There’s a Story in Your Voice*

A lot of factors affect whether a reader gets drawn into a book or series or is disengaged. One of them of course is the main characters’ personalities. If there’s no-one in the story to like or at least appreciate, that’s enough for a lot of readers to send the book to the DNF pile. An interesting post by Elizabeth Spann Craig has got me thinking about one way that authors reveal their characters’ personalities: internal dialogue. When we get a look at the way a character thinks, we get a sense of what that person is like and we can decide whether or not that character interests us or not. That’s one way in which internal dialogue can be a powerful way to “show not tell.” Lots of authors focus the reader even more on internal dialogue by using the first person when they write. For readers who like novels written in the first person, internal dialogue is probably the most important way they decide whether they like the main character’s personality.

Some of Agatha Christie’s novels are written in the first person. For instance, there are several first-person stories written from the point of view of Captain Arthur Hastings. Those stories tell us quite a lot about Hastings’ character and it’s often revealed through his internal dialogue. In Dumb Witness (AKA Poirot Loses a Client), for instance, Poirot and Hastings investigate the poisoning murder of wealthy Emily Arundell. She left behind a group of relations, all of whom are desperate for their shares of her fortune, so there are several suspects. Hastings has been raised in the English tradition of sportsmanship and a certain set of expected (and taboo) behaviours, and we see this in this novel. Here for instance is his reaction when he observes Poirot listening at a door:

 

“At whatever school Poirot was educated, there were clearly no unwritten rules about eavesdropping. I was horrified but powerless. I made urgent signs to Poirot, but he took no notice.”

 

We don’t need a detailed description of Hastings’ modest, sometimes even retiring, and always “old school tie” personality. It comes through in his internal dialogue.

Ross Macdonald chose to write his Lew Archer stories in the first person as well. Archer is a private detective who isn’t afraid of fisticuffs if that’s what a case comes to, but at the same time, he’s hardly heartless. He has deep compassion for his clients (in that way he’s reminiscent of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee) and gets involved in his cases. His clients are really people to him. Readers can see that just from his internal dialogue. In The Far Side of the Dollar for example, Archer is investigating the disappearance of seventeen-year-old Tom Hillman from the school he attended. At first it looks as though Hillman, who comes from a wealthy family, might have been kidnapped. But it’s not long before the case becomes more complex than that. As Archer discovers, it’s all related to the Hillman family, their relationships and their pasts. Here’s a bit of internal dialogue that takes place while Archer is waiting for a piece of evidence he is expecting from an old acquaintance:

 

“I sat in the echoing silence thinking that she [his acquaintance Susanna Drew] had been treated badly by a man or by men. It made me angry to think of it. I didn’t go out for dinner after all. I sat and nursed my anger until Susanna’s messenger arrived.”

 

Other internal dialogue in the Lew Archer stories shows without telling that Archer’s observant, has a good memory and notices psychology as much as he does physical appearance.

A character’s sense of humour and attitude towards life can also come through in first-person internal dialogue. That’s the way Kerry Greenwood has revealed the personality of her Melbourne accountant-turned baker sleuth Corinna Chapman. Chapman isn’t what you would call an eager sleuth but she does care about her fellow humans and often gets drawn into cases that way. For instance, in Heavenly Pleasures, she’s upset when neighbours Juliette and Vivienne Lefebvre’s chocolate shop is seemingly sabotaged by someone who fills delicate chocolate with chili. Chapman is beginning to look into this case when her lover Daniel Cohen comes back from a trip to Ballarat the worse for wear after a run-in with a polygamist. The two incidents could very well be related to a new resident in Insula, the building where Chapman lives and works. It could also be related to a missing girl and a possible case of “possession.” Chapman and Cohen work together to untangle the mystery and throughout this novel (and the others in the series) we see Chapman’s personality. For example, here’s what she thinks during an interview she has with police officer Letty White after an unknown person tries to climb into her apartment:

 

“‘You must have got a shock,’ she [White] said in her dry, exact voice.
‘No, you think so?’ I asked weakly. I was too exhausted to scream at her. Probably a good idea since few police officers take to being screamed at.”

 

Even from those few lines of internal dialogue we can see Chapman’s independent style and sometimes sarcastic sense of humour. We also see her familiarity with and even liking for Letty White combined with her lack of blind obedience to authority. We don’t have to be told these things so the story moves along smoothly and keeps the reader’s interest.

There’s some very effective first person internal dialogue in Anthony Bidulka’s Russell Quant mysteries. Quant is a former Saskatoon Police Service (SPS) cop turned private investigator. He’s smart, resourceful and quick, which are good things because although he’s far from a weakling or a coward, Quant prefers to avoid getting into physical fights. In A Flight of Aquavit, he investigates the case of Daniel Guest, a successful married accountant who’s being blackmailed because he’s had a few secret trysts with other men. What starts out as a case of blackmail turns deadly and Quant finds out that it’s a far more complex case than he thought. At one point Quant visits a local theatre to track down the possible blackmailer and is confronted by a young secretary whom he hopes will provide him with pictures of some of the actors:

 

“‘Hello, my name is Rick Astley and I’m the Artistic Director for Theatre Quant in Mission.’ I was betting she wasn’t old enough to be up on her late 1980’s teen idol trivia or informed enough about British Columbia community theatre to catch on to my clever ruse. And actually she looked pretty unimpressed with life in general regardless of the decade. I continued on, hoping my enthusiasm, if not my really bad English accent, would be contagious.”

 

Quant does persuade the girl to give him the information he needs, and his effort turns out to have been worth it, because the ‘photos do provide him with a tiny piece of the puzzle. And we can see just from this bit that he’s got a sarcastic and somewhat self-deprecating sense of humour and doesn’t take himself too seriously. He is, though, committed to what he does. Other pieces of internal dialogue show us too that he cares about his clients and sees them as people, not just paychecks.

There are a lot of other examples of internal dialogue that show what a character is like. That’s often the way we decide whether we like a character’s personality or don’t. What about you? Do you enjoy internal dialogue or do you prefer a minimum of it? Does it draw you to a character? If you’re a writer, how do you use internal dialogue?

 

 
 

*NOTE: The title of this post is the title of an Elvis Costello song.

>"Cat’s Paws"

>Many murders, both in real life and in crime fiction, are planned and committed by just one person. Either the killer is holding a grudge, or hopes for some kind of gain from the killing, or kills in the heat of passion. Sometimes, though, the killer chooses a “cat’s paw” – an unwitting accomplice whom the killer uses as a tool to accomplish her or his purpose. On one hand, taking advantage of a “cat’s paw” allows the killer to “hide” behind someone else. On the other hand, most people don’t take kindly to being duped, especially if they’ve helped to cover a murder. This often means that the “cat’s paw” is a potential threat to the killer. Despite that risk, “cat’s paws” can be very useful, and there are certainly plenty of them in crime fiction.

Several of Agatha Christie’s novels feature the use of a “cat’s paw.” For example, in Thirteen at Dinner (AKA Lord Edgware Dies), Hercule Poirot investigates the stabbing death of the 4th Baron Edgware. Edgware’s wife, actress Jane Wilkinson, is the prime suspect. She’s eager to free herself so that she can marry the Duke of Merton. In fact, she asked Poirot to help her persuade Edgware to give her a divorce. She was also overheard saying that if she couldn’t get free of her husband, she’d have to “go round in a taxi and bump him off myself.” Also, on the night of the murder, someone looking exactly like Jane Wilkinson, and giving her name, came to see Edgware just before he was killed. The only problem with the case against Jane Wilkinson is that she claims she was attending a dinner party on the night in question. The host, the staff, and the other guests are all prepared to swear that she was there, too. So it seems that someone else must have killed Edgware. In the end, Poirot finds out who murdered Edgware and why; he also finds out that the killer has used two “cat’s paws” to accomplish that purpose.

