Mystery Plotting in Five Steps

Here’s a quick brainstorming exercise to help you develop a plot outline for your mystery novel.

 

Mystery Step One: The Crime

Define the crime.

Determine exactly how, when, and where it was committed.

Describe the weapon(s) used.

Describe the condition of the body when found.

 

Mystery Step Two: The Motive

Define the motive.

Describe why the villain was driven to commit the crime.

Describe what he/she hoped to achieve.

Define the results of the crime.

 

Mystery Step Three: The Suspect List

             WHO                                    WHY____________

1.    
2.    
3.    

Mystery Step Four: List of Clues

        CLUE                             FOUND WHEN/HOW

1. Victim        
2.             
3.                    
4.                  
5.  

 

Mystery Step Five: Red Herrings

  FALSE CLUE                       FOUND WHEN/HOW

1.     
2.      
3.      

In my last post for this series I’ll discuss putting it all together.

All of the brainstorming exercises described in this blog series can be found in my Scrivener template on Google Drive at https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BzGNFy181nZiM0J5TGI3WXJyUkE/.

For non-Scrivener users, Personal Noveling Assistant (PNA) pages are at https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0BzGNFy181nZiczA2aGJrTnN1X2c/.

For more about my stories, check out my author page at http://www.amazon.com/author/lauraewrites/.