Basics of the Mystery Story

In this post, I will go over the basics of a mystery story, over the pieces you need to have in order to have a successful story of that kind. I’m not going into specific directions, such as the ‘Locked Room Mystery’ (not this time, that is), and I will use a specific book to present them - “Evil under the Sun” by Agatha Christie.

“Evil under the Sun” is not the most well-know novel by Agatha Christie, not even the most well-known Hercule Poirot story, but it’s one of my favourites, because it plays extremely well with two aspects of a crime: time of death and identity of the body (also the identity of other people).

The novel starts, as all Agatha Christie stories, with establishing the setting. The past of the hotel where the murder will happen is explained, Hercule Poirot is introduced and the basics are laid out. The people staying at the hotel are introduced, so we have a good picture of who might be behind the murder. The victim is introduced early and it’s suggested from the beginning that Arlena Marshall (Arlena Stuart while she was still on stage) had it coming - that she made more than enough enemies in her life. That is one of the first things to keep in mind about a mystery story. A murder where only one person is a suspect is not a mystery. It’s an open-and-shut case. If there’s not a number of possible suspects, then there will not be a mystery at all. Arlena Marshall is a good victim, because of her character and because of her past. She has broken hearts, cheated on people, talked people down. She is only looking out for her own pleasures, not caring whether or not she hurts people in doing so. Even at a little seaside hotel, the list of possible murderers is, therefore, long - which is how it should be.

The murder doesn’t happen right at the beginning, either - that is not Agatha Christie’s style. She introduces the situation very well and gives the reader a chance to get to know the various characters who will later on play a role. But that is her style, it’s not a necessity for a mystery story as a such. Many stories do well with starting right with the murder and establishing the setting later on. By the time Arlena winds up strangled, we are well-acquainted with everything and everyone and can easily follow Hercule Poirot on his quest for the truth.

At the beginning, we have the following parts of the mystery: the setting, the detective, the victim, the array of suspects with their motives. Then the murder happens. Arlena Marshall leaves the hotel earlier than usual to take a float to one of the small coves of the island the hotel is on (not one which has sun in the morning, either, so it’s clearly not for sunbathing). Hours later, Mr. Redfern (who is less of a suspect than his wife, since he has a little affair with Arlena) finds Arlena together with another guest, Miss Brewster (who has not motive at all) - he’s in the green there, obviously, having been in plain sight of Poirot and a host of other guests all morning so far. He sends the Miss Brewster back to the hotel, knowing she won’t climb up the ladder of the cove, because she’s afraid of heights, but take the boat instead. By the time Poirot arrives, there is no doubt Arlena Marshall is dead - strangled by someone with strong hands, which takes Mrs. Redfern out of the list, for she has exceptionally small hands and a fear of heights herself (so she couldn’t have used said ladder either). Still, there’s enough people on the island who would like to see Arlena dead.

It’s also established early that a stranger is out as the murderer - the island is hard to reach during high tide, so nobody can just have walked over, killed her, and disappeared. The murderer therefore must be someone who spent the morning on the island. This is another important part - establish that there is only a limited pool of suspects and it can’t have been a chance death. Because the reader wants to investigate alongside the detective and thus the mystery must be solvable - a chance killer won’t be found during an investigation and luck shouldn’t play a role for the solution.

Next, Poirot needs to establish the basics of the crime. He himself helped Arlena Marshall to push her float into the water that morning, so he knows she was still alive around quarter past ten. When Miss Brewster and Mr. Redfern reached the cove, it was about quarter to twelve, which means that by that time, Arlena was dead. The first question then is who has no alibi for the hour (it takes about half an hour to reach the cove  from the beach with a boat or float) between Arlena’s arrival in the cove and the time she was found. Nobody, it turns out. Even people who thought they had none were seen or heard by someone and thus given an alibi they didn’t even know they had. Another important part of the mystery is established - there’s something about the established facts which is wrong. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be a mystery, it would merely be a case which needs a little longer to be closed.

