who knows what, readers wanted, and more quiet people

Characters reveal a lot about themselves by what information they have.

My favorite "who knows what" moment is in the movie Mystery Train. There's a character named Luisa (played by Nicoletta Braschi). She's transporting her dead husband's body back to Italy, and she's having a layover in Memphis on the way. We see her wandering around, preyed on by various minor cons, and she ends up in the fleabag hotel where most of the movie's action takes place, sharing a room with another woman who has no money. In the morning, they hear a gunshot from another room in the hotel.

The other woman says something like, "Was that a gunshot?"

Luisa says, "It sounded like a .38."

It tells us a lot about her that she has an idea about the caliber of the gun just from hearing the sound.

I was just watching an episode of the old TV show The Prisoner called "Hammer Into Anvil" (I'm working my way through the entire series, again), and at one point Number Two is threatening (as usual) to break Number Six, and he (Two) says to Six, in German, "You must be hammer or anvil." Six understands the German and recognizes that it's a quote from Goethe, and the rest of the conversation shows that he understands the real meaning of the quote while Two does not (anvils break hammers, not the other way around). We know very little about Number Six, but it is telling that he has all of that information.

I've done this type of things in a few places (probably more than a few, actually).

One example would be this scene. Jan Sleet is trying to solve a mystery for a woman named Claudia, but she's also trying to convince Claudia that her (Claudia's) extensive education could be put to productive use. The quote, by the way, is from The Importance of Being Earnest, and it means, "If I am occasionally a little over-dressed, I make up for it by being always immensely over-educated." Which is relevant to their conversation, of course.

It says a lot about Jan Sleet that she can pull both the quote and the translation out of her head (she quotes the play elsewhere also, but in English) and it says at least as much about Claudia that she catches the reference (and, of course, the meaning).

Obviously, you do have to make sure that it's plausible that the specific character will have that information. Otherwise, it's just a deus ex machina, and you'll lose the reader. But, for example, it's already clearly established (and plausible) that Jan Sleet understands French (we've seen her speak Italian and Spanish as well, and we can infer that she speaks Portuguese), and the extent of Claudia's education has already been discussed. As I wrote before, you can't suddenly have Wolverine sit down and play the harpsichord, or write PHP code.

(Sometimes, with a first person narrator, you have to account for what a character doesn't know. One of the mystery stories, "The Rock Band Mystery," is set in a rock band rehearsal space. I know a lot about those types of places, but Marshall was narrating and he knows nothing about such things, so I had to make sure the descriptions didn't include things he wouldn't notice or information that he wouldn't know.)


readers wanted
I'm looking for at least a couple of people who fit the following two criteria:

  • You've never read any of my writing (or possibly very little; depending on what, I may be able to adjust for that)
  • You'd like to read a few chapters and give feedback

The problem I'm trying to solve is this:

  • I'm working on a revision of my third novel
  • My third novel follows the other two, in terms of setting, plot, and characters
  • It has to work for people who have never read the other two

This is not something I or my most regular readers can really determine. So, if you'd be interested, please let me know (email or comment is fine). The chapters mentioned are not yet written, so it will be a while. I'm working on the first one, and they will be posted one at a time.


more quiet people

"The Mystery of the Quiet People" is now posted here. It is complete, though there will be an epilogue at some point. The new parts of the story start here.

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