Mystery Tropes

 Annamaria on Monday

Much of what I want to say on this topic has more to do with movies and TV shows than with books, but I fear some of these habits show up in crime stories across the board.

But let's start with crime stories on film. They are the ones, rather than ones I have read that inspired me to write about this on this topic. Like many people I suppose, over the past few years I have taken to binge watching crime series.  (Could this new habit be a symptom of "Long Covid?). Anyway, I keep seeing almost identical scenes as I work my way through the episodes, in date order, of course. I find myself able to guess accurately what is coming next.  I bet you can too.

For instance:

At some point in the story, the scene shifts to a wooded area.   Soon  a dog runs into the shot (almost always from the right).  Then the dog's owner, typically not a character in the story, follows.  What do you think happens next?  Of course you know.

Then there is this one:

A beautiful woman sits before a mirror and dons a splendid necklace which includes many very large and very expensive jewels.  And then...

Or:

One of the characters in the story happens to have a storage unit not connected to his residence.  Depending on whether that character is a good guy or bad guy, the unit will contain....

Tropes can, of course, be used to great effect.  My problem is that as soon as I see the dog in the woods, I know in the next three minutes, there will be a hand sticking out of the dirt. One of the things we, both readers and writers, love about our genre is suspense.  Predictability is the enemy of a good story.

Suppose the dog were to find something wildly unexpected: like the drivers license of a convicted murderer who was executed six years ago. With fresh blood on it. 

Then there are tropes that are supposed to help you comply with the "rules" for writing crime fiction.

"Rule one":  The person who is going to be your crime solver must have "a character flaw."  Google the rule and you will find lists, sometimes LONG ones, of suggested flaws you can paste on to your good guy.  He's a cop? But he has a flaw, so he may not be able to control his habitual drunkenness to solve the crime.  Or her troubled family will distract her and make it hared for her concentrate.  

"Paste on" character flaws can seem that way, because we've see it before.  Oh no, not another private detective who is fighting with his spouse over custody of the children.

Then there are those lists of nice traits that you can paste on to your villain.  Such as he loves his mother?  Or he is kind to animals?

Perhaps the best way we can use those lists of tropes is to consult them when we have a "good idea."  If my idea is on the list, I am going try to think of something else.

Finding Paradise on Mykonos

 

Saturday–Jeff

“Your assignment, Jeff, should you choose to accept it, is to find paradise (small p) on Mykonos.”

A mission impossible?

Some might say that, but I’m used to challenges of that sort for they come at me each year at this time in the form of an email from the managing editor of Mykonos Confidential.  In it, I’m asked to contribute an essay to its eponymous glitz and glamour magazine –an icon of the high fashion lifestyle that rules Mykonos each summer.

This year’s topic was described to me as “inspired by the documentary ‘Super Paradise’ - you might have heard of it…we are looking for paradise stories on Mykonos!”

I’d not.

Still, in the three decades I’ve written for MC, they never changed a word of what I’d written, nor has its editorial content shied away from addressing controversial issues. 

I reward that journalistic honesty by writing what I think appropriate for that summer’s topic “without fear or favor” of those who might feel otherwise.

Below is my contribution to this summer’s Mykonos Confidential, and here’s a link to my essay that appears at its pages 44-45.

A Place for Friends

Paradise is a decidedly subjective term.

We can adorn our respective images of paradise with modifiers such as “super” or some yet undiscovered supercalifragilisticexpialidocious version, but the bottom line remains this: each of us possesses an intensely personal view of paradise.

For millennia, creators of art, music, poetry and prose have extolled its virtues while others have proffered demonic versions consistent with their views on paradise as lush with amorality.  That seems a topic worthy of serious attention for members of the Mykonos early morning kafenion crowd in their inevitably intractable musings on the state of their beloved island.

Among visitors to Mykonos, many likely envision paradise as involving turquoise waters lapping against golden beaches under azure skies––perhaps while in the embrace of a new-found lover.

