Detective novels twenty rules

First, the reader must be given an equal opportunity to solve the mystery with the detective, and all clues must be clearly explained.

Second, in addition to the murderer to the detective to play the necessary criminal techniques, should not deliberately deceive or improper trickery to fool the reader.

Third, you can not add love in the story, so that irrational emotions do not interfere with the purely rational deduction. What we want is to put the murderer in the court of justice, not to send a couple in love to the altar of marriage.

Fourth, the detective himself or the police searchers can not be transformed into a murderer. To do so is the same as to take a penny copper and say that it is a five-dollar gold coin, which is an untrue statement.

Fifth, the accusation of murder, must be through logical reasoning, can not be false accident, coincidence, or no reasonable motive of the suspect confession. To solve the case in the latter way is tantamount to intentionally driving the reader to search for an impossible answer, and then, when the reader fails to come back, telling them that the answer is in your pocket from beginning to end.

Six, deductive fiction must have a detective, the detective does not detect the case can not be called a detective. The task of the detective is to collect all possible clues, and then based on these clues to find out that the story at the beginning of the person who committed the evil deeds. If the detective cannot analyze the clues and deduce the final conclusion, then it is like peeking at the arithmetic class book after the answer to the schoolchildren, not really solved the mystery.

VII. In speculative fiction, there are usually corpses, and the more suspicion a corpse reveals, the better. A crime that lacks murder is too thin, too underweight, and three hundred pages for a crime so mundane is too much. After all, the reader must be rewarded for his or her time and effort. Americans are by nature more humane, so a vicious murder stirs up feelings of revenge and fear, and they want the killer to be brought to justice. So, when a "vicious" murder occurs, even the most gentle reader will pursue the murderer with a passion for justice.

Eight, solve the case only through natural methods. In terms of speculative fiction, magic, divination, mind-reading, séance or crystal ball and so on are all listed as taboo. According to a rational reasoning story, readers have a fair chance to participate in the battle of wits, but if the world of competition with the supernatural, and even cross the body of the fourth dimension of the world of the shape of the murderer, readers are equal to the starting point on the doomed to lose.

Nine, there can only be one detective, that is, the protagonist responsible for the real reasoning to arrest the murderer, like the ancient Greek war drama deus ex machina, the god of the siege, is unique. In order to solve a mystery and move to three or four detectives, will only distract the fun of reading, disrupt the pulse of logical reasoning, and will improperly deprive readers and detectives of the rights and interests of a fair battle of wits. The number of detectives more than one, the reader will not be able to figure out who is his real competitors, which is like letting a reader single pick a relay team.

X. The murderer must be a more or less significant character in the novel. That is, the murderer must be a character that the reader is interested in, and more or less knows about. If the novel proceeds to the last chapter, only to put the charge on a stranger, or an insignificant character, that is the author admits that he is incompetent, and does not deserve to fight with the readers.

XI. Those who are servants, let us say butlers, footmen, waiters, keepers, cooks, and so on, must not be chosen as murderers. Because such a murderer is too obvious, too easy to be found, such treatment is really unsatisfactory, the reader will also feel that a waste of time. The murderer must be someone worth the time and trouble of finding - usually the least suspected one. If the murderer is really some humble slave, there's really no need for a writer to write a book about such a story for the world to remember.

XII. Even in serial killings, there can only be one murderer. Of course, there can be a *** offender or *** plotter, but only one person must be allowed to pick up all the blame for the crime, and all the reader's anger must be focused on the single outlaw.

Thirteen: In speculative fiction, it's best not to have secret societies, gangs, or crime syndicates like the Mafia, or the author is writing adventure or spy fiction. A perfect murder mystery is irrevocably doomed if so many people are involved. Of course, the murderer in a mystery novel should still have a legitimate chance to escape, but to have an entire secret organization backing him up (e.g., an all-encompassing hideout or a large group of people to protect him) is obviously too much. I'm sure a first-rate murderer with self-respect wouldn't allow himself to be cloaked in impenetrable armor before taking the field against a detective.

