09 October 2007
Okay, this is one of the many techniques for getting to know your characters and getting inside the way they actually respond to situations. You've probably seen one or more of the many character questionaires or memes that have circulated. My favorite, however, is to actually write a résumé for the character. If you happen to be putting together your own résumé for that endless job-search, there are some pointers here that might help you on that, too.
Okay, that's the want-ad. Now, how will you put together your résumé so that it sells to the prospective employer. Here's a hint: It doesn't look like this.
All too often we think of a résumé as our employment history. And while that might be of help in an interview where someone wants to know if you actually know Lex, it doesn't really tell anything about your experience. Compare that to a résumé written as accomplishments:
So, see the difference? First of all, based on the job requirements I posted, I have found a candidate that appears to be more than qualified for the simple jewel theft I had in mind for my story, but now I can start weighing other candidates. You are thinking in this process of what kind of background will give your villain the skills, motivation, and character that you need in order to pull off the caper in your story.
And by the way, that is how I wrote my own résumé and is how I write my goals for the year. No one is going to be interested in how I served my time. They will be interested in what I accomplished. The same is true of your villain or other character. Write him/her a good résumé and you will know precisely what he/she is capable of when you write the book.
Wanted: Evil villain for mystery novel
Must be able to use people without conscience, despoil innocent women, and be facile in financial crimes. The successful candidate will have experience in seduction, embezzlement, strong-arm tactics, and simple theft. Candidate will be a self-starter, well-educated, and socially ascendent. Apply within.
Okay, that's the want-ad. Now, how will you put together your résumé so that it sells to the prospective employer. Here's a hint: It doesn't look like this.
1998-2000: Personal Assistant to Lex Luthor, Luthor Corp.
2000-2001: Self-employed in money laundering business.
2001-2006: Member of George Bush's cabinet.
2006-Present: Consultant to UAW/CIO labor union.
BA in Economics from Brigham Young University.
All too often we think of a résumé as our employment history. And while that might be of help in an interview where someone wants to know if you actually know Lex, it doesn't really tell anything about your experience. Compare that to a résumé written as accomplishments:
As Personal Assistant to Lex Luthor, I coordinated the take-over of the Smallville Bank, personally evicting 35 farmers who were behind on their mortgages and engineering the acquisition of a single plot of over 4000 acres without cash payment.
Without my employer knowing it, I embezzled $750,000 from said bank into off-shore accounts, establishing a network of pseudo-legitimate business clients.
Single-handedly turned network of business clients into a sieve for laundering the money received from drug-lords in South America, legitimizing the income through acquisition of real estate in South Central Florida.
Set a record by seducing 14 brides in a single 30-day period, on their wedding nights (sometimes in pairs) and lifted over $4,000 from their wedding gifts without being detected.
So, see the difference? First of all, based on the job requirements I posted, I have found a candidate that appears to be more than qualified for the simple jewel theft I had in mind for my story, but now I can start weighing other candidates. You are thinking in this process of what kind of background will give your villain the skills, motivation, and character that you need in order to pull off the caper in your story.
And by the way, that is how I wrote my own résumé and is how I write my goals for the year. No one is going to be interested in how I served my time. They will be interested in what I accomplished. The same is true of your villain or other character. Write him/her a good résumé and you will know precisely what he/she is capable of when you write the book.
While this sounds like a mystery writing technique, the first time I used it (way back in '81) it was for my first occult fantasy. I had given my first draft of the novel to a friend whose opinion I valued to give me feedback. I gave him all 120 pages of my first novel! When he gave it back he said, "Wow! It's really freeze-dried. If you added a little hot water it would be a whole book." Well, that got me thinking. Having read the book again myself I started out thinking about what else I'd like to know about what happened. As a result, I started interviewing my main character, asking question after question. That was the moment that my character, J. Wesley Allen, took shape as a real person with whom I could carry on a conversation. He became so real that he took control and I wrote five little booklets of his philosophy with a hundred short pithy quotes that I called collectively "The Book of Wesley."
Last year, you saw a lot of that technique as I explored the creation of my characters Dag Hamar and Deb Riley. Many of you actually participated in making them real. So here is the technique I use to interview my characters, and specifically for those writing a mystery, how to interview the suspect.
