When Writing A Mystery, Start At The Middle of The Onion

I will fully admit, I am not a famous mystery writer. However, between my sci fi thriller Old Soldiers, and my hardboiled cat novels Marked Territory and Painted Cats, I've done my share of plotting and planning when it comes to webs of red string. And one thing that I've learned throughout my career as a writer is that while the audience (and your protagonist) starts from the outer layers of a mystery and works their way in, what you need to do as the creator is start in the heart of the thing, and build your way out.

It makes everything significantly easier, trust me!

And you do a lot less crying, overall.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more!

The Seed of Your Mystery

So, you want to write a mystery. Maybe you're writing a traditional private detective novel, a police procedural, or even a spy thriller, but you want the plot to take its share of twists and turns before the reader gets to the end of the story. The problem you're facing is that when you think about your mystery, you end up getting bogged down in misdirections, until you're chasing your own tail.

Here's what you do. Take a deep breath, clear your mind, and go all the way back to the beginning. What is the central event of your plot? What is at the heart of the mystery you're writing that your protagonist is going to uncover? Once you know that, you've found the center of your onion.

And from there, we spiral outward.

For example, did a missing person end up getting killed in a back alley scuffle behind a bar? Is a highly-placed official in the intelligence service actually a double agent for the enemy? Is the client's husband cheating on her?

The answers to these questions might seem simple, but the center of most mysteries usually are. And once you know where the center of your onion is, you can then start adding the extra layers around it.

So let's take the classic story of a private detective whose client wants him to find out if her husband is cheating on her. As such, the central part of the mystery that you know, as the author, is yes, the husband is actually cheating on his wife. But that isn't all that interesting, as far as plots go, nor is it much of a mystery. So we start building layers around it.

Return to the affair. The husband has, of course, been trying to hide the fact that he's cheating on his wife (hence why she had to hire a private eye to follow him around). But is there something unique about the husband, or the person he's cheating with? For example, does the husband have an important government position where he deals with sensitive intelligence? Or does the person he's cheating on his wife with have such a position? Or was there another complication entirely?

For the second layer, let's say the husband had a relatively normal life and a normal job as a business manager. He started cheating on his wife with a new intern at his office. It seems like a perfectly normal affair, as such things go. But the intern was actually a plant by the FBI under a false identity who was there to examine the business's money laundering for organized crime.

Now when our detective starts looking into the husband, and into the intern, suddenly he becomes a person-of-interest to both parties. The mob wants to know why he's keeping tabs on a guy who helps run one of their fronts, and the FBI is wondering who this guy is that's trying to run down specifics on their agent, worrying that he could compromise her position. Especially if it turns out the affair is part of her cover story, and the agent is trying to use that to get more sensitive information for her own investigation?

The plots go deep.

Every layer you add from initial seed of the mystery builds your onion up that much more. And once you have added what you think are an appropriate number of layers, you can then start mapping your protagonist's (and your audience's) path through them.

For example, does your detective start with the husband, gathering information on him? Does he dig into the business, and talk with some of the other people who work there? Or does he just start tailing the husband, hoping to catch him in the act, and that's how he catches sight of the "intern" he's seeing off-the-clock, while also getting noticed by the mafia goons who act as the husband's personal security? After refusing to be warned off, does he deal with harder pushback, resulting in alley brawls, or even a shoot out? And if that happens, do the feds step in to do their part to warn him off, explaining that he needs to tell his client nothing, or to lie and say her husband isn't having an affair (as that kind of chaos could jeopardize the current case they're building)? And if he ignores the warnings of both the cops and the criminals, does he keep pushing until he gets kidnapped or black bagged? And in the end, does the detective's friction cause the mob to slip up, tipping their hand, and getting them caught?

A complicated scenario, absolutely... but at the core of the mystery the answer to the question is, yes, the client's husband was absolutely having an affair. That turned out, though, to be the smallest part of the mystery.

But if you started at the outside and tried to work in, it would be a lot harder to construct the onion as things might not match up so neatly. So begin in the center, and work your way out organically... it will make your job a great deal easier at the end of the day.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- My Rumble Channel (longer videos that won't show up on YouTube)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel, as well as my Rumble channel listed above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Anything CAN Happen With Your Book (But That Doesn't Mean It WILL)

When you create something, it's possible that this is the one that breaks big. Maybe your novel gets people to really pay attention to you as a writer, and it becomes a major sensation. Perhaps the next video you put out goes viral, and you end up with millions of views, and an overnight audience. Maybe this episode of your podcast, or audio drama, just happens to explode, and it puts a lot of cash in your pocket.

However, the keyword here is possible. The problem arises when you, as a creator, operate on the belief that just because something can happen, then it's going to happen. Because that is where you start getting tripped up, and running into serious problems.

