Three Steps to Murder

My current series of blog posts is focused on how to read a suspense novel rather than how to write one. Today, let’s look into the way an author goes about the business of offing a character. There’s no one correct way, of course, but for what it’s worth, here’s how I go about the writing process when I want to dispatch a character in one of my novels:

Step 1. I become a method actor and play the role of the killer. What's the killer's motivation? What's the killer's back story? Is the killer ex-military? Ex-police? A drug-crazed psychopath? Is the murder a planned execution or a crime of passion? The weapon comes out of the character's back story and motivation. Where does the murder take place? The killer in a crime of passion finds his or her weapon at the scene usually because there is no premeditation. The exception is a case like the O.J. Simpson trial where the killer clearly premeditated his or her actions by bringing a knife to the scene. In this case, you would want your character to have extreme anger issues and a history of violent behavior.

Step 2. I describe the scene as a dark place. Even in the bright sunshine of a usually happy place, I look for ways to describe the scene as dark. If the killer strikes on the fifth fairway of a golf course on a sunny Saturday afternoon, I bring in an unexpected cloud cover. I kill off some bushes or trees so the place starts to look like a graveyard. I have the groundskeeper neglect this particular fairway so it's weedy and overgrown in spots. Nobody replaces their divots on this fairway. The idea is to make the reader feel the darkness.

Step 3. I focus on moving the plot forward and hooking the reader to want to continue. While learning "Whodunit" is usually sufficient reason to turn the page, I might break the scene just before the crime. Or I might break the scene with the reader knowing the crime was committed but not certain the victim died. Or do something to make the reader want to know more. I want the reader to go: "Huh, is that it? There has to be more. Oh, wait. Look, there is more. There's another chapter."

Choose your weapon
Unless you are making the weapon a kind of character or important plot device like the yellow Rolls Royce in the film "The Yellow Rolls Royce" (sorry, couldn't think of a new movie), the weapon isn't important but the reader likes to know specifics. If using a pistol, the reader wants to know not only that it's a Glock, but also which model and why the killer chose that model (it's compact and hides well in your pocket).

You can get that sort of information with a Google search. Since most of the time, the weapon is not as important as the fact that someone got bumped off, the weapon is only important to the investigation, not the crime itself. What does that mean? It means that the candlestick is just as deadly as a well-placed homemade explosive device that required the killer to spend six years in the military perfecting his or her craft. You don't need an exotic weapon to make your story interesting. You need an interesting story that makes the reader want to turn the page. The choice of weapon is at best the icing on the cake, not the cake.

Free weapon ideas: In an episode of Alfred Hitchcock's TV series, the wife murders her husband by clobbering him with a frozen chunk of meat, probably a leg of lamb. She then cooks the lamb and serves it to the investigating police officer. Another great weapon is the ice cycle which is a self-destructing chunk of evidence.

The Literary Weapon
Sometimes the author chooses the weapon because he or she wants the reader to connect the weapon to some larger point the author is trying to make. For example, if I want to convince you that war is evil, I’ll blow up a school filled with children with a misplaced artillery shell. If I want to make a point about the villain’s sexual prowess or lack thereof, I’ll choose a weapon for its phallic import, such as a Bowie knife.  If I want you to think the victim is the true villain, I’ll have the killer hang them or electrocute them or give them a chemical injection. And If I just want to make a mess, I’ll have the victim visit a busy industrial machine shop at the wrong time.

As a reader, consider the author’s intent in picking the weapon. In some cases it’s simply a plot device to remove a character from the stage. But when the author connects the weapon in some additional way to the story, making a symbol of it, you are in for an interesting read beyond the plot itself.

Sometimes to kill off a character, I'll let Satan do my dirty work. To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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Ever Run Into Yourself?

Here's another Scary Suspense Theater episode. Watch at your own risk. You may see somebody you know.

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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Butt Grabbing Stories

What holds your attention when you read a suspense/thriller novel? The suspense keeps you reading, especially when the author deploys grabber hooks that make you turn the page. But what is it beyond the obvious that keeps you reading?

In my last three blog posts, I talked about plot and characters. Look for novels that hold your attention by combining characters you can believe in with a plot filled with suspense, thrills and action. When you care about the people in the story, you keep reading to learn what happens to them. And you keep reading because you enjoy “being with them.” Good characters become like friends or family so you want to hang out with them whenever you can. This is one reason readers like to re-read novels.

Plot holds your attention when something important is at stake for the characters. The characters have to change the world around them in some way such as eliminating the bad guy or the monster. Along the way, the characters change in important ways as they learn lessons from their adventures. You can’t go into the heart of evil without coming out changed in noticeable ways.

As you read your next novel, look for the way the plot interests you and notice how the characters are not the same at the end of the story as they were in the beginning. Think about what happened in the plot that forced the characters to change. Focus on the main character the first time you read the story. Then go back and focus on the other characters.

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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Characters make the difference in suspense

Some suspense/thriller stories revolve around famous or important people. Abraham Lincoln has become a vampire slayer, for example. I prefer the stories where ordinary people face extraordinary circumstances. These stories make you feel like, hey, that could be me facing a space alien, psycho killer, vampire, or worse. What would you do? Do you have that deep down intestinal fortitude to jam the stake through the vampire’s heart, after he wakes up?

