Would you read a murder mystery where the first 10-15 chapters are from the victims perspective? Why or why not?

[ElijahRyne]

I want to write a super natural horror/mystery with its own power system. In the first chapter the victim dies before going into an extended flashback. I had planned out the first arc of the story to be an introduction to the characters, their motives, the various groups, and their abilities before establishing the stakes. Then the second arc would, like Paranoia Agent, start the Sam as the first before describing that characters life/circumstances up to that point. Now, though, I want the second arc to be a murder mystery, where the first arc sets up all of the suspects, their motivations, etc., but would you read that? Why or why not?

 

[Cipiteca396]

No, because I'm not terribly interested in mysteries.

... That aside, it sounds like a fairly typical murder mystery. If you can figure out who the killer is by the time the flashback catches up to the death of the victim, you can call it a successful Book One.

If you intend to figure out who the killer is at the end of act two though, it's probably just too drawn out. Not that I'm anyone to say that.

Basically, the person solving the murder needs to figure out what happened at the same time or slightly before the reader. If you know who the killer is and it takes the 'detective' 15 more chapters, that's just boring.

 

[ElijahRyne]

If you intend to figure out who the killer is at the end of act two though, it's probably just too drawn out…..

Basically, the person solving the murder needs to figure out what happened at the same time or slightly before the reader. If you know who the killer is and it takes the 'detective' 15 more chapters, that's just boring.

Thank you for the feed back! Arc two is from another person’s perspective (I should have made that clearer), so I don’t think it would be too drawn out. As for the last point that is just the difficulty of the genera, is it not?

 

[AnonUnlimited]

Depends on the length of the chapters and how interesting the victims are, but if you want to write a mystery then getting to the point is more important than the victims themselves.

 

[georgelee5786]

I would. It would provide valuable information to the reader.

 

[Twin]

This lacks self insert. Though whenever a story lacks something it needs to make up for it with other things. In your case, your story needs fabulous pen pictures to make it work (I think)

 

[Akaichi]

It has to be interesting, lf the victim was antispating someone would kill him... it may be an entire short story on it's own.
this kind of opening would depend on the reader's taste. I hate it when a character i didn't expect to die does, but others love this...

 

[CarburetorThompson]

I think it could be cool. Personally I kind of like the angle of the first bit being from the killers perspective like the show Columbo.

 

[Gryphon]

The point of a mystery would be to discover how these two people, in this case victim and murderer, ended up in the scenario where they each gained their respective titles. If you spend 10-15 chapters going over how the victim ended up where they were, then there wouldn't be much left to figure out besides who done it. That is if you don't go ahead and reveal it in the first 10-15 chapters.

However, it could work. If you were to start the story by saying this person dies, you can essentially do what Shakespeare does with most of his tragedies. Cause the author already told the reader the POV character will die, instead of wondering if they will die, and their death is more important than their life, then what the reader is left with is how they die and what decisions they chose to end up where they were. In turn, the reader will be trying to piece together the clues right away, and they aren't blindsided by the eventual death of the victim then thrust into the POV of another character

If you want to do this, I suggest shortening the chapters from 10-15 to 5-10. Again, they're death is more important than their life. Their life will be pieced together by the detective as he tries to track down the murderer. Get it out of the way while showing as much foreshadowing as possible and laying down the clues to figure out who it could be that killed them. You're honestly getting my creative juices flowing now.

 

[ElijahRyne]

The point of a mystery would be to discover how these two people, in this case victim and murderer, ended up in the scenario where they each gained their respective titles. If you spend 10-15 chapters going over how the victim ended up where they were, then there wouldn't be much left to figure out besides who done it. That is if you don't go ahead and reveal it in the first 10-15 chapters.

However, it could work. If you were to start the story by saying this person dies, you can essentially do what Shakespeare does with most of his tragedies. Cause the author already told the reader the POV character will die, instead of wondering if they will die, and their death is more important than their life, then what the reader is left with is how they die and what decisions they chose to end up where they were. In turn, the reader will be trying to piece together the clues right away, and they aren't blindsided by the eventual death of the victim then thrust into the POV of another character

If you want to do this, I suggest shortening the chapters from 10-15 to 5-10. Again, they're death is more important than their life. Their life will be pieced together by the detective as he tries to track down the murderer. Get it out of the way while showing as much foreshadowing as possible and laying down the clues to figure out who it could be that killed them. You're honestly getting my creative juices flowing now.

Already had him die in chapter 1, as for what the purpose of the first 10~ chapters, it is to explain how the magic system works, introduce all the suspects and who they might work for, set up the next couple arcs, etc. The goal of the story more broadly is to show the mysteries behind the city of Gullnain, switching between different povs. For the feel of the story I took inspiration from Ito’s Uzimaki, Paranoia Agent, and the Noir genera in general.

The second act would be from the ‘detectives’ pov. The first arc was the interrogation of the victims soul, so what we know she knows. From there

 

[georgelee5786]

Already had him die in chapter 1

Bit early, imo. I'd take 2-3 chapters to properly set things up before having the murder occur, but that's just me.

 

[ElijahRyne]

Bit early, imo. I'd take 2-3 chapters to properly set things up before having the murder occur, but that's just me.

Perhaps, but his death and interrogation are the very first thing that happens. Think of it like starting a movie with ‘You are probably wondering how I got here…’ while not breaking the 4th wall.