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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Writing a Murder Mystery: The Conflict Character

Today, I’d like to talk about what I’m going to call the ‘conflict character.’

As I’ve mentioned, the antagonist as antagonist doesn’t come ‘on-screen’ until the end of the story when the detective reveals the murderer’s identity to the reader.

This is one of the quirky characteristics of murder mysteries: for most of the story no one knows which of your characters is the criminal, not until the end of the story. (I’m going to use “antagonist” and “murderer” interchangeably except where I think it might cause confusion.)

In, say, an action/adventure story the reader knows who the antagonist is, at least in general terms. For example, in Raiders of the Lost Ark we knew from the opening sequence that Indiana Jones’ nemesis was René Belloq.

This is not the case in a murder mystery. Yes, the detective’s goals and the murderer’s goals are mutually exclusive, but since the reader can’t know who the murderer is before the big reveal the detective often has another character—I’m calling this character the conflict character—to butt heads with. (Note: There can be more than one conflict character.)

Conflict and the Murder Mystery

Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of conflict—and this applies to any story, not just murder mysteries: There is conflict that spans the entire arc of the story (i.e., the main arc) and conflict that spans a minor arc (for instance, the B-story, C-story, etc.).

The first kind of conflict lasts for the entire story and is often between the detective and her sidekick; I go into this further, below.

The second kind of conflict is conflict that only lasts for a portion of the story. This portion could be a portion of a scene, a sequence of scenes, or the entire B-story/C-story/D-story, etc.

I’ve covered the conflict within a scene elsewhere (see: Making A Scene: Using Conflicts And Setbacks To Create Narrative Drive) so I won’t go into that here. What follows has to do with conflict that comes from arcs such as the B-story, C-story, etc.

How many conflict filled arcs are needed depends, at least in part, on how many murders there are: the more murders, the more suspects. For instance, in a show like Midsomer Murders where 3 or 4 people die, there needs to be a larger initial character pool than in a show like Murdoch Mysteries where, often, only one or two people die.

An Example of Conflict: Murdoch Mysteries Season 10, Episode 17

In the main arc, the spine of the story, Murdoch teams up with the Captain to investigate the murder of an older derby skater, a person who coached girls, girls who later formed an aggressive derby team. That is the first major event. The second (usually either a murder or some sort of setback) is the victim’s daughter being knee-capped and crippled for life.

In this episode the Captain acts as Murdoch’s sidekick. Murdoch’s goal is to find the killer as well as the girl’s assailant. He hopes that even if the girl’s assailant isn’t the killer it will help him identify the killer. But there is no quarrel between Murdoch and the Captain. There is a certain gentle push and pull but nothing remotely aggressive.

That’s the main arc. The two sub-arcs are, first, Dr. Julia Ogden and Rebecca James’ rivalry with the derby girls (there is a minor arc having to do with their good-natured rivalry with each other over who is the better skater). The second arc has to do with the conflict between George and his new girlfriend, the reporter Louise Cherry.

Who are the conflict characters? Which character generate conflict? I would say that the closest think to a conflict character is the derby team collectively. Here it’s not so much a person as it is a collection of people/characters. George’s conflict with Louise is a one-on-one conflict (since everyone else seems to love her!) while the conflict with the derby girls is between them and everyone else!

What Sort of Characters Are Conflict Characters?

Let’s talk about character roles. The conflict character could be the murderer, but most often isn’t. The conflict character could be a scapegoat, it could be a rival detective or even the detective’s sidekick.

In what follows I’m going to explore each of these possibilities (see below) as well as give examples to illustrate what I’m saying.

• The scapegoat as a conflict character.
• A rival detective (or simply a rival) as a conflict character.
• The detective’s helper/foil/sidekick as a conflict character.

I'll cover each of these in turn.

The Scapegoat as a Conflict Character

Let’s look at Agatha Christie’s Peril at End House. (Note: In what follows I draw from the television adaptation starring David Suchet.) This conflict spans most of the story and is part of the main arc.

A-Story: The Murder

--- Major
Detective: Hercule Poirot
Detective’s foil/Watson/sidekick/comic relief: Captain Hastings
Murderer: Magdala 'Nick' Buckley
Victim: Maggie Buckley
Scapegoat: Freddy Rice (Conflict character)

--- Minor
Detective’s ally: Miss Lemon
Police representative/ally: Chief Inspector Japp.

Note: Client lies to Poirot.

B-Story: The Relationship with Michael Seton

This is the red herring.