17 Black... what were the odds?

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

Better To Have A Plan You Don't Need

We've all had those daydreams where we imagine ourselves as massive successes. We contemplate how many copies we could move at a convention, and we fantasize about how nice it would be to just write all day without worrying about bills. Those of us who treat our writing as a job will take it a step further and research keywords, marketing strategies, trends in the genre, and we'll put together plans for how we're going to reach our target audience. And a lot of us will try to build momentum by putting out small samples of our work, building our audience, and trying to snowball interest.

But even if you workshop your plan, massage your metrics, and come up with a plan that looks perfect on paper, that's no guarantee that it's going to work. And that is important for you to acknowledge.

Well, it's not quite what I was expecting...

Just because you have an interview with a prominent YouTuber or TikToker, that's no guarantee their audience is going to buy your book. Just because you have a large newsletter, that doesn't mean it will translate to large sales. You could have amazing artwork on your cover, a prominent booth space at a convention, and so on, and so forth... none of these things will guarantee that your creation is going to find the audience you need, or that you'll make enough sales to turn this into your career.

As such, it's important to use the Cheese Cloth Method when it comes to actually selling your book.

Think back to when Covid first became a pandemic. Social distancing was one of the first methods to avoid transmission and spread. However, it wasn't always possible, and even then there were people who still got infected. Masking was also used as a way to prevent the spread of the disease, as well, stopping the infected from exhaling germs, and preventing the uninfected from taking in a viral load with their next breath. When the vaccine came out, it represented another way to prevent people from getting infected in the first place.

Individually, any one of these things might fail. But the more layers of protection that were put in place, the more defenses one had against the sickness. Consider your marketing strategy the same way. Because any one aspect of your strategy may fail, or simply not get the results you want. However, if you put together a layered approach then you're more likely to get the results you want.

But it's important to remember that more likely is also not the same as guaranteed. Even if you put in the work, and do your best to come up with all the possible angles, there's still a chance that you don't get the results you wanted... but you've got a better chance of getting there if you have a plan.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- My Rumble Channel (longer videos that won't show up on YouTube)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel, as well as my Rumble channel listed above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

Being An Author Is Cringe (So Embrace It Already)

There is this weird obsession a lot of writers have with being taken seriously. A need to believe that they are doing something meaningful with their story, and that their work is more than just a silly, self-indulgent exercise. It's why so many of us stay away from dragons and spaceships, and even if we do indulge in them we try to make sure that our stories have something real to say.

Why? Because we don't want to be seen as immature. We don't want our work to be thought of as childish. We don't want to make something that society tells us we should be embarrassed of. Or, to put things into a more modern vernacular, we don't want to be cringe.

And this can often prevent you from doing your best work.

And if you won't listen to me, listen to a classic voice in the genre.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more!

Take It From C.S. Lewis

There's a particular quote that I think is very important for anyone who intends to be a writer, and it's from one of the big names in the field. For those not familiar with it, C.S. Lewis is quoted as saying:

"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up."

Honestly, this sums it up pretty well. Because so many of us are overly concerned with being seen as grown-ups making grown-up work, but to paraphrase what someone else once said, adult books are all about sad people cheating on each other and making bad life decisions. Young adult books are full of magic, monsters, adventures, wonder, bittersweet endings, and aliens.

Trust me, I know a thing or two about telling silly stories.

There is something that often gets lost with our desire to appear adult and mature to other people... it isn't fun. It isn't fulfilling. And the whole point of being a grown up in the first place is so that you can do whatever the hell you want. Most of us left peer pressure behind in high school... so why are you letting the worry that you, your story, or both might be cringe determine what you choose to put out into the world?

Especially if it's something you genuinely believe in, and it's a story you want to tell. And, not to be that guy, but I always have groups of eager adults who want to hand over money to me when I bring my cat mysteries to a convention, but who aren't terribly interested in more serious, adult fare.

There's no guarantee that your story will be widely read, or widely loved. But if you're willing to let the idea of being seen as silly, immature, or ridiculous stop you from writing something you care about, you should really sit with that for a while. Because all writers (and especially the memorable ones) are pretty damn cringe, and that didn't stop them for even a moment.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- My Rumble Channel (longer videos that won't show up on YouTube)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel, as well as my Rumble channel listed above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

How Many Books Do You Have To Write Before You Can Survive? (The Answer Might Depress You!)

I have lost count of the number of friends, family, activity partners, and even casual acquaintances who have remarked on exactly how much time I spend working. Whether they're impressed with the grind, or they're frustrated it stops me from making plans, or they express that I should really take more time for myself (trust me, I would love to do that), there's always a throughline in these conversations. Sometimes it's said directly, and sometimes it's implied, but it always boils down to roughly the same sentiment.

"Sooner or later you'll have written so much stuff that you'll be able to take your foot off the gas, and relax a bit."

I laugh, they laugh, and the conversation moves on. However, there is a bitterness to my chuckle, because I know something that they don't. Something I'd like to share with all of you today.

Trust me, it isn't funny.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

It Does Not Matter How Much Stuff You Make

All right, let me back up a step.

