Murders She Didn’t Write
By Porter Anderson (@Porter_Anderson) | August 16, 2019 |
Image – iStockphoto: Jelena 990
With All Due Respect to Agatha and Angela
I trust that it’s needless to say that the shooting incidents of the last couple of weeks in the States have rightly refocused the attention of many Americans–though not enough Americans–on gun violence.
I can offer you a few non-politicized, undeniable facts, thanks to the work of the independent nonprofit news organization called The Trace.
- Each year in the United States, a firearm is used in close to 500,000 crimes.
- The headlines and news stories we normally read refer to only some 2 percent of the gun deaths actually occurring here.
- At least 14,611 Americans were killed in 2018 by guns, and that excludes suicides.
- That’s actually a 7-percent drop over 2017, in which there were 15,658 non-suicide gun deaths.
If you’d like more specifics, here’s a good article with charts. The gun lobby in this country has suppressed the kind of research that develops this information. You may find it illuminating.
Provocations graphic by Liam Walsh
My provocation for you today is about homicide in literature–and, of course, associated entertainments, but let’s focus on books because that’s what we’re about here.
We have a long, long history as writers and as a publishing industry, with crime fiction. And I’ll confess that I’ve never liked that vast set of genres and sub-genres. That’s a personal bias and I want to be sure that I present it to you so you can count out the correct number of grains of salt.
I find crime repulsive and criminals disgusting. I revere the best of our police forces in real life–what shows of heroism we’ve seen in tactical responses to the recent inexcusable attacks! But if I never read another police-procedural again in my life, that will be just fine. I find quirky detectives ridiculous and I simply won’t watch or read something that involves one of these sleuths “coming out of retirement for one last case.” Like cowboy westerns and doctor shows, I really wish we could give this whole thing a rest.
However, I can also assure you that I see murder-mystery writing as one of the most demanding challenges of the canon, not least because readers seem so obsessed with finding flaws and guessing culpability–and the ways and means of taking human life–despite the author’s best efforts to conceal things.
And among the crime-writing authors I know, the cozy mystery folks are among the hardest-working, best-organized, most assiduously conscious fiction writers I’ve ever encountered. By that, I mean that they know their stuff, they know how they make it, and they know what works and what doesn’t with a precision that would make a literary writer weep.
So please understand that my comments here today are in no way, shape, or format meant to suggest that our crime-fiction and particularly cozy-murder writers are anything but superb professionals and great people. If you write this literature, do not feel criticized here. In fact, please, help us think about this with your experienced head.
What I do think we need to ask ourselves is how much crime fiction and especially the more genteel, soft elements of that world may be fogging over the actual horror of death–in a world now far more weaponized and angry than it was when these genres and traditions were originally developed?
A few lines ago, I used the phrase “cozy-murder,” not “cozy-mystery” deliberately. Did you catch it? That’s what these stories are. They always involve a human life, maybe more than one, taken in what normally is a community setting (the village), and oh yes, here comes the amateur hobbyist sleuth revered by professional police for her amazing savvy–yeah, she probably reports to each murder scene on a bike, and you know the routine as well as I do.
But that’s the problem: routine.
These things are routine to us.
Deaths and the investigations of them are entertainment to us.
And after answering a couple of great comments, I’ve realized that I should offer you the concept of a “stochastic” environment–that’s really what I’m talking about. Our intelligence community these days is discussing this. It’s the context of OK-ness that can be generated when leadership doesn’t condemn something–the theory being that a lack of condemnation for white supremacy and these days could create a context in which “stochastic terrorism” can seem acceptable to some.
Crime-fiction entertainment, of course, is nothing so dreadful as what’s driving many assaults today. But if you ever get close (I pray you don’t) to a violent attack, you’ll find there’s nothing about it that’s cozy.
Which brings me to my questions for you today.
Is it possible that we may be looking at a world so changed by violence and hatred that the book business’ (and its readers’) fondness for making murder cozy needs rethinking? How many “Bloody Good Time” book festivals built around death literature do we need before those red-dripping, weapon-festooned logos start to look wrong to us? If the hamlet’s murderer offs her victims with a candlestick in the drawing room, does that make us feel better than if she’d pulled out a gun? Is the taking of human life an entertainment theme you feel as good about after a mass shooting as you did before it?
There are no right or wrong answers, of course.
And–another update from earlier–I’m not telling you that you “shouldn’t write” what you want to write. I’m asking, in honest concern, and I think that’s healthy for us, not bad: Could it be that “entertaining” death literature is a form we need to consider leaving behind us?
[coffee title=”Wish you could buy Porter a glass of Campari?” icon=”glass”]Now, thanks to tinyCoffee and PayPal, you can![/coffee]
@Porter_Anderson is a fellow of the National Critics Institute. He is Editor-in-Chief of Publishing Perspectives, the international news medium of Frankfurt Book Fair. He co-founded The Hot Sheet, a newsletter for trade and independent authors, which now is owned and operated by Jane Friedman. Priors: The Bookseller‘s The FutureBook in London, CNN, CNN.com and CNN International–as well as the Village Voice, Dallas Times Herald, and the United Nations’ WFP in Rome. is a recipient of London Book Fair’s International Excellence Award for Trade Press Journalist of the Year. PorterAndersonMedia.com
I used to look to this blog for inspiration and craft advice on a level that I couldn’t find anywhere else. These days, most of the posts seem to be about what we “shouldn’t” write. Having the guts to spend lonely hours writing and then face the rejection letters from agents and nosy questions from friends – just being a writer – is tough enough without now being told what we should or shouldn’t write about.
People, if you love writing crime fiction, go for it! And if you want to write from the point of view of someone of a different race or gender, do that too. Don’t let anyone discourage you. There is enough of that elsewhere.