C-story: Drugs

Commander George Challenger: Drug dealer and transporter

D-story: Will/Forgery

Bert & Milly Croft: Forgers (antagonists of C-story)

Conflict. As indicated, Freddy Rice is the conflict character. From the first time she comes on-stage she pushes back against Nick’s claims. The first time we meet her she calls Nick the most brazen liar but then softens this by saying she doesn’t mean it as a criticism. She views Nick’s ability to lie as a gift. Freddy claims Nick is lying about the brakes on her car being sabotaged. But Freddy doesn’t stop there. At various parts of the story Freddy contradicts what Nick says.

Scandalous. For that time (the novel was published in 1932) Freddy was a scandalous character. She was married and yet carrying on a public affair with her lover, Jim Lazarus. And she is addicted to cocaine. As such, Freddy is not an especially sympathetic character! Just what one wants in a scapegoat.

A Rival Detective (or Simply a Rival) as a Conflict Character

Let’s stay with the Queen of Crime, Agatha Christie, but this time let’s take a look at Murder on the Links. Again, I’m going to use the TV adaptation of the story starring David Suchet.

A-Story: The Murder

Detective: Hercule Poirot
Foil: Captain Hastings
Murderers: Madame Daubreuil (Mastermind),  Georges Conneau/Paul Renauld (22 years ago), Marthe Daubreuil (present day).
Victim: Paul Renauld
Scapegoats: Jack Renauld & Bella Duveen
Police representative: Giraud of the Sûreté (Conflict character).

Note: Client lies to Poirot.

B-Story: The Relationships between Jack Renauld, Bella Duveen and Marthe Daubreuil

Jack Renauld and Bella Duveen were a couple until Jack left Bella for Marthe Daubreuil.

C-story: The relationship between Captain Hastings and Bella Duveen.

Captain Hastings falls in love with Bella Duveen, but fears she is still in love with Jack Renauld and has murdered Paul Renauld. But, hey, every relationship has its problems!

Although (as in any murder mystery) there is conflict between each character and the detective, the main source of story conflict (the A-story/arc) is between Poirot and Giraud. Both men consider themselves the greatest detective alive so there was bound to be a clash. Giraud, though, is a condescending bully who lacks Poirot’s grasp of order and method. Events come to a head when Giraud arrests Jack Renauld for the murder of his father.

The Detective's Helper as a Conflict Character

When the detective's helper is the conflict character the sidekick is usually somewhat bumbling, the detective somewhat acerbic, we see that they both have reasons for how they feel but they’re both likable, good and fair.

I’ve already gone over an example of this, above, but let’s talk about Peril at End House. Here Poirot clashes with Hastings over the latter’s fanaticism over golf—he would much rather golf than help Poirot with the case—and this irks Poirot.

Also, Poirot tells Hastings that his instincts about who is a good guy are so bad that if Hastings thinks a certain person is beyond reproach Poirot thinks they’re probably guilty of something! Hastings is, of course, offended. These minor clashes continue throughout the story.

Long-Term Conflict Generated by the Detective's Love Interest

A story arc is the story's spine. It has to do with the characters, their goals, and the obstacles each encounters. In a television series the spine generally stretches over an entire season while the myth arc spans an entire series (not all series have coherent myth arcs, and that's fine; it's not necessary).

In a murder mystery there are often two spines. One spine is what you would expect, the protagonist has the goal of discovering the identity of the antagonist/murderer and the antagonist/murderer has the goal of not being caught (or perhaps of doing whatever it takes not to be caught). As I've mentioned, it can be difficult to infuse conflict into this arc because the identity of the murderer is unknown.

The other spine, though, often focuses on the protagonist's romantic interest. This story arc can generate conflict. While each episode will contain minimal conflict, when taken as a whole, generous amounts of conflict are supplied by the season-long romantic arc.

For example, in Death in Paradise one story arc had to do with Humphrey engaging in what he thought would be a whirlwind romance with a friend on vacation but which turned into something deeper for both of them. I won't describe the story arc, but it has the traditional setup: each character has a goal and each goal is mutually exclusive. While each of them seems like a very nice person, they are each other's antagonist. It's effective.

I think the TV show Supernatural (I'm currently addicted to it!) is the most successful at using both a seasonal story arc and its myth arc to generate conflict. Each season the brother's are in conflict over something. Further, this familial conflict is directly tied into the threat they're trying to save the world from (which, in turn, is tied into the whole myth arc about why they're doing this in the first place).

Why does this work? Because, hey, they're brothers! It's realistic. They love each other, would die for each other, but they can drive one another nuts! They can have epic fights. The conflict comes across as natural. (I've mentioned Supernatural because, while not strictly speaking a mystery, it does include that element.)