Because of that, Poirot has to take a step back and look at the facts again. He knows that Arlena Marshall is dead and he knows that she was strangled. That much he has seen with his own eyes, so he can take it for face value. A survey of the cove shows him that there is a small cave around in which a quantity of heroin has been hidden. It takes another realisation to turn Poirot’s mind to the truth: the only person who was close enough to identify Arlena when she was found by Mr. Redfern and Miss Brewster was Mr. Redfern. Miss Brewster didn’t go too close to the body and she went back with the boat - afraid of staying with a dead woman when the murderer might still be close by. What Miss Brewster did see was a body with Arlena’s white bathing suit, jade-green Chinese hat, and bronzed limbs sticking out. As Poirot pointed out himself at the beginning of the book, those bronzed bodies at the beach all look the same, so was it really Arlena? And was she dead or alive at that point? Because if it wasn’t Arlena or she wasn’t dead, Redfern is no longer beyond suspicion.

There are other strange things which turn up during the investigation, such as a bottle being thrown out of a window and a bath nobody admits to have taken. Slowly, things come together and, finally, Poirot is able to solve the case. That is an important part - the detective and through them the reader will have to look at things from a different perspective. The case needs a twist, otherwise the mystery isn’t good enough. I will not disclose the twist here, in case you want to read the novel yourself.

Let’s review the parts to keep in mind.

Establish a victim with a host of enemies. There needs to be a host of suspects after the actual deed is done.

Make sure the number of suspects is not too high, though, and they are all introduced. You don’t want the victim to be a chance victim or a professional killer in the story, because in both cases, your detective will not be able to solve the case. At the same time, you don’t want the reader to be confused by the pure number of possible murderers.

Let the detective establish the basics of the crime and start their investigation. You need to give the reader something to work with, so let the detective detect. Certain facts, such as the identity of the victim and the way they were murdered, are usually easy to detect. Time of death often can be found out early, too.

Have a twist. Something about the case just won’t come together, all suspects have alibis, there’s no way of saying who did it.

Make the detective take a step back and choose a new direction. Through examining the facts again, the detective should finally be able to find the right lead and the culprit.

You can play the last two stages several times, but stop it before it gets too obvious. Two false ‘right’ leads should be enough. Just as ten suspects or less should be enough. If you have too many, the reader will not be able to keep them all in mind.

Around those basics, you can spin whatever case you want. The mystery will always work out, no matter the genre. Keep in mind that a mystery story is always a story about a puzzle, a puzzle which the reader will solve alongside the detective. The reader needs to be able to do so, so give them all the information as the detective gets it.

The London Terrors Review

Normally, I’m a little weary about books which bring together Sherlock Holmes and supernatural themes. Strange, considering that “The Hound of the Baskervilles” is by far my favourite Sherlock Holmes story (followed closely by “The Empty House”), but true. Yet, when I bought “The London Terrors” by William Meikle, it was with a good conscience. One reason for that was that I liked his Carnacki stories, the other was that I’d already read his other supernatural Sherlock Holmes tale, “The Dreaming Man.”

“The London Terrors” is actually a collection of three stories, all of which feature a strong and traditional supernatural element. The stories themselves are independent of each other and could be read in any order, not just in that in which they’re in the book. They all lead slowly but surely from the natural and normal to the supernatural and not-quite-as normal. They show a human Holmes, who is struggling with bringing together his scientific mind and the supernatural themes. They allow for Holmes to make mistakes (I like the new tales which do, because it makes Holmes more solid as a character - everyone makes mistakes, after all). They give Watson a lot to do and make them a team, instead of a hero with a chronicler in tow. They even put quite a physical strain on both Holmes and Watson, showing how far both will go in the course of their work, in order to get to the bottom of a case and help justice triumph.

Of course, the supernatural doesn’t fit too well with Sherlock Holmes, but whether or not it works out, is very much down to the talent of the author. Meikle does have the necessary talent to make it work. In addition, he’s always sure to add a good dose of science to the supernatural horrors, so they fit better with Holmes than they would otherwise (his Carnacki stories are less scientific oriented, but then, they don’t need to be, since Carnacki is a ghost hunter). Those horrors are beyond human ken, but some of their aspects can be explained and are explained by using scientific means.

