It Is Recommendsday, My Dudes #160 · 6:32pm April 10th
Probably the hardest genre to get right is mystery. Not only do you need to craft a solid narrative that fulfills all the requirements of a good drama or comedy (because without that it's just a trumped-up logic puzzle), but you also have to create that mystery itself. It can't be too obvious - otherwise why bother - but you also can't make it rely on bullshit and information the reader is never told.
So it's probably the toughest entry point for a new writer because there's so many easy traps. Plus by their nature mysteries tend to have fairly large casts - your detective, their audience surrogate assistant, at least two suspects, and usually a far greater number.
Which brings up the lead story today and the one that's been sitting in my newbies folder the longest: The Lady in the Cake by TheInfamousFly.
Pinkie Pie gets to judge the National Dessert Competition! That's awesome! And Rarity has brought her a wonderful gift to celebrate the event that's full of familiar faces and notable characters. And then Rarity has her tea interrupted by the news that Pinkie Pie has been poisoned during the competition's taste testing. But being herself, Rarity leaps into detective mode and takes over as judge so she can root out the killer from the inside.
So I'll lead by saying that this story manages something impressive: it creates a believable (attempted) murder mystery out of a group of entirely canon characters, and without having any of them be out of character. That's tough, particularly for a relatively sanitized and peaceful setting as ponydom. Sure there's a few things that get revealed that put those characters in a different light (or add to their pasts), but they're all things that make sense and work with who they are.
The mystery does a solid job, too, of keeping them all as suspects. Nearly all the competitors (and judges!) have a possible motivation that's kept on the table until the last minute. There's several nice swerves that both drop important information about the actual solution while still reframing individual characters and their issues - it's a hard balance to strike, and done quite well here.
In the end, I had sort of guessed the culprit - I'd gotten the right murderer but not the motive - and I consider that the sign of a pretty good mystery. And what we've got here is well-written for a challenging genre. Absolutely a challenge that was met, and well done by a newer writer.
Now, the last two new writers I've paired with experienced, well known writers. This time's not as much - Paracompact has been around for a while but hasn't made a huge splash. Today's feature - Bug in a Blizzard - is their biggest impact and their only story to break the 100 likes and 1k views mark.
Detective Pesco Margherita (and his assistant Bluebird) are called to the snowbound Villa Vivant to solve a mystery. The vacation villa is home to six young nobles: a pair of reindeer twins, two griffons, a pony, and a zebra. And one changeling. They just don't know where the changeling is. Maybe it's hiding in the villa. Maybe it's replaced one of them. And that's the mystery - Margherita needs to find the changeling before the snowstorm lifts or the love-devouring creature will escape.
This set up, of course, is a classic. Several suspects trapped in a location with the detective and a ticking clock to discover who done it? I'm sure any one of us could think of a dozen mysteries using that general plot. And for good reason - it's a solid, effective story base.
But it does rely on having a colorful cast to carry the story. Fortunately, this one's got it in spades. I mean, I was sold from minute one. The lead is a hard-bitten detective in a trenchcoat named Pesco Margherita? That's awesome. Plus it really makes the whole thing a little more twisty: you've got a Columbo type in an Agatha Christie book, assisted by… okay, actually I'm not really sure which classic assistant to liken Bluebird to. But that's not a negative because Bluebird's probably my favorite character of the bunch - rookie enough to be a good audience surrogate, naive enough to be disarming, still competent enough to be fairly critical to the case (and to know how to use the first two).
Now as opposed to the last story, I didn't figure things out by the end. But that's not a bad thing! All the characters were probable enough that I suspected all of them at one point or another - the detectives included. Even once the changeling was finally revealed, the story still had more twists to throw! It really kept me mentally hopping.
This one is easily one of my favorite mystery stories on the site. It captures that classic mystery novel feel, spins a great yarn with fun characters, and was great at keeping me off-balance. Top marks from a mostly unknown author.
New or catching up? Try Recommendsday: The Index for your story needs!
yes
I've always wanted to try writing one but I just can't figure out how to get there. D: