Motivation

November 25, 2023 ~ susanoleksiw ~ 9 Comments

I’ve been working on the sixth Anita Ray mystery since July, and now have 44,000 words. That by itself should tell you that I haven’t been well focused on this one, but I’ve had two epiphanies this month. First, I know what the big crisis will be, and it’s coming up in the next 10,000 words. Second, and much more important, I don’t have to know a character’s motive until I get near the end.

This, the second discovery, surprised me. I’ve struggled with finding motivations for my characters’ behaviors beyond their conduct simply being the result of who they are, their past experiences and hopes for the future. That’s always been true of any character, but when it comes to murder or some other form of violence, I need to see something more in this person I’ve created, something that the reader hasn’t already divined by reading about him or her.

We stitch together our fictional creations from snippets of real life. Riding on the subway or bus or train brings us into contact briefly with the oddities of our world, the woman who wears orange sandals under a plaid lumber jacket on a sunny day, her jacket covering up fabric of such color we’re dying to get a look at it but she’s buckled up tight. Perhaps the only thing about her buckled up. We overhear snatches of conversation. I still wonder about the meaning behind the casual words of two men in a cafe. She’s always been like this; it was no secret. But he married her anyway? He did. And it isn’t medical? Nope. I really want to know what “it” is. And then there was the package that arrived at a neighbor’s, which she sniffed and shook, and apparently rejected because she left it on the front step. I don’t know what happened to it after that, only that it disappeared.

I’m curious about these people’s lives but if I put them in a story as a killer, I need to know what would make them kill. Being odd or different or cryptic isn’t enough, as every writer knows. We look to the great ones in our genre—Agatha Christie in the traditional mystery, Ray Bradbury in science fiction, or James M. Cain for noir—and think about how they developed their characters’ moves and failures. The motives for crime can be limitless, but perhaps the shortest list comes from Christie: greed, lust, envy. Those cover just about every failing in life.

I’ve been thinking about these for weeks now because even though I have a murder, another crime coming up, a diverse cast of miscreants, and a great deal of stupidity, I still don’t have a motive for the inciting incident. At least, I didn’t. That was part of the second epiphany this month. The characters can have all sorts of immediate short-term motives, but the one that’s driving everything has to be larger, tied deeply and inexorably to the character’s identity. I found it this month, and it has delighted me. It was almost obvious, but not quite.

The surprising thing to me is that I’ve written half the book without knowing why this is all happening and happening in the way it is. We watch people in life, just as in books, wondering what they’re up to. We’re waiting to cross the street when he see a man on the opposite sidewalk stop and stare in a store window; he peers, he moves closer, he looks around to see who else is nearby, and he stares even harder in the window. When he walks on, looking back once or twice, we cross the street and try to guess what he was looking at. It’s an old-fashioned tailor’s shop with the expected clutter in the undusted window—scraps of fabric, a bolt of cloth, a tape measure, a small cardboard box of pins and other notions. In the unlit interior beyond, we see nothing to catch our interest. So what was he looking at? He wasn’t wearing a fine suit, just a short jacket and slacks; and he wasn’t old enough to have known about regular tailors in this little city. But there is something in that window . . .

I stopped worrying about my characters’ motivations in this particular novel while I wrote, figuring each one would either come to me or it wouldn’t. And I have faith in my unconscious to supply the needful. But I’m also flexible, and if a better one pops into my head, I’ll go with that. This is all part of the path I decided to try with this book. I would write it without guideposts, outlines, clear (or vague) ideas of where I was going. If a character or incident popped into my head, I’d add it. I’d just keep going. It’s very liberating but also a little scary. I’m not sure what I have, if anything, but I do have a sense of things coming together. I’ll let you know in another 20,000 words or so where I am.

Foreshadowing

August 27, 2022 ~ susanoleksiw ~ 9 Comments

I read a lot about craft issues—writing the perfect opening sentence, creating a cliff-hanger ending to a chapter, character description that reveals something more than height and taste in clothes, and the like. One area I’m working on now is foreshadowing.

When I begin a story I rarely know exactly where the characters are going, but I follow them faithfully through the mine fields of their lives until I reach what seems to be the end. It isn’t until I’m working on the third or fourth draft that I realize instead of foreshadowing an approaching development I’ve anticipated it in a truncated scene.

There’s a big difference between foreshadowing and getting ahead of myself, revealing too much too soon. In foreshadowing properly done, the reader doesn’t know what’s going to happen, only that something will. A character joking about her horoscope on the train into work is a hint that the unexpected is on the horizon, but her report of what the horoscope promised would be getting ahead of the story.