The stories themselves cover quite a bit of ground, as far is horror is concerned, not only using one type of supernatural being, but three rather different ones. Each story features conundrums for Holmes - and not just because of the supernatural elements -, horrible murders, and also Holmes’ brother Mycroft, who comes in because the cases are threatening civic life in London or even the Empire. Therefore, all three stories are on a much bigger scale than your regular Sherlock Holmes story.

Meikle writes Watson’s style very well and manages to keep the voice of the good doctor the way we are used to it, while at the same time making the text fluid and quick to read. Unlike “Holmes and Houdini,” which has several viewpoints, “The London Terrors” keeps to the traditional style and only writes from Watson’s perspective and no other.

Since Watson is more likely to accept the supernatural and also more likely to be shocked by whatever kind of monster he and Holmes encounter, he makes a very good stand-in for the reader, a much better one than Holmes himself might make under the circumstances. In this case, the chronicler perspective works out well and even better than the hero’s own point of view might.

And since Watson is a doctor and all three stories deal with things which have not been seen before, with creatures which exist against all odds, his eye as a medical man, who can quickly judge the physical condition of another human, is quite useful. He might not quite believe what he sees, but he can describe very well what it is that he can’t believe his eyes about.

The characters in general, be they monsters, victims, or others, are described with quick strokes. Meikle gives enough details so a picture can form in the reader’s mind, but doesn’t overdo it. Unfortunately, there aren’t many female characters (“Holmes and Houdini” is better off in that aspect), merely the client in the third case and, of course, Mrs. Hudson herself are around. However, given the many monsters in the stories, it’s not that much of a surprise to see few humans of note overall.

Mycroft gets cast in a less-than-stellar light, he’s indeed ‘the government’ and acts accordingly, not thinking too much about the individual human, but about the general populace and the Empire as a such. This puts him at odds with his brother Sherlock, but also with Watson and, in the last story, with Lestrade, who doesn’t appreciate being called off a case which cost one of his men his life. Nevertheless, it does make the cold relationship between the brothers more believable and gives Mycroft a character which, while not always pleasant, still makes a lot of sense within the world of Sherlock Holmes. Mycroft is not uncaring as a such, but his ‘care’ is on a much higher level than the individual, whereas Sherlock’s whole career is built on caring for the troubles of individual humans.

Every story eases the reader into the supernatural part, there’s none which starts with it. There’s no ‘I’m going to tell you a story filled with horrors beyond your imagination.’ Instead, there’s the beginning you might expect from any Sherlock Holmes story: the mundane occurrence, such as a letter, a client arriving, or a talk with an old friend. And the horrors creep closer slowly, barely perceptible at first. A seemingly normal murder, a strange disease, or the hint that there’s more to the ‘night shift’ working on the new underground train. Yet, there’s also action, often more of it than you might expect from the classic stories. But then, modern readers are expecting more and Meikle writes the action very well.

If you don’t like the combination of Sherlock Holmes and supernatural topics, “The London Terrors” is not for you. But if you can put the disbelief aside for a couple of hours, you’ll find the book a good one, filled with three good stories and even accompanied by a few rather nice illustrations. I definitely enjoyed it and will reread it at some point.

Holmes and Houdini Review

“Holmes and Houdini” by I. A. Watson (and was there ever a better-named author to write a Sherlock Holmes story?) has definitely earned a place on the list of my favourite new Sherlock Holmes stories. It’s well-written, has an interesting premise, a good plot, and enough twists and turns to keep the reader engaged. But then, it’s I. A. Watson, whose regular Sherlock Holmes stories, including the wonderfully horrible “Season of Madness,” are definitely a high-point in Airship 27’s line-up.

The idea of a cross-over between fictional hero Sherlock Holmes and real-life person Harry Houdini is an interesting, but also intimidating one. In the novel, the connection is made through Arthur Conan Doyle himself, who is shown as Watson’s literary agent and also knows Harry Houdini and his manager Martin Beck. In reality, Doyle and Houdini were acquaintances, but drifted apart later on over the topic of spiritualism. Doyle became a believer in his later years, whereas Houdini spent a lot of time proving it was nothing more than trickery. It’s clear which side Sherlock Holmes would have taken, of course.

