The murder mystery genre is alive and well and living at an on-line bookstore just a mouse click away. How is it that this over-utilized method of story-telling has remained so fresh and compelling after well over a hundred years? The answer lies in the basics of writing.
Grab Them Where it Hurts and Their Minds Will Follow
An author must first and foremost always tell a compelling story, involving, to one extent or another, recognizable three-dimensional characters. The fact that the story takes place against an otherwise formulaic backdrop, involving the effort to solve a murder mystery is just icing on the cake.
A reader needs to care about at least one of three people: the person who was murdered; the murderer; or the person searching for the murderer. Unless the reader can identify with at least one of them, the story will generally not coalesce. Reading a book utilizes our time, and in the modern world, that is frequently our most precious resource. The author must have a compelling answer to the question: why should I waste my time reading your novel?
The answer to that question is that the story is about someone the reader will find quite...