The Many Layers of a Mystery

I thought writing a mystery would be a breeze. I mean, mystery is my favorite read. It’s primarily what I watch on TV.

But I couldn’t have been more wrong. There are so many more layers to a mystery than the women’s fiction I’ve been writing. Oh, sure many books have a subplot or two or three, and those are layers that have to seamlessly fit into your main plot. But with a mystery, I’ve got to track so much more information.

Wow! what I’ve learned in the last several months as I’ve tapped away at the keyboard. I got to a point in my story that I realized it was time for the detective to start investigating, to hunt out the suspects, and determine the culprit. But I wasn’t sure where to start.

So I started where most writers do…with research. I asked AI how would a detective investigate a theft (that’s the crime that occurs in my story), especially when tourists might be involved. And while that gave me police procedural details for a credible story, it didn’t give me what I really needed, which was how to plant all those clues and red herrings. Who would my suspects be and why?

Tracking Suspects, Timeline, and Evidence

To help in the process, I created an Excel file (okay, okay, AI created it for me). One tab that tracks who my suspects are. Another tab tracks timeline and opportunity, and a third tab tracks clues and evidence. I even watched a YouTube tutorial on how to create a visual timeline in Excel (thank you, but I’ll get it done faster if I draw it myself).
I’ve even done some diagnostic work on my first chapter and some scenes. That was amazing!

To say the least, I’m so excited about this book. LOL, but I still need to determine the details about my suspects so I know what to include in each scene.

Ferguson and Maisie are getting impatient with me. So is Clemmy. As I write this blog post, I am halfway through December and have 17,301 words to the manuscript. Will I get finished by the end of the month? I don’t know, but I’m working diligently in order to get it published in 2026. Thanks for your patience with me!

Books 2 and 3 will go much faster since I’ve figured out the essentials needed as I wrote book one. Whew!

Kudos to all the mystery writers out there. This is quite a task…but I’m having a blast!