Author Ric Frances is all set to publish his very first novel, Lightning Strikes Twice, a mystery/detective novel motivated by the author’s love for detective movies, books, and shows. His favorite author is the best-selling fiction writer of all time, Agatha Christie. Heavily inspired by Christie’s work, Frances began to write a detective mystery novel. In Lightning Strikes Twice, Detective Richard Urbanax, the best in southeast Louisiana, uses the help of his eighteen-year-old daughter/protégé and fifteen years old, techie, twin sons to solve the kidnapping of an eight-year-old boy and a woman from the Michaels’ home. The case that drove Urbanax into early retirement was one of Cora Michaels, a six-year-old girl that was kidnapped and murdered. The detective was never able to solve the case and bring her killer to justice. Two years late, Cora’s cousin and aunt are abducted from the same home. Are the two kidnappings related? If they are, how long will it be before Detective Urbanax can finally bring the little girl any justice? Well, you’ll have to read Frances’ novel to find out.
Writing a mystery is not easy or simple work, it takes plenty of time and attention to craft a good mystery. If you are planning to write the next best mystery, here are six writing rules, by author Mur Lafferty, which you’ll have to follow:
· Rule #1: Know your murderer before you start writing.
If you know who your ultimate criminal is, you can write the whole book while posting clues and red herrings throughout because you know exactly where you’re going.
· Rule #2: Don’t know your murderer before you start writing.
Take an ensemble cast, give them all a motive for committing the murder(s). Make sure they all have opportunities to interact with the victim(s). When you get to your climax and you can see that everyone still would have had the chance to be the murderer, then you choose someone.
· Rule #3: Your hero should have some flaws.
While the alcoholic detective who is terrible with women is somewhat of a cliche, the truth is you do need to have a character who has their own internal demons to fight as they solve the murders externally. It makes them much more relatable and adds layers of conflict to your story.
· Rule #4: Your hero should be infallible.
Before you tell me that this won’t work, let me go and fetch the sales numbers for Agatha Christie, the world’s bestselling author of all time. Murder on the Orient Express sold 3 million copies—in 1974 alone. Anyway, Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot can be said to have flaws like, um, Poirot is full of himself—but it’s not hubris because he’s right when he says he’s the world’s greatest detective.
· Rule #5: Mysteries have a formula; follow it.
Lay the suspects, make your detective be the one to solve the case, kill the victim in the first third of the story. If you break these rules, the reader won’t trust you.
· Rule #6: Break all the rules.
One book title for you: The Murder of Roger Akroyd. The narrator—the first person POV watching Poirot investigate Ackroyd’s murder—is revealed to be the murderer.
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