by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig
I’ve written here before about cozy mystery victims and how tricky the process can be. It’s tough to make the victim a genuinely good person when you need to have five people with good motives to kill them. But you also don’t want to make the victim someone totally irredeemable because the reader may not end up invested in whether the murderer is caught or not.
I’ve been mulling over an article by PJ Parrish that I read some time back. She talked about the need to have more than just “cardboard corpses.” She also quotes Ross Macdonald, who said:
The detective isn’t your main character, and neither is your villain. The main character is the corpse. The detective’s job is to seek justice for the corpse. It’s the corpse’s story, first and foremost.
I love this perspective. I’ve always known the victim was important because I basically plan the story around them. Who is this person and why do people want to kill him or her? Of course, when you’re considering motives, you’re often thinking about the negative characteristics of the victim or the problems they had in relation to other people.
To make the victim come alive after they’ve already died, it’s helpful to have your sleuth make conversation with a variety of different characters, from suspects to the deceased’s family members and friends. The suspects may want to find something good to say about the victim to deflect attention from the antipathy they had toward them. The family and friends will round things out with a more complete picture of the victim: what they were interested in, who they loved, what they wanted out of life.
Getting that fuller picture helps readers care about the outcome in the case and helps the victim be more than just Mr. Boddy from the Clue board game. It also provides a little more depth for the cozy.
This process can also work for providing more rounded antagonists, too.
If you’re a mystery reader or writer, have you thought much about the victim? How do you make victims (or your antagonists) more complete characters?
Cozy Mysteries: More About Victims: Share on XImage by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
Talking to people who knew the victim is often the only way readers will know anything about them. I can see all sorts of interesting things coming out in those conversations.
Red herrings and clues, for sure!
I think you're right, Elizabeth, about the importance of the victim. That person gets killed for a reason, and we don't find that reason until we know who that person was and what that person was like. I'd suppose that's one reason that it's so hard to sold 'John/Jane Doe' crimes. We don't know anything about the victim. If you can get readers to care about the victim, you get them to want to solve the mystery, in my opinion.
I totally agree. So much more interesting when we know all about the victim!
I haven't heard the term "cardboard corpses" before – that's awesome!
I'm getting better at making my villains more rounded and realistic – but it's an ongoing battle :)
It can be a tough one!
You'd probably uncover a lot of good stuff because no one would want to throw suspicion on themselves by talking trash about the dead.
Very true! That’s something of a giveaway, ha.
Don't undervalue the importance of your victim's involvement when creating a cozy mystery. They are more than just a plot device; they are an important part of the story. Creating a well-rounded victim can increase the intrigue and satisfaction of your mystery for your readers.
I don’t have as much about my first victim as he was sort of caught up in all the evil of the main victim/second body drop. When my sleuth starts digging for clues, the evil of the second victim comes out then. Like how many people despise him/her.
Maybe you can circle back around to your first victim right before the end. Sounds like a nice opportunity for a red herring (Victim 1 was despised by ____. Not connected to victim 2. Maybe victim could have had advance information about victim 2’s death.