Locals, too, undoubtedly subscribe in varying degrees to that paradisiacal vision of the sea that surrounds their island home.  But mostly it is to their families’ deep roots in a shared hardscrabble past, and unabashed pride in their island’s new-found affluence, that they point to when describing Mykonos as their paradise.

And proud they should be, for prosperity came to Mykonos in no small measure because Mykonian families saw beyond the petty temptations, foibles, and feuds that often come into play when natives, conditioned to accepting as gospel a fixed vision of their paradise, find themselves adrift among compelling alternative perceptions of what paradise might mean going forward.

In an effort to precisely pinpoint what keeps my 40-year love affair with Mykonos still going hot and heavy, I reviewed decades of articles I’d written for Mykonos Confidential.

My first essay described what I liked most about Mykonos.  That answer was easy: the people. Life then was more about hanging out with friends, be it for coffee in the morning, spearfishing and the beach in the afternoon, or joining in on any number of communal activities––all for the purpose of making me part of their lives and they part of mine. 

Back then I saw Mykonos as every bit the legendary draw for tourists from around the world that at its heart still remained a small, Greek island village.  A place where people raised their families and shared strong traditions—forever linked in geographic and spiritual kinship to the Delos of antiquity.

A few years later, for Mykonos Confidential’s Tenth Anniversary issue, I wrote:

“We have entered a different world.  We no longer exist as we once did.  We are separate and apart.  We are imagination and fantasy, dreams and aspirations, a place in the sun unlike any other, fulfilling the great expectations of our planet’s buyers and sellers.”

Despite all that change, Mykonos remains a place of joy where friends from around the world seeking paradise still gather to celebrate.  Old faces and new; Greeks, non-Greeks; gays, non-gays; locals, non-locals; rich, non-rich, all there in abundance listening to their eclectic music, grazing on modern cuisine, imbibing in whatever they desire, wearing as much or little as they wish, dancing, sunning, playing, perhaps even praying, but all smiling and doing whatever makes them happy. 

And as the years roll on, I watch old Mykonos tales of magical moments being remade by the young in their own words, and though time will fly by for them surely as quickly as it has for me, I can assure them that those memories of their time in paradise shall always remain the property of their makers—staying just as fresh for them as mine do for me.

My memories of Mykonos as paradise shall forever remain linked to my Mykonos friends. Friends who continue to draw my heart and soul back to our shared island home.  I’ve stood with them from midnight until two-thirty on an Easter morning crammed into the tiny second-floor space above the chapel of Agia Kiriake in Chora. I’ve danced at their weddings, rejoiced at their baptisms (at times, to both on the same day), and cried at the funerals of longtime friends. 

Though I was not born here and my roots are not Greek, I met my wife here, and Mykonos is the place I call home more than any other.  It is a place of wondrous contrasts and energy, a source of inspiration for my writing. But above all it is home to many of my most treasured friends.  Which is why Mykonos is, and shall forever remain, my paradise.

––Jeff

Jeff’s upcoming events

2025

All Live Events

 

September 3 – 7 | Bouchercon 2025 | New Orleans, LA
Friday, September 5, 4:00-4:45 p.m.
New Orleans Marriott—La Galeries 5-6
Panelist, “Tips and Tricks for Keeping a Series Fresh,” with Anne Cleeland, Marcy McCreary, Charles Todd, Tessa Wegert, and Moderator Deborah Dobbs

Saturday, September 6, 10:30-11:25 a.m.
New Orleans Marriott—La Galerie 3
Panelist, “No Passport Required: International Mysteries and Thrillers,” with Barbara Gayle Austin, Cara Black, Joseph Finder, J.L. Hancock, and Moderator Mark Ellis

 

Wednesday, September 17, 6:30 p.m.
Greek National Tourist Organization
Presentation of the literary work of Jeffrey Siger
Ilias Lalaounis Jewelry Museum
Kallisperi 12, Acropolis

 

The Hippodrome

The Hippodrome of Constantinople.

Circus Maximus Constantinopolitanus.

Those are the ancient names of what is now Sultanahmet Square in Istanbul.

And what a lovely place it is, a real cornucopia of faith and people, with a friendly and relaxed vibe.

