Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel: Part II

Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel was somewhat easy to write, probably because I had been thinking about it for three years. Some chapters took me a day to write, some two or three days. I went at it steadily, so that I would never lose touch with the purpose of the book and the tone of the book.

After I finished, I let a couple of weeks go by, and then I sat down with the manuscript and read it critically, marking it up heavily. From these marked-up pages I wrote the second draft. I showed that draft to my first two readers, listened to what they had to say, and wrote the third draft. I showed that to two more readers, and wrote the fourth (final) draft.

As I mentioned in my previous blog, my actual working title for this book was Writing the Mystery Novel, even though there were a few books with that title already out there. I knew that at some point I would change the title. When that time came, I read up on what constitutes a good nonfiction title. And subtitle. 

Many articles suggested making the title humorous and the subtitle serious. But I felt I wanted the main title to carry the message of what the book is, so that anybody searching for it could find it easily. And I wanted the subtitle to reflect what was in the book. Once I decided to title the book Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel, it took me maybe a minute to come up with the subtitle, Lots of Examples. I liked the down-to-earth feeling of the word “Lots,” which is of course colloquial. 

It’s amazing how our subconscious works parallel to and in step with our consciousness on occasions. No sooner had I deliberately, consciously chosen the colloquial Lots of Examples than, out of nowhere, my subconscious prodded, Plus Dead Bodies.

So I spent maybe three hours reading up on and thinking about nonfiction titles, about five minutes deciding on my main title, and about two minutes coming up with the subtitle. But the five minutes and two minutes would never have given me the solution had I not spent those three hours researching and thinking.

Every time I decide to self-publish a book, I ask Robin Koontz to design the cover. I’m always thrilled with her cover designs, and this one is no exception. It was Robin who came up with the idea of crime scene markers for the subtitle of the book and also for the inside chapter titles. I love it! In fact, even though I know about crime scene tape, I was unaware of crime scene markers — but I am so glad that Robin was aware of them! 

Robin also came up with the dead body (don’t ask how!), the layout, the colors, and the typefaces. An immensely appealing cover, I think. (Thank you, Robin!)

Designers put great thought into not only the front cover of books, but also the back cover. Personally, I find back covers difficult to decide on. The back cover of She’s on First contains review quotes: such testimonial blurbs are the most common back cover item. The back covers of Dirty Proof and Sound Proof contain book descriptions: sort of what the inside flap copy would be like in a hardback book.

The back cover of Research Notes Volume 1 contains extensive about-the-author information. The back cover of Volume 2 contains two long review quotes about Volume 1. The back cover of Jack and Larry contains five testimonials from sources with clout. The back cover of my poetry collection, Crossing the Skyway, contains nothing but the continuation of color from the front of the cover.

For Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel, I was seriously thinking of describing the contents of the book (as with Dirty Proof and Sound Proof), but Robin Koontz came up with a better idea. She took the topics discussed in the twenty-five chapters and created an attractive, intriguing, eye-catching collage of these topics for the back cover. This is my favorite of all the back covers of all my books.

Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel was the eighth book I self-published, but it was the first of those books to contain an index. If I were using such a book as Guide and had finished reading it, then at a later date wanted to refresh my memory about what the author said about, say, subplots, I would want an index — because I couldn’t assume that every comment about subplots would be within the chapter on subplots.

So I asked Sharon Johnson, a friend who’s a professional indexer, and who indexed Women at Play back in 1993, if she would create the index. She said she would (Thank you, Sharon!), and the book has an index. I hope that many people find this index useful.

It’s interesting how things work out. If I hadn’t written my first mystery, Dirty Proof, I wouldn’t have written a second mystery with the same detective hero. And if I hadn’t written that second mystery, Sound Proof, and used it when teaching, I would have never written Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel: Lots of Examples, Plus Dead Bodies. In fiction, one thing leads to another. Just as in life.

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Barbara Gregorich’s most recent book is Charlie Chan’s Poppa: Earl Derr Biggers.