If you’ve ever felt let down by the end of a mystery novel, there’s a good reason why. The biggest secret in crime fiction is that there are really only, like, four ways to tie up a mystery, and I’m going to show you all of them in 1,200 words. Get ready to have an entire genre irrevocably spoiled.
1. The Obvious Killer
“I know it was you, Ignatius Didit. I knew it when you shook my hand, and I saw something dark crusted under your fingernails. I knew it when I heard peculiar noises coming from your basement and decided not to investigate them for some contrived reason. I knew it when your alibi fell apart. I knew it by process of elimination, because everybody else who might have done it is dead. But, really, I knew it the first time I met you; when I visited you at your place of business, I saw that the sign above the door said: ‘I. Didit, Purveyor of Fine Hatchets, Cleavers, and Shovels.’ Your guilt couldn’t be more obvious. The only reason I thought it might not be you for a while is because it seemed too manifestly self-evident. But it’s apparently you. So, I’ve got to say, I’m pretty disappointed.”
2. The Tertiary Perpetrator:
A. The Forgettable Man
“Who is that? Oh, it’s you. Yes, I recognized you. It just took me a second, because I haven’t seen you for, like, 200 pages. And, to be honest, you didn’t really make much of an impression when we met. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t have remembered you, except that somebody very pointedly and deliberately reminded me about you two chapters ago. I should have expected that you’d be showing up again. Otherwise, why would anyone even bother to mention you? What are you doing here? And why have you got that knife?”
B. A Little Too Friendly
“I swear, sometimes this detective job gets to me; drives me to the bottle. You want a swig? No? More for me then. Everybody’s so awful. I know most of them are innocent, at least of the murder, but they’re all so cagey. Everyone here seems to have some dark secret, and they’re so fast to lie or conceal things from me. It just shatters my faith in mankind. They’re so hopeless. All of them except you. You’ve really been a friend to me, these past few days. You’ve been so happy to divulge everything you know and to tell me all about the reclusive oddballs who live in this Norwegian fishing hamlet where the sun only rises for three hours a day. You’ve helped me keep track of the byzantine genealogies of the feuding local families, and you’ve offered your extensive local knowledge in service of my attempts to identify inconsistencies in their stories. I wouldn’t be anywhere without you, and I hope we will remain close friends when this is all over. Why are you laughing so sinisterly?”
C. He Mostly Kept To Himself
“Pardon me, I was just passing by on my way to accuse somebody else of being the brutal serial murderer who has terrorized this neighborhood for the past few months, and I happened to notice an odd stench coming from your apartment. Is everything okay in there? Do you mind if I have a look around? It seems like — OH GOD! OH GOD! OH GOD!”
D. Here Comes A New Challenger
“Who are you? Oh. You’re the victim’s ex-fiance. Isn’t it odd that I’ve been investigating the murder for the entire book, and we are just meeting now, for the first time, on page 320? I think someone told me about you, but I didn’t think much about it at the time. What? You say you eloped with her, and you were secretly married? I guess that explains the receipt for a plane ticket to Las Vegas that I found in her desk. But if you’re her husband, and the whole family is dead, then that means you’re the sole heir to the largest combination yarn store and kitten shelter in all of New Hampshire! That’s your motive, you conniving rapscallion! And you would have got away with it, too, if it weren’t for me, the Etsy detective and my associate, Mr. Mittens, the wiliest tomcat in New England!”
3. The Master Of Deduction Goes To Work
“Watson, you’ll notice from these footprints that the perpetrator wears one shoe in a size nine and-a-half, and another in a size 11.”
“That seems most convenient, Holmes.”
“Yes, I find things usually are. Now, if you examine the footprint more closely, what else do you see?”
“It looks to be the tread of a work-boot.”
“Perhaps I don’t tell you enough that you’re stupid, Watson. I mean, really, you have a special gift for pointing out the obvious. How did you become a surgeon anyway? What happens when you operate on someone? Do you saw open the poor man’s torso, and then notice that his chest seems to be full of organs?”
“What do you see, Holmes?”
“You can see that the boot print contains some red dirt. That’s brick dust. This is very fortuitous, because each clay-bed has dust of a unique color, so I can always tell where someone has come from, as long as they’ve wandered through a brickyard. And criminals are always wandering through brickyards, I guess.”
“That also seems awfully convenient.”
“It’s like I always say, Watson: When you eliminate all the inconvenient possibilities, what remains, however implausible, might as well be the truth.”
“Quite right.”