* * *

We see that because the identity of the antagonist isn’t revealed until the end of the story, conflict in a murder mystery is often handled differently from other kinds of stories. That is, the other main characters, and even minor characters, help stoke conflict and keep the antagonistic fires burning. And of course the antagonist helps out by providing one or more murders for our intrepid detective to investigate.

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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.

Being Poirot. This is an amazing documentary for fans (like me!) of Agatha Christie’s Poirot.

From the blurb: “As twenty five years of playing one of television's greatest icons come to an end David Suchet attempts to unravel the mysterious appeal of the great detective Hercule Poirot - and reveals what it has been like to play one of fiction's most enduring and enigmatic creations. In this entertaining and revealing documentary Suchet allows the camera crew to follow him as he prepares for the emotional final days' filming on set. Suchet returns to Agatha Christie's Summer home in Devon, where he first met the author's family after taking on the role a quarter of a century ago, and travels to Belgium as he attempts to find Poirot's roots and discover what the Belgians think of one of their most famous sons.”

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

Notes:

1. Except when it isn't! In a murder mystery there are exceptions to this rule but they are so rare I'm not going to talk about them except to mention their existence. Example: The 10 season of Murdoch Mysteries. It seems as though George Crabtree's decision between Louise Cherry and Nina Bloom.

The Structure of a Murder Mystery

I’ve written many stories in many genres but, until recently, I’d never finished writing a murder mystery. Which is odd given that I absolutely LOVE murder mysteries.

I’ve often wondered why I had this particular disconnect. Here’s what I think:

In writing there's 'head smarts' and what I think of as ' heart smarts.' When we write a zero draft we draw from our heart smarts. This means that, no matter how much we know about story structure, that's not what guides us when we write. (It's what guides us when we edit.) And if we try to impose some sort of structure (head) on our words in the creative moment (heart), it can block those words.

Of course we should still make sure our stories are properly structured! But I think it's best to leave that for the first draft.

Elisabeth S. Craig's Take on The Structure of a Mystery

I love Elizabeth S. Craig’s blog—Mystery Writing is Murder. What a great title! Elizabeth Craig is a bestselling mystery writer. When I started reading her blog years ago she was published by Penguin but is now a "hybrid author" which just means she is both traditionally (Quilt or Innocence) and indie published (Myrtle Clover Cozy Mysteries).

Much of what I say, blow, is inspired by her post, “Pre-Writing.” I encourage you to head over to Elizabeth Craig's blog read her article for yourself.

In any case, in what follows I study EC's structure for a cozy mystery in the hope that we can use it to write better mysteries!

A Mystery Structure in Three Acts

I've attempted to keep close to EC's article, though I have included some information drawn from the many mysteries I've devoured read.

Act One: The Ordinary World

1. Setup/Status Quo

Introduce all your characters starting with the sleuth. EC writes: It’s “best to start out with [the] sleuth so that [the] reader knows who to identify with right away.”

2. Inciting Incident

You have two choices here:

(a) Write a “... scene showing [the] interaction of [the] future victim and future suspects ...”

or

(b) Introduce a body.

3. Call To Adventure & Acceptance of the Call

If the sleuth isn’t part of the police force then they have to get pulled into the case somehow. A friend has to beg them to become involved, or perhaps the person who died was someone they cared deeply about, or perhaps the sleuth is a suspect, or ... You get the idea.

Act Two: The Special World of the Adventure

4. Tests & Trials/Fun & Games

A number of things happen here:

• The Sleuth interviews suspects.
• The suspects provide alibis.
• A red herring or two is thrown out by the writer.
• Some of the suspects lie. Perhaps some lies are lies of omission, perhaps other people simply are confused, they mis-recall things. Some lies have to do with awful things they've done, but these things have nothing to do with the murder. And, of course, one person is lying because they're the murderer.
• And perhaps one of the suspects actually tells the truth!

5. Midpoint

In my experience as an avid reader of murder mysteries, I've found that the midpoint primarily does two things. First, it introduces new information—information that changes the detective's view of the Special World of the Adventure. Second, the detective goes from being passive (or reactive) to active. Let's look at each of these in turn.

New Information

Sometimes another murder occurs. If so, then this will scuttle the detectives current theory of the crime. How? Well, perhaps the person found was the suspect the detective thought committed the killing(s). Or perhaps the person the detective currently likes for the murder had to reason to kill the latest victim.

Or the new information could be about the killer's motivation for the crime(s). Perhaps the detective discovers the murderer's real name and history. While this gives the detective a lot of new information about the murderer and his/her possible motivation, it doesn't reveal who the killer is since he/she is living under an assumed identity.

