the detective gathers clues and decodes them, but catching rather than unmasking the killer is the ultimate goal.

In a caper story the question is: Will the group of theives be able to do it? Will they be able to pull off the perfect crime? That’s not to suggest that an element of mystery isn’t involved. For instance, there’s often a mole, a double-agent, in the group. The identity of this person is a mystery, but one that is usually solved before the climax.

How an English Murder Mystery Differs From Other Kinds of Mysteries

The Essential Function of the Detective

English Murder Mystery

Auden influenced my thinking about this. He held that the essential function of the detective was to restore justice—restore balance—to a community after the peace, the norms of the community, was violated. This is one reason many cozy mysteries take place in small close knit communities: a monastery, a rectory or the country estate of landed gentry.

The ultimate purpose of the sleuth was to mend the community's structure of social and moral values.

P.D. James, in her book Talking About Detective Fiction, argues that:

"The differences between the hard-boiled school and such Golden Age writers as Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers and Michael Innes, are so profound that it seems stretching a definition to describe both groups under the same category. If the British detective story is concerned with bringing order out of disorder, a genre of reconciliation and social healing, restoring the mythical village of Mayhem Parva to prelapsarian tranquillity, in the United States Hammett and Chandler were depicting and exploring the great social upheavals of the 1920s—lawlessness, prohibition, corruption, the power and violence of notorious gangsters who were close to becoming folk heroes, the cycle of boom and depression—and creating detectives who were inured to this world and could confront it on their own terms."

American Murder Mystery

American murder mysteries tend to be darker, much darker. The detective has given up on bringing balance to society. Given this, why does the detective bother to do what he does? Is it all about the money?

Not at all. In the American murder mysteries (though the motivation does vary) the detective solves the mystery and brings the murderer to justice (because either of his own personal internal will of ethics or because he has formed an emotional attachment to a person involved in the case. In short, the case has become personal for him. Just as no one needs anything as high sounding as a code of ethics to defend a loved one, so these detectives may have no code. They may, in fact, be what most of those in society think of as bad guys. But, still, they protect their own.

The Significance of Society

English Murder Mystery

Auden writes, “Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures, so that society has to take the place of the victim and on his behalf demand restitution or grant forgiveness; it is the one crime in which society has a direct interest.”[2]

As P.D. James says, the location of a typical British mystery is much like the world she was born into. She writes:

As I was born in 1920 it was an England I knew, a cohesive world... It was an ordered society in which virtue was regarded as normal, crime an aberration, and in which there was small sympathy for the criminal; it was generally accepted that murderers, when convicted, would hang...”

Accordingly, cozies (also known as ‘Country House mysteries’) were generally set in small interwoven communities and typically took the many interrelationships of such a community as a key theme.

American Murder Mystery

The American murder mystery is much darker. There is no sense of the detective striving to bring balance—justice and fairness—back to the community. In fact, sometimes the detective labors knowing that either this WON’T happen or that it will make the society MORE chaotic.

Closed versus Open Society

English Murder Mystery

In the English murder mysteries all the suspects come from a—to use Auden’s phrase—closed society.

This means that, in an English murder mystery, right from the get go we know who could have, and who could not have, committed the murder. In an American mystery we have our suspicions—perhaps we know certain characters are involved—but we don’t have the certain knowledge that one of a list of characters is the murderer.

This is one of the conventions of a cozy mystery. I would go so far to say if this isn’t the case, if the reader doesn't know who could have committed the crime, then the story in question cannot be a cozy mystery.

American Murder Mystery

In an American Murder Mystery the society usually isn’t closed although the reader does often feel the culprit is either one of the named characters OR one of the named characters is involved with the crime, although not the killer and one feels perhaps they were coerced. In this sense, the American murder mystery is a bit like the thriller.

The Detective and the Police

American Mysteries

It’s also telling, I think, that in American Mysteries the detective is often a loner, a private investigator who does not enjoy good relationships with most of the people on the police force. Perhaps one of them is kinda-sorta his friend, but even that is tenuous. Most police would just as soon lock him up and throw away the key.

And that’s another thing. American detectives, especially of Noir fiction, are usually male.

