Lynn

Hi everyone,

I need a little advice. I'm writing my first novel. Romantic Mystery.

The main character has someone trying to kill her. I want the reader to think that it is one character while it is actually another. Both characters are close to main character, her boyfriend and her sister.

How can I go about letting the reader know these two characters without giving away the mystery?

I though about not showing their point of views. Would that be the best way to do this?

Any advice would be welcomed.

Thanks,
Lynn

Aeryn

You can show their point of views, just leave out a few of the details. Just be real sneaky about it. =] Make each one do some suspicios things then at the end you can validate the actions of the non-killer one. =] You can show the point of veiw of the killer, just not who it is. =] I think the best way to do this would be to watch some movies and take notes. Scary Movie was really sneaky about their killer.

I hope I helped!

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Chris

Tell the story from the main character's perspective, and have her suspicions be reflected upon the reader. This may disable you from taking a more omniscient narrative, but then it wouldn't really be a mystery if you did.

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Rayhi

NO! NO! NO!.....stop it!

Think OUTSIDE the box so people can relate in this day and age! It's toooooooo boring traditional. YUCK. ''

Hint: pick a new location.

abbenormal

Hi Lynn,

I also am another newbie currently working on a romatic suspense and that is the same problem I have. I'm so afraid I'm going to telegraph who the killer is.

You may want to have more than 2 suspects. I think that's what I'm going to do.

Romantic suspense is still very popular and probably always will be. I know you'll figure it out. And when you do, tell me! LOL

Best to you,

Abbenormal

gabriella

What you could do is you could always have somebody from the past come back to be a suspect. You could always add an old classmate who had moved away because she kept beating up other students, carrying weapons, threatening people... etc. (I say this only because I doubt the sister or the boyfriend would have such a horrible reputation.) And you could also make her have always hated your main character, so that would make her a prime suspect.

All I know about mysteries, is that you need people who have so many motives for killing the person, that there could be no other suspect BUT them (and of course, they CAN'T be the killer.) Then you need somebody with no motives who IS the killer. You need somebody sweet and close to the victim and with a motive so deep it's impossible to find.

Maybe the victim had cheated on her boyfriend a while ago, but they had worked things out and everything was perfect - or so she thought. Or maybe her boyfriend was also her sister's crush, and she thought that her sister had gotten over things - again, everything seemed fine between her and her sister.

I really like the idea of the crazy girl, though. Or, you know, she doesn't have to be crazy (even though that would add so much, and when the victim loses her boyfriend or sister, she and the crazy girl could become best friends.) She could just be somebody from her past that had utterly despised her, and then comes back to town (she doesn't meet up with the victim, but they bump into each other.)

Another thing - I love love love the idea of keeping it with the victim's perspective. It would add alot more depth and detail to your novel... unless things are happening - that you want your reader to know about - that there's no way the main chara could no, I say go with first person.

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Talia_Brie

Read some Mary Higgins Clark, and see how she does it, because that is basically her formula.

having your 2 suspects be male and female is going to be difficult, MHC generally has 2 male suspects.

I suppose when your talking about the killer be gender non-specific. Also, ensure that neither boyfriend nor sister have an alibi.

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Anticipation

When you're writing a mystery be sure to work from the back to the front. Working from the back to the front minimizes the chances that you will have gaps in your evidence. Plus, reverse engineering give you the opportunity to throw in dud clues with a lot more ease because you already know the real outcome. This way you can fool the reader even easier and make the process of self-discovery tougher (Which is what all us readers really want in a good book, instead of having the evidence handed to us on a poster board).

I think Point of View is going to answer this question for you. If you don't know a whole lot about point of view I suggest you change that. Point of View, essentially, IS your novel. With out a point of view you can't tell your story, period. That is why PoV will make or break many novels. Have you thought about writing in the 3rd person limited point of view? This point of view is basically 1st person (Through the eyes of the character) except it is written in grammatical third person. The reason it is limited is because you only have the thoughts of the main character, and not all the others. They also call this the "Fly on the Wall" Point of View.

I hope this advice helps!

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Lynn

Thanks everyone for all the advice. I really appreciate it. You've each gave me something to think about.

I will be posting soon to get opinions. I'm wanting to get the first draft completely done. I have had critiques on my work from another site and that has helped my writing greatly.

I look forward to hearing feedback from you all.

Thanks again,
Lynn

Apsu

I think that making an effort to make your charactes real in your own mind will help alot when it goes down on paper. If the killer is all bad and just hiding behind pretend goodness then it will probably show through. If he/she is sometimes conflicted about his/her course of action, makes moves that genuinely contradict his/her cruel intention rather than simply try to disguise it then it will help to make it real and to hide it
This formula is totally played. Alot of people saw and loved "Mystic River" I personally hated it. It followed that formula so to a T that all you had to do was think of the least likely killer and you had the thing figured out before the movie was half over. The crappy part is you have to continue watching the movie in hopes that you are wrong just to save the story for you. Whatever you do don't write any character who is too obviously innocent and has little reason for being in the story if not to be the surprise killer.

Lynn

Thanks apsu.

I will take your thoughts into consideration.

See ya round,
Lynn

Ralizah

Eh, generally, when you want to lead them in another direction, you've got to go against reverse-formulas.

For instance, most people who read mysteries expect the person who's not the main suspect to actually be the suspect. What you want to do is hint at both so you can fool your reader into thinking it's the person they're not expecting, then twist it so that it surprises them with the main suspect.

Just my thoughts.

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Lynn

Thanks Ralizah,

I will consider that. Nice suggestion.

Happy Writing,
Lynn

gabriella

That's why in both the examples I gave, the reader will know what the motive is and they'll know that the sister and boyfriend aren't exactly on PERFECT terms with the victim.

Frankly, I hate it when there's no mention of the motives of the innocent person until the end. Like, "Sallie is the killer because when she was a baby her mother's boyfriend abused her and then he had a son who turns out to be going out with Sallie's best friend, and Sallie tried to kill the son to get back at the father but killed her friend on accident" and all that.

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Ed Parnell

SOunds to me like you need misdirection. You need to have something of a major point while the subplot is chundering away.

For example, I could have a character say "I never saw him take the money". It doesn't mean the character didn't know, take part in or organise the robbery. It simply says he didn't see him do it. This kind of verbal and physical misdirection is used a lot. There is a film with Ben Kingsley where he swears he will "Never kill my friend" and then when he has what he wants instructs someone else to "Kill my friend". It keeps his word but has the same result.

It's a useful thing because it allows you to scope things and send the reader thinking one thing while you twart those ideas with another and send the reader off elsewhere.

Don't overplay it though, because it's not something you can use *that* often without it becoming rather staid.

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