The new information can be anything that transforms the detective's understanding of the case, raises the stakes, increases the urgency and, in so doing, pushes the story forward.

Passive (or Reactive) to Active

In the first half of the story the detective largely reacts to the situations, the conditions, that the murderer creates. In the second half of the story the detective takes the fight to the enemy. Now the detective sets traps for the murderer and, in general, actively works to apprehend him/her.

6. Setback

Whatever happens at the midpoint, it puts the sleuth back to square one. The sleuth has to re-evaluate the previous evidence in light of the new information. This means going back and talking to many of the suspects again.

EC writes, “Give suspects [the] opportunity to refute [the] evidence pointing to them from the previous murder.” See (4) above.

It could also be that the sleuth is personally affected by the previous death, or by the information revealed at the midpoint. The victim could have been a close friend or perhaps someone who was an exceptionally good person and an enormous loss to the community. Of course, it could be anything. Let your imagination be your guide.

Act Three: The Return

7. A New Plan/The Epiphany

This is what I think of as the lightbulb moment. The sleuth has an epiphany, puts two and two together, something sparks a revelation, etc. But the sleuth has to confirm it. He/she has to be sure.

8. Climax

Put the sleuth in danger. Increase the tension, increase the stakes.

From my reading and viewing experience, the sleuth is sometimes stalked by the killer. But sometimes the sleuth isn't threatened with death. Sometimes his/her job is on the line. Sometimes it's 'just' his/her reputation. Sometimes the life of someone the sleuth cares a great deal about is threatened. There are many different kinds of stakes that can be raised.

Eventually, though, the sleuth will turn the tables on the murderer and bring him/her to justice.

9. Wrap-Up

This is the denouement. The sleuth draws the curtain back and, clue by clue, explains how he/she solved the mystery.

ESC writes, “Are there other components in the story? Of course. But this is the basic structure of a mystery, just as other genres have their own skeletons.”

The Characters

Before you sit down to write your zero draft, think about:

• Who will your sleuth have as a sidekick?
• What are the potential motives of the characters?
• How were the murders done? What weapons were used?
• Think about what kind of subplot you’ll have. ESC writes that at this point you’re “just brainstorming.” I’ll add here, courtesy of Lester Dent, that you might want to make the murder method big, bold, dramatic, unusual, exaggerated, shocking, different. Think about all the different ways characters were done away with in Midsomer Murders.
• The murderer. ESC writes that she doesn’t worry too much about the murderer’s identity. Sometimes she doesn’t know this until she’s at the climax of the story! She writes, “The killer’s identity? Not really.  I have an idea who I think may be a good killer, but I frequently change my mind 3/4 of the way through the first draft.  It’s always good to be flexible.”

The Suspects

How many suspects should you have? The suspects are going to be characters who have a reason, a motive, to want the victim dead. In ESC’s example she lists five suspects: the niece, daughter, son, husband and friend.

Did the victim have a lot of money that his/her family and friends had a lively expectation of inheriting?

Did the victim use their money and power to manipulate others? If so, who?

That’s it! I hope you have a great, productive, weekend. I’ll talk to you again on Monday. In the meantime, good writing!

And now, my pitch. :-)

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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.

Today I'm recommending, Fall to Pieces (A Southern Quilting Mystery Book 7), by Elizabeth Craig. From the blurb: "Dappled Hills quilters are eagerly anticipating new events at the Patchwork Cottage quilt shop. The shop’s owner, Posy, has announced ‘Sew and Tell’ socials and a mystery quilt group project. But one day, instead of emailed quilt instructions, the quilters receive a disturbing message about a fellow quilter. When that quilter mysteriously meets her maker, Beatrice decides to use her sleuthing skills to find the killer before more lives are cut short."

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How To Write A Murder Mystery

I've never written a murder mystery, but I've always wanted to.

I fell in love with detection and murder in grade nine when my English teacher assigned the class Agatha Christie's story, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. We read a section in each class and had to try and guess who the murderer was, then defend our guess.

Best. Class. Ever!

One of my life goals is to write a mystery novel, one sprinkled with murders, false leads and scandalous secrets.

I've started a few murder mystery stories. Every two years or so, I decide to take another run at it but I always end up setting the manuscript aside after several angst-filled writing sessions.

Which is why I was utterly thrilled by Susan Spann's post, 25 Things You Need To Know About Writing Mysteries, over at Chuck Wendig's blog, Terribleminds.com.