Thanks for your input, Anne-Marie.
And I’ll just point out that I said nowhere in my piece that a writer shouldn’t produce crime fiction.
Actually, I’ve jumped back in to say one more thing — again, with appreciation and respect for your response but with something I do think needs to be said. It has to do with your last couple of lines which, effectively, are along the lines of writers getting a great deal of discouragement and there being too much negativity. I want to respectfully disagree with you. I cover a great range of news, and I can tell you that in almost any field, the players seem to think that they’re victims of discouragement and “shouildn’t write” messages, too. There are fields in which far fewer people succeed than writing. And the self-victimization that I hear in so many writers is much more potent than the actual negativity they’re encountering.
{I’m with you on the nosy questions from friends, however! LOL I might even be able to look the other way for a little cozy-murder treatment of the inane things friends, family, and neighbors will say to and about writers, don’t tell anybody I said that.)
But at least in the case of this column from me today — and in a lot of the “problem” pieces that I do for our Provocations series (it is designed as a deliberate chance to consider things) — I think that asking ourselves a hard question or two makes us better, not worse. Stronger, not victims.
And if you need a lighter piece, I was much frothier last month in my travel piece. :) Here you go: https://staging-writerunboxed.kinsta.cloud/2019/07/19/about-that-writing-vacation/
All the best,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Thanks for your reply! I always appreciate anyone who can point me to something light and frothy!!
Look, if your point is that ALL writers need to be cognizant of how their work influences the feelings and the behavior of others, then I absolutely agree. But picking out one group of writers and basically saying that you hope their work goes the way of the minstrel show isn’t going to help you convince many people. At least, not anyone who doesn’t already agree with you. But hey, your technique got your post tons of attention today so maybe you had the right idea. You’ve entertained me, anyway!
Avid cozy mystery reader and fledgling cozy mystery writer here. I totally get your point about mysteries possibly normalizing murder, but I don’t see it that way. From what I’ve read while researching how to write a cozy mystery (and what the genre’s readers expect in a mystery) people (and I can agree the same is for me) read cozy mysteries (and maybe all mysteries) because they are focused on the justice part of murder. You need to have the murder solved and/or there has to be justice for the victim. It’s like melodrama for the current times, maybe? But a little less corny, I hope.
Many of the authors I read develop strong characters and there is usually a life-giving subplot or two as well. Cozy mysteries in particular eschew violence, which is why there isn’t graphic discussion of the murder or the murder scene. Does this lessen anyone’s understanding that violence and murder is horrible and messy? I don’t think so.
Stories have long been a method for people to understand and make sense of the world around them. Since the Greek tragedies there have been stories of murder and violence. Shakespeare wrote Titus Andronicus, for goodness sake. That’s the stuff of nightmares as a mother! Human nature can be obscenely base, and now there are so many more opportunities to hurt so many more people with significantly less effort. I don’t believe not writing mysteries is going to change the worlds perception of violence and suddenly decrease the amount of crimes.
Just my two cents. :)
It’s a great two cents, Lara :) and thanks for it.
I think you make some useful points here — especially the idea of justice being done certainly is carried out more in fiction than in life and has its own merit simply for being there.
And I wholeheartedly agree on the character-creating capacity of many crime and/or cozy writers — as I was pointing out, I have a lot of admiration for how good they are at their craft. (As comments come in today, you’ll notice that no one mentions that part of what I wrote. Having started my career as a critic, I can tell you that playwrights, actors, authors, dancers, you name it, can remember a single negative line for decades and recall none of the positive comments whatever, lol.)
Now for the oddest thing I’ll say back to your good thoughts here: I’d rather they read (or see a production of) Titus. Not rather than YOUR cozies, of course! LOL They must read all of your books first. :) But seriously, I can better appreciate something like Titus because it lays out the utter depravity of old-world warfare and governance and nightmare. Nothing cozy, in other words.
Lastly, I hear an echo of something I get all across the spectrum these days of news (which of course I work in) and reaction to it, in your line about not believing that “not writing mysteries is going to change the world’s perception,” etc. I get your point, of course. (And no, I don’t think violent video games are giving us mass shootings, either, which you’ll hear in certain quarters.) But I do think that on the wider contextual scale of how we live — in any era, not just this one — the presence and popularity levels of one form of entertainment over another DOES have an impact. May I show you one? Minstrels. There was a day when “black minstrel” shows were common and deemed OK. Now, we recoil at those images but when they were on the circuit, they created a subtle OK-ness for a certain kind of joke. Another? Burlesque. Those shows were misogynist and helped drive us into many of the shameful places we’re still trying to crawl out of in how women are demeaned in our culture.
And on thankfully lighter notes? We really do’t have those cowboy westerns on TV all the time anymore (and their grotesque depictions of Native Americans). And even less ominously but just as tedious were the hospital shows … every night, every network, every rerun, remember?
Perhaps the most positive way to put this is to say that I LIKE how we seem as a culture to grow out of certain things. We move past them. Don’t worry, your cozies will be wanted and read for many, many years to come! But I, for one, will be happier when we have less focus on crime fiction overall, especially as it relates to loss of human life. I’ll just bet we’ll find other ways to keep the readers entertained. :)
All the best, thanks again,
-p.
PS — In answering Erin below, I realized I forgot to mention the “stochastic” potential of things in all this. Here’s how I just wrote about that to her:
Do you know “stochastic”? The intelligence community is talking about “stochastic terrorism” these days with the newest shootings. It means that a certain climate for something — in this sad case, white supremacist violence — is made to seem OK because a leadership structure does not condemn bad actors. I love this example from history: when Henry II, furious with Thomas Beckett as archbishop of Canterbury, said “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?” two of his men took that as the OK to murder Beckett — much to Henry’s horror. That was the creation of a stochastic setting that made it appear that a certain violent act was OK. What I’m saying about crime entertainment is that it might unintentionally create a stochastic OK-mess for things we don’t really want to have happen.
