Whodunnit

I've never written a murder mystery blog post before. Which is surprising. I've covered most genres. Kitchen-sink drama, off-beat black comedy, bathroom-sink drama, costume drama (difficult to indicate in text alone), dinosaur redemption epic, rom-com, sonnet, spoof news article, com-rom, Kevin Spacey.

But I've never written a murder mystery.

I've written about murder mysteries. Especially in this well thought-out exploration of the fetishization of murder. Sadly, it's two and a half years later and my Paedophile Mystery Weekend business venture has yet to come to fruition.

But I've never written a murder mystery.

UNTIL NOW!

(Well, not now. I haven't written it yet. I'm writing this bit. I haven't even decided if I will write one or just skirt around the issue.)

A good way to write a compelling mystery is to start at the end and work backwards. Well, I'm going to use a similar technique. I'll start at the beginning and work forwards. But at the end I'll have all of the characters travel back in time. There's more than one way to cook a potato.

The most important thing to remember when writing a murder mystery are:
1) Someone must be murdered
2) There must be some kind of mystery
3) The victim must not be a fish (people don't care about fish)
4) You must have more than one plausible suspect
5) Always leave your reader guessing about whether numbers 1-3 are true
6) Motives are like denim jackets: everyone must have one
7) If in doubt, GOOD

I've never written a murder mystery before.

But I feel qualified to impart seven rules on how to write them. And I also feel qualified to annotate my murder mystery as I write it, to let you know which techniques I'm using (behind the magician's rabbit curtain, if you will) and why they combine to create the BEST MURDER MYSTERY EVER.

I've never written a murder mystery before. I haven't even thought about what this will be about. I may not even follow through on this introduction. But I'm still confident that this will be the BEST MURDER MYSTERY EVER.

Also, it will be in French.

***

I've just come back to this blog post after some time away from the computer (I was waxing an orphanage).

This last section seems to include quite a bit of me (the old me, from a while ago) goading me (the current me). I've hilariously raised expectations, challenging myself to meet the preposterous requirements outlined in the above brief.

The trouble is that you're (presumably) reading this all in one go. It won't have the desired effect. A person stitching up their future self is quite funny. But as far as you're concerned, my past self and my current self are the same person.

For goading to be effective, the goader must elicit some frustration in the goadee. But if both goader and goadee are the same person, the goading turns out to not be goading at all. It's just stupidity. Or self-harm.

And self-harm isn't funny. Unless it comes from a clown. Even then, there's a pathos to the whole thing - balloon razorblades, deliberately-scalding pies - which tempers the chuckles with yuckles (the laughter of disgust).

I've challenged myself to write the best murder mystery ever. I think I will struggle to do so.

I've challenged myself to write it in French. I think this will be extremely difficult. I know about eight French words, and am shaky on grammar. At the very least, my poor French would further hinder the quality of the finished piece.

But I'm always game for a challenge. So I'll write the mystery. It will probably be short, badly written and will certainly be in English.

***

Like a Knife Through Butter

an Inspector Lammb Mystery 

by

Mick Stmedia

CHAPTER ONE

On a Saturday afternoon, a car with three passengers bore a hole into the countryside. On the dashboard of the car was an invitation. On the invitation was a signature. The signature was a forgery.

"I've been counting bushes," said Higgy, one of the three. "But it's difficult to tell where one bush ends and another begins."

Dav squashed a fly with the tip of his index finger, opened a crack in the electric window and rubbed the fly parts into their slipstream. "There's only one bush," he said.

Lo drove. They had come from London.

And so Higgy (potential murderer), Dav (potential murderer) and Lo (?) were carpooling, even though they'd only met each other a few times, and all of those times had been costume parties. That morning was the first time they'd seen each other's real faces, uncovered by eye patches, surgical masks or the beak of "a toucan that's also a milliner". The latter was worn by Dav, who had been annoyed that his creative genius didn't win some kind of prize. None were awarded that night.

"What do you think it's going to be like?" asked Higgy, sitting on her hands and wiggling to the poorly-sequenced music in her own head. 

Dav opened a book that was lying on the back seat. He didn't pick it up, but opened it where it lay, all prone and unreadable.

"Party going be killer, man," Lo's English was not good. "No costume, no problem. Gone get LASHED."

"Yeah. Yeah!" Higgy straightened up in her seat, buoyed by her initial "yeah".

"Should be right near," said Lo. She picked up the invitation and propped it up on a Dalek figurine. "Number five... two... two... two..."

Higgy looked at the house numbers on her side. Dav closed the book and looked through the window, eyebrows first. "There," he said. "By the bush."

A big cloud blocked out the sun and the other clouds, as Higgy, Dav and Lo got out of the vehicle. Lo had parked in a parking space. It seemed like the thing to do. 

Near the parking space was a gate. Behind the gate was a long gravel driveway. Beyond the long gravel driveway was a large house.

On the gate was a sign. It said 'Avenbaden Manor'.

The three passengers started to walk.

***

At one o'clock in the morning, a phone rang in the dark. On the fourth ring, the phone was answered.

"Lammb here. ... Right. Let me find a pen."

At quarter past one in the morning, Inspector Lammb climbed into his impressive car and turned on his SatNav. It took three tries to spell Avenbaden correctly.

END OF CHAPTER ONE.

***

This will be continued. Possibly. I don't normally continue pieces of writing, but the characters are so well drawn in this one that I might have no choice.

The challenge was a worthy one. The goading was rewarded. It's good to push yourself. Especially if you push yourself into a cupboard full of naked people.

I'll let this all sink in.

I may be the new Colin Dexter, but it's probably too early to tell.