Characters you can relate to help you enjoy reading the story. It’s one thing for the characters to be sexy like Hollywood stars. These characters are attractive, of course. But the characters that hold your interest are more like your brother or sister. Or the kid next door. Or your cousin Iva from Cleveland. They have acne scars. Their hair never seems quite right. He ought to really just shave the mustache because it doesn’t work for him… or her. Regular just plain folks grab our attention and hold it in ways that Hollywood sex queens cannot.

Main characters usually can be counted on to be reasonably attractive. Otherwise, you wouldn’t keep reading the story. But there also needs to be that element of everyday folk about them. As you’re reading your next suspense/thriller novel, watch for the way the author describes the main character. How does that description attract you to the character? Consider how the author makes the character real for you. Is it the pretty girl’s sexiness? Or is it her lonesome quality because her mother abandoned her at a young age? What makes the character work for you?

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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The Suspense Journey as Quest

Bang, bang, shoot ‘em up adventure… or… Why are The Birds behaving that way? … or I’m your father, Luke.  Or how about… Let’s go to Troy and steal Helen back… or Hey, King Arthur, I bet I can find the Holy Grail if I ride around England long enough… Suspense keeps you on the edge of your seat and turning the page… at least the good ones do. How do authors move you as a reader through the plot of their story?

One common plot device is the quest journey. The quest is a complicated plot form that would require a book to fully explain. As a reader, you can keep it simple. There are three phases to a quest that you should be aware of. The first is the “Let’s get going” phase where something happens to motivate the hero or main character to take off on a journey of discovery. One fun thing to look for in this section is the hero almost always turns down the invitation or is reluctant to go on the journey. Think of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane praying that the Father would remove this cup from him. Or Luke Skywalker telling Obi Won Kanobi that he has to stay home and help his uncle.

The second part of the quest is the journey itself. Sir Gawain heads off in search of the Green Knight. The private eye sets out to find the killer. The boyfriend sets out to find his missing girlfriend last seen at a nearby motel. During this part of the story, our hero keeps running into obstacles, gets beat up and left for dead, or simply loses his or her way until the final, climactic scene.

The final act is the “Ta-Da, We did it!” section. Dorothy and friends kill the wicked witch. Luke turns his father back from the dark side. The private eye figures out whodunit.

The quest is a clean story with a beginning, middle and end. Not all stories work this way. In Hitchcock’s The Birds, the birds attack for no reason to spoil a perfectly good romantic comedy and turn it into a horror story. Instead of a journey of discovery, there is only hiding and running away. And at the end, when you expect that “Ta-Da” moment, there is none. Instead, you’re left with the birds waiting for the right moment to attack again with the main characters trying to escape in a convertible. The Birds works as suspense, although the slow build up at the beginning may be too slow for modern movie goers.

The old movies used a plot device where they built the story slowly until the big crash when the monster is revealed and the movie heads into a roller coaster ending. Today, you are more likely to go straight into the roller coaster just as it starts down that first hill. That old style helped the movie viewer forget that the movie was a thriller in the first place. You hear about the new suspense movie, you buy your ticket and popcorn. You plop down in your seat and find yourself staring at a romantic comedy that’s not particularly comic but you sort of forget that it’s really a suspense horror story until wham the birds strike and you wake up, jump out of your seat, and enjoy the ride.

Bringing this home to the suspense novel, look for elements of the quest in the stories you read. If you spot a reluctant main character in the beginning of the story, chances are you are reading a quest-based plot. If so, you may want to Google “quest story” and learn more about what this method of storytelling is all about. The more you know about the quest, the more you will enjoy your reading and the easier it will be for you to figure out what will happen next before it happens.

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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Reading the Quest Story

Suspense/Thriller fiction is often built around the quest. A quest requires the main character to solve a mystery, find something that's missing or solve a problem. The quest teaches the main character something about life so that he or she is a new person at the end. My video goes into this topic.

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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Not Exactly Hardboiled Noir

In noir fiction, you have a fatally flawed main character who ends up dead or worse. The writing is cynical and dark. Most of my fiction gives you the hard hitting, cynical style of a noir drama, but my stories end up in a good place. It’s not possible for a noir story to have a happy ending, so my novels are not true noir.

So why bring this up?
Noir fiction tells a compelling story about life’s losers and ne’er-do-wells. My characters pass through a loser phase but then find redemption. I’m taking the loser and saving his soul by dragging him or her through some muddy places.

I like to lighten the mood with humor. In Fulfillment, humor relieves the tension in an otherwise dark world of the first century C.E. In Faerie Tale, which I’ll release this summer, humor again provides the necessary relief from a frightening world.

In my current work in progress, which shall remain unnamed for the moment, I’m using a heavy amount of humor to the point where I may lose the deep noir darkness, but I’ll keep some of the gray tones. So you may say that I’ll be reversing the style from noir with a touch of humor to humor with a touch of noir.

Style distinguishes an author’s work. Once you have read a few novels by the same author you will be able to pick out the author’s writing even if the name is not given. Style is one of things that makes your favorite author your favorite.

To learn more about my suspense novel Fulfillment, click here for Amazon or click here for paperback.

Here’s another novel idea…
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