There’s another fine example of a “cat’s paw” in Christie’s Third Girl. In that novel, Poirot gets a visit from a young woman, Norma Restarick, who says that she may have committed a murder. Before Poirot can even get her name, much less the details of the alleged crime, she leaves, saying that after all, he’s too old. With the help of his friend, detective story author Ariadne Oliver, Poirot finds out Norma Restarick’s identity and he and Oliver begin to try to find out if a murder was committed, and whether Norma was involved in the crime. After some searching, Poirot and Oliver discover that there was, indeed, an unexpected death. They’re just putting the pieces of that puzzle together when another murder occurs, and Norma Restarick is found next to the body, holding the murder weapon. In the end, Poirot finds out (with help from Oliver) who the murderer of both victims is. He’s also able to show that the murderer used Norma Restarick as a dupe in both cases.

In Ellery Queen’s The Origin of Evil, where we meet another “cat’s paw,” Queen takes a small house near Hollywood. His intention is to focus on his writing, but that plan is soon scuttled when he gets a visit from Lauren Hill. She’s recently lost her adoptive father, Leander Hill, to a heart attack, and is convinced that his death was deliberate. When Queen asks her for details, Lauren tells him that before his death, her father had received the gruesome gift of a dead dog, together with a cryptic note that more was to come. She also tells Queen that her father’s business partner, Roger Priam, has also been receiving strange gifts, although she knows less about those. When Queen approaches Priam about what’s been happening, he’s sharply rebuffed. Priam wants to handle his own problems, and is not interested in any help from Queen. Priam continues to receive notes and frightening packages, and then one day, he has a narrow escape from death. Despite Priam’s refusal to co-operate, Queen finds out who’s responsible for Leander Hill’s death and for the attack on Roger Priam. It turns out that the real killer has made very clever use of a “cat’s paw” in engineering everything – such clever use, in fact, that even Queen doesn’t have the proof he needs to get the police involved. So, in the end, Queen chooses a very inventive way of keeping tabs on the murderer.

We also see a very clear example of a “cat’s paw” in Emma Lathen’s Murder to Go. Clyde Sweeney is a ne’er do well who’s gotten a job as a delivery driver for Chicken Tonight, a fast food franchise poised for real success. Chicken Tonight is also poised for a merger with Southeastern Insurance. Sweeney is bribed to poison some of the ingredients that he’s transporting from Chicken Tonight’s warehouse to some of its stores, and several customers are sickened. One of them even dies. When Sweeney flees after the death, everyone assumes that he’s solely responsible for the crimes. The real truth is quite different, though, as Sloan Guaranty Bank senior vice president John Putnam Thatcher finds out. The Sloan has a vested interest in Chicken Tonight and the merger, so Thatcher’s been asked to vet both companies; what he finds is that someone else used Sweeney as a dupe in order to scuttle the merger and ruin Chicken Tonight.

Appropriately enough, there’s also a “cat’s paw” plot in Lilian Jackson Braun’s The Cat Who Said Cheese. A mysterious woman who calls herself Ona Dolman has moved into the small town of Pickax, “400 miles north of nowhere,” and is staying at the local hotel. Everyone speculates about her, but no-one really knows who she is or why she’s there. One day, a stranger delivers flowers to the hotel for Ona, but the flowers contain a bomb. The resulting blast kills Anne Marie Toms, one of the chambermaids, and wounds two other people. Then, Ona Dolman, for whom the bomb was intended, suddenly leaves town. Jim Qwilleran, columnist for the Moose County Something, and Braun’s sleuth, has a newsman’s curiosity about the bombing and the arrival and disappearance of Ona Dolman. Before he can put the pieces together, though, there’s another death, this time what looks like an armed robbery. Gradually, Qwilleran connects the events, and they seem to center around Aubrey Scotten, a local beekeeper who also makes his own honey. Scotten’s truck was seen at the hotel on the day of the bombing, and it turns out that it was Scotten who delivered the flowers. Scotten’s role seems even clearer when Victor Greer, a tourist who’s visiting the area to do some fishing, is found in a cabin on Scotten’s property, stung to death. What Qwilleran discovers is that Greer’s death is also connected to the other deaths, and that Aubrey Scotten has been used as a “cat’s paw” by the murderer.

