 Mystery: May 02, 2018 Issue [#8883] |
  Mystery
This week: The Tone of the Crime Edited by: Jeff  
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"The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the
fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science."
-- Albert Einstein
Trivia of the Week: Detective fiction author Laura Lippman was formerly a reporter for the Baltimore Sun. She met and eventually married another Baltimore Sun reporter, who went on to create and executive produce the television series The Wire. As an homage to his wife, the character Bunk is shown reading one of her books (In A Strange City) in episode eight of the first season, and Lippman herself appeared in the first episode of the last season as a reporter working in the Baltimore Sun newsroom.
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THE TONE OF THE CRIME
When it comes to writing mysteries, a lot is discussed of the protagonist's career (cop, private investigator, FBI agent, bounty hunter, etc.), and even more about the nuances of the plot (whodunit, how they dunit, etc.). What isn't as often talked about is the type of tone that your crime story is trying to strike with the audience.
Tone is important to a story because it tells your audience how they should feel about the events in the story. And in narratives that focus on the commission (or solving) of a crime, there are a wide range of tones that you might want to strike. A heist, for example, might have the lighthearted, feel-good tone of the Ocean's Eleven gang sticking it to a casino boss who stole the protagonist's girl or the Italian Job crew stealing back the money that was stolen from them from their double-crossing ex-partner. Then again, it might have a grittier, more violent tone like The Town or Heat.
Here's a list of tones that you might want to consider for your crime stories, and some examples of each:
Tone: PLAYFUL
Stories where the criminals are having fun and/or the people chasing them are having fun too.
Examples: Ocean's Eleven, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Sting
Tone: SILLY
Often playful as well, the crimes or criminals in these stories are often inept or things go sideways to a humorous degree.
Examples: Trapped In Paradise, Bottle Rocket, Raising Arizona
Tone: IMPARTIAL/NEUTRAL
Some stories don't take a particularly positive or negative stance on the crime in the film, whether it's because the criminal element takes a backseat to something else or otherwise.
Examples: The Usual Suspects, Confidence, Memento
Tone: CYNICAL
These stories often have a bleak take on the human condition, exploring human frailty and weakness.
Examples: Training Day, Nightcrawler, Dark Blue
Tone: GRIM
While cynical stories often show characters who are realistically bleak, grim stories are downright dark in their explorations of the depths of the human psyche.
Examples: Se7en, Sin City, Chinatown
The next time you're writing a crime story, it's worth considering the tone you want to present. Just as there are multiple perspectives to tell a story from, and multiple types of crime you can write about, there are also a multitude of tones you can assign to the crime itself, which can result in radically different types of narratives.
If you're the kind of person who likes to tell lighthearted, fun crime stories, consider tackling one with a little more grit and darkness to it. And if you're the kind of person who likes to write heavy, bleak crime stories, try your hand at a more upbeat, laid back type of story where your characters have a little fun in the process. By changing up the tone to your crime story, you can tell essentially the same story in scores of different ways.
Until next time,
Jeff
If you're interested in checking out my work:
"Blogocentric Formulations"
"New & Noteworthy Things"
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EXCERPT: My name is Kai Elliot, and I'm sitting in the shadow of a broken down taxi that smells like burning coffee and oil.
Being stranded in the middle of an isolated road with said car and an irritated driver is one way to start my new life in the more rural side of this country. It's not my most preferred way, but at least this one isn't as boring if not unfortunate way to start my new chapter in life.
As I sit in the shadow of the car, I hear the sounds of the tires being mercilessly kicked by the taxi driver over and over again. A sigh escaped my chapped lips and I drank some water from my water bottle.
EXCERPT: I glanced around the attic for the fourth time. Large leather-bound books were stacked on shelves and in corners. Most of the titles were the same, or at least sounded the same. "Monsters and Magick." "Myths and Monsters." "Supernatural Monsters That Live Today." I thought most of the books were bogus but cool to look at least. But I was really interested in the boxes of raw stones. Quartz, Topaz, Opals, and so much more. Apparently, they all had some sort of spiritual effect. I didn't really know much about that kind of thing; it was more of my friend Chloe's thing, but I liked to look at them while listening to Chloe try to explain them.
EXCERPT: A flash of tiny bright dots blinded Merryn from the cast spell. Rubbing them she stumbled onto the cobblestone walkway. The dangling coin pouch on her hip jangled, so she grasped it, silencing it.
Giving it a double squeeze, it stretched out and slammed back down, compressing its contents.
The port and the book were at opposite ends of the city, hopefully, the map would have a few shortcuts marked on it. Paved jade streets and marble lined walls bled of status and wealth.
She pulled the map out from another pouch. Yes, it's off ahead; the northern district.
EXCERPT: She walked into my office like she owned the joint. Unlike the usual simpering, sighing broads, this kitten knew what she was after. I tipped my fedora back and ranked the dish up and down. From the way she was dressed I figured the dame was a chippy, crushed out from the head doctors.
EXCERPT: Amalasanda Wolff was a pre-eminent personality in the industrially advanced city of Berlin, for he was the owner of the Wolff Inc. establishment which manufactured the most wonderful cars in town. His cars were regarded as technical wonders by the people of Berlin. They saw him as the most honest face in town. But he had a secret no one knew of- he had a twin brother.
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