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Several of the mystery writers I know really have a lot of fun with their victim.  Sometimes an author purposefully makes the victim similar to someone he’s had a  run-in with or someone they didn’t like in high school.  There are plenty of unpleasant people out there and it’s easy to make an amalgam of them to form your perfect murder victim.

The victim needs to be someone murderable (I know, it’s a made-up word).  In other words, someone who has a few enemies.  Actually, this is a rule that I’m playing with a little for the book I’m writing now.  I start the book with everyone having warm fuzzy feelings for the future victim, but then we start finding out a little bit more about her.  Then we know why several people would like to bump her off.  Otherwise, why on earth would your victim legitimately be murdered?  Unless you’re writing a thriller with a serial killer who just kills random people.

I’ve read books before where the victim is dead on page one.  Later on, we find out more about the victim through flashbacks (not my favorite device) or through interviewing people who knew him.  This can be really interesting, if done right.  I found that I was very curious to find out more about the victim and having the information doled out in tantalizing bits and pieces held my interest. 

I’ve also read books where the reader was fully introduced and vested in the victim before the murder.  This works, too.  The reader has gotten to know the victim and has more of a personal interest in who killed him. 

How gruesome is the murder of your victim?  This depends on the type of book you’re writing.  If you’re writing a cozy mystery, the murder will probably take place off-stage and you won’t provide your reader with many gory details.  If you’re writing a police procedural or a thriller, you can usually get away with a lot more.  But keep in mind that if a book gets too graphic, you could lose some readers.

  Sometimes a task can be easier if you make yourself a checklist to ensure you’re covering all your bases.  With that idea in mind, here’s a brief checklist you might want to consult before sending your manuscript off into the big, bad world of editors and agents. Or, it might be more helpful to think about these things while you’re still plotting your novel.

Genre: Have you got a clear genre for your book? Thriller, cozy, police procedural, hard boiled? If you can’t identify your genre to an agent or editor, your manuscript won’t go too far.

Have you followed the rules of writing a mystery?: (see Twenty Mystery Writing Rules )

Setting: Frequently, setting plays a role in a mystery novel. It limits the number of suspects if it’s a remote island, for example. For a thriller, you may want a faster-paced, big-city environment. See how setting plays a role in your book. If it doesn’t, you may want to consider tweaking your manuscript.

An Engaging Beginning: Have you started out with a bang? Or have you started out with some messy backstory that no one wants to wade through at the beginning of your book? Make sure you’ve lured your reader in from the very beginning so they’ll want to stick with you.  Think twice before using a prologue or using flashbacks at the beginning of your manuscript.

A Murder that Happens in First 50 pages or so: Don’t wait until you’re half-way through the book for a body to be discovered. Your reader may give up on you.

Protagonist: This will be your sleuth or police detective. Are they likable people or at least people interesting enough for your readers to want to spend time with? What special talents do they have that make them capable of solving the crime? Are they easy to talk to? Have they spent many years in the police department? What sets them apart?

Suspects: Do your suspects all have motive, means, and opportunity? Does their motive make sense and is it believable? Have you given the reader a chance to meet each suspect and learn about them? Have your suspects misdirected your readers and provided some red herrings? Have they lied to the sleuth and the reader? Do they have secrets? Do they have some depth?

Murderer: The killer will need to be fairly clever so he isn’t caught right away. Is your culprit believable but not obvious?  If the murderer ends up being the least likely candidate, have you made his motivation realistic? 

Clues:  The clues need to be made available to the reader as well as the detective.  You have to be fair with your reader in providing them the clues, but make sure they don’t stand out too obviously in the scene.  If they do, think about pointing the reader’s/detective’s attention in another direction, quickly.  There also needs to be more than one clue–preferably three or more. 

Red Herrings:  Make sure your red herrings don’t last the entire length of the book—that’s generally considered unfair.  Red herrings are a good diversion to mislead your reader, but  they can be taken too far. If the entire focus of your murder was blackmail and the ensuing investigation is wrapped up with blackmail victims and scurrilous gossip: and then the real motivation ends up being revenge or obtaining life insurance money,  most readers will end up wanting to throw your book in frustration. 

Victims: You know you need at least one. Do you need two? Do you need more? (Remember that some genres, like cozies, generally don’t have a high body count.)

Element of Danger: Does your sleuth or detective know too much? Are they getting too close to the truth? Adding some action or a touch of danger can help with sagging middles of books.