Back in the day, it was the sporting and social centre of Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire. The word hippodrome comes of course from the Greek hippos for horse, and dromos for path way as horse and chariot racing were common in the ancient world and the remains of hippodromes can be found in  cities all over the Roman, Hellenistic, and Byzantine periods.

This Hippodrome was built when it was Byzantium, in AD 203. Then in AD 324, the Emperor Constantine the Great decided to rename it Nova Roma but nobody liked that so they called it  Constantinople, the City of Constantine.

 The hippodrome was 450 m long and 130 m wide, and could hold 100 000 people. I think we have all seen Ben Hur enough to know how the action played out. In Istanbul's hippodrome, the central part, the spina is still easily recognisable with many of the monuments and structures still in place.

The stands held 100,000 spectators.

My other half often quotes statistics about the violence between the fans at these ancient games. Rangers and Celtic have nothing compared to the rivalry between the teams, and their fans, in the Byzantine period. People would bet large amounts of money on the chariot races. Four teams took part, each team had two chariots, each pulled by four horses. Each team was sponsored and supported by a different political party.

The one quoted to me most often is the story of the riot that broke out between supporters of the Blues and supporters of the Greens in Nika  in 532. That escalated to civil war in which an estimated 30,000 people were killed. The Hagia Sophia was destroyed in that riot, resulting the building that stands there today.

 Carceres is name for the place were the animals were kept before release, and above the carceres in the Hippodrome was the gilded copper statues of four horses, The Horses of Saint Mark.  I know that Dan Brown has his theories but the ancestry, Greek or Roman, of these horses has never exactly been determined. According to Wikipedia ( and maybe Dan Brown!) they were stolen at the time of the Fourth Crusade (1204) and are now  on the wall of St Mark's Basilica in Venice.

Here's a quick walk round the Hippodrome as it is today.

                                                     The German Fountain, Gifted from Kaiser Wilhelm.

                                                                        The Blue Mosque

Hagia Sophia

And a street of old buildings, in wood. They reminded me very much of Nantucket!

 

Get the main character up a tree…

 Michael - Alternate Thursdays

“The writer’s job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them.” - Vladimir Nabokov

First step
Man up tree

[I couldn't resist trying out Chat GPT as the artist to illustrate this topic. Man up the tree came out pretty well. I like his stare into the distance. Worried about the stone throwers, I'd guess.

Second step
Addition of stone throwers

When I asked for the addition of the stone throwers, the perspective became suspect and the whole affair rather biblical. But then that's not unreasonable if you're into stoning people.]

Back to topic. It’s obvious what it means of course - make life impossibly difficult for the main character. This is especially true for thrillers, but probably applies to all fiction. If you work at it, you can get characters into a lot of trouble. However, there are some issues that need to be addressed. The reader needs to care about the character, otherwise the reaction is 'so what'?  However, while it’s quite easy to get the character up there, then what? If it’s really impossibly difficult, the character has no hope. That’s the most intriguing scenario for the reader, but now you have to rescue the character from the impossible situation. Somehow. Unless you’re writing The Lord of the Rings, you can’t have an eagle arrive, invite the character onto its back, and fly off, taking evasive action to avoid the stones.

Jeffrey Deaver says that he plots his books in such detail because of exactly this issue. He needs to know how far he can drive the protagonist up the tree and how many stone throwers he can have and yet still save the character for the next crisis. He's got a point.

Stanley and I are largely “pansers” so we don’t plot more than a general outline. However, our character-up-the-tree is the bad guy, so we don’t expect the reader to identify with him. On the other hand, we need to get him down because we want the book to have an interesting and exciting conclusion. Also, his victim, a boy we hope the reader will care about, is depending on him to return or to tell someone where he is. He's up his own tree. Yet the bad guy is stuck. He has to find someone and has no way of going about that. (The tree.) The whole Botswana police force is looking for him. (The stone throwers.) How is he going to pull that off?

Actually, unfortunately we don’t know. We have some ideas, but most of them have flaws or are too much like the eagle approach. We’re working on it right now. 

So back to work. Hopefully I can give you positive update in two weeks' time.