Ross McDonald tells the story of a “cat’s paw” in his short story, The Singing Pigeon. His sleuth, Lew Archer, has just crossed the border from Mexico into the U.S. when he stops for the night at the Siesta Motel, a small, off-the-beaten-path inn. At first, the manager seems unwilling to give Archer a room. He’s finally persuaded and Archer settles in for the night. The next morning, he hears a young woman screaming and sees that she’s got blood on one of her hands. The matter is quickly hushed up, and Archer is all but asked to leave the motel. He checks out, but soon finds an abandoned car in which he sees a dead man – with a towel from the hotel wrapped around him. Archer returns to the hotel and begins to investigate the death. While he’s trying to find out what happens, the young woman disappears. Archer believes that her disappearance is related to the murder, and goes in search of her. What he finds is that the murdered man and the young woman’s disappearance were connected to a group of mobsters, and that a hotel employee has been used as a “cat’s paw” to kill the man.

Stories that involve “cat’s paws” can be tricky because it can be difficult to believe that someone would allow her or himself to be used. Yet, it happens, and when it’s well-written, the “cat’s paw” strategy can add layers of interest and plot twists to a story. Do you enjoy mysteries that use this plot point? Which ones have you especially liked?

>She Never Mentions the Word, "Addiction"…*

>Crime fiction (except for historical crime fiction) tends to reflect the society and times during which it’s written. As social attitudes change and knowledge increases, crime fiction changes. One way in which crime fiction seems to have changed quite a bit through the years is in the way that it portrays drinking and drug use. In a lot of crime fiction, there’s been an association between addiction to alcohol and drugs and crime, but the way in which crime fiction depicts drinking and drug use has changed a great deal.

In the early days of crime fiction, drinking was a natural part of daily life, and although there were mentions of those who drank too much, alcoholism wasn’t really described as an addiction; rather, it was considered a sign of lack of moral fiber. Drug use was common in those days, too. For example, Sherlock Holmes is a user of both cocaine and morphine. Dr. Watson remonstrates with him, but Holmes sees no problem with his drug use. For instance, The Sign of the Four begins with an interesting discussion between the two on the topic. Watson notices Holmes preparing a syringe and asks whether he’s injecting cocaine or morphine. When Holmes tells Watson it’s cocaine and offers him some, Watson says that he’s not strong enough to tolerate its effects. Holmes then says,

“Perhaps you are right, Watson…I suppose that its influence is physically a bad one. I find it, however, so transcendently stimulating and clarifying to the mind that its secondary action is a matter of small moment.”

Watson’s response is equally interesting:

“Count the cost! Your brain may, as you say, be roused and excited, but it is a pathological and morbid process, which involves increased tissue-change and may at last leave a permanent weakness. You know, too, what a black reaction comes upon you. Surely the game is hardly worth the candle. Why should you, for a mere passing pleasure, risk the loss of those great powers with which you have been endowed? Remember that I speak not only as one comrade to another, but as a medical man to one for whose constitution he is to some extent answerable.”

Despite Watson’s objections, Holmes continues his drug use and what’s really interesting about it is that it’s almost glamorized in the Holmes stories. Holmes disapproves of opium use, but not because it’s a drug; rather, he sees it as having a dulling effect on the intellectual processes.

By the time Agatha Christie was writing, drug use had lost its air of glamour. In fact, in Death in the Air (AKA Death in the Clouds) and Murder in Mesopotamia, there are mentions of characters with drug habits. In both cases, the drug use is portrayed quite negatively and in Murder in Mesopotamia, Poirot mentions that prolonged drug use has the effect of “blunting the moral sense.” That negative portrayal of drug use is even more pronounced in Third Girl, where drug use and abuse plays an important role in the case of Norma Restarick, a young woman who comes to Poirot because she thinks that she may have committed a murder.