“Now, over here, we have a bit of pipe-ash. The leaf from every tobacco store in London is unique for some reason, and therefore identifiable by its ash. I can triangulate the area between the pipe-store where this tobacco came from and the brickyard where the dust came from, and then we have only a three block radius in which to look for the man with the mismatched feet!”
“Extraordinary!”
“And wait! What’s this? Why, it’s the pollen of the African violet, which I can identify on sight even though it’s practically microscopic and looks pretty much the same as any other pollen. There is only one window box in that neighborhood that contains African violets. By the way, I evidently know the location of every single weed or blade of grass in all of London. We have narrowed our search to but a single building, and now I know the name of the man we’re looking for!”
“How is that possible?”
“I don’t mean to be mysterious, my dear stupid Watson. I shall tell you everything, just as soon as I snort up all this cocaine.”
4. The Big Twist
“Look! It is I! You thought I was dead, but I am not dead. I am still alive, and I tricked you. Also, I am not really a woman; I’m actually a man. I’m the brother of the boy who was hit by the train 20 years ago. I never disappeared. I’ve been here all along, in disguise. Also, are you ready to have your mind blown? You and I are actually the same person. That’s right. We’ve been the same person all along. If you think about it, it totally makes sense. Also, this isn’t really New York City. It’s actually purgatory. But it’s not really purgatory; it’s more like a computer simulation of purgatory. And the computer is a ghost, but it doesn’t know its dead.”
Image Credit: Wikipedia
Awful all around, for all of them.
I think the US covers are so much better. They are more subtle and more artistic. I was pleasantly surprised!
— Radhika.
Such a thought provoking and in-depth analysis of the work, AMPruteanu.
Its clear from this that America is way better than the UK!!
Go team America!!
Yay!!!
UK = visit a dentist already!!!
Jimmy Nowhere: when they pay me for that, I’ll give them that. Until then, though: Nyet!
Have you seen the UK cover for Knut Hamsun’s Hunger?
It’s awful.
Never judge a book by its cover they say….
Obviously they’re never read the Necronomicon ;)
They have tails you know…(Brits that is)
My cousin/brother Jeb told me so.
I’ve even heard that some of the books they read have plain covers with just the name of the book on it!! Sometimes only down the spine!!!
They have big dusty old libraries with these plain covered books and people actually read them!!! 80
Its a mad, mad world and no mistake!!
It isn’t that one set of covers are better or worse than the other it is good that publishers recognise the different sensibilities of 2 seperate sets of readers. perhaps we could work on the spelling next.
P-lease! Don’t get me started on the spelling!!!
I’m pretty sure they learnt modern English from us Americans (You only have to read Charles Dickens to understand how backward they were before we educated them on modern English)
I love the accent though; “Aw-roight Mary, spare us cupla bob!”
so twee…
“seperate”
“Aluminium”
“Honour, Colour.”
An obsession with the letter ‘u’ maybe?
(If you line up lots of u’s it kind of looks like teeth:
uuuuuuuuu
They have wooden teeth you know….
F.A.C.T.
(The Queen mother did in fact had plywood teeth)
Actually judging from the perspective of which books I would be more likely to pick up to read the blurb – for the most part (perhaps one exception) I prefer the UK covers. Could not always tell you why. I certainly wouldn’t presume to say the US covers are awful (well one or two really put me off) but simply that they do not attract me in the same way.
Great article!
The ignorant/rude/offensive people in the comments? Not so much.
Or person, should I say.
This is strange: in the years since I’ve been following TMN’s Tournament of Books, this marks the first time that I’ve preferred the US editions over the UK. Except with “Freedom” and “So Much for All That.” That giant bird drives me nuts.
You should compare covers of the John Cleaver series by Dan Wells. They’re also in Germany (and look at the cover from Taiwan from the first book).
Great piece; I find it fascinating that although we English and Americans are very similar in many respects, that there are also some beautiful finite differences that make us wonderfully unique.
I can’t agree on this whole spelling deal though! – ‘English’ grammar on the whole is an organic entity and changes have appeared throughout the 20th Century on both sides of the Atlantic. Hundreds of words are added to the Oxford English Dictionary every year, I’m sure the same applies state-side…
NB: The American spelling ‘Aluminum’ is in fact scientifically correct; When this new material was presented to English engineers, they, in their wisdom changed it!
(The queen Mum did in fact have very bad teeth though i’m sure they were spruce not plywood!!)
vive le difference as they say…
> I did think that the Necronomicon post was funny though!!
Like it or not, ‘Dwayne the Rude’ is one funny guy!