First, understand that the suspect doesn't want to give you the information that you need. If she did, you just have to ask her, "Why did you kill your husband?" and she would fill you in on all the details. End of mystery. So you have to do two things: collect evidence that will convict the suspect, and try to get the suspect to give you enough information that she entraps herself.
It is an old saying that a murder (or other crime) requires three elements: Motive, Means, and Opportunity. So, in your interview you have to elicit these three pieces. Let's start with motive. For convenience sake, I'm going to stick with the example I just started. I suspect the wife of murdering her husband. Here are some of my interview questions.
This group of questions was all focused on getting a motive. That's usually the hardest part because you have to get inside the suspect's head to find out what motivates her. So the next thing you have to figure out is whether or not the suspect could possibly have done it. Did she have the means?
Assuming that you have reached a reasonable conclusion that the suspect had motive, means, and opportunity to commit the crime, you still have to collect the hard evidence that will convict her. But now you know that she did it; you just have to prove it. She was distraught over the fact that her husband threatened to leave her for a younger woman, she is missing a steak knife from the kitchen drawer, and she was in the parking lot where he was killed. You need the weapon (preferably with her fingerprints or identified as part of the set) in order to get an airtight conviction.
Last year, you saw a lot of that technique as I explored the creation of my characters Dag Hamar and Deb Riley. Many of you actually participated in making them real. So here is the technique I use to interview my characters, and specifically for those writing a mystery, how to interview the suspect.
First, understand that the suspect doesn't want to give you the information that you need. If she did, you just have to ask her, "Why did you kill your husband?" and she would fill you in on all the details. End of mystery. So you have to do two things: collect evidence that will convict the suspect, and try to get the suspect to give you enough information that she entraps herself.
It is an old saying that a murder (or other crime) requires three elements: Motive, Means, and Opportunity. So, in your interview you have to elicit these three pieces. Let's start with motive. For convenience sake, I'm going to stick with the example I just started. I suspect the wife of murdering her husband. Here are some of my interview questions.
- How did you and your husband meet? Was it love at first sight? Did you marry for convenience? Do you have children? (The intent here is to get the character to talk to you about things that don't seem all that threatening. They aren't accusatory, they are just going to fill you in on what the relationship used to be like.)
- Do you do all the child-rearing yourself or was your husband actively involved? Did you agree on how to raise the children? Did he ever take the children out by himself? Was he abusive to the children? How about to you? (Now we're beginning to get into one of the three biggest areas that married people have extreme fallout over. The children. You are actually playing an elimination game here. Subtly you are getting around to the abuse subject. You want to know if she trusted him.)
- Was your husband's job stressful? Did he have any enemies at work? Was he responsible for anyone being fired? Did people envy him for his position or his wealth or salary? (Notice that here you are opening a door for the wife to accuse or try to direct your attention to someone else. But the real deal is you are trying to find out whether they fought over money. Was she satisfied with her social and financial status? Was her husband a wastral? Unemployed? Spending more than he earned? Insured?)
- Did your husband always come home at night? Was he prone to working late? Did he travel a lot? Did anyone travel with him? Did you ever suspect him of being involved with something against the law? Drugs? Embezzlement? Did you know about his affair with the secretary? (Sex. That's really the third big area. You are working her around to letting you know that she hated her husband for cheating on her.)
This group of questions was all focused on getting a motive. That's usually the hardest part because you have to get inside the suspect's head to find out what motivates her. So the next thing you have to figure out is whether or not the suspect could possibly have done it. Did she have the means?
- Are there any firearms in the house? Could you hand me my briefcase, please? Do you enjoy cooking? You have a degree in botany; can you identify edible mushrooms?
- How long have you been confined to a wheelchair? When did you start taking self-defense classes? How did you get that scar?
- So these questions are focused on two major areas: Did the suspect have the physical ability (strength, health, mobility) to commit the crime, and did the suspect have access to the necessary weapon (firearm, poison, knife, etc.)? Now, we have to establish whether the suspect could have been in the right place at the right time to commit the crime. I'll start with the obvious.
- Where were you the night of the fifth between 8:00 and 10:00 p.m.? (In reality, that's not a great question to ask unless you are intentionally misleading the suspect into thinking you believe the murder was committed at a different time than it was. You could follow up the question with "Then did you go straight home?")
