In a mystery series (murder, crime, medical, or otherwise), every story needs to start with a third party that hasn’t been seen before, and who will most likely never appear again. That’s true of many short stories as well, although it’s possible to “cheat” and have short stories really be a series.
And then you have the core of the mystery series, the detectives or doctors or whoever, who always appear, whose personal stories are long and cover multiple stories, intertwining with the temporary stories of their clients.
How do you make that combination work? It’s more complicated than simply having a core set of characters. Instead, you have a core set and another important set who’s part of the current story. You need to work two teams, the home team and the visitors.
And more importantly, the plot that involves the visitors–the introduction of the case and the solving of it–is the driving force of the book–the character moments in the home team are more or less a background rhythm, whether subtle or a rock beat, that’s what it is.
Which makes mysteries (and others of that ilk) really about short stories.
I tend to be a character-driven writer, not plot-driven. I’ll have to change my tack to be plot-driven as well, which isn’t my strength. But I must make it my strength.
I’m watching House, M.D. and trying to puzzle out how it’s done. I feel such sympathy for the characters who come on and off, even though they last but less than 30 minutes of screen time all told (but a most important half hour they are). And yet the character moments between the core characters are done, just right, enough to make them compelling from episode to episode.
It’s like studying magicians from a distance, trying to see the tricks they pull, when you’re strongly tempted to just sit back and enjoy the illusion with the rest of the audience, because the observation is difficult work.
Observing, observing… writing.