‘On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Perhaps they can read both my cozies and Titus. :D
Thanks for the nice reply, because I always enjoy your discussions. And I did note all the nice things you said about the mystery genre and mystery writers, even if others don’t/didn’t!
I’m personally looking forward to a day where I don’t feel beat up every day with tragic news and stupidity on a global scale. I read mysteries to help balance the injustice I see in the world on a regular basis and that I’m unable to fix in my little world in Nebraska. I’m hoping to write mysteries that help address those injustices and maybe teach other people a new perspective. It’s not for everyone, and I’m okay with that.
I’ll have to think on crime fiction and stochastic terrorism. That’s too much for my brain to handle right now while I’m at work!
Have a good weekend!
I suppose these are not called provocations lightly, eh Porter? Should be an interesting day of comments… :)
I’m keenly aware that I am not smart enough in a particular way to write crime fiction, especially since I’m not a big plotter. Nor do I generally set out to read it (though certainly I sometimes run into some grisly scenes in the literary fiction I like to read). But I do agree that the should/shouldn’t write debates are wearing a little thin.
Most writers I know balk at the idea of banning books and censoring what people read and yet more and more we are censoring ourselves on what we write, effectively creating a pile of unwritten books to burn in the town square. Certainly a different view of the arts (because that is what we are doing here, right?) than my professors encouraged us to have in college.
We pretend, I think, that we are a liberal and enlightened society, but Orwellian strictures are crouching at our door, seeking to pounce (first on Twitter, perhaps, and then later IRL). We become on the one hand cowardly (I won’t write this because I’m afraid I’ll get raked across the social media coals if I do) and on the other hand condescending (I know what’s good for you, simple reader, and it’s not more [insert whatever thing we’re currently railing against]).
Let the producers produce according to what their muse/tastes/conscience will allow and let the consumers consume same. In the marketplace of ideas, I am still a capitalist.
Hey,. Erin.
Yes, you know how Porter’s Day at Writer Unboxed Goes. Amazon Prime is running its monthly special on Porter Pitchforks if you need one. :)
It’s actually fine. We have a saying in journalism: You’re doing something right when everybody is mad at you. :)
And I can promise you that I’m not the Orwellian crouching at your door. That guy’s initials are DT. :)
Happy to take on board your capitalist idea of letting the market handle what’s out there. That IS in fact how things (maybe even death as entertainment) will change, or not. No need for you or me to do something on that score.
Let me ask you this, though: Because the market has done its work on cigarette smoking — and now is wrestling with vaping, etc. — is it incorrect to say that glamorizing smoking may not be good for people’s health? Capitalism will handle that, too. But surely telling your teen that nicotine isn’t good for him isn’t wrong, it it, even for a capitalist?
As I pointed out to Anne-Marie up top, I didn’t say stop writing crime fiction and cozy-murder novels. Nor would a single person even bat an eye if I did. (O, would that I were so powerful! LOL)
What’s really interesting is the defensive posture everyone takes when you ask them to consider something like this.
As I mentioned to Lara above, what about black minstrel shows? If the market still supported those things and people went to stage productions in which African-Americans were presented as black-faced buffoons (and much worse), would it be wrong for us to question the idea of writing for them?
Here’s what I’m saying. While I really like seeing the culture grow out of certain phases of entertainment — I think it’s one way we grow as a culture — I think we MAKE that progress by respectfully questioning what we’re doing. I think we got away from minstrel shows because as our understanding of civil rights grew (and now more precious to us than for a long time because of our racist administration), there were some good folks in the vaudeville circuit who started questioning what they were doing. Eventually, laws caught up with them, too. But all of that change occurs when we stop and question it. And while we’re great at looking back and saying, “Hell, minstrel shows were disgusting!” we surely were not so good at seeing and saying that when they were a big draw on the touring stages.
It’s just fine to question what we should and shouldn’t be writing, and I invite you to join me in that. :) Like you I have nothing near the kind of smarts needed to write crime fiction (I think it must be the same gene I’m missing for math). But we’re in a crisis of violence today in our society. And thinking about the “stochastic” context we help to create for things is important.
(Do you know “stochastic”? The intelligence community is talking about “stochastic terrorism.” It means that a certain climate for something — in this sad case, white supremacist violence — is made to seem OK because a leadership structure does not condemn bad actors. I love this example from history: when Henry II, furious with Thomas Beckett as archbishop of Canterbury, said “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?” two of his men took that as the OK to murder Beckett — much to Henry’s horror. That was the creation of a stochastic setting that made it appear that a certain violent act was OK.)
If any kind of entertainment creates a stochastic potential for bad actors, I do think it’s worth considering. And I apprecate your thinking about it with me.
Check your door and see who’s really out there crouching. It’s not me. :)
Cheers,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
“But we’re in a crisis of violence today in our society…”
Right here is where I want to focus readers’ attention, because yes. Porter, your post is empowering because you are wondering what we as writers might at least consider doing that might make a difference. That’s why it’s a Writer Unboxed post, and why I’m glad to see it here today.
Thank you for the provocation, Porter.
Thanks so much, Therese,
First, for your good note, which perfectly recognizes my intention here — to be sure we’re all as conscious as possible of how our work may lie in the wider body of literature and what it can mean to a society, especially one suffering such a remarkable, dangerous passage as ours is experiencing these days.