- What time do you pick the children up from school? Who else knew you were going to see a movie Friday? Did you often ask your husband to stop at the grocery story on the way home? (Now you are establishing routine and patterns that put the suspect in proximity to the victim.)
- Where else did you go when you went to pick up the children? Did you speak to the crossing-guard when you got to the school? Why were you at Safeway in Issaquah at 3:00? (Now you are trying to spring information that you have gathered on the suspect to take her off-guard and get her to paint herself into a corner with lies that you can already verify. You already know that she left half an hour earlier than normal to pick up the children, that the crossing-guard was home sick, and that she used her credit card to buy gas in Issaquah.)
Assuming that you have reached a reasonable conclusion that the suspect had motive, means, and opportunity to commit the crime, you still have to collect the hard evidence that will convict her. But now you know that she did it; you just have to prove it. She was distraught over the fact that her husband threatened to leave her for a younger woman, she is missing a steak knife from the kitchen drawer, and she was in the parking lot where he was killed. You need the weapon (preferably with her fingerprints or identified as part of the set) in order to get an airtight conviction.
Okay, so you already know how I plan. I'm a fanatic (though this year's planning looks like prep for an extemporaneous speech for which I don't yet know the subject). So I'm not going to lecture you on how you should or shouldn't plan. I know you will be successful no matter how much or little planning you think you are doing in advance.
Instead, I'm going to offer a technique for getting inside the characters' heads that I found very successfull in both of my last two outings. It's called a Johari Window and you can read about it in my original post on this back in October of '05. But here are some highlights that I think might be helpful.
Set up a grid with one character on the side and one across the top, let's say your detective and your perp. Here's a sample of what that would look like:
Now, in any given circumstance, you can take your two main characters and balance them out against this window. The unfolding story usually takes place in the "hidden" quadrant that is what is unknown to both of them. I used this two years ago to go through the five main events in my story and plot the two main characters against this. What did they both know, what did one know that the other didn't, and what did neither of them know?
What I find even more helpful, especially when you are thinking of planting red herrings for the mystery (which, indeed, often comes long after the fact), is that you can treat your relationship with the reader in the same way and work with the reader to solve the question. Put yourself across the side as the author and the reader across the top. At any given time in the story, you should be able to show what is known to both of you (you already wrote it), what is known to you that the reader doesn't know (you've got it plotted out), what is known to the reader that you don't know (the reader brings her own assumptions and deduction to the story. The reader may have figured out who did it in the first chapter, but still be reading because they don't know when the detective will discover it), and finally what neither you nor your reader know yet. It's that last "hidden" quadrant that contains the real mystery for your story. It enables you to keep developing and discovering things as you write the story.
I'm going to follow this up with the next of my mystery writing lessons "How to interview a suspect." BTW, you can find more basic information about Johari Windows at Noogenesis.
Instead, I'm going to offer a technique for getting inside the characters' heads that I found very successfull in both of my last two outings. It's called a Johari Window and you can read about it in my original post on this back in October of '05. But here are some highlights that I think might be helpful.
Set up a grid with one character on the side and one across the top, let's say your detective and your perp. Here's a sample of what that would look like:
Now, in any given circumstance, you can take your two main characters and balance them out against this window. The unfolding story usually takes place in the "hidden" quadrant that is what is unknown to both of them. I used this two years ago to go through the five main events in my story and plot the two main characters against this. What did they both know, what did one know that the other didn't, and what did neither of them know?
What I find even more helpful, especially when you are thinking of planting red herrings for the mystery (which, indeed, often comes long after the fact), is that you can treat your relationship with the reader in the same way and work with the reader to solve the question. Put yourself across the side as the author and the reader across the top. At any given time in the story, you should be able to show what is known to both of you (you already wrote it), what is known to you that the reader doesn't know (you've got it plotted out), what is known to the reader that you don't know (the reader brings her own assumptions and deduction to the story. The reader may have figured out who did it in the first chapter, but still be reading because they don't know when the detective will discover it), and finally what neither you nor your reader know yet. It's that last "hidden" quadrant that contains the real mystery for your story. It enables you to keep developing and discovering things as you write the story.
I'm going to follow this up with the next of my mystery writing lessons "How to interview a suspect." BTW, you can find more basic information about Johari Windows at Noogenesis.
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