Due to the different players in the story, there are several viewpoints and, in a way, it’s Dr. Watson whose viewpoint (classic first-person past tense) sticks out a little, since all other viewpoints (Holmes, Houdini, Beck, for a short spell also a Newgate guard) are written in more regular third-person past tense. Nevertheless, the story is well-written and the changes in viewpoint are always clear.

The story also easily conjures up the big bad of Sherlock Holmes lore, Professor James Moriarty, eleven years after his fateful dive into the Reichenbach Falls. Not by bodily bringing him back, but by making his late revenge on Sherlock Holmes an important plot point. It also gives Colonel Moran the chance of shooting a few more people, which is nice. It’s not him who Houdini and Holmes are after, though, it’s a cabal of rich people who enjoy the unusual pastime of hunting humans. Their intended target is Houdini, who has a few things to say about that, of course. The Far Edge Club would have done better choosing another target - and taking a closer look at their own members, as it turns out in the end.

But I. A. Watson also makes good use of having real people in his story by reminding the audience of the Boer War and the first-ever concentration camps in history (just as horrible and deadly, although the Germans did it even worse in their efficiency). It’s a nice touch to give a real-life explanation for the villain’s deeds, because it gives said villain more depth.

The different plot threads are kept together very well, introducing the readers through the expected and familiar Watson perspective and only shifting much later, to set the other threads in motion. There’s Houdini’s thread, keeping the Far Edge Club from killing him while still turning up for his public appearances and searching for the necessary information to bring his hunters down. There’s Beck’s thread, knowing that something is going on, but being kept in the dark and forced to look for information himself. There’s Holmes’ thread, following the leads of the hints left inside Moriarty’s death mask and then hunting down those who have threatened the lives of innocent children to take the original manuscript of Moriarty’s second book off his hands. And there’s Watson’s thread, being the gallant knight again and finding a third wife in the process.

Another big plus of the story are the prominent women - they have their agenda and are far from just being damsels in distress who need saving. I’m not saying more about any of them, because it would ruin the story, but they all play their roles perfectly.

The story is well-told and has a lot of twists and turns. The author also proves very good at bringing all of the threads together towards the end, letting them merge one by one, until he’s back to the classic Watson perspective. And while being in the heads of Houdini and Holmes might diminish the mystery somewhat, as their knowledge is available to the reader, the story is written so that doesn’t matter, because there’s many possible culprits and the looming danger of what an escaped Sebastian Moran might be doing and to whom. After all, he was caught trying to kill Holmes before. I was invested in the story from beginning to end and that’s not always the case - some stories do need a few pages or even a chapter or two to get my complete attention. Even the occasional story by I. A. Watson.

Of course, the novel-length is a lot of help in this case, too, since it allows for the story to be more complicated and include more plot threads. It also allows for a larger number of characters, which in turn allows for more suspects to this mystery. The switching viewpoints mean a lot of different things happening at once, keeping the readers engaged.

Characters are far more than paper cut-outs. There’s a lot of villainous characters in the story, which is only logical with several Far Edge Club members and their entourages on their hunt. They overshadow the real villain - or the master villain, if you want to put it that way - and that is good. Because the person with all of the thread in their hands is not just after Houdini, but after much more - after something which might or might not exist. Holmes, in the end, is sure it doesn’t exist, that the manuscript was a last act of revenge on him. The villain is sure that it exists and that they can force Sherlock Holmes to decode it for them.

“Holmes and Houdini” is a very interesting cross-over novel with two great leads and an excellent story. It’s a good read and full of twists and turns, as is to be expected from an Airship 27 story (they are pulp specialists, after all). The novel definitely gets two thumb-ups from me.

Teams In Pulp

There are certain constellations of characters (or, rather, character types) which you will meet often in pulp or adventure stories, so I thought I should discuss a few of them here.