To Be . . . or not to Airbnb?

 Sujata Massey

I recently finished writing an honest 5-star review for the charming cottage in East Nashville. As you probably guessed, I booked it through the business website, Airbnb. Isn’t that the first place one consults when looking for an overnight stay far from home? And while I was grateful for a smooth, uneventful stay in an air-conditioned house in what seemed like the hottest city in America, I didn’t feel 100 percent about it. 

I am trying to kick the Airbnb habit. But it’s hard. Looking at the photo above, shot from the porch of a Victorian home Airbnb in Bayfield, Wisconsin, you can see how much good luck I've had with Airbnb.

Still, I’ve heard a lot of negative chatter about Airbnb this summer. In June and July 2025, local people came together to mount mass demonstrations throughout Europe protesting the rampant and unregulated short-term rental culture in their cities and towns. It happens like this. Tourists and digital nomads blow into town during good weather—which in Southern Europe, can run most of the year. They book themselves into apartments for anywhere from a few days to six months. These mostly-millennial and Gen Z folk can pay rents that are sometimes quadruple the regular rate for long-term local renting. 

We stayed in the tall house just beyond car

This desperate situation has arisen because landlords are commonly evicting long-term tenants to turn ordinary flats into souped-up temporary rentals. Local people on salaries that might have allowed for 500 euros rent per month maximum are out in the cold. Now they may have to move from their hometowns to cheaper places, live in cars, or stay with their parents forever. In Crete and on other Greek islands favored by tourists, locals often can only find apartment rentals for 8 or 9 months of the year—the non-tourist months. I’ve seen news reports where Greek and Spanish working people have become homeless and live in their cars. A similar housing crisis is playing out in Dublin, Ireland, not only for reasons of tourism and nomadic workers, but because of mass permanent migration of wealthy foreigners taking advantage of low taxes.

Especially in Barcelona, the summer protests have involved firing flares and water guns at hotels, tourist vehicles and even some cafes where tourists are sitting. Less in-your-face protests in the Netherlands, Greece, Italy and Portugal. This is a spread from similar tourist protests in Spain in 2024.  Many tourists staying in countries during the protests have expressed an uncaring attitude, usually reciting the old cliche that foreign dollars make these countries prosper. Some people prosper, to be sure. But not the everyday Joe.

Our historic St Paul duplex lodging is on right

In the US, short term rental housing companies include the company VRBO (Vacation Rental By Owner), and others in addition to Airbnb. And this tourism option has impacted lots of cities including my childhood hometown of St. Paul, Minnesota. In St. Paul, downtown hotels are losing business, because businesspeople travel less frequently, and the parents visiting the area's college kids have the chance to stay a few blocks away in historic houses like the one pictured above, where I stayed in 2022 during a chilly weekend. In a variation of this concerned college-parent theme, I booked the Nashville cottage in order to have four or five days to help my college-bound son find and lease his first apartment. I liked staying in a quiet place with free parking and no buses full of drunken bridesmaids. 

Neel and Tony and I found him an apartment, but it was expensive than I expected. In Nashville, most apartments seemed to be in the $1800 to $3000 price range. Wistfully, Tony and I recalled an era when rental prices didn’t  rival house mortgages. In the mid-1990s, we rented a 2 BR, 2 BA apartment in a large 1920s Baltimore building for $1000 a month plus utilities, with just two washers and dryers for everyone to use in the haunted basement. We rose early to find a free machine to wash clothes, but we did manage to save money and buy our first house six years later.

We really liked our apartment, but we absolutely loved our first house, and the two that have since followed. Houses have personalies and quirks that feed into the allure of staying overnight somewhere, in privacy. 

There’s a bit of a gamble with each Airbnb. I punch in a code, turn a knob and hope that the place matches the pretty website photos. I feel lucky when the place is lovely, filled with comfy sofas, tasteful art, and more than one bed and bathroom.  There also have been times when the place I booked reeks or has uncomfortable bedding, anemic plumbing and no more than a two plates and two glasses in the cabinet. And what about the always-recording Alexa device left plugged in? Warning: if you leave a critical review about any of this on Airbnb—the owner might get their revenge by grading you as a terrible guest. 