And second, for giving us this forum in which we can discuss these things, compare notes, exchange opinions, all with the civility and respect that’s absent in so many other parts of our public discourse. Would you please take over Congress immediately? ;)
Seriously, this is part of Writer Unboxed’s service — welcoming provocations and provocateurs along with so many other good columns and voices is a big part of the site’s value.
It, and you, are much appreciated!
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Ooh, so much to tease out…
First, yes, I agree that change happens when enough people put enough pressure on enough other people to make a change. Obviously, minstrel shows, blackface, even the misogynistic plotlines of early Cheers episodes, are things to move away from. But I think the main way that happens is that the audience begins to change, not because those things are suddenly unavailable to them because of outside regulations or restrictions (remember how well prohibition worked to keep people from drinking in this country–when something is forbidden, it becomes yet more tempting).
People are free to make entertainment that other people will refuse to watch because they disagree with it. There is a lot I don’t watch or I turn off or stop reading because it presents a gross parody of my faith or is actively blasphemous. I don’t deny those people the right to make that stuff–I’m just not going to consume it. To start saying certain topics or viewpoints are completely off limits (and I know that’s not exactly what you’re saying) moves us further down the spectrum to tyranny, not freedom (think the reaction to the Charlie Hebdo cartoons, which yes, were in bad taste and blasphemous to a particular religion, but surely that didn’t warrant murdering the people at the magazine).
Let’s look at your example:
“Is it incorrect to say that glamorizing smoking may not be good for people’s health? Capitalism will handle that, too. But surely telling your teen that nicotine isn’t good for him isn’t wrong, it it, even for a capitalist?”
I counter with this thought: smoking has been the opposite of glamorized for nearly 20 years (give or take) and outlawed in most public places (except perhaps in the South?). I would imagine that smoking rates have gone down because of governmental restrictions and high taxes. Great for public health. But you mention vaping, which has replaced it because it is not yet regulated in the same way. Teens still want to smoke, and because it’s easier to vape (or their friends think it’s cool) they do that instead, right? (And thinking of the people I see vaping in my town, I wouldn’t call it glamorous.) They still do it.
Telling my kid smoking isn’t good for you (which it isn’t, but can seem disingenuous coming from parents who are occasional cigar smokers) is true, and it’s better for public health not to inflict your own smoke on someone else who isn’t a smoker rather than forcing them to suck down secondhand smoke. I agree with smoke-free public places. But in terms of books or other forms of entertainment, if I read a murder mystery in public, I’m not inflicting it on someone else, am I? I’m not contributing to the murder rate by doing this as I might be contributing to the cancer rate by making other people inhale secondhand smoke.
Let’s take your comment about creating an environment where bad actors feel empowered to act in bad ways. Again, I agree. When people are violent or threatening online or in person, good people need to call them on it and not turn a blind eye. Yet I wonder how many white supremacists are getting their ideas from cozy mystery novels.
I don’t think the crime genre is creating this stochastic setting. I think rather it is more likely to be bubbles of like people clinging together, online and in person, not letting in other viewpoints, not seeing other people as fully human, and being encouraged to act out more and more violent behavior because that is rewarded in their circles.
The most powerful way to change that kind of viewpoint is not, I think, to say “maybe there should be less violence in our novels” but “how can I get my bigoted friend to develop a real relationship with the person he is prejudiced against?” or “how can I get my bigoted friend away from the people who are bad influences in his life and into a circle of friends who are more open and accepting?” or maybe even “how can I write a book that shows the real detrimental affects of bigotry and violence on people and communities that I can share with my friend so he will start to question his views?”
And in order to do any of that, don’t we need to be open to staying friends with those with whom we vehemently disagree so that we can hopefully help them make a change rather than blocking out everyone who disagrees with us? Because it’s not just the “bad actors” who tend to hang out in monolithic groups. It’s all of us who decide that not hearing from the other side is preferable and so we unfollow and block and unfriend when we probably should be doing the hard work of continuing the discussion (and I don’t exclude myself from this criticism).
Great topic, Porter. :)
Interesting take! But… people are not killers because they read too many books. Good crime novels delve into the drivers of violence and do far more to enlighten than desensitize IMO
Hey, Kate, thanks!
I’m with you. I don’t think crime novels drive people to commit crimes. I DO think that crime literature over time, though, has created a kind of environment, a context, that I don’t think for a moment was intended or wanted by its writers.
One entertainment parallel I’m using with folks is the age of vaudeville and burlesque, which were notoriously misogynist forms of stage shows. At the time, it was hard to see that for a great many people, both attendees and performers (and writers of that form of comedy).
And I wonder if the day may come when we look back and see our pleasure in crime fiction as something that was more questionable than we could see at the time.
Thanks again for jumping in, hope all is going well for you!
-p..
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
While I agree we live in violent times (although statistically I believe that violent crime as a whole is historically down, mass shootings notwithstanding) , spending time analyzing the role of literature (literature!) in the gun culture feels like the proverbial rearranging of deck chairs on a sinking Titanic.
Not sure your analogy to vaudeville or burlesque holds up as they were inherently problematic (and in the case of the former, abhorrently racist). Crime literature is much less monolithic, and again, is focused on the nuances of a culture that perpetuates violence. The violence itself is never the point.
