Tag Archives: plotting

Plotting Mystery Novels by @_NancyRadke

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Mystery novels are a little bit different than regular stories because you need to plot backwards on some things. I wrote two cozy mysteries, Any Lucky Dog Can Follow a Trail of Blood, 2021, and Any Lucky Dog Can Find a Missing Child, 2022, and am starting to plot the third one, Any Lucky Dog Can Save Her Master’s Life (working title).

Mystery Novel

Because this is a series, I already have the dog’s name, Lucky, and the hero, Sheriff Craig, and the heroine, Jenna. I also have the town and many characters in the town. But because this is a series, I have to figure out what time of year I want it. Right now I think I will put this in December, when Jenna and Craig plan to have their wedding. Nothing like a murder to interfere with wedding plans.

Plotting backwards involves deciding on the villain or villains—who they are and what their motive is before you plan anything else. Once I have that, then I have to decide who they will kill and how. Since I am just starting to plot, I haven’t made these decisions yet. I am at the stage of just jotting down ideas in a notebook.

Next, I need to figure out what clues the sheriff and Jenna will follow to solve the mystery. I also need to decide on what are called “red herrings.” These look like clues but lead nowhere.

Who will find the body? I’ve already decided that it will be Lucky who leads them to the body, and I’ve decided where I’m going to hide it, as this will be the opening chapter. I might have to change it, but that sounds good right now.

Two other books which I plotted backward were Scorpion’s Trail (my all-time favorite) and Stolen Secrets, both written in the late 1900’s.

I am not an author who enjoys plotting. It “ruins” the excitement of writing the book when I know all the answers. But a mystery can’t be written totally plotless. If I can, I will avoid plotting some scenes and let them write themselves. Then I’ll enjoy it more and I think the book just turns out better.

I enjoy watching Korean mystery series on Netflix and pick up some ideas from them. Two series I watch over and over are “Stranger” and “Beyond Evil.” Neither are “cozy” but I enjoy the characters and watching how they work the clues into the plot.

If you enjoy mystery novels, take a look at Murder Is To Die For, a boxed set featuring diehard dames who don’t give up.

Diehard Dames

Find other Authors’ Billboard Boxed Sets by clicking here.

Plotting Around Cell Phones by @_NancyRadke

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Cell PhoneThe first books I wrote, the Sisters of Spirit series, were written before cell phones were even thought of, much less used, by everyone. That’s not very many years ago and I wrote them on a typewriter.  When I went to publish them, I had to bring some of them up-to-date by adding modern things like the cell phone and the personal computer, which I switched to while we still needed to open it in DOS (the disk operating system).

Not Easy To Do

The addition of cell phones changes a plot. Instead of being out in the wilderness without a phone, the injured hero just calls rescue. Now the plot must be changed so that there is no coverage, or his phone is broken during his fall, or the battery is dead.  Authors are forced to use these excuses so that they can keep the hero in trouble longer. In my latest Brothers of Spirit book, Terminal Pursuit, the hero has thrown his phone out the car window onto the highway so he can’t be traced, and is wishing that the phone booths that used to be on the street corners were still there. He threw his first phone into the river earlier in the book, along with a bomb that had been placed in the car.

Terminal Pursuit

Into The Future

I found a TV show called Tunnel especially interesting. The detective hero is sent 30 years into the future. He doesn’t know what has happened to his typewriter, what a computer is, or what the things are that folks are carrying around with them. How can a picture get on their phone? He hasn’t heard of DNA or CCTV (closed circuit television). He doesn’t have a driver’s license and has to bum rides and borrow money. But his detecting methods still work.

I was in my seventies before I got a cell phone. I don’t use it every minute of the day. And I don’t carry my phone on me as it is heavy and pulls my jeans down. It sits wherever I’ve left it, and I have to run through the house to answer it. If I’m outside, I’ll miss a call. I can deposit money and do online banking on the phone. But I just found out that you can get a pinpoint GPS with your phone, which I then added to the latest book I’m writing, a cozy mystery called Any Lucky Dog Can Follow a Trail of Blood. This book is part of the Authors’ Billboard anthology called Murder is to Die For. The anthology will be available a week from now on 9-17-21. Technology grows faster than I can write.

Writing A Book Takes Time

So when you read a book and the technology isn’t up-to-date, just realize how long it takes to write a book sometimes. Modern technology might not have even been around when the author was plotting the book. Things like drones, or computer phones as part of your wrist watch. That last was first envisioned by the author of the Dick Tracy comic strip; the detective had a two-way wrist radio. The real watch far surpasses the wrist radio, but I remember thinking that we’d never have anything like that. Now my daughter talks to her wrist all the time.