During our recent two-week-long trip to Greece, Tony and I traveled widely. We stayed in three small hotels, but we started off with four nights in an Airbnb in Chania, Crete. Our abode was a tiny, traditional house just one room wide with a steep, winding staircase that went up three stories. It was a blessing to have a separate floor to tiptoe down to during restless nights with jetlag. More recently, in the East Nashville Airbnb, we enjoyed morning coffee on the back porch overlooking a yard and forested area. A good house, stocked by a caring person for guests, is a haven.

Silva Heritage is called "Home Stay" hotel in Goa, India

Silva's 300-year-old farmland seen from room's balcony

Airbnb meant “air bed and breakfast” originally. The first Airbnbs I heard about were spare rooms in someone’s apartment. This type of arrangement is similar to being a “Paying Guest” in someone’s bungalow in India, or pensione in Italy, or domatia in Greece. And speaking of domatia, I remember fondly staying in several during travels to the Cyclades back in the late 1980s. In the pre-internet days, the only method the owners could attract you was by coming in person to the port, calling out, and holding up signs with photos of the lodging.

I find the advantage to a true homestay is the cultural connection with its owners who can help you in so many ways. We were saved by the kindness of our Airbnb owner in Chania, who did live next door and communicated in Greek with the local airport to deliver our lost luggage. It seemed to me that the little house we stayed in was probably family property, rather than investment, because she told me that her electrician husband had done all the complex lighting in the house. However, a faraway management company had come to handle the bookings and billings in recent years. 

Here I am, pondering whether there is any chance for change--or if this is an inevitable, permanent reshaping of who gets to live where. Can governments fix this for the better? And what would shift things to send more tourists into hotels and thus save lodging for year-round people? 

Hilton and Marriott have been offering for years all-suite hotels that are budget- and family-smart, but rather short on charm. Different hotels could reshape their existing infrastructure to include more genuine, two- and three-room suites with homey features—including coffeemakers and microwaves, which seem to vanish the more a room costs. And why can't a good hotel have some washers and dryers, now that same-day laundry valet isn't always offered? 

Airbnb Victorian cottage in Lewes, DE 

Inevitably, travelers press on. We can dare to make our journeys with the intent to speak at least a few words of the local language, and to perhaps stay in towns where there aren't too many of us. I acknowledge there are some countries and towns where Airbnbs aren’t such a drain on the local housing market, and renting one’s house might be important income for someone who doesn’t have paying work. It's just that when a particular town becomes too famous and too popular, that the problems begin.

 

Right now, I am in the slow--planning stage of various trips to  the United Kingdom, Greece, and Spain. This time, I’m researching smaller hotels and actual bed-and-breakfasts. Do b&bs still exist? If you know a good one, tell me.

A Sinkhole in Singapore, Children's Stories and Celebrating Mr Subbiah!

Ovidia – every other Tuesday.

Here in Singapore we're celebrating Mr Subbiah--Construction site foreman Pitchai Udaiyappan Subbiah--because his quick thinking saved the woman whose car was caught when two lanes of Tanjong Katong Road South collapsed.
A sinkhole in Singapore?

Singapore is often seen as a model of safety, stability and predictability. We're an island with a granite core and government after all. So the sudden appearance of a sinkhole was all the more shocking.

Workers at a nearby site saw a woman in the vehicle that plunged into the hole (rapidly filling with water) that appeared. Luckily she was conscious and said there was no one else in the car with her. Mr Subbiah coordinated the rescue effort (involving a nylon rope harness) and they got her out in under five minutes.

I found it all the more striking because during a recent story writing workshop at the Naval Base Primary School, in response to suggesting 'bad' things happening, one of the students suggested "An earthquake?" but this was dismissed by her peers as "Something that would never happen in Singapore!"

And yet... this sinkhole (not quite an earthquake but quite as traumatic if you were in that car) happened!

