Five mistakes that can make a story look criminally stupid — by Abby Zidle

The wonderful Abby Zidle is the paperback editor of my first novel, “Law of Attraction.”  Abby and I recently went to the Romance Writers of America national conference, where we presented a seminar called “Criminal Mistakes: what crime novels and TV shows often get wrong.”  I spoke about many of the topics we’ve covered here on this blog.  Abby discussed the mistakes that make her cringe when reading a manuscript.  I’ve gotten lots of requests to post Abby’s speech, so here it is —  with thanks to Abby for letting me reprint it here.  

Crime writers, take note of Abby’s Top 5 mistakes, and avoid getting these things criminally wrong!  

1. I have a secret, but I can’t tell you.

When your protagonist overhears the bad guys explaining a key plot point, but chooses not to share that information with anyone. When the victim tells the investigator he has no idea who’d want him dead, and leaves off that business partner we saw threaten him two pages ago. If you’re going to let us know that one of your characters is keeping a secret, you’d better have a good reason for it.

2. I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.

So you’re at the climactic scene in your book, and the protagonist has been captured by the villain. All the baddie needs to get away scot-free is to shoot your guy in the head and skip town. So what does he do? Decides to have a little chat in which he confesses every detail of his plan because “What does it matter? I’m going to kill you anyway.” Ok, Dread Pirate Roberts, thanks for sharing. Please, try to find a way to avoid or overturn this cliché—your readers will thank you.

3. Oh noes! My cell phone/GPS/Interwebz is down!

I know, I know, these things happen. They do. But when they happen in your book, it can’t feel like they happen just so that you can get to page 384. If you need your person to be incommunicado, establish a good reason for it. Did she flee the bad guy and was forced to leave her purse behind? Is she living in a remote mountain cabin to get away from it all, and has to drive down to the general store when she wants to make a call? If you set it up well, I’ll believe you. But if your protagonist is a type-A perfectionist who dots every i and crosses every t, no, she didn’t just forget to charge her phone last night!

4. Don’t go in the house!

We’ve all seen them—the “too stupid to live” characters. Just like in your favorite bad horror movies, these protagonists are constantly ignoring advice, orders and common sense in their efforts to dash headlong into trouble. When the cops tell the “plucky” journalist at the crime scene, “Let us do our job,” and she starts investigating, only to get snagged by a crime ring? I say, “She had it coming.” Mind you, there are good reasons for your protag to strike out on her own—just make sure you’ve established them.

5. Too many red herrings in this tank.

You know whodunit—great! And you also know you need some likely suspects who didn’t do it. But we don’t need to meet every single one of those suspects in one overstuffed chapter. And we do need to meet them occasionally thereafter. Nothing says “guilty” like the snippy secretary who gets a really long scene in Chapter 3 and then disappears until Chapter 27.

Abby Zidle is a senior editor at Gallery and Pocket Books, where she acquires a variety of commercial fiction and nonfiction. She always charges her cell phone.