Fourteenth, the killing method and crime solving method must be reasonable and scientific. That is to say, speculative fiction is not allowed to use pseudo-scientific, pure fantasy or speculative mechanism device, for example, the murder of the deceased by the discovery of new elements such as super radium killed, this is unreasonable; or, with extremely rare, even the author of the imaginary poison killed, this is also not allowed. A writer of speculative fiction must limit his imagination in poisons, and the poisons used must not exceed the scope of the common pharmacopoeia. If the author is free to fly in the world of imagination, and to soar in the non-existent space and time without any inhibitions, then it will be out of the boundaries of the speculative fiction.

Fifteen, the truth of the mystery must be clear and organized, so that readers with sharp eyes can see through it. What I mean is that after the case has been revealed, if the reader rereads the novel, he will clearly find that the key to solving the case is always in front of his eyes, and all the clues are pointing to the same murderer. If he is as smart as the detective, he can solve the case himself without waiting for the last chapter. Of course, such readers do exist. My basic theory about speculative fiction is that if the structure of a speculative novel is written in a fair and reasonable manner, it is impossible for the reader not to be able to discover the answers on his own. It is to be expected that there must be a certain segment of readers who are as resourceful as the author. If the author has enough sportsmanship, the plan of the crime and the clues are honestly described in the book, these keen readers can be the same as the book's detectives, through analysis, reasoning and elimination of the suspects will be identified, and this is exactly where the fun of the game, which also explains why some of the readers who do not care to read popular literature, for the reason of reading the reasoning of novels do not feel red

Sixth, too much narrative. > 16, too long narrative text, subtle character analysis, excessive atmosphere or for some of the minutiae to play with the text, should not appear in the reasoning novel. These are totally unimportant in the recording of the crime and the process of deduction. The main purpose is to state the problem and to analyze it in order to draw satisfactory inferences. This type of writing only hinders the development of the plot and adds irrelevant things to the theme. Of course, the necessary narration and characterization can make a novel more realistic. When the author makes the story so compelling that the reader's emotions are fully invested in the development of the plot and the portrayal of the characters, he has, in this respect, brought the purely literary skill and the truthfulness and compatibility required for a crime document into equal measure

. Writing speculative fiction is a very rigorous business, and readers don't read it for florid diction and style, or for splendid narration and emotional projection, but for the mental activity done to stimulate the brain - as if they were going to a ball game or a game of Scrabble. If, at a baseball game, the players are told during changeover time how beautiful the natural beauty of the field is, how does that motivate the players to want to win the game? If the vocabulary in a game of charades is laced with difficult words used in academic papers on linguistics, this will only make the charmer agitated while playing the game.

XVII. Professional criminals should not be made responsible for crimes in speculative fiction. As for the bad things done by thieving villains who break in, they are the responsibility of the police, not of writers and distinguished amateur detectives; such offenses belong to the routine work of the criminal division. It is only crime that really attracts people, when it should come from some respectable big shot in the church, or from an old lady famous for her charity.

18. In speculative fiction, a crime must not end in an accident or a suicide; this kind of ending is an unforgivable joke on the reader. If someone buys the book, realizes that it is a fraud and asks for his money back, any impartial court will side with him and punish the writer who has cheated his loyal readers.

XIX. The motives for crimes in speculative fiction are personal. As for political games of international intrigue and strategy they belong to a different kind of fiction, like, for example, stories of secret service organizations and the like. The plot of a murder must be kept somewhat simple in order to reflect the reader's daily experience and to give vent to their long-suppressed desires and emotions.

XX. Below is a list of a few common methods (and by the way, I've rounded up these rules) that have been used to great effect. A speculative fiction writer who knows how to respect himself usually won't use them again, because all speculative fiction fans are more than familiar with these methods. Anyone who uses it is admitting their own stupidity and lack of creativity.

(A) Identify the murderer by comparing the cigarette butts left at the crime scene with the brand of cigarettes smoked by the suspect.

(B) Pretend that the victim's ghost has manifested itself to scare the killer into confessing.

(C) Fake fingerprints.

(D) Creating an alibi with a dummy.

(E) Because the dog doesn't bark, it means the intruder is an acquaintance.

(F) An innocent person is identified as the murderer, but turns out to be the murderer's twin brother (or sister) or a very similar-looking relative.

(G) Injecting with a syringe or putting ecstasy in a drink.

(H) The murder begins when the police break into a locked room.

(I) Guilt by association.

(J) The use of a code or secret word that is eventually recognized by the detective.