How to write a bad detective series

 

Some of these points will occur in most series. It is the manner and context which determines whether the point is well handled, neutral or indicative of a bad series. (See the introduction to the Grand List of Science Fiction Clichés for further comments.)

• The only crime worth investigating is murder. Any petty (or other) crimes that occur will link up somehow with the murder(s) committed. No other crime, however complex/ingenious in constructing or resolving, is worth developing or investigating.

• Motives for committing the crime will be banal or involve non-rational motives.

• The murder will be committed as messily/unpleasantly as possible. Nobody will Suffer Beautifully.

• Crimes and their investigations will occur one at a time, rather than overlapping/concurrently.

• There will be no reference to other crimes in previous stories (to allow for varying sequences of presentation) whether loosely connected to the particular episode or indicating a story arc. Nor will there be any reference to current events in reality (to keep the shelf life going).

• Private individuals who investigate the crimes which regularly and repeatedly occur around them are never considered as possible candidates for serial murder.

• These private individuals can solve murders without having any formal training in the relevant fields/apparently having appropriate knowledge. They can resolve the crime without having access to the resources of the police/investigating unit, just by using ‘common sense.’

• A regular character’s actual skills will be ignored or used only intermittently, and there will never be a ‘puzzle’/crime within their field.

• In an official investigating organisation of whatever nature, the lead figure is regularly in conflict with the head of the unit/their immediate superior/immediate inferiors. There will also be tensions within the department, whether sexual or otherwise, and everybody is able to switch to the latest investigation, however important their own work.

• Many of the people involved will have fractured personal lives, which will be given significant coverage.

• No matter how ancient the crime (relative to the timeframe of the series), there will always be someone around who was on the case/knows something vital, and/or was not contacted despite being an obvious source of information.

• The files for ancient cases will always be available, while modern ones will get misplaced. Files and other records will never be linked/boxed up with unrelated cases.

• When there is insufficient plot to fill the time/space available, fill the gaps with gratuitous sex/violence/discordant music (if TV) and other ‘plot-fillers not related to the storyline.’

• Two murders/several crimes will be interlinked far more frequently than is statistically likely in Real Life.

• Provincial towns and villages will have far more murders than would seem likely for the area: the geography of the surrounding area is somewhat compressed and all roads lead outwards to only one destination, rather than crisscrossing. Nor, given the relatively high rate of murders is there either a mass exodus of people fearing for their lives or an influx of media or conspiracy theorists trying to observe the phenomenon.

• Historical and other research will be displayed in full detail: things obvious then but unfamiliar now will be explained in detail, however much those in the series would regard it as ‘stating the #### obvious’ unless to be used as a rabbit out of the hat solution.

• Modern English rather than that contemporary to the setting will be used not only to make it easier to understand the dialogue, but to an extent that “feels wrong” to the reader/viewer. Alternatively twee and quaint language is used to an extent that renders the dialogue difficult to comprehend if not annoying, and in contexts where it would not have been used.

• The reader/viewer wants a complete surprise – provide many red herrings and false trails, rather than clues for them to work out who might have committed the crime and why.

• Plot holes can be ignored.

• Historical murders will involve psychologically implausible for the time motives and mindsets.

• Science fiction detective stories will rely on excessive use of gizmos, which do not have a backstory.

About The Author: Jackie Speel enjoys researching obscure history.

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