The hero and his chronicler

This one is well known since the time of Arthur Conan Doyle, who used that team twice, once with Holmes and Watson, and later on with Challenger and Malone. There are quite some problems with the chronicler perspective (often called Watsonian perspective), but it is a team which has been around for a long time. Whenever you have a highly intelligent character as hero (Challenger is, to put it mildly, a very arrogant guy, but he is intelligent, too), things could be given away early. That is why we see Holmes’ cases through Watson’s eyes and not through those of a man who can tell where someone took a walk by looking at their trouser legs. Nevertheless, it also means withholding information and not choosing the optimal viewpoint character (which is always the hero themselves). Today, this construct is mostly used by authors writing new Sherlock Holmes stories, which is where it belongs.

The lone wolf

This one is usually not too high-tech and features a hero who uses regular weaponry and tools for the time they live in. You will find them in setting which are not too civilized, such as the wild west, where a lone hero travelling from place to place is not uncommon. The lone wolf needs the skills to survive on their own, the ability to get things done by themselves. They’re usually good with weapons and often also with close-quarter combat, people who act rather than people who think deeply. Lone wolves do not thrive in a civilized society, though, so they are rarer in more modern settings, but they can crop up again in sci-fi stories where new planets replace the old wild west.

The three- to four-people team

This one can be seen in a lot of pulp stories, such as Jim Anthony or the Black Bat. You have a main hero and a few helpers. Usually, there’s one who is physically strong and one who has street-smarts. There might also be a woman in the mix, be it as a love interest or as a helper. (Jim Anthony has more of a love interest, whereas the Black Bat shows its female lead as a capable helper.) This allows for the hero to rely on other people for certain parts of the plot, such as finding information or blending into specific groups. Often, those helpers also have talents and skills the hero lacks (such as scientific knowledge or piloting skills). The teams often share a common past (the Black Bat’s helpers are criminals he brought back to the right side of the law, whereas Jim Anthony’s friends have been with him for a long time already) and thus stand together against all dangers. On the bad side, having a team means that there are hostages for the villain to take hold of.

The hero with an organisation behind

This hero doesn’t necessarily have a team working with them. They have unlimited funds, though, and can find help whenever they need it, because they are employed by an influential organisation. Usually, those operate world-wide and have unlimited funds which are at their agents’ disposal. Secret Agent X works for such an organisation, which enables him to spend all his time fighting crime and evil, instead of having to seek employment. For heroes without wealth of their own, such a setup is often the only chance to keep their fight going. In exchange for that, though, they sacrifice some of their freedom of choice, since the organisation gets a vote in what the hero does and when.

There are a lot of variations to these team-ups and they can be found in a lot of different settings - even though the lone wolf usually is confined to the outskirts of society. They work, because they allow for the author to show the readers how the hero manages to do what they’re doing.

A team of hero and chronicler works well for mystery stories, because it allows for the author to keep some facts from the reader without outright ‘cheating.’ If the hero isn’t telling the story themselves, whatever they don’t tell their chronicler isn’t known to the reader, either. Still, it’s hard to pull that off these days, because we expect to see things from the hero’s perspective rather than from a friend’s.

A lone wolf has no easy weakness to explore, nobody to threaten to keep them under control. On the other hand, nobody is an island and we all do need help every now and then, which is hard to obtain for the lone wolf. This is where the stories have their challenges for the author.

A team of three or four people on the other hand allows for a large number of skills and for several different characters who will act and react very differently. The author can have specialists (such as a pilot or scientist) without having to tone down on the action. It allows for the hero to be in the middle of it while others around them provide information or tools.

Something similar goes for the hero with an organisation behind them. They often work on their own, but the organisation provides the help which in other constellation is given by teammates. They don’t have to worry about funds and can devote all of their time to their fight against crime or evil. For an author, having a hero with unlimited means in money and contacts is good for writing stories which go beyond the regular and push them into world-spanning adventures.

You can make free use of those team-ups in pulp and put them in whatever stories they fit best. All of those character constellations have their good and bad sides and none is suited for all kinds of stories, but they have their use and can be a lot of fun to write.