FAQ - What Are Your Limits?

Q: Are there things you won't do in your writing or things you just won't write about?

 

A:  Some readers  vow that they won't read a book if the writer: harms a dog, kills a cat, abuses a child, writes a prologue, puts in too much back story, ends on a cliff-hanger, leaves out the back story, writes about violence to women,  gets preachy and pushes a cause, uses adverbs, deploys the F-word, engages in stereotyping, writes dialect, uses italics, kills off an on-going character, uses the past perfect,  writes in a character (human or animal) just for the sake of killing it,  puts in/leaves out sex scenes  . . . I’m sure there are more. And I've been guilty of many of them.

As a writer of mystery, I'm fascinated by how strongly some folks feel about so many things in the mystery genre.  If I followed all these proscriptions, would I gain more readers?

Every writer has heard such warnings— "People won't buy books that ______." And if you want to hear readers express themselves passionately on any of these subjects, just spend a little time at Dorothy L. This online discussion group for mystery fans is an interesting glimpse into the thoughts and opinions of some of mystery’s most ardent and vocal fans.

 Take prologues. There are more than a few Dorothy L-ers who declare that they always skip the prologue and begin at the first chapter.  Always.  As if it were a point of honor. Puzzling.  I had prologues in my second and third books (ART’S BLOOD and OLD WOUNDS) but by my fourth book I was beginning to wonder if I was making a Big Mistake. So I took the prologue I’d written for IN A DARK SEASON and called it Chapter One. Hardly hurt at all.

It’s not so easy to adhere to some of the other requirements various readers have. Early on, I promised a friend that I would never harm a dog in any of my books. That was easy to do – especially since my protagonist’s dogs are based on mine. But then, after I’d mentioned this promise here, a reader made a plea that I would extend the same courtesy to cats.

Oh dear, where will it end, I thought, and in my post What About the Cats?  I explained why I couldn’t make any more promises of this kind. Bunnies aren't safe either. Or people. These are murder mysteries, after all.

The thing is, I finally realized that I have to tell the story and write the book the best way I can – the way the story unfolds as I tap away at my laptop -- not paying attention to polls or writing manuals or even fervent pleas from cat lovers because, in the end, if you tell the story well, you can break the so-called rules.  

No, you can’t please everybody. Somewhere, some day, some affronted reader is going to hurl your book against a wall and vow never to read another. So be it.

“You have to shatter the reader,” was one of the first things my editor told me – before she offered me a contract. So sometimes I write up to the edge of that fine line between engaging readers and turning them off – and thank heavens, there are no promises to keep.

Except for the one about the dogs – they’re still untouchable.