SS's post set forth important, insightful and, above all, useful writing tips that could help even a murder mystery neophyte (like me!) actually finish writing one.

How To Write A Murder Mystery

1. Start with your sleuth

Everything begins with character.

Once you know something about your sleuth you can create a world around him, one designed to show readers what kind of a person he is and make them care about him and his quest for justice.

As is true for any story, your characters need to be both engaging and unique. Think about how your character looks, his physical appearance, and how he will stand out from your other characters. How about his behavior? Does he have any ticks? Phobias? Idiosyncrasies?

Something needs to set your sleuth apart. He needs to be interesting and memorable. Often this is accomplished through exaggeration—Mr. Monk is scared of everything, even milk!

Jim Butcher has a marvelous discussion about this over on his Livejournal blog.

2. Make your sleuth quirky and damaged

Break your sleuth in interesting ways.

Susan Spann writes:

"... take a hammer to your sleuth’s emotional kneecaps. Bust those suckers good—and be creative. Divorces, tragic accidents, and dead relatives are dime-a-dozen. You can do better. Make your detective allergic to coffee, or phobic of houseplants. Squash her beloved iguana beneath a Zamboni and then force her to solve a murder at an ice rink."

I love that last line. It's easy for me to forget that a character's weakness is only interesting if I exploit it.

We only care about Indiana Jones' fear of snakes (a big fearless adventurer with a fear of snakes) when he's forced to confront one (or, more likely, a dozen). And of course the snake is going to be poisonous.

That's what I mean about forming the fictional world around the hero. Indy's fear of snakes is part of his backstory, but it's something that's going to affect what sorts of obstacles you throw at him, so it'll help shape your story and your story world. That's why you need to know all about it before setting pen to paper.

3. Backstory

The reason why Indiana Jones is scared of snakes is part of Indy's backstory. Susan Spann reminds us that we need to work in backstory without using the following props:

- Internal monologues
- Flashbacks
- Dreams

That said, if your character is a seer, a visionary of some sort, I imagine using a dream to introduce bits of backstory might be okay.

It all depends. As Stephen King says in On Writing, it's all on the table, every trick, every tool. If it works, great, keep it. If it doesn't, throw it out.

Aaron Sorkin, in How To Write An Aaron Sorkin Script, writes that the key to introducing backstory is to make the audience—in our case, our readers—want/crave/demand the information. Sorkin writes:

"A song in a musical works best when a character has to sing— when words won't do the trick anymore. The same idea applies to a long speech in a play or a movie or on television. You want to force the character out of a conversational pattern."

Sorkin is talking specifically about how he sets up a character to give one of the monologues he's known for, but these monologues are basically info dumps. An excellent article.

4. Get a handle on your sleuth's motivation

As a general rule, humans prefer the easy to the hard, the simple to the complex, the happy to the sad.

If your hero is going to put herself in mortal danger, if she's going to risk not only her life but her retirement pension, we've got to give her a darn good reason.

For instance, when Neo goes to rescue Morpheus in The Matrix he doesn't believe he's going to survive the attempt but he's got a darn good reason for doing so. He believes that without Morpheus the human resistance is doomed to fail. By giving up his life in exchange for Morpheus' he's saving the world.

Not bad as far as motivation goes!

Make sure that your hero has a darn good, believable, reason for putting it all on the line.

5. Kill 'em

We're writing a murder mystery so there has to be a murder (at least one) and the sooner the better.

Bank heists, jewel robberies, kidnappings, and various other nefarious crimes will not suffice. This is a murder mystery, your readers demand a murder.

6. Kill 'em soon

Have the first murder occur in the beginning—in the first half of the first third--of the novel. Put another way, if your novel is 300 pages long, have it occur in the first 50 pages.

7. Kill 'em with style

Get creatively offbeat with the murder method.

Susan Spann writes: "Anything is fair game if you can explain it."

I went googling for unusual deaths and came up with these:

- Death by Egyptian curse
- Death by puffer fish poison
- Death by ricin
- Death by caffeine
- Death by puppets
- Death by robot
- Death by milk (In honor of Mr. Monk)

8. Kill 'em logically

For each murder the writer must figure out:

a. The killer's method.
b. The killer's opportunity.
c. The killer's motive(s).

9. Kinds of clues

There are three kinds of clues:

a. Genuine clues

These kind of clues point to the killer and can help the sleuth solve the crime. She just has to figure out they're genuine.

b. Red herrings

Fake clues point to someone other than the murderer. Red herrings distract the reader and (at times) the sleuth.

c. Pivotal clues

These are the clues the sleuth uses when she finally solves the crime.