I think that murder stories, whether for children or adults, are a kind of preparation for things beyond the comforting illusion that life is safe and stable.
And when lives are not safe and stable (as for so many right now) they may offer hope that 'this too shall pass'.

I was really surprised and impressed by the young student-writers. And a bit intimidated by them.
When creating characters we asked and answered questions like "What's their favourite food?" and "What's their greatest fear?"
I was expecting answers like "failing exams" or other school issues, but I got responses like, "My character's greatest fear is death," and "My character's greatest fear is his parents going on Haj and dying and him not knowing why they don't come back."

It made me realise that when we're writing with and for children, we can't dumb it down because they're living in the same world and facing the same issues as everyone else.

I'd always had the impression that when writing for children, you don't talk about death.

But even as I write that I know it's not true. One of my favourite children's books, Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage, features a murder or two (or three, if you count the one that happened years ago).

Why do we read and write stories and books? For entertainment, sure. But also because it's a way to learn and see how other people work things out--and sometimes because it helps us figure things out.

The children I was working with had all read my middle-grade book The Mudskipper, which has a sort of villain character, Aunt Mona (somebody dies in the book, but she doesn't murder him). And one child asked, when we talking about villains, "From Aunt Mona's point of view, she might have thought she was actually helping by being so strict. Sometimes my parents are very strict with me, but they mean well. Maybe she meant well too" and we talked about writing paired stories, where the 'villains' of a story are the main characters of the other.

Yes, I was surrounded by twenty five eleven year Rashomon creators! And it was wonderful, I was so impressed by them.

But even more I'm impressed by the schools and teachers who create creative spaces and are constantly stepping up and ploughing down to bring out the best in these students.

I got the thanks, but they are the ones who deserve the credit!

And big thanks, of course, to Mr Subbiah--who has been working here for 22 years and said it's his first time being involved in a rescue effort but was matter of fact about it.

In his words (translated from Tamil) “We saved a life… whatever happens, that is all that matters,”

Talking Mysteries in Minnesota

Annamaria on Monday

When Stan Trollip  invited me to go to Minneapolis and appear with him in a presentation about his and Michael's Kubu detective series, I jumped at the chance.  Why wouldn't I, when the topic was a series I have greatly admired and enjoyed from its very beginning.

Me, the Kubu fan, in Mysterious Bookstore in NYC

in 2013, when Kubu was nominated for an Edgar!

Stan and I met at my first Bouchercon in 2009.  He was there to promote Kubu's 1 and 2 set in Botswana, a place I had visited twice quite recently and was fascinated with.  Also, the founding of Murder is Everywhere was a result of that conference.  Eventually, we co-edited the short story anthology, Sunshine Noir.

Stan's invitation was irresistible.  Minneapolis is, for me, the US city second only to my beloved NYC. In addition to its world-class theater, music, and sports teams, Minneapolis and its surrounding area offer crime writers some wonderful opportunities to connect with fans of the genre.  And Stan was inviting me to join him in an appearance before them. 

First on our list was Minnesota Mystery Night, a gathering for dinner in an attractive pub, followed by a mystery writer "in conversation with" someone in the field.  Our event, I am thrilled to say, drew a sold out crowd and was very well received.  The folks attending were enthusiastic and asked lots of great questions.  When we were signing books afterwords, the attendees hung around, chatting and full of energy - a sure sign that the monthly reception brings truly dedicated fans. 

Second on our agenda, on the following Friday, we were interviewed on Writers' Corner, a public television show that is distributed widely on scores of local PBS stations.

The pièce de résistance of the week for me was the capper: on Friday evening Stan treated me to my first-ever concert at Minneapolis Orchestra Hall.  What a knockout!  First of all, the acoustics of the hall are astonishing, in a class with  Carnegie Hall in New York and the best European concert halls I have visited.  The second half of the program was music I have heard all my adult life: Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. Every other time I have heard it played live, it was by an orchestra, providing the music for ballet. It's lovely music under those circumstances. But I got to hear it in a whole new way - in a concert performance, and it was spectacular. The Conductor, Jonathan Taylor Rush imbued the music with energy and passion and without robbing it of its elegance.  Wow!  What a week!