Many modern crime novels explore the seamier side of drug use and abuse, and quite often, it’s portrayed as the cause of a great deal of heartache, crime and murder. For example, several of Ian Rankin’s John Rebus novels deal with drug wars, AIDS, prostitution and other tragic consequences of drug use. Hide and Seek, for instance, begins with Rebus being called to the scene when the body of what seems like just another dead drug addict is found in an Edinburgh housing development in the worst part of town. On the surface, it’s just another overdose death, but the body is surrounded with satanic symbols, and it’s not long before Rebus suspects that it’s much more than just a drug death.

While there seems to be a definite trend in crime fiction to portray drug use negatively, the use of alcohol isn’t nearly so clear-cut. In several Agatha Christie novels, for instance, there are alcoholic characters who are presented unsympathetically. For example, in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, we’re told that Roger Ackroyd, whose death Hercule Poirot investigates, is a widower because his wife “drank herself into her grave.” In Death on the Nile, one of the characters, Salome Otterbourne, is an alcocholic who’s caused her daughter a great deal of unhappiness because of her drinking. And in The ABC Murders, one of the victims whose murders Poirot investigates has an unpleasant, alcoholic husband who’s the primary suspect in his wife’s murder – at first.

Some sleuths, too, are shown as alcoholics who struggle with their addiction. Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer is one example. Jo Nesbø’s Harry Hole is another example. So is Carol O’Connell’s Detective Riker, who mentors her sleuth Kathleen “Kathy” Mallory. There are, of course, many other examples throughout the history of crime fiction. So on one hand, there’s a solid argument that the tendency has been to portray drinking in a negative way. In earlier crime fiction, that negativity was because those who drank too much were presumed not to have enough self-discipline to curb their drinking habits. As time’s gone by and we understand alcoholism better, there’s been a tendency to portray alcoholism as an addiction, rather than a lack of discipline. Even today, there isn’t agreement, anyway, about what pushes some people into alcoholism.

What blurs the picture of alcoholism in crime fiction is that there’s also, in some ways, a glamorization of drinking. For example, in Golden Age crime fiction (e.g. the work of Ngaio Marsh, Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers), meals are nearly always accompanied by a great deal of alcohol. Careful attention is paid to the wine that’s served, and whenever guests visit, some form of alcohol is served. Characters who object to drinking are sometimes portrayed negatively, too. For instance, in Christie’s Dumb Witness (AKA Poirot Loses a Client), Poirot investigates the death of Miss Emily Arundell, a wealthy spinster. At the beginning of the novel, Miss Arundell has a conversation with a friend of hers about her niece Theresa’s fiancé, Rex Donaldson. During that conversation, she mentions her disappointment with Donaldson’s request to drink barley water when she’d “opened Papa’s special port” for a dinner he’d attended. There’s a distinct message there that gentlemen, anyway, should drink at least some alcohol.

Classic “hardboiled” detective fiction is frequently centered around a hard-drinking sleuth who may go on binges, but who also finds the killer, beats the “bad guy,” and often, has a real appeal. Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer is, of course, the classic example of this kind of sleuth. So is Ross McDonald’s Lew Archer. For these sleuths, drinking is presented more realistically and in more graphic detail, but is still almost glamorous.

Even in more modern fiction, frequent drinking isn’t always shown in a bad light. For instance, Colin Dexter’s Inspector Morse gets many more calories in liquid form than in solid form, and that has some very negative effects on his health. In fact, his drinking aggravates his diabetes which, eventually, is fatal. Comments about his overindulgence are sprinkled throughout the series. And yet, he’s a brilliant sleuth, he’s functional, he meets plenty of women, and one could make an argument that he’s very successful. He even says of himself that he thinks more clearly when he’s drinking than when he’s not drinking, and there’s an air of romanticism about him. Ian Rankin’s John Rebus is also a heavy drinker, and we see the struggles he faces with that part of his life. Yet, he’s a sympathetic character. He’s hard-working, driven and has a passion for justice.

I’ve only been able to give a small picture of drug and alcohol use in mystery novels. There are many, many examples that I haven’t mentioned. What do you think about the way alcohol and drug use are portrayed in crime fiction? Is it realistic? Have you seen changes in that portrayal over the years?

*The title of this post is the first line of The Black Crowes’ She Talks To Angels.