I always love posts on writer unboxed and this is no exception. My first published novel dealt with the social aspects that are often at the heart of crime. And trust me, I struggled with my crime scenes. I despaired, in fact. But I have been affected by crime and I have struggled much of my life with the core issues around crime. When I was 12, a dear friend was kidnapped, raped, and murdered. Leaving her ballet lesson at UC Berkeley, a man waited for her in her car. The “talk” around her death and how she could have prevented it was my first glimpse into how we speak about women’s lack of power. Growing up, I was always acutely aware of my native background and the post traumatic stress (alcohol, suicide, etc.) that permeated our family history and the repression of that background in order to survive and thrive within the prevailing society. That is a double whammy of violence. And eight years ago a doctor put a needle into my beloved dad’s thigh who went into a coma and died 7 days later. The record of my dad being there magically disappeared. There are so many kinds of violence. You are right, there is nothing cozy about it. As writers of the genre, we seek answers and we seek to convey empathy through our own truths. I have always hoped that my debut novel did not glorify violence in any way. It deals with resource allocation, power, and violence that are very real dynamics in our world today. At the core of my own quest, I have come to realize so many things that I did not at the beginning. One is the presence of psychopathy and sociopathy and how that affects all of us as a society and how that becomes a cycle across generations. That realization has given me some understanding that people are not always in charge of their own destiny and it is possible that our jails are filled with people who have very complex motivations that they don’t even understand. So here’s the thing, I think most writers of the genre are mindful of their task. It’s a big task. When they try to “cozy” up to the subject, it is because they recognize its heaviness. It is not because they are trying to romanticize violence. In fact, in one of my book talks, a fellow writer of a cozy mystery tried to distance herself from the difficulty of my suspense thriller. But violence is violence. It’s just part of the human condition and one we should seek to transcend.
“So here’s the thing, I think most writers of the genre are mindful of their task. It’s a big task. When they try to “cozy” up to the subject, it is because they recognize its heaviness. ”
Exactly!! :D
Excellent comment, Elizabeth. Reminds me why we write about violent things at times (why we write about anything, perhaps): because we need to deal with it, and writing is a way to accomplish this. Offering that writing to readers is a way for us to share the process of dealing with loss, violence, guilt, shame, anger, bitterness, etc. because they all have to deal with that too. Writing and reading stories, even hard ones, makes us more human and humane.
Reminds me of reading Beasts of No Nation. An old friend sent it to me because his brother-in-law is the author and he knew I’d appreciate it. And I did. But it is such a hard book to read because of the content (child soldiers in an unnamed African country, complete with murder brutality, the repeated rape of a boy, etc.). Yet it was in NO WAY glorifying any of it. It was mourning it and exposing it and calling people to take notice, to care, to do something. Still, I couldn’t bring myself watch the movie because I just didn’t want to see it in full color, you know?
Hello, Elizabeth,
Please know how much I appreciate your eloquence and integrity in sharing this, and how sorry I am for the traumas you’ve undergone. Your insight into the chatter after your friend’s murder and its underlying misogyny alone is so important and so profoundly infuriating.
Honestly, if everyone working in crime-fiction entertainment were coming from such a place of introspection, care, and sheer awareness — questioning their work and its potential impact –I could leave the field, confident that all was in the best hands possible.
Unfortunately — and I hope you’re right and I’m wrong — I’m not as confident as you that “most writers of the genre are mindful of their task. It’s a big task. When they try to ‘cozy’ up to the subject, it is because they recognize its heaviness.”
Normally tending to give more of the benefit of a doubt to someone than I should, I feel differently in this case. I’d suggest that crime writers who frequent Writer Unboxed are likely among the more self-aware and the ones probably more like you in your own approach — generally more attuned to their world and their place in it, as you are. But on the whole, I fear that we’ve been through a period in which bigger, splashier, go-for-broke entertainment values have made it harder and harder for some creative types to discern where the guardrails need to be and to think deeply about their work in the wider sphere.
As I say, I hope I’m wrong, and I’m glad to see such supportive comments coming back to you here.
Over time, I feel sure that we’ll understand this period better and where we all stood in it, how our work and our concepts and our attitudes played their parts. Hindsight!
For now, thanks for being so conscientious in what you’re doing and telling us so forthrightly about how it has factored into your own work and how you hold it. That takes courage, and I applaud you for it.
Best with your work,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Thank you, Porter, for your thoughts as well. I think we all worry about the level of violence today. But failing to shine a light on it will not diminish its horrors. It just silences its victims. But I do agree with you. There are far too many venues in which violence is trivialized.
Best with your work, too.
The problem is not crime writers, but the criminals who hang out in Washington encouraging hatred and doing nothing about weapons in the hands of maniacs.
May you be heard in the Beltway when they all come back from the August break! :)
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Murder, never mind mass murder, would feel “normalized” to us even without fiction. There is simply too much of it. We must dull ourselves to it or go mad.
What murder mysteries do along with other story forms that involve violent death is not glorify violence (not always) but portray people who go through it. It’s about coping and restoring order, reassuring us that chaos and our animal instincts will not in the end win.
My problem is when characters are unaffected by violence. That’s just not realistic or honest. That is what is too “cozy” to me.
“Murder, never mind mass murder, would feel ‘normalized’ to us even without fiction.”
Unfortunately true. As it has ever been.
Don!
Thanks so much for dropping in! Very glad to have your perspective! With which I disagree! And I’ve just used three exclamation points — I may never forgive myself. :)
Seriously, thanks much. And just as seriously, I do not believe that we must dull ourselves to mass murder or go mad. I have not done so. And — knock on wood and several very good artificial wood substitutes — I have yet to become mad. (You may disagree, I realize, lol.)
I can immediately agree with you that characters devised to look as if they aren’t affected by violence are unrealistic and dishonest. Totally.
But as for your assertion that “What murder mysteries do along with other story forms that involve violent death is not glorify violence (not always) but portray people who go through it,” I think you’re engaged in wishful thinking. Don’t get me wrong. I’d like to jump right in and join you in saying that entertainment murder fiction is “about coping and restoring order, reassuring us that chaos and our animal instincts will not in the end win.” And some of it is. But I don’t see that as the actual, thoughtful, conscientious goal of so much of this literature.
