Mystery and Motive: Some Criminal Minds

By Jamie Freveletti

I was reading the newspaper and getting my daily dose of stories about mayhem, brinkmanship and near world annihilation when I paused and took another look. Wait, Russia is defending Syria? Why?

Further down in the article I saw a possible reason: "Syria is Moscow's rare ally in the Middle East, home to a Russian naval base and a customer for its arms." Reuters          

And there you have it--money--the oldest motive in history and the most enduring. Money, when linked to its sister motive: Power, is a driving force behind a whole lot of murder and mayhem in this world. I would argue that Power is a distant second in terms of motivators, because while it's often desired by Nations there aren't as many of those as there are people, and people often do things purely for money. For many people, power is secondary and if you offered them a chance to be really, really rich they'd forgo the power. Not all, of course, but many.

Which brings us to mystery novels. Most writers are aware that power and money are the really big motivational players in the human psyche and most exploit this trait when writing their own stories of murder and mayhem. Thrillers tend to lean toward the Nation/State and Power module, while Mysteries lean toward the Individual and Money/Greed motive, and both give us really twisted tales of both.

Here are some nice, filthy tales of money and power, in no particular order:

Absolute Power  David Baldacci.

A career criminal is trapped in the house that he is burglarizing when he sees the President of the United States having an affair with a woman. The situation turns violent, the Secret Service breaks in, kills the woman, and after learning that the criminal saw the murder go down, blames it on him. Love this novel. Goes right to the top of the Power food chain and implicates the President of the United States.

A Very Private Woman: The Life and Unsolved Murder of Presidential Mistress Mary Meyer  Nina Burleigh

Another novel about a president and a dead mistress but this one is non-fiction.  I've met Ms. Burleigh after a speech for her other novel, The Fatal Gift of Beauty, about Amanda Knox trial and I find both books well researched and written. The motive in the Knox trial is even more sinister because it isn't readily apparent why a prosecutor would handle a case in this manner.

And the tales of average, everyday mayhem for money. I'm going to focus on the ones that include humor just to narrow an extensive field and lighten up a bit:

Pest Control Bill Fitzhugh

When down on his luck exterminator Bob Dillon creates a brochure for his new, environmentally friendly extermination method involving hybrid assassin bugs (which Mr. Fitzhugh says are very real) it ends up in the hands of a European murder- for- hire broker, who decides to eliminate the competition. Funniest story about assassins trying to slaughter the competition that you'll ever read. If you loved and watched the movie Grosse Pointe Blank, which I'd recommend as one of the best movies of the "assassin wishing to go straight and being targeted by his former colleagues" genre, then you'll love this one.

Cosmic Banditos AC Weisbecker

Another very, very funny (in a sick sort of way) story about a down on his luck drug dealer who becomes obsessed with learning the secrets of the universe and heads north to California to confront a physicist with his theories while dodging the authorities who have charged him with drug dealing and terrorism. The story of the librarian will make you laugh out loud. This is a cult novel, and requires a twisted sense of humor to fully appreciate.

Enjoy!

Writing Hero Protagonists in a World of Damaged Souls

by Jamie Freveletti

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about writing the damaged protagonist, and promised to discuss writing a hero. Writing heroes, especially in the current climate where damaged protagonists are the norm, can be tough. Currently, even protagonists that were initially written as heroes have been altered in later incarnations to be damaged.

For example, in Ludlum’s novel, The Bourne Identity, Jason Bourne was actually a good guy working for an undercover CIA operation and charged with finding “Carlos” the international assassin. He spent most of the novel concerned that he may be an assassin, and is relieved to finally learn that he was not.

Fast forward twenty years to the movies starring Matt Damon and the Jason Bourne character is altered to be the assassin, not the hero, and he spends his time learning the horrific truth. The movie goes through quite a few twists to show that Bourne was brainwashed into being the bad player.

Why are damaged protagonists in vogue? As I blogged earlier, I think it’s because the damaged individual gives the writer a built in conflict between the character and the demons he or she faces. In a novel, conflict is king. Without it, you got nothin.’ Additionally, damaged characters can engage in a lot of edgy behavior and the reader will buy it a whole lot quicker than if the character was presented without emotional baggage.

So what does this mean for writing heroes? A lot. It means that you need to present someone as inherently decent who does the right thing in the face of bad actors, and you need to make that courage ring true. People love to root for heroes, but they need to be portrayed as believable as well. This presents a challenge for the writer, because a lot of behavior that might be interesting to write about with regard to the damaged character is off limits to the hero. The hero can't step off the line of good, needs to treat others with respect, and yet still be multi-dimensional enough to keep the readers turning pages.

I write a female hero, and it feels right for me. She doesn't cringe from danger, doesn't wait for the men to save her-she saves the men- and she deals with them on an equal basis. This last bit of information is key when writing a female hero, because she needs to make the final decisions and propel the action forward. If she defers to the men she's not the hero, she's a supporting character.

The better known writers have FBI agents, detectives, cops, ex-Secret Service agents and former military written by Rollins, Baldacci, Grafton and Child. All of these writers get it when it comes to writing heroes. Their protagonists are the kind of people you’d want in your corner or shoulder to shoulder with you in that bar when the guy with the pool cue is aiming at your head. There’s something reassuring about a man or woman character that you can depend on to outwit evil, and who has never felt the need to wallow in it. Perhaps they’re coming back into fashion, or maybe never went out of fashion, but they’re fun to write and even better to read.

I'd love to hear about your favorite hero protagonist-book or movie!