Sometimes, reality feels like that, lately. We've got fifteen year-old girls killing nine year-old girls 'just to see what it feels like,' mass shootings at army bases, people stabbing each other over subway seats... in short, human life seems to be cheaper than ever. As a crime writer, I wonder sometimes if I'm contributing to this, by writing murder mysteries. Has anyone else ever had this thought? Of course, justice triumphs at the end (at least, in my books it does), but are we contributing to 'violence porn' in our culture? Your opinion and thoughts, please...

MK
www.minervakoenig.com

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You think it's bad now, read American history. Conditions for the poor in New York and other major cities around the time of the Civil War would not be tolerated today, even by conservatives. And if you think life is cheap today, look back to settling the West, where the threat of law enforcement was far more a theory than a fact, and no one thought twice about someone dropping out of touch for months at a time before they'd start to worry.

I'm not saying everything is great now, but the media make sure we see these things every day, both in fact and in fiction. that's not a bad thing--people should be aware of the world around them--but it can give a distorted view.
It's not that I fear the world is any closer to the end of days now than at any other time in history, or that one particular type of crime fiction is 'better' than any other -- it's that I wonder if, by writing murder mysteries, we're somehow profiting from society's misery. In other words, people seem to be more and more fascinated by death and mayhem, and we, more so than other genres, play to the balcony.

Or is it just the old Good triumphs over Evil story, retold?
it's that I wonder if, by writing murder mysteries, we're somehow profiting from society's misery.

Why is that a bad thing? In fact I think we tend to exaggerate society's misery--serial killers are rare, torture-murders are rare, we remain a violent society but much less so than a generation ago, but you'd never know it if your only window on the world was crime fiction. It's fiction--fiction is based in conflict, and there's a kind of conflict scale that writers have access to--from the quietly domestic to the fully apocalyptic. We're somewhere in between.

people seem to be more and more fascinated by death and mayhem, and we, more so than other genres, play to the balcony.

The audience isn't making us do anything. If our work reflects a fascination with death and mayhem, that says volumes about us as writers and not that much about readers, who mostly just want a good story.

Or is it just the old Good triumphs over Evil story, retold?

I hope not. Nothing in fiction is more boring than moral certainty.
Don't agree. Readers' tastes dictate what authors write. Perhaps not for you, Jon, or for me, but certainly for many authors who are motivated by wanting to have success/money.
We act as though the conventions of the genre are completely beyond our control. If we didn't have some fundamental interest in writing about murder/crime/violence, we'd be writing romances, or academic comedies, or YA vampire fiction, or poetry. Nobody has to write about murder; nobody makes us do it.
You make an interesting point, Jon (as usual).

I'm not sure what it is about murder mysteries that grips my interest, but something about them does. I wish I could put my finger on it, and on what it says about me as a person...
I can't speak for anyone else, but for me there are two things: first, I like a mystery. Both as a writer and as a reader, I like to think through a problem, weigh the various possibilities, and try to beat the detective to the right answer (then be pleasantly surprised when I'm wrong). That process is weirdly enjoyable--enough that I'm happy doing it over and over. As a writer, I also get to unleash my inner murderer, vent a bit of my pent-up rage, make fun of people who need making fun of, work out some of the stickier bits of homicidal ideation I've got rattling around in my head--both from a how-to perspective (always fun), and in terms of the moral implications. It's not cartoon Good overcoming cartoon Evil: it's more about whether character x deserves to die, and pinning down the squirmy nature of justice.
That implies that there is little variety in the genre. And that is patently and thankfully untrue. Of all the genres, mysteries (or crime novels) allow writers more freedom to choose the less-traveled but more interesting and challenging path than any other format. The point is, they don't avail themselves of this when the well-trodden, secure-sales track beckons.
That implies that there is little variety in the genre.

No it doesn't. :) It implies what it says--that the central convention of the crime novel aka mystery aka murder mystery is crime/violence/murder, hence the name(s). You can write a mystery without a murder, but you'd better substitute something roughly equivalent in order to raise the emotional and moral stakes to the proper pitch (mixed metaphor--sorry).
If you'll go back to the original posting, you'll note that it dealt not with crime per se, but with violence porn. Cozies tend to avoid any reference to overt violence other than the existence of a body, and some humorous heist books don't rely on those kinds of emotional and moral subjects at all.
In any case, the emotional and moral stakes you mention need not rely on extreme and repeated violence any more than a love story needs to rely on repeated sex acts.
In any case, the emotional and moral stakes you mention need not rely on extreme and repeated violence any more than a love story needs to rely on repeated sex acts.

I don't know who you're arguing with, IJ. I never said they did. You're taking us way back to the original, thread-starting post, but what I'm responding to above was Minerva's question about society's misery.

In any case, even "humorous heist" books rely on crime or criminal behavior (transgressive behavior, to use the academic word), the threat of discovery and at least the threat of violence, in order to generate their tension. And I'm done arguing with you on this thread now--it's getting pathological

That said, the more "sex acts" in a love story, the better.
Okay, that was offensive.

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