You need to insert these clues into the story in such a way that your reader won't know which category (genuine, fake, pivotal) the clue falls into.

10. The unusual suspects

Susan Spann holds that you'll need at least three suspects, through her preference is for four.

Further, each suspect must fall into one of two categories.

a. People who wanted the victim dead.
b. People who had the opportunity to kill the victim.

Further, one of your suspects should be different, wacky, "out of the box," someone not like the others. This person should add a sense of the crazily unexpected. SS cautions, though, to be careful not to stretch a reader's belief to the breaking point.

I'm not finished, there are another 11 points to consider when writing a murder mystery, but I've put those into a post that's going out tomorrow. Stay tuned! (Update: Here's the link: How To Write A Murder Mystery: Part Two)

Good writing.

Photo credit: "Dawn of the Anna" by 55Laney69 under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.

Creating The Perfect Sleuth

As I mentioned last time (Creating The Perfect Murderer) I'm interested in writing a particular kind of murder mystery, one that is unabashedly intended as entertainment.

With that in mind, what is the single most important thing about the hero? That his actions should entertain the reader. Ideally, the reader should be so closely identified with the sleuth that he/she feels vicariously heroic because of our sleuth's actions.

So, what traits should our hero possess?

1. The hero/sleuth should be dramatic.

Think about the character of Sherlock Holmes as portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch on Sherlock. One of my favorite episodes is A Scandal in Belgravia (season two, episode one) when Sherlock is summoned to the palace wearing nothing but a bed sheet because he refused to put clothes on.

That's dramatic.

His refusal to do something simple like getting dressed also beautifully illustrates his stubborn refusal to do anything he doesn't want to and so makes his eventual manipulation by The Lady all the more striking (pun intended).

2. The hero/sleuth should be interesting

This is, as they say, a 'no-brainer' and yet, sometimes, one can lose sight of it.

One thing that makes a character interesting is possessing contradictory character traits. For instance, Sherlock Holmes doesn't care about people, they're all morons as far as he's concerned, and yet he cares passionately for his friends. So much so that he would give his life for theirs.

3. He should live a life the reader will want to learn about

Again, this is pretty basic stuff, but how many of us have started a story off with a character waking up in their bed, looking out their window at the same old scenery and starting their same old, boring, day?

What? Just me? (blush) Okay, moving on ...

Maybe living an interesting life means the hero lives in a Park Avenue loft, or maybe it means he lives in a seedy tenement with a one-eyed cat who can tell when someone is lying.

I think the key is that the hero's life isn't ordinary. Something about it is striking, unexpected.

Whatever your setting, remember, if it doesn't interest you what are the chances it's going to interest a reader?

4. The hero/sleuth is courageous.

One thing that struck me about the Monk mysteries was how the screenwriters succeeded in demonstrating Monk's courage. Keep in mind that this is a character who is scared of milk.

The key is, it takes courage to face your demons, whatever they are, and Monk regularly chose to face his demons to preserve the things he cared about, whether that was walking through a rat infested sewer or risking his reputation and his chance to get back on the police force.

Threat to life and limb. Though temporarily overcoming a debilitating fear of milk is admirable, even tormented characters such as Monk need to, eventually, face a threat to either their life or the life of someone they care deeply about.

Or not. Sweeping comments like the above are almost always false. I think that demonstrating courage has more to do with facing one's demons, facing one's fears, and that doesn't require the threat of physical death.

5. The hero/sleuth is skilled at what they do

Whatever that may be. Sherlock Holmes is a detective who solves those cases he finds interesting and he's good at it. If he wasn't he'd just be a guy who thought too highly of himself. That would be boring.

Monk: It's a gift and a curse. His physical quirks--multiple obsessions and a phenomenal memory--ruin his life but they also make him great at solving crimes. If he wasn't great at solving crimes he'd just be a bundle of neurosis and there's nothing interesting or exceptional about that.

Your sleuth doesn't have to be a detective. For instance, Miss Marple was a little old lady in a small English village who knew everyone, noticed everything, had a wonderful memory and charming manners. Her skill: she was very good at finding analogies between the actions of those around her and events in village life, analogies that laid bare the killers heart. As soon as Miss Marple got the analogy right, she solved the crime.

If Miss Marple didn't solve the crime then she'd be what nearly everyone thought her to be: a doddering old lady. As it was, she was the embodiment of Nemesis.

