Writing a Murder Mystery

You’ve decided to try your hand at writing a murder mystery, so where do you begin? Here is a place to start:
Figure out the basics. Sit down and think about the basic component of your murder mystery. Think of different scenarios: murder on a train, murder by stabbing, murder at a house, or even serial killings. Whatever inspires you, write it down. You’ve got to answer all these questions:

• Who are the detectives?
• Why were they murdered?
• Who will be murdered? How was the person’s life? Does anyone else gets murdered too?
• What will they be murdered with?
• Does anyone discover about the murderer? Is information about the case released by the police, or is it kept a secret? How the victim’s friends and family reacted to the news?
• Who are the suspects? Did they have a relationship with the victim, the murderer or another suspect? What are their life stories?
• Lastly, who was the murderer? What was his or her sentence after trial? How was their relationship with other existing character like? Do not make the murderer too obvious.

Self-Publishing: Why It’s Often Treated with Suspicion

 Have you fallen asleep or put a book down because you found it boring? The story wasn’t moving fast enough; the characters seemed flat—not people, just cut-outs; you were left wondering where did this character come from? First, you put it down as poor editing—you’re right. That’s only half of it—it’s really poor writing. The editor was “trying to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear”, so to speak. That doesn’t happen often. More than likely, it was a self-published book that was not properly edited.

It is not my intention to damn self-publishing. Far from it—it is the only sure way for an author to get a work into print. It is cheap and fast and, with a little work, it can be as good as any work published by “the Big Six”. The operative phase here is “with a little work”. This goes beyond an attractive cover and a nice picture of the author. This means having, usually paying, a professional editor to work over your writing. This editor must look at and beyond grammatical and spelling errors (those should have been caught by the author). This editor will analyze the story arc, character development and make sure everything is brought to a final, believable conclusion. A final note—a spouse, a parent or other relative rarely makes a good final editor. This editor should not be biased by relationship or friendship.

What is “denouement” and what does it mean?

I keep hearing this term “denouement” pop up in some of the writing materials I’ve been reading. What exactly is a denouement?

           Denouement is a hard word to pronounce (and a harder word to spell for some of us, especially me—it’s one of my Achilles’ heels for some reason). But the role of the denouement in literature is not hard to comprehend and, once you understand it’s definition, you’ll be to spot it quite easily in most novels.

The denouement is the final outcome of the story, generally occurring after the climax of the plot. Often it’s where all the secrets (if there are any) are revealed and loose ends are tied up. For example, the denouement of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet comes just after the Romeo and Juliet take their own lives. When the families find their dead bodies, Escalus explains that their deaths are a result of the family feud, leaving members of both sides to feel guilty. That is the denouement.

As a writer, it’s important to keep this in mind when crafting your own story. While you want to give away bits of information about your plot (and subplots) throughout, you want to save the juiciest revelations for the end, rewarding readers for staying the course. That’s the ultimate goal of any good denouement