Exciting Chapter Endings: Don’t let your reader put down your book and go to sleep. Do you have some exciting chapter endings so they’ll want to go on reading?

Resolution: Did you catch the bad guys in the end? Did you tie up all the loose ends that you created? Did you explain how the sleuth/police followed the clues?

Errors: Have you checked all the grammar, spelling, mechanics? And double-checked it? Have you trimmed any pointless dialogue, scenes that go on too long? Everything you write should have a purpose….there’s no time to dilly-dally.  Double-check to make sure you haven’t made any major changes in your manuscript–did your character start out being middle-aged and then end up being older or younger?  Did your story start out during the dog days of summer and then suddenly change to spring? Make sure you read your manuscript from start to finish to eliminate any content errors. 

 

To me, one of the most fun things about reading a mystery is the puzzle. I love finding the clues along with my sleuth…and being misdirected by the author’s red herrings.

I also have fun writing in clues and distracting my readers from them in my own book. But I admit that planting clues is the hardest part of writing a mystery for me. I want them to point to the killer, but I also want to make sure the reader doesn’t have a neon sign blinking “CLUE! CLUE!” whenever I plant a clue.

Agatha Christie did a great job writing in her clues. She frequently slipped in an important clue among some useless information that seemed more important than the actual clue. Or she would plant a clue, draw the reader’s attention to it, then have two characters suddenly burst into the room in the midst of an argument that completely shifted the reader’s attention.

There are some good websites out there that can help writers learn more about writing effective clues and red herrings:

Don’t Drop Clues: Plant them Carefully! by Stephen Rogers does a great job covering the types of clues, how to misdirect your reader, and mistakes to avoid.

Suite 101 covers planting clues in different ways: tucking them in a paragraph, heightening the drama, clues of omission, missing weapons, and clues from real life.

Author Sandra Parshall’s website explains how “Clues Drive the Mystery Plot.”

The Christie Mystery website demonstrates how Agatha Christie used clues and other plot devices.

Stephen Rogers writes a different article on red herrings and how to use them effectively.

I know there are a lot of writers who have a germ of an idea for a mystery novel. Most of them are mystery readers and feel like, if they can just get started, that they can finish an entire manuscript.

Here are some interesting and useful websites for mystery writers, and other writers, to help them get started on their mysterious voyage:

Write That Novel , which has useful, printable sheets for characterization, plotting, storyboards, etc.

Book Crossroads , which has links to online mystery writing groups, hardboiled slang dictionaries, forensic information, and legal overviews.

John Morgan Wilson’s website , which gives tips on mystery writing, including a useful page that demonstrates how to bring your characters to life (if you’ve ever been told “show, don’t tell,” this would be good for you to check out.)

Holly Lisle’s website , which has articles on creating characters, preventing a “sagging middle,” ending your writer’s block, etc.

A Yahoo Group for writers on firearms : a good place to start your research.

Tripod.com’s Classic 12-Chapter Mystery Formula : Reading this can help you see the bare bones of many mystery novels. You don’t have to follow it exactly–it’s just a guide.

Advanced Fiction Writing.com’s snowflake method of writing a novel : one of many different methods of writing/plotting a book.

The Cliche Site is just sort of fun. But it can also remind you how many cliches you have built into your writing. Take a look and see if there’s another way to word some of the cliches that you’ve used.

Hope these help!

Okay, I’m intending this post to be a warning to all you parents out there.  PLAN YOUR QUIET WRITING TIME IN ADVANCE!  I managed to do this during the summer, but for some reason have gotten out of the habit. 

What you should do: Tell your kids to give you_____ minutes for you to write. Have it be whatever length of time you feel you’ll need.  Tell them what’s available for them to eat for breakfast, or, go ahead and fix it for them before you get started.  Tell them not to disturb you unless they’re sick or the house is on fire, etc.  Tell them to let the answering machine pick up. Take the dog out to use the bathroom.

What you should not do: what I did this morning, which was just to send them upstairs (this is early in the morning and my husband is not up yet.)  Because this led to my daughter (“I have a tummyache. And I’m hungry.”), my son (“I’m having a problem installing a program on the computer.  Can you take a look at it?”), and my dog (“Whine! Whine!” and looking earnestly at the front door) all interrupting me.  Luckily, I knew where I was going with my story this morning and stepped back into it.  But how much faster could I have gone and how much more could I have accomplished if I’d done a little prep work before I got started?