6. The hero/sleuth has a special talent

I've said something about this in the points above, but it's worth focusing on. The special ability can be anything,

- a photographic memory (Sherlock Holmes, Monk),
- a lifetime of experience combined with a keen intellect (Miss Marple),
- the ability to mentally recreate a crime scene and live it from the killers point of view (Will Graham),
- the ability to use logic and psychology (his 'grey cells') to solve the puzzle of the crime (Hercule Poirot),
 - the ability to tell if a person is lying (multiple),
- a cool whip and the ability to use it (Indiana Jones),

And so on. But it doesn't have to be a 'cool' ability, it doesn't even have to be particularly useful. It can be something trivial like being able to eat more hot dogs than anyone.

The hero needs to be better than anyone else at something. If this something makes them seem clever and resourceful, so much the better.

7. The hero/sleuth has a deep wound

Any fully developed character will have a deep wound, but this wound plays a special role in the case of a hero/protagonist.

Previously I've talked about the main arc of a story and the secondary arc, let's call this the A and B stories, respectively. The B story generally is about the hero's inner landscape, her feelings, her dreams, her problems, her insecurities while the A story has to do with an external goal or object of desire. In many stories the B arc concludes when the hero confronts her deep wound and either heals it or is destroyed by it.

This isn't going to be a tragedy so my hero will confront her deep wound and heal it.

Here's the cool bit: the hero's deep wound is healed because of her willingness to sacrifice herself. Similarly, the villain/murderer's wound will never heal because he will never sacrifice himself, his happiness, for others.

In healing her deep wound, the hero discovers the key to attaining her external goal and victoriously closes out the A story.

Or something like that. ;)

I think I'll stop there for today. In the next post I'll talk more about the quirky characteristics our sleuth could/should have. For instance, have you noticed that many popular sleuths have been named after guns, have never been married, have no children, do not live in the suburbs and do not drive an ordinary car?

Huh.

Question: Who is your favorite sleuth?

Other articles you might like:

- How Many Books Would You Have To Write To Quit Your Job?
- Advice For New Writers
- Donald Maass On Why Books Don't Sell
- 5 Rules For Writing A Murder Mystery: Keeping the Murderer Secret Until The End

Photo credit: "Universal Captain America" by JD Hancock under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.

Creating The Perfect Murderer

I've always wanted to write a murder mystery. I read them all the time but I've never written one. I'm hoping to change that.

Over the next few days and weeks I'm going to publish a series of posts (not all at once, though!) about writing a murder mystery. I think that in order to really truly learn a subject one must teach it--I know that sounds strange, paradoxical even--but I think it's true.

In what follows I make certain broad statements, please take these with a grain of salt. I'm talking about the kind of murder mystery I'm interested in writing, which is also the kind I usually watch. If something I say doesn't seem right to you, please ignore it. Better yet, talk to me about it in the comments! :)

The bare bones of a murder mystery

Although there are a number of variations, this is the bare bones of a murder mystery: the murderer/villain kills someone. The murderer is then pursued by the hero/sleuth who will, before the end of the story, solve the mystery and bring the murderer to justice.

Secondary arc

In a murder mystery there is generally a main arc--the story of the hero solving the mystery and bringing the murderer to justice--and a secondary arc.

The secondary arc is often a story that has some intrinsic interest and that is interwoven with the main plot. For instance, in Scott Turow's excellent murder mystery Presumed Innocent, the murder investigation happens against the backdrop of an election for County PA.

The secondary arc often poses a problem for the hero, the solution of which he uses to ultimately solve his primary problem: how to bring the murderer to justice. For instance, this sometimes happens on the TV show Castle; the solution to the secondary arc/dilemma has to do with his family and it will provide the solution to the problem of the main arc.

Setting

The secondary arc is often tightly related to the setting. For instance, I mentioned Castle. In that show the secondary arc almost always involves Castle's interactions with his mother and daughter and much of that show takes place in his penthouse apartment where they live.

The key: Create a place where dramatic things are happening besides the mystery.

Main Arc

The story's main arc will be about a sleuth investigating and solving a murder and, ultimately, bringing the culprit to justice.

The first thing we need to do is figure out who our murderer is.

Why the murderer and not the sleuth? Because the murderer is the one who plans and executes the crime. A murder mystery is really all about the murderer, about why he/she committed the crime and about his/her identity.

Meeting the murderer

What is the murderer's ruling passion? What does he/she love? Everyone loves something above all else--often ourselves! What does our murderer love enough to kill for?

Let's make something up.

Chances are our murderer has killed more than once. The murderer could have committed the first murder for plausibly noble reasons; for example, to protect someone he cares about.

