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In the first act of the mystery, you laid out all your detective’s skills one by one as new situations arose. In the middle, you frustrated all those skills by exposing your sleuth’s weaknesses. Now at the end, you can bring back those skills and strengths as your detective confronts the killer. Your detective has…
Barriers and Clear Sight You are finally heading toward the conclusion of your mystery as you begin the final act. But, your ace sleuth still has a bumpy ride before the end. As a writer, you focus on complications, twists, and building the killer’s cunning.First, congratulate yourself for making it through the middle without one…
The Detective Finds Clues in the Killer’s World Let the complications roll! Your detective screws up, asks for help from the wrong people, stumbles over his weaknesses. If it’s bad, bring it on. In the final section of Act II (Four-Act Structure) your detective dives deeper into the killer’s world as the ultimate exploration of…
Avoid the Sagging Middle in Your Mystery Mystery writers have an advantage over many other genres when it comes to keeping the middle from sagging. Up to the middle the detective has delved into the evidence and suspects in the victim’s worldThe essence of keeping a reader turning pages is heightened tension. Rather than episodic…
The Detective In The Victim’s World Without A Map As you take your detective and your readers deeper into the story in the first half of Act II, your detective enters a new world, the victim’s world. As he wanders the victim’s world he gathers bits and pieces of information, meets suspects and in their…
Meeting The Possibilities All of Act II in a novel can be a big muddle for first time novelists. It’s easy to get lost in your own story, forget conflict, or pace in uneven leaps from one scene to another. Your protagonist goes here and then goes there in an episodic attempt to get to…
From Murder to Trouble in Your Mystery In the first five chapters you introduce your detective, connect your detective with the murder, and start your detective off with a plan to find the murderer.Your main goal in those beginning chapters is to bring the reader into your story world, get them empathizing with your detective—even…
Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash Where The Story Starts Today’s readers want a good story. Your beginning sets up your reader for the rest of the story. Lose them at the beginning and you won’t get them back. Your goal at the beginning, is to get the readers involved in the story.Beginning writers can struggle…
Individual Characters and the Story In a mystery, supporting characters provide conflict for the detective. Their role in the story is to confound, confuse, lie and make trouble for your protagonist. They enhance the story context and color how your story is revealed. The Character Bible A character bible is the place where you…
Setting – A Force In Your Story Setting is like a character in your story that has no dialogue. Setting not only grounds your characters and your readers, setting interacts with characters to enhance your story. Setting is what makes readers feel like they are there.Beginning writers often overlook the depth that setting adds to a…