Foreshadowing is a device for increasing or maintaining tension, directing the reader’s attention to a particular issue or relationship, for example, hinting at where danger lies. Anticipating too much too soon or too clearly does the opposite of creating tension; it undermines the climax or twist to come. It takes the air out of the balloon.

This would seem to be an easy technique to master but in my first drafts I often slide right past what I’ve done. It’s not until a much later draft that I notice that I’ve told the reader almost exactly what’s coming, and to make the narrative work effectively I have to cut that part and rewrite. The danger, of course, is that I’ll miss it and be shocked when a Beta reader finds it. (Love my beta readers.)

Someone who has published ten mysteries with three publishers and a few self-published also could be assumed to know all the basic techniques of crafting a novel, but that would be naive. I always find something more to learn. Right now I’m focused on foreshadowing, but next month I could be focusing on dialogue. In some stories the characters emerge clearly in dialogue and I don’t doubt what I’ve written. In others I can’t seem to get them to say a single line that isn’t forced or awkward. But that’s another problem for another post.

Not Your Usual Suspect by Paty Jager

March 11, 2019March 7, 2019 ~ patyjag ~ 2 Comments

The way my mind, and I would expect most writer’s minds work, if I see a person with something interesting about them, chances are they are going to end up in one of my books.

I like to make my main and secondary characters stand out. Whether it’s their background, their mannerisms, or just the way they look. Study the people around you. No one is exactly like another. Yes, they may have the same color of hair or wear glasses. But if you look close, one may have designer glasses while another has the cheapest brand. And one may have smooth, shiny hair while another has hair that could use some conditioner or even be washed. Both the glasses and the hair tell you a lot about that character without me saying too much.

That is what I like to do when writing. Give the readers just enough information about a character to then let their imaginations fill in the blanks.

I think if you over describe a character, you are not allowing the reader to fully use their imaginations in “seeing” your story.

It’s like the scene were six people witness a crime and each one sees something different. I think all readers are the same way. Even if I did give them an exact description of a character, they would still “see” the character in their own way in their mind.

And I like to flip things around. If I see a well-dressed man with a bald head and carrying a brief case that’s normal. But I see he is wearing sneakers- that’s different. I figure out why he is wearing sneakers in my mind, then in my story, it’s a woman in her sixties, in a jacket and skirt, with sneakers and gray hair. She is wearing sneakers because she is finished with her appointments for the day and she is getting ready to walk home. Maybe…

Now the man may just wear sneakers all the time because he is a CEO of a sporting goods firm, but I gave the spin on the woman and why she is wearing shoes to show some insight into her. She is a person concerned for her health, so she walks. And is wise enough to bring sneakers and confident in herself to be able to wear sneakers with business clothing.

Or- is she grudgingly walking because of her health. Perhaps her doctor told her she had to get more exercise and rather than “waste” time, she found she could walk to and from work faster than driving and that way, she gets her exercise and a few more minutes of work time? There are so many ways to spin one character and so many ways to falsely show they may be the killer.

I would have to say my favorite part of writing murder mystery books is finding ways to throw the reader off and point a finger or evidence toward an innocent person. Does that make me cruel? Perhaps! But it is what makes writing and reading mystery books so much fun!

Go ahead, pick out a person and study them. How can you use something about them to create a character?

MURDER OF RAVENS

Arresting his brother-in-law ended his marriage, could solving this murder ruin a friendship? https://www.books2read.com/u/bxZwMP

MOUSE TRAIL ENDS

Dead bodies in the wilderness. A child is missing. Hawke is an expert tracker, but he isn’t the only one looking for the child. https://books2read.com/u/mlYaWB

RATTLESNAKE BROTHER

Corrupt officials. Death to those who dare complain. (Releasing March 20th)

What a character!

December 3, 2018November 27, 2018 ~ sandyfairfax ~ 8 Comments

by Sally Carpenter

I recently began rewatching an old favorite TV show from the 1970s, “Alias Smith and Jones,” about two bank robbers in the Old West who decide to go straight. This time around I noticed that much of the show—and its appeal—was based less on traditional western action (gunfights, brawls, horse chases) than on character development.

Some of the stories were complex and required close attention, but the focus was on the two charming, good-hearted protagonists and the fascinating characters they encounter each week. We have many long scenes of just two people talking—and it’s interesting.

TV shows of the 1970s were loaded with gimmicks and catch phrases (“Aaayyyy!” “Oooooo, Mr. Kotter!” “Who loves ya, baby?” “There ya go!”). Baretta had his cockatoo. Cannon was obese. Kojak was bald and ate lollipops. McCloud wore a cowboy hat and boots in Manhattan. Ironside was in a wheelchair. Charlie’s Angels was jiggle. Even people who never watched the shows recognized these characters, but does anyone remember the stories?