Perhaps this has changed in the last couple of decades, what with Eve Dallas (a fictional detective created by J.D. Robb, pen name of prolific writer Nora Roberts), Kinsey Millhone (a fictional character created by Sue Grafton for her alphabet murder mysteries) and last but surely not least Dr. Kay Scarpetta (a fictional medical examiner created by Patricia Cornwell).

English Mysteries

There isn’t as much to say about the relationship between the British detective and the police. Probably because the relationship is generally placid! And why wouldn’t it be? The detective is well heeled, knowledgeable, affable (if a little quirky) and generally quite happy to let the police take credit for solving the crime!

One of Agatha Christie’s less famous sleuths, Miss Marple, often had a more antagonistic relationship with the police, at least at first. They saw her as a meddlesome little old lady who couldn’t do anything for the investigation other than muck it up. As Miss Marple helped them prise apart the many delicate threads of the case, their attitude changed.

But, at least in Miss Marple’s case, the police were always fair in the sense they gave Miss Marple a fair shake. When she proved herself they, sometimes grudgingly, accepted her help and, often, thanked her at the end. This is perhaps the most significant difference between English mysteries and their American counterparts: in the hardboiled variety the world isn’t fair and this is reflected in the detective’s relationship with the police.

Often the local police despised the detective and even if the police believed he could help them solve the crime the police would have rejected his help. In fact, sometimes the police are corrupt and do not wish the crime solved!

The Private Life of the Detective

American Mysteries

Another difference between British and American mysteries is that in American mysteries—and in contemporary stories generally—the private life and loves of the detective are an important part of the story.

English Murder Mystery

I’m not saying that this disregard of the private life of the detective is true for ALL cozy’s, though I have found it to be true for most.

That said, in many contemporary cozy’s, those where the protagonist often owns her own business (a bakery perhaps) and has an on-again off-again relationship with the unbelievably gorgeous deputy, that this relationship isn’t an important B story. But it’s not the visceral, gut wrenching, demon-exploring scrutiny that can occur in the more American variants of the murder mystery.

The Temperament of the Detective

English Murder Mystery

And this brings us to what might be the single most important difference between American murder mysteries and English cozies: cozies are light and bright. As a general rule, nothing irredeemably bad happens to anyone in them except for the murder victim(s). Even then, the victims are often horrible people the townspeople had oodles of reasons to want dead.

Cozies are read as a diversion, as an escape, as a mental exercise.

That said, there are notable exceptions to this. I’m reminded of P.D. James’ wonderful character Adam Dalgliesh. He is tortured. Truly bad things happened to him and James’ other characters. And James wrote books that were classic English cozies.

To sum up, I think the generalization that British sleuths are emotionally muted in the sense that they are rarely frightened, that they are rarely themselves victims of crime, that they outwit the criminal rather than the reverse and that, taken collectively, they are a rather courageous lot, is more or less accurate.

American Murder Mystery

As Margaret Atwood mentioned, American detectives are at home on the mean streets, perhaps because they are more violent and know how to punch and jab and kick. Myself, I can’t imagine either Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple doing anything like that!

Commonalities Between English and American Mysteries

What is common between the genres? Both rely on suspense to drive the story forward.

Categories of Crime Fiction

The way I’ve been using the word, a whodunit is any crime story where a crucial element of the suspense, the mystery, is who committed the crime. In this sense, all of the following categories are whodunits.

The Categories:

Cozy mystery

Locked room mystery

Historical murder mystery

Hardboiled murder mystery

Police procedural murder mystery

Forensic murder mystery

Legal thriller

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That’s it for now! I’ll have another post for you tomorrow and to catch up, another one either Saturday or Sunday. Until I talk to you again, good writing!

Notes:

1. The Roots of American & British Crime Fiction, by Seonaidh Ceannéidigh.

2. “The Guilty Vicarage: Notes on the detective story, by an addict,” By W.H. (Wystan Hugh) Auden.

3. Here I talk about British and American mysteries but could just as easily have talked about softboiled versus hardboiled mysteries.

4. “Mystery writer,” by Margaret Atwood.

5. A note on terminology. The way I’m using the words, “whodunit” is ambiguous between English and American murder mysteries. To my mind the essential characteristic of a whodunit is just what the name suggests: The focus of the story—the story question—has to do with who committed the murder. As opposed to, say, how the murderer committed the crime or whether and how the murderer was caught.