In Columbo, 'A Deadly State of Mind,' a psychiatrist kills his lover's husband while defending her from him. It was self-defense but the killer doesn't think the police will believe them so they make it look like the husband was killed by a burglar. When Columbo sees through that story the psychiatrist kills again, this time murdering his lover in cold blood in a vain attempt to cover his involvement in the crime and pin everything on her.

Motivation: self-interest

The main point is that the murderer acts out of his/her own self-interest. In the example, above, perhaps the first killing was done for someone else, but the second was cold and calculated.

The murderer doesn't appear evil

The murderer will not seem evil to those around him. Perhaps he will appear to be a good family man/woman, a member of the PTA, a respected business person, someone liked and looked up to by those around him.

Or not. Perhaps, as in Presumed Innocent, the murderer will be someone quiet, subdued, controlled. Still, though, they are generally the last person one would suspect.

The murderer will appear clever and resourceful

The murderer must appear clever and resourceful. After all, if the murderer isn't clever and resourceful then it's not going to be much of a mystery. The antagonist/villain/murderer has to seem to be at least as clever and resourceful as our sleuth.

Deep psychological wound

The murderer (this will be true of the hero as well) will have a deep psychological wound. For instance, perhaps the murderer has a deep fear of being alone, of being friendless, shunned. They would do anything to be popular. They are rabid for approval.

This point ties into the next one which is that ...

The murderer must be extreme

For instance, the deep psychological wound must be severe and potentially debilitating. This will help explain why he murders, his deep inner motivation.

Characteristics: Physical, mental, social

- Is the murderer male? Female?
- Tall? Thin?
- In good physical condition?
- Does he have physical injuries? Scars?
- What color is his hair?
- How old is he?
- What kind of a childhood did he have? Who raised him? What did his parents do for a living?
- Did he like school? What kind of grades did he get? Did he finish high school? Did he finish college?
- How does the murderer currently earn money?
- Does he have a violent temper?
- Does he find it easy to make romantic connections?
- What does the murderer find easy? There is one thing he is exceptionally good at. What is it?

That's a partial list. There are many wonderful character sheets on the Internet that can help with character development.

I will pick up this topic again and, next time, we'll talk about our sleuth/hero and start developing that character.

Happy writing!

#  #  #

For the past few days I've been reading through notes I made at (it looks like) a workshop on how to write mystery stories. Unfortunately I didn't write down where it was, when it was, and so on, but I'm going to share them with you anyway because they're too good/helpful not to.

Question: What do you think is the most important characteristic for a murderer/antagonist to have?

Other articles you might like:

- 25 Tips For Writing Great Sex Scenes
- 4 Ways To Get An Audience To Love Your Story
- 3 Steps To Better Prose

Photo credit: "Untitled" by Mark Wooten under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.

5 Rules For Writing A Murder Mystery: Keeping the Murderer Secret Until The End

It seems like a contradiction of sorts, I love reading murder mysteries--whodunit's--but I've never written one.

I think about writing one from time to time, I've even started to sketch an outline, but I lose interest. It's a puzzle. I don't understand how I can love to read something but have no real desire to write one.

So it was with eagerness, and perhaps a wee bit of envy, that I read  Price McNaughton's guest post on how to write a murder mystery, Keeping the Murderer Secret until the End.

Price writes:

When I first began writing murder mysteries, my biggest fear was that I would reveal the murderer too soon. I hate books that make the perpetrator evident from the moment he/she steps onto the page. I didn’t want to be guilty of the same!

Price's solution was to make up his own set up rules for mystery writing (I'm paraphrasing):

1. Know who your murderer is and why they did it.

- What was their goal?
- What are the stakes?
- What motivates the killer?

By the end of the story make sure you've answered these questions in your manuscript.

2. Leave clues

The clues "do not have to be obvious or even fully explained. You'll want to leave some "mystery in your mystery."

3. After you finish the first draft add in clues where needed

Price's tip:

Red herrings are much easier to add in after the book is written as long as you don’t write yourself into a corner with your characters, such as explaining everything they do and why.

4. Don't fully explain everything

Price writes: "Let your characters retain some mystery."

People aren't fully explained any more than they are wholly good or bad, your characters should reflect this.

5. Your protagonist doesn't have to know everything, at least not right away

Like you and me, it's okay if your sleuth doesn't have all the answers and is unsure about what happened ... as long as she gets there in the end.

Question: Have you written a murder mystery? What are your rules?

Other articles you might like:

- How To Write Episodic/Serialized Fiction, Part 2 of 2
- Larry Brooks On The Structure Of Short Stories
- What Slush Pile Readers Look For In A Story

Photo credit: "7:08 AM" by dicktay2000 under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.