I think entertainment overrides empathy, in other words.
And while I salute your vision of what such writings could be, I look forward to a day when more of them are those things.
i don’t think we’re there yet. And I think we need to say so.
As ever, I’m grateful for your input and collegial friendship. Thanks and hope you and the family are well.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Well okay. Let’s not become inured to murder. No disagreement there.
As to whether making cozy entertainment out of murder is a poor idea in our era…hmm. Literature that no longer reflects its times tends to go away, Perhaps what feels wrong to me is implying that it *should* go away, and I think it is that “don’t write that” hint that that has raised hackles.
That’s not what you’re saying, and you’ve made that clear. So once again I’m not sure that we actually disagree about anything, or much.
What I do think is that we are hugely distressed and feeling helpless against mass shootings and the insane rate of death by gun in our country. It is natural to ask what are we lit types doing to prevent or help, and it’s good to ask that.
I do not think entertainment is faulted any more than violent video games. I suspect that the solution is complex and not as simple as background checks or red flag laws. That said, a safer nation starts with outrage and intolerance of the status quo and I think that’s where you’re coming from, am I right? Let’s not get cozy about murder.
Well, okay. Do we disagree? Maybe not, but if it means having a glass of something and the chance to keep debating with my favorite provocateur then yeah, I say we should disagree as often as possible.
Hello from Dublin, BTW, all is well with us, thanks.
Many years ago a writer gave us this wisdom:
“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.”
― G.K. Chesterton
The purpose of crime fiction is not to teach us how to murder or revel in it. It is to there to help us make sense of terrible things and give us the hope that there are heroes out there trying to protect us.
Hannibal Lector was horrible, but Clarice Starling was there. She was the hope.
Hi, Brian,
Many thanks for reading me and joining the discussion.
I think your comment and your use of Chesterton is terrific — in the aspirational sense. And while a lot of us are always happy to be reminded of Chesterton’s genius, he lived from 1874 to 1936. Both culturally and in the sheer scope and tonnage of publishing’s output, that great thinker lived a long, long time ago. What may have been the intention and generally understood purpose of murder fiction in the England of Chesterton’s time lies a long way behind us now.
In the United States, Bowker — which is the agency for ISBNs in the States — listed 900,000 titles as active in 1998. By 2012, Bowker listed 32.8 million titles. Those weren’t all murder mysteries (mercifully!) but what I think you can see here is that the explosion of published material occurring in the American market is stupendous.
And what that means is that absolutely nothing like Chesterton’s wise understanding of the purpose of mystery writing (or anything else) in the 19th and early 20th centuries can be expected to hold sway as it once did in a far smaller, more tightly knit English fiction milieu roughly 100 years ago.
Chesterton never knew the crisis of violence that exists today in England, let alone what we’re going through in the States. He didn’t live to see terrorists drive vehicles (twice in 2017) into crowds at the Houses of Parliament, nor to watch a far-right assailant shoot (twice) and then stab (15 times) the Labour Party MP Jo Cox in the small, “cozy” town of Birstall (that’s in Yorkshire) outside a library in Market Street in 2016.
You get my point. These are not Chesterton’s times. And I’m in NO way implying that someone sat down, read a cozy mystery, and headed out to kill people!
What I AM saying is that nobody today can be expected to be getting GK’s memo.
And if you put aside the climate of violence that I’m describing (the context for “stochastic terrorism,” as intelligence leaders are discussing), hope you’ll think with me about the astonishing change in the size and energy of the storytelling industry today since Chesterton did his good work.
One of the things you’ll see me start amplifying in these comments now is a point that I find eludes many authors (though perhaps not you), and that’s the sheer force and range and weight of the digital entertainment industry.
Many authors don’t want to think about this — I get it — because, sadly, the rise of the digital media complex already is damaging the will and capability of so many of us to engage in long-form immersive reading as we once did. But more importantly to our topic this weekend, it means that it’s a lot harder to think that everyone working in this vast, voracious age of streaming networks and film is even able, never mind willing, to remember that the purpose of crime fiction is “to help us make sense of terrible things and give us the hope that there are heroes out there trying to protect us.”
I can easily agree with Chesterton!
And with you, Brian! I’m so glad you jumped in. Because you’ve given us the perfect illustration of “that was then, this is now,” and you’ve brought forward such defining thoughts as Chesterton gave us, so that we can test where they stand today and what we see as the real engines of narrative entertainment in 2019.
So again, thanks so much for the good input. Great to have you here.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
The worst mass murder in history was the Bath School Shooting. 28 students, faculty, and administrators were killed and another 58 were injured. That was 1927.
This problem isn’t new. It isn’t about guns or the mentally ill. . Murder stories are not to blame.
Dismissing Chesterton’s advice because of digital media is wrong nothing more than a feel good, empty gesture.
I applaud your instinct to do something, but that something must work or it’s a waste of time.
“Nobody wants to buy sour milk.” -Tim Cook
Post WWII, violence in literature reflected how our society couldn’t escape violence. Does it still serve that function? Yes, and it always will, but I think Porter is right in saying what we’re consuming has more vinegar in it. Will that change how we write violence in our stories now is a good question to ask. I think our societal numbness to violence is fading.
James!
Such a fine, succinct comment here, thank you for it.
Yes, exactly, I, too, think that the numbness that has held sway for quite some time is starting to give way to a new alarm about the dangers around us and the actions that need to be considered, the debates that need to be held, the reconsideration that needs to be applied to what words can and cannot be expected to do for us (or to us).
Thanks for this, and for reading me.
I hope you’re right that our societal numbness to violence is fading. It’s a really good time to wake up and smell the peril.
All the best with your work.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
I hope I’m right too.
