A Riddle, a Mystery, or an Enigma

or what’s in a name

One of the first decisions I had to make when I started pitching the Declan Shaw books to agents and publishers had to do with “genre”. How was I going to label these stories? It may seem obvious. The main character is a PI, so they are detective novels, a sub-genre of mystery fiction. I wasn’t overly fond of these categories. The shoe was an OK fit, but it didn’t feel comfortable. The thriller or suspense option was worse. I didn’t write about knocks on the door in the middle of the night, footsteps in the dark, or the flash of a blade in the moonlight, with cliffhangers at the end of each chapter. In query letters, I said the books were crime fiction which was true to their dark, contemporary nature. Sometimes, however, I had to stick my submission in a standard form with check boxes. When crime wasn’t an option, I had to settle for mystery.

I know where my unease comes from. It’s all in my head. When I hear detective, I think of Sherlock Holmes pulling clues out of his violin. Luckily, Philip Marlowe, Sam Spade, and Dana Scully soon walk in. I gladly check these boxes. Mystery, however, is a different ball of twine. The word conjures Hercule Poirot and his waxed mustache. In my irrational mind mystery gets conflated with murder mystery, which I associate with a specific kind of literature, wildly popular during the period known as the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, 1920-1939.

The Declan Shaw books are PI novels, they are not murder mysteries. But what are murder mysteries exactly?

Last week, I read Alex Pavesi’s excellent novel The Eighth Detective which provides a fun and elegant answer.

One of the story protagonists, Grant McAllister, is a mathematician who wrote an obscure little book called The White Murders, seven short stories followed by an appendix titled “The Permutations of Detective Fiction” where he dissects the mechanics of classical murder mysteries (note how Grant jams the two together: detective fiction and murder mystery!). I won’t go into the details, you’ll have to read the book. It’s very clever. In summary, Grant theorizes, with Venn diagrams if you please, that a few elements are indispensable for a murder mystery to be valid. They are the following: at least one victim, two suspects minimum, one killer or killers, one detective or more (amateur, pro, passerby, whatever). Pretty basic stuff, frankly.

There are multiple variations or permutations on the format but they’re not infinite. The victim can also be suspect and killer—that would be a case involving suicide. The detective can be suspect and killer. The detective can be victim, suspect and killer, all wrapped into one. Some of the variations require creative contortions. The seven stories in Grant’s (and Pavesi’s) book serve as demonstration. I won’t tell you what the stories are, I’ll give you movies instead: Ghost (1990) is a variation on a victim investigating their own death, in the two D.O.A.movies (1950 and 1988) the victim is on the clock and hunts the killer, and Christopher Nolan’s Memento (2000) makes the story go both forward and backward with amnesia as a cherry on the cake.

There are victims, suspects, killers, and detectives, in some shape or form, all over crime fiction. Nothing earth-shattering there. But what makes a classical murder mystery is the puzzle.

We’re all familiar with the concept. Suspects are assembled in a specific location (house, boat, train, resort, small village), clues are hidden in the story, slippery red herrings are thrown underfoot, misdirections abound, and the readers try to beat the sleuth to the solution. The game the writer plays with the readers is key. You can enjoy the quality of the writing, the setting, the quirky characters, but the real fun is the treasure hunt: whodunit!

It’s Clue: Colonel Mustard in the library with the rope. It isn’t Hitchcock’s Rope (1957) which is no more a puzzle mystery than The Murders in the Rue Morgue. Hitch’s film isn’t about who committed the crime but why which is way more interesting, and Poe’s story focuses on the how, which then leads to the killer. In Street Song, the first Declan Shaw book, all the PI and the cops know is how the murder was committed. There are no suspects, and there are no apparent motives. Why the hell was she killed is the nagging question that drives the story.    

You may think that genres and sub-genres don’t matter. Either you like a book or you don’t, and you don’t care in what pigeonhole I stick my stories. Fine, but agents, publishers, bookshops and libraries (real or virtual), bloggers, podcasters and reviewers need ways to organize things (and promote and sell them). Readers need a few pointers too. Like it or not, categories are needed and they better be accurate, or we’ll find The Black Dahlia under “Gardening” and Rum Punch under “Food & Wine”.

So here we are. List me under Crime. And Mystery. If you must!

If ever I send my detective on a Caribbean cruise, he might flirt with a classic murder mystery. But he’ll have to seriously winnow down the number of suspects, 6,000 is a bit much. There are only twelve in Murder on the Orient Express and it’s a bear to keep track of who was where and when.

Short Stories

This time, I’m giving you a flash story published a while ago, a teeny-tiny crime morsel. Here is Queenie, a very immoral piece of work… in my opinion!

And at random: a Hummus Recipe …

It’s easy, cheap, and it makes a bunch. Try it!

2 cups drained chickpeas, liquid reserved
½ cup tahini
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil + oil for drizzling
2 cloves garlic peeled
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon cumin or paprika
juice of 1 lemon or more as needed

Put everything in a blender (except oil and chickpea liquid).  Add the chickpea liquid as needed for the consistency, while the blender is running. Add the olive oil as needed to get desired smoothness. You might not need all the oil.

I tried the paprika version and it isn’t interesting. Stick to the cumin. I have also added a jalapeño to the mix for a spicy version. Very nice!

As a parting shot, here’s picture of a mural in Houston

See you next time!