Writing A Mystery-Thriller Series: Part 2
Drawing pictures — connecting the dots
An essay in five parts
by mystery-thriller author Mark David, imaginator of The Elements
You can sign up for the occasional Elements newsletter, follow Mark David on Twitter @authorMarkDavid. You can read more about his fiction on The Elements homepage or here on medium.
Introduction
In this, the second part of an essay exploring my thoughts, ideas and processes used in growing a series, I’ll examine the writing process including the first of a number of sources of inspiration. I’ll touch on the path of the reader: What it is I want the reader to experience —and enter into an open discussion regarding the use of authors voice and different modes of writing when creating a series that works with more than one book at a time.
This essay is part of a series of fives parts — an open dialogue, as much to myself as anyone, a chance to take a bird’s eye view of the whole in writing a Mystery-Thriller series that has taken many years, while I still have a little time left to tweak the first release. It’s a chance to collate pieces of information, ideas about creation, putting them together here to tell what the first book is about. More importantly, I’ll examine why I wrote it and how it is a smaller part of a much, much larger project, being now the prologue to a series called The Elements.
The story grew in the telling, to quote another author I know who wrote (something to do with a ring I believe.)
The path of experience
The reader’s path — for me — is not, in the prologue, one of identifying with a lead character, and/or following that character all the way through the story to resolution. The intention instead is to suggest the story universe of which the prologue is the peek into, and build the pieces of a puzzle through a gradual process of discovery, as first the investigators, and then the suspects are engaged, adding bit by bit, the elements of story that provide the setting. As to the details as to why certain things happen? This is the balancing act, this author aiming to suggest rather than serve. Thus, it will be left up to the reader to paint the picture, by dots if you like, since enough of back plot is revealed, but only as dots.
Artistic Intentions: Drawing pictures
My artistic intention was to write a book viewed as an isolated incident in place and time, connected to people, forces, past events, in a rich multi-colored tapestry. I want to portray a happening as the tip of the iceberg, just glimpsed underneath the surface. So there is a large, vivid picture waiting to be discovered, it’s just that… ahem, it’s a little unclear.
Now, I appreciate this may frustrate some readers, but from the feedback of many others, I know this approach works for most. For example, we start with a death and the reader is taken along as observer, viewing the consequential events taking place as a detective grapples with coming in with nothing, no idea who these people are, why they are here, piecing it slowly together, little piece by piece.
Artistic Intentions: Connecting the dots
This author finds that approach utterly absorbing. It might not be everyone’s expectation, but it is my intention, the intention here is something held dear, being the method to uniqueness in writing, of having something that stands out from the crowd. I want the reader to connect the dots, creating their own sense of reality based on what has been pieced together, even at the expense of relating to a particular character. I say particular character, since the tendency in series, especially crime these days, is the ‘Mr. Smith’ series. Yawn. The Elements wil be anything but…
Beta reading
To try and get the balance right, I’ve sent out to a lot of ‘beta readers’ — readers who ‘test’ the book. Of all those who read it, some had reservations, all were intrigued and liked the story, some loved it. What I’ve done is to listen to those criticisms where readers were left feeling frustrated. As one trusted beta reader said, ‘I wish I saw a little more of the match, so I could see the passes coming.’
And so in the final version now being drafted and edited, together with Audio, I have done just that, added just enough of the match so the passes can be interpreted in terms of the game, even if the opposite end of the pitch is a little gloomy. So the reader can connect the dots. Hopefully. I have therefore had to change my original approach somewhat, providing more access to inner thoughts and motivations, the real difference in the novel as being something quite different compared to other fiction.
Sources of Inspiration: 1
One of my favourite books is ‘Shantaram’ by Gregory David Roberts (GDR). GDR wrote an essay on his first book, something he took a long time writing, full as it was with his reflections on writing. His essay ‘The Architecture of the Novel’ was a guide to Shantaram. GDR uses all of his ideas and experiences in writing, the book being the fruit of endeavour and the thoughts guiding it.
To understand the book, why it was written and what is about, we need to get into the mind of the author. GDR has said in the Indian Non Fiction Festival in Mumbai about writing:
‘It is critically important to recognize your own voice. You should be able to read and hear that voice… you need to preserve your authorial voice… we talk to the heart and the soul but not so much the mind, into the heart of the people who read our work.’
What I love about GDR is, he talks about the simple things that are important — to him as a writer, and to us as people we use to reflect upon in the course of our writing. Following GDR’s example, and I think it’s important to tell people who are are inspired by. I am inspired by real events. By our history. By the ideas that have been developed by those upon whose shoulders we stand upon. I wanted then, to capture the simple things that have informed me in developing a series operating across the boundaries of history in the 20th century.
Finding Author’s Voice
As I write this essay I am reading through and making a number of changes to what was an edited piece of writing, for the simple reason that I have found my Author’s voice, and find it, having written a number of other books in progress, to be at variance with the first work that set the whole ball rolling. It’s the subtle things I find to be different, flowing between scenes, adding more personality, modes of telling. I started writing from a strict show-don’t-tell approach, and find that now to be too austere. A reader needs connection, needs to connect the dots in order to make the picture.
When I write now, it comes naturally. Especially when I start from scratch. He Who Favors Fire is the prologue to The Elements that works with timelines. The last timeline was written on the fly — trying to hang on, the words forming in the mind quicker than the fingers can keep up. These scenes seem fluid, since they were written as brain-in-motion, I never stop to think then and the words come of their own accord…
2 Modes of Writing
The B-side is before that takes place with writing historical fiction — there is a lot of research that is made before scene-writing. Writing more than one book at a time is a complex process that places emphasis on ordering information. Information being the bits of knowledge certain characters know. A spy for example, has a process of discovery. The reader needs to follow that process, my intention that the reader experiences pretty much what the character experiences as they discover more items of information, set against the forming of the puzzle in their minds. (This puzzle aspect was covered in part in this series.)
This ‘information’, the ‘bits of knowing’, is laid out as ‘loose scenes’ — laying out a path of plot points from which the dynamics of story are evolved. I can’t plan, since new information often leads to a rehash of story… productivity being king, I find the loose scenes are easiest to work with. So in effect, there are two modes of writing — writing without the dictates of researching historical information on the fly churning out words as fast as I can type them — and writing with information as the generator for dialogue.
The bulking out of dialogue happens most when the research takes over, since the dialogue — conveying information as discovery — is often re-drafted in new settings as the story firms up…
Coming up…
In the next installment in this mini-series, I’ll look at more specifically at themes in the first release: the prologue in The Elements called He Who Favors Fire. I’ll open up the secret ‘brain junky’ nature of myself that lead to the name of the book and the catalyst for the series being called The Elements at all.
by mystery-thriller author Mark David, imaginator of The Elements
You can sign up for the occasional Elements newsletter, follow Mark David on Twitter @authorMarkDavid. You can read more about his fiction on The Elements homepage or here on medium.
If you want, contribute to developing the collection Stories To Imagine, working with elements of the imagination from the real world.