We are very good at laughing at ourselves over here ;)
200 years ago Noah Webster changed the spelling when he did his dictionary.
Generally, the UK covers have a little more tone, but adaptability to local tastes is a dine idea.
Comments (above) about dumbed-down American spelling are pointless and incredibly self-defensive!
Is oversimplification really the first principle of everything in the US?
“fine idea”, of course.
Generally the American covers are more artistic.
What’s clearly noticeable though is the fact that 90% of UK covers have snippets of acclaims or praise from sources, be it newspapers or other authors. This plays as a major selling point for the books from my study of the UK market.
As an American, I could not say which is better–we are all culture bound. I can critique the art tho.
The Brit ROOM for instance offers great claustraphobic effect with the gradient as if looking through a window and the strectched text on ROOM give the effect of a magnifying glass. So that house is really small. The Am. ROOM suggests a child and maybe an angry child which I don’t find as interesting.
The Brit FREEDOM has vertical text which is harder to read. The Am FREEDOM has eye catching text and nice colors.
SO MUCH FOR THAT on the Brit ver is harder to read than the Am. but the opposite ti true of the next book, SUPER SAD.
To Dwayne Davies:
The British fascination with the letter ‘U’ is actually a very successful innovation on their part.
It makes drawing the ‘U’ to a Scrabble rack much less of a threat.
^ U’s used to be V’s – (Ancient stonemasons found it easier to carve a V than a U.)
I live near a city called Bath, Roman Name: Aqvae Svlis
V’s like, 4 points, U’s only 1 point :(
I therefore blame the Romans for my poor Scrabble scores.
There is one big difference between the US and UK. The UK still publishes a lot of quality writing,= and has many excellent bookstores. The US tends to publish cookbooks, romance novels and self-help trash. The difference may be that the British still teach English in schools. Most people here in the US find People magazine challenging.
Just pop in any American bookstore–what do you find. Anything BUT books and then cookbooks and self-help trash.
Dear Dwayne Davies…
Give it a break. Or get a job. You obviiously have too much time on your hands given the number of off-topic posts…
I thought the good ‘ol US would be crushed in this one, but I’m pleasantly surprised to see that we faired pretty well. I’m one of those nerds that would lean towards purchasing a book (or any product) just because of the design. I appreciate the insightful reviews after each example.
me being neither American not English i would say i have unbiased opinions and I think for all the books except for freedom i prefer the UK book covers are much better since I am guilty as charge of judging books by their cover i would have choose the UK ones every time (except for freedom) without even knowing which one it belongs two!!!!!
~Cuz Diamond is nothing but coal that did well under pressure~
You can’t really tell from the picture, but the UK Super Sad… has a coloured foil effect that, IMHO, works very well.
IMHO:
“The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake”: US. US version reminds me of the paintings of Wayne Thiebaud: Happy, but with a haunting quality. The UK version looks like a still life with cake, lemons, and human being. That’s kind of creepy when you think about it.
“Room”. UK. A hauntingly beautiful quality about it. Little house draws us into picture, and might draw me into the book itself. The US version is more scary-creepy-disturbing.
“A Visit from the Goon Squad”. US. I like Jennifer Egan, and the bigger her name is on the book the more likely I am to read it. The UK version is just kinda’ weird with the letters falling like coal on an umbrella. What’s that about?
“Freedom”. US. It’s pretty, and it has a whole bird and not just some lame feather like the UK version.
“So Much For That”. US. Bold colors and torn picture suggest more than a place setting where if you look closely the knife has been replaced by a box cutter (or is that a fountain pen?). I like orange in books. It reminds me of my copy of “A Clockwork Orange”.
“Super Sad True Love Story”. US. A tongue-in-cheek, over-the-top title deserves a similar cover. The UK version is too muted and convoluted in tone. The US version is as in-your-face as the title.
jeez, could’ve you have been ANY more bias against the UK??
could’ve been a good article…
wasn’t
I am a writer and I design my own book covers completelty by myself. Who else knows better than me how to visualize the content of my manuscript?
Completelety = completely
Hehe, completelty
I find it interesting that for the “unbearable Sadness of Lemon Cake”, the UK cover emphasises the “Sadness” whereas the US cover emphasises the “Lemon Cake”. Far be it from me to draw any conclusions from that. :-)
Reading some of these comments are quite funny, “Visit a dentist already” & “Plain covers with only the title down the spine”, guys come on, really? Don’t believe everything you hear. The U.S version of most of the books are better, which is a shame really as it’s the covers that draw you in, oh well, I think more time needs to be spent deciding on the cover designs over here in Britatin.