Columbo (my favorite TV detective) had his raincoat, rumbled suit, cigar, old car, lazy dog, unseen wife and loads of relatives. At one point Peter Falk complained that his show was overloaded with gimmicks. Yet “Columbo” stands out not only for the subtle clues and sharp dialogue but because Falk expanded the character beyond the artifices into a captivating person that viewers wanted to bring home to dinner.

Back to “Alias Smith and Jones.” The protagonists, Kid Curry and Hannibal Heyes, had no gimmicks, tics or catch phrases. Kid was a fast draw. Heyes possessed a silver tongue that could charm the skin off a snake, and was often the brain behind their schemes. But that’s as far as it went. Ben Murphy and Peter Duel (later Roger Davis) developed their characters through their actions and dialogue—as any good actor should do.

What does all this have to do with mystery writing?

Mysteries have a reputation of sacrificing character for plot. The emphasis is on solving the mystery/puzzle. Too often the characters are caricatures or stereotypes (the hard-bitten PI, the femme fatal, the overweight rural sheriff, the klutzy/ditzy female cozy sleuth who falls in love with the police chief) whose sole purpose is to serve the plot. Character depth or development often gave way for clues and plot complications.

Readers may spend time once with a book to solve the crime. But if the characters don’t grab them, they’ll never give the story a second read.

The appeal of cozies is in the character more than the crime. Each cozy series strives to create a loveable cast that the reader gets to know more with each new book. Readers watch a protagonist go through romance, courtship, marriage and maybe children. Young characters grow up and older ones may decline. Many cozies have the “goofy relatives” (which are often stock characters) who provide conflict for the protagonist.

A criticism of cozies is that they are more about the characters than the plot. I’ve seen cozies in which the body appears on page one and then disappears until the murderer, for no reason, blurts out a confession to the protagonist in the last chapter. Not what I call a mystery.

So the challenge in mystery writing is to balance both character and plot—that the crime carries through the entire story and is solved by the protagonist through fair play and sensible clues, and that the characters are fully developed personalities, unique but realistic.

All this with a minimum of gimmicks.

Digging into a Character by Paty Jager

May 14, 2018April 4, 2018 ~ patyjag ~ 8 Comments

I’m currently working on a the first book of a new mystery series. This new series is making me grow as a writer which is what I hope each book does, but this series and character in particular is really making me stretch my brain which isn’t getting any younger.

I picked not only a male protagonist but I made him Native American ( one of my signatures of what I write) and I put him in a profession I know nothing about. Whew! Talk about working in a totally new environment!

Through the years writing romance before I got the nerve to try my hand at mystery, I wrote from both the male an female points of view and in my Shandra Higheagle series I write from a male point of view with Detective Ryan Greer. But this book is told completely from the male point of view- from Fish and Wildlife State Trooper Gabriel Hawke’s point of view.

Not only do I have to think like a male, I have to think a bit Native American and as a lawman would. Having been around my son-in-law who is a detective with the State Police, I’ve learned that even when they appear to be off duty and hanging around, they are still seeing things and picking up on things that the rest of us shrug off.

Trying to keep my character “on the alert” yet laid back and letting things happen as they should has been a tricky balance. Using his upbringing and his drive as counterpoints has also been tricky. He has worked hard to get out of the reservation and to have the job he does-protecting his ancestors land. But at the same time because he is protecting his ancestors land he has a deep connection to his Native American roots. While he is full blood Native American he still feels as if his feet are in two worlds. He is upholding the Whiteman’s law as a lawman, but at the same time keeping vigilance over his Native roots.

This first book is taking me longer to write than I thought it would but I had to put it on hold while I did a ride-along with a Fish and Wildlife State Trooper in the Eagle Cap Wilderness where my character works. The day I spent with the game warden was eye opening in the scope of duties they must preform. Because it is a large remote area, not only do they have to do their game duties but they also serve as a state trooper and while they are on the trail of a poacher or trespasser and there is a call that comes in about a shooting or domestic dispute they have to respond even if it is across the county from where they are at the moment.

20180326_111247 — Elk refuge where we were looking for trespassers

The best part about the ride-along was getting the troopers perspective on his job and learning some of the little nuances that I can add to books to give the character the flavor of a real life person.

When the first Gabriel Hawke book is ready to go to my critique partners and beta readers it will be interesting to see if I managed to get the male character correct.

The first thing that pulls me into a book is the characters. What about you?

SH Mug Art