First things first, yes, the more stuff you create, the better the chance you have of succeeding. It's like rolling a 20-sided die. Yeah, you want that 20 to come up, but if your first roll didn't do it, being able to roll again, and again, does help. And, at least in theory, having an archive of stuff you've written means that anyone who discovers you for one thing at least has the potential to dig into your backlog to check out your other work as well.

Let's talk about that word. Potential. Because that is what a lot of us bank on, but it's also what a lot of average folks out there don't really grasp when it comes to this profession. They might understand it academically, but down in their bones they don't really get it.

Size is no guarantee of success.

I've seen dozens of different takes on this over the years. There used to be programs claiming you needed an archive of at least 400 blog entries/articles to really suck your audience in, get people reading through everything you had, and earning regular revenue from their traffic. There are programs out there right now promising that if you can write 20 novels (not an easy feat in and of itself) that you'll have reached the mystic number where your work becomes self-sustaining, and you can relax a bit.

The problem with all of these so-called solutions and promises is that they're bunk. Complete and absolute fables. And I say that so confidently because they put the emphasis on what you are doing as the author, and promising that if you work a certain amount that it's some kind of guarantee that eventually your career will be successful.

I am here to tell you that, unfortunately, that is not true. And it is not true for the simple reason that all you can do is create the thing, and do your best to promote it. The people who decide whether your work is successful is your audience... or lack thereof, in many cases.

No One Knows What Will Or Won't Succeed

I've mentioned this before, but if you look at every major publisher's book list, they have a handful of really big sellers, a few middle earners, and a lot of books that never really go anywhere. And if you ask an editor why publishers don't just publish the books that are going to be top sellers, the answer is always the same.

"We'd love to, but no one knows which goddamn books they will be!"

This illustrates the central point of this week's post. Because even major publishers with all the resources to promote the books they publish, and all the industry insight of experienced editors, cannot predict with any real accuracy which titles and which authors are going to be financially successful. They, like those of us who write said books, are literally rolling the dice and hoping for the best. Books that have everything going for them that should become beloved bestsellers go mostly unread and forgotten, while books by no-name authors no one has ever heard of become roaring, viral successes.

Why? If I knew the answer to that, I'd be sitting on a throne of royalties instead of writing this blog.

Seriously, writing books is WAY more fun.

So the answer to how many books you have to write, how many articles you have to craft, how many videos you have to make, is... it's a crap shoot.

Let me throw some numbers at you. Because as of right now I have:

- 4 novels

- 2 short story collections

- 326 articles on Vocal

- 150+ videos on YouTube

- 191 tabletop RPG supplement titles

I am not the most proliferate creator (and I left out the 1,500+ blog entries on this blog and my gaming blog Improved Initiative, as they don't pay me anything), but I have a rather sizable amount of stuff out on the market for folks to consume. And if I had a big enough audience, or something I made went viral for some reason, yeah, I could take a day off, kick up my feet, and relax. If for some impossible reason a thing I made drew thousands upon thousands of readers every month (or every year in the case of a book), I could theoretically stop making any new stuff and just coast on that popularity.

I wouldn't, because I like writing, but I could.

Because at the end of the day, it does not matter how much stuff you produce as a writer. It matters how many people consume what you're writing. If you write a single novel, and half a million people a year buy it for the next decade, you don't really need to write another one unless you want to. By the same token, you could write 20, 30, or 40 novels, but if no one buys them, it's the monetary equivalent of never having written anything.

Your Audience Decides Your Success (Not You)

You, as the author, should do everything in your power to create the best quality work you're capable of. You should write a good story, fix all your spelling errors, make sure there's no dangling plot threads, and so on, and so forth. You should do your best to pick enticing cover art, to find folks to review your book, and to promote it as best you can.

None of that is going to earn you a dime unless people buy your book.

It does not matter how much you write. It does not matter the quality of your work. It does not matter if you have a massive social media presence, if you go to conventions, or if you make an entire vlog channel documenting the book's journey. If people do not buy your books, or consume your content (in the case of articles, videos, etc.) then you do not get paid. Period.

For instance, folks who want more of this serious should buy copies!

The point, to hammer it one more time, is that you cannot write yourself to success in the way so many people think. If a creator needs more money, they can't just write more articles, make more videos, or put out another book... it's sales, not word count, that matters.

If you've got a successful series with a lot of readers eager for a new installment, yes, a new book will probably get your audience to pick up copies... buf if you don't have the audience who is supporting you, it doesn't matter how much stuff you make, because no one is buying it. You're the proverbial tree falling in the forest, and no one is around to see you or hear you.

An author's success (and how hard they have to work) is determined by their audience. So if you have an author who you want to pay their bills, and work a reasonable day instead of pulling 12 hour shifts at their desk, do what you can to support them. Buy their books, leave reviews, follow them on social media, boost their signals, leave comments... do what you can to help them build up the audience. Because without an audience, it doesn't matter what we do... all of our earnings comes from you. Full stop.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- My Rumble Channel (longer videos that won't show up on YouTube)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel, as well as my Rumble channel listed above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.