Thank You Porter
“Is it possible that we may be looking at a world so changed by violence and hatred that the book business’ (and its readers’) fondness for making murder cozy is no longer acceptable?”
I understand where you’re coming from. I have a friend whose uncle committed suicide after killing his wife and dogs. It doesn’t take much imagination to know that she can’t watch any more murder mysteries, nor wants to.
For me? I don’t read any mysteries that are remotely realistic. If I did, I’d be upset all the time. No, the mysteries I read are cardboard cutouts of what real crime is.
And at the same time, don’t let it get you down. We are probably actually living in one of the least violent, most humane periods in history in terms of personal safety. And that would even be worldwide. Most of that is due to financial prosperity. When people have something to lose, they tend not to want to lose it.
Let’s not forget WWI or II for extreme violence on an unprecedented scale. Nor the Spanish Flu for a wallop of a natural disaster. Nor the seemingly barbaric practices of the Romans’ entertainments and military practices.
Thanks, Matt,
By comparison to previous eras’ exposure to warfare, we do indeed live in less violent times.
But I’d just invite you to look carefully at how a new form of violence — less structured and formally conducted than war — is replacing open, army-on-army conflict.
Today’s threats are more guerrilla, more aimed at soft, civilian targets, more recognizable as terrorism, and more deeply frightening because they come from within: The American white supremacist is a monster that we, ourselves, have created and she or he is a creature we’re learning has made much more rapid inroads into the imaginations of our young adults than many of us had realized. Today, you don’t raise an army, you radicalize the kid who mows your lawn.
Barbarism is still here. And our climate crisis will give us far more trouble than the Spanish Flu did, if you need to compare the eras’ natural disasters.
All I’m saying is don’t get too comfortable, Matt.
Much of the stability and comparative safety you correctly identify in comparison to other eras’ nightmares is being sorely tested at this moment by an administration in this country that has a weak grasp at best and a genuinely dark motive at worst, and has tried very hard to undermine the world order in which you (and I) find reassurance.
All is not well. And I very much appreciate your letting me put this to you — that alone shows a breadth of intellect on your part, for which I’m grateful.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
I’m disappointed by this article, although I see what the thought process behind it is. Fiction is an escape. “Death literature” or murder mysteries don’t celebrate death, nor do they normalize it. They are a way to take a subject we’re uncomfortable with and make it entertaining. This doesn’t make DEATH entertainment … it provides an outlet for stress, sort of like dark humor. I’m the least violent person out there, and I read murder mysteries constantly. They make me feel less stressed about an incredibly stressful world, TEMPORARILY making murder a subject I can approach without fear, angst, or stress. I am well aware that there is a huge difference between the murders in cozies or other novels, and real murders. But books are, as they’ve always been, a way to look at something at different angles, a way to escape from grim reality and feel empowered – if only temporarily. In a way, cozies are akin to the dark humor of cops and doctors, who MUST be able to (sometimes) make light of a serious subject lest they have a breakdown. Cozies are a tension lifter. And most of the people I know who read them are women, and most of those women are pacifists. Soo … no. I don’t think these books are a symptom of a failed culture. There are other symptoms; books are not one of them. Besides, murders mysteries have been popular for a long, long time.
Also … sometimes it’s hard being a woman. These female sleuths make me feel like I can be stronger. Like I could save myself and others. That’s powerful. That’s necessary. And that requires a darker fictional backdrop to be effective.
Should crime fiction writers — across the spectrum of the genre — occasionally stop to wonder about the role of what we write in the larger culture, particularly when it comes to violence? Yes, of course. Do we “normalize” crime (not just murder)? No; it happens every day, to far too many people. What we do, I think — or at least, this is the goal — is seek to explain and explore it, to probe its causes and its effects. In the traditional mystery, which includes the cozy, crimes are solved, the internal and external order of the community is restored, and justice is swift, clear, and certain. (And dinner is on time.)
The main appeal of crime fiction is the opportunity it gives the writer and reader to explore human nature. This is as true of lighter work as it is of darker work. Does every crime fiction author do it as well or deeply as we’d like? No, but again, that’s as true of darker work as lighter. Series fiction, which cozies tend to be, is a particularly apt form for this, because characters grow and develop over time. Over and over, I hear readers of cozies say they read as much for the characters as for the plots.
Honestly, I think crime fiction is an ideal vehicle for delivering what the modern reader wants: interesting characters who grow and change, intriguing settings, solid plots, and strong writing.
Should we ask these questions from time to time? Yes, of course. But as a crime fiction author, with 9 published cozies, more than a dozen published short crime stories in a variety of subgenres, and a nonfiction book aimed at helping writers write accurately about the law, I think these questions apply to all fiction, not just crime fiction, and to all crime fiction, not just cozies. Seriously, I’ve killed people on the page with ghost chiles, a heavy ceramic platter, and a string of Christmas lights. I’m not too worried about copy cats. (I have used more traditional methods — guns, knives, and cars, and 100 foot cliffs — as well.) Whether and how media influence — and not simply mirror — culture is a fair question, as long as we ask and answer it fairly.
And to be fair myself, I’ll acknowledge that I haven’t read all the comments or Porter’s replies yet, and some of these topics may already have been addressed. Now back to work — cozy #10 is due in just a few weeks!
I liken “cozy-murders” to romance novels. Readers understand that real murder is nothing like what they read is cozies, just as they understand real love rarely involves yachts, hunting estates, and powerful/mysterious/stunningly beautiful Venus and Adonises.
Here in Peoria we’ve seen 15 murders by gun so far this year. That’s in a population of about 100,000. I think the killers were motivated by drugs, alcohol, anger, and a culture of victimization. I doubt a single one ever read a cozy.
An important point: mysteries, cozy and otherwise, are read around the world, but not all countries have the US’s problem with gun violence. (You dislike murder mysteries; I dislike the presumption of US-centricity seen so often on the internet. #notmyculturalhegemon)
Yes, it may possibly be that Americans will lose their taste for fictionalized violence when they rub shoulders with the real thing. Or maybe their revulsion will be directed into action against the real violence, and not against the murder-as-plot-element.
I don’t think cozy mysteries do make murder a matter of comfortable familiarity. They portray it in an unreal way, as a formalized factor in what is essentially a riddle. But we don’t assume that real murder is like that, any more than we assume the guy with the mustaches next door must be Hercule Poirot.
If anything, it’s the mysteries at the other end of the spectrum, which present the reader with blood and brains and ravaged families, that are desensitizing us to violence, because we experience it in narrative form for entertainment’s sake.
Dear Mr. Anderson,
Thank you for writing “Murders She Didn’t Write.” I’ve been quietly reading Unboxed articles for years, and this one struck me as not only important, but crucial for us to consider seriously. Writers are used to reaching into our guts and pulling out painful truths. This is one of those truths. Please keep talking about difficult issues. I deeply appreciate your honesty and wisdom.
Thank you again.
(I apologize for this late comment–my heartfelt first).
Welcome to the party, Cathee.
Thank you, Christine.
Dear Ms. St. Clair,
I’m so honored that you’ve responded for the first time at Writer Unboxed to an article I put together.
Thank you for that (as well as for reading WU articles for so long), and for your gracious openness to this difficult, distressing topic. One of the hardest things any of us must ask (and this can occur at many points in life) is whether we might be part of a problem.
When I entered journalism, I’d had a first career as an Equity actor and was hired as a theater critic by a newspaper the NYTimes bought. I would go on to do about 12 years of criticism, ending with The Village Voice. During that time, the American Theater Critics Association had a program to help train young theater critics. And there came a time when I had to ask myself how I could continue to support such training (which in our hearts, we all wanted to maintain) as we watched the jobs for critics disappear at newspapers which then, themselves, began to disappear. The ethics of teaching young adults the ways of an art and industry in which they could find no jobs finally had to be confronted.
Similarly, I think that writers today must think carefully about their work, not just in crime fiction but in many forms and conditions, because the entire structure of entertainment is adjusting so fast, so radically, and with such power in society.
Basically, writers immediately are part of something evolving far faster than we may realize, like polar bears caught in a melting ice-scape. The more we can do to confront what’s happening and how we want to fit into it, the better we’ll be for our readers and ourselves, because we’ll have become conscious of what we’re doing.
There are many, many more murder mysteries still to come, I’m sure, and some may be quite good. I’m guessing that those will be the ones written by authors brave enough to ask how they can contextualize their work so that it speaks to the needs of readers today rather than replicating the formulas of an earlier time.
Thank you again for taking this step in writing a comment, and for saying this so well: “Writers are used to reaching into our guts and pulling out painful truths. This is one of those truths.” And we’re much better for pulling it out, facing it, and discussing it together.
All the best and don’t be a stranger at WU!
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Thank you, Porter Anderson, for a WU post that said what I have thought but was too afraid to say. I have stopped watching and reading most “murder mysteries” because I think they make murder and violent death seem routine. They make it seem like we can always solve things and put the bad guys in jail or shoot them in return Clint Eastwood style. The protagonist will always get the culprit. But in real life, it is far, far harder than that, which is something I liked about the British series The Unforgotten. The horror of what happened, the toll on people’s lives including the detectives was clearly shown. There are plenty of other things to write about that move the soul than murder and mayhem.
Hey, Lynn,
Thanks so much for this thoughtful note.
I’m not sure we can avoid writing about murder and mayhem because they’re part of our lives. But I think what we can do is ask at every opportunity whether what we’re writing is treating the material as the dreadful reality it is, or as entertainment. From television series, by the way, I can exchange your mention of Unforgotten by recommending The Bodyguard with Richard Madden and Sophie Rundle, a relentlessly serious look at corruption and its own forms of contemporary violence.
Thanks again for such a gracious note, and all the best,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Porter,
Thank you for this post and your gracious words about mystery writers. As an avid reader of mysteries (and without the chops to write one myself), my hope is that their stochastic influence is that we as a culture may come to expect justice, not shrugging our shoulders and saying, “Well, that’s just the way it is” or “Everybody does it.” Much of the post-war literature conveyed that fatalism, and today I see far too many segments of the U.S. culture giving up on the idea of justice–not everyone, I hasten to add!
I read mysteries because I love the challenge of the puzzle, the justice meted out, and the high quality of the writing. Still, I often ask myself the questions that you raise here. I avoid the mysteries that seem to delight in gruesome details of violence (more often than not against women) which I consider violence p*rn.
More problematic than any mystery book, though, are some of the crime dramas on tv, the ones that try to outdo themselves in more and more grisly crimes. We could debate about the effectiveness of visual media versus print, but I think imprinting these pictures on viewers does far more than books to normalise the violence–for those tempted to commit it and those who aren’t but come to expect that these things will happen.
A similar dynamic to the latter was how a wave of crime dramas about children being abducted by evil, sadistic perpetrators led to outsize parental fears, such that middle-class children in the U.S. are now less likely to be allowed to play outside without adult oversight, as was common in the 1950s and 1960s. This despite the fact that child abductions are overwhelmingly commited by an estranged parent. You may have heard about the parents in a Maryland suburb who were arrested a few years ago for allowing their two children to walk by themselves a few blocks to the park.
So yours are good questions to consider. I love when writers of any genre take responsibility for the impact their work may have.