When I first began the task of crafting my new novel, ZION'S WEB, I actually had no idea what sort of book I intended to writeâ€"other than I wanted my story to be a thriller. Despite involving Mormons in the story, I certainly wasn't attempting to write LDS fiction, nor do I think I succeeded in accomplished thisâ€"at least not in the traditional view of things. But what I did write, in my viewpoint, is fully uniqueâ€"and, more importantly, it's mine.
This naturally goes for the hero in my novel, Zachariah (Zack) Burton, an ex-FBI-Agent-turned-private-investigator who lives on a 50-foot sport fisher in San Pedro, California. In figuring out precisely how I wanted to develop Zack, it is perhaps useful to inspect the roots of detective fiction which is where I got my ideas. In delving into private eyes, I learned that many of these personalitiesâ€"at least those of the male variety set in the twentieth century and laterâ€"seemed to bear at least some resemblance to the hard-boiled detectives created by the likes of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. These men were all hardened, basic types of individuals, with a somewhat cynical view of life.
My lead personality Zack fits this profile in a number of ways due to many of the events that have occurred in his life. Zack recently lost his wife to cancer, for instance, an event that caused him to begin drinking excessively. This behavior ultimately led him to lose nearly everything he had in life, including his job with the FBI. The one thing he managed to hang onto was the Kajiki, his sport fisher berthed in a marina in San Pedro. True to his hard-boiled image, Zack starts out as a loner and a near-total recluse but through the progression of the book grows as a person until by the end he is far more approachable and sympathetic.
What makes Zack stand out , however, is the Mormon component. Thanks to the nature of the case he is entangled withâ€"the rescue of a female escapee from a polygamist compound run by self-proclaimed fundamentalist Mormonsâ€"I felt it was important to distinguish these individuals from the mainstream Mormons headquartered out of Salt Lake who gave up the practice of polygamy over a hundred years ago and excommunicate any of their members who continue practicing it. For similar reasons, I also thought it was necessary to include something about mainstream Mormonism in my story.
The girl Zack was married to as an example was a Mormon, even though he isn't. His ex-brother-in-law is also a Mormon and provides the main vehicle through which assorted historical elements about Mormonism are presented, though these are never permitted to interfere with the key story line.
The bottom line on all this is to say that your lead personality in detective fiction should be based on something you identify with personally, which is how you'll make him or her your own. If I had copied Dashiell Hammett's character, or Chandlers, or any one of a half dozen others, my character would not have been unique, which would have influenced my story and made it somewhat unremarkable . And if your story is not unique, it has little chance of developing a robust audience or distinguishing you as a writer.
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This naturally goes for the hero in my novel, Zachariah (Zack) Burton, an ex-FBI-Agent-turned-private-investigator who lives on a 50-foot sport fisher in San Pedro, California. In figuring out precisely how I wanted to develop Zack, it is perhaps useful to inspect the roots of detective fiction which is where I got my ideas. In delving into private eyes, I learned that many of these personalitiesâ€"at least those of the male variety set in the twentieth century and laterâ€"seemed to bear at least some resemblance to the hard-boiled detectives created by the likes of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. These men were all hardened, basic types of individuals, with a somewhat cynical view of life.
My lead personality Zack fits this profile in a number of ways due to many of the events that have occurred in his life. Zack recently lost his wife to cancer, for instance, an event that caused him to begin drinking excessively. This behavior ultimately led him to lose nearly everything he had in life, including his job with the FBI. The one thing he managed to hang onto was the Kajiki, his sport fisher berthed in a marina in San Pedro. True to his hard-boiled image, Zack starts out as a loner and a near-total recluse but through the progression of the book grows as a person until by the end he is far more approachable and sympathetic.
What makes Zack stand out , however, is the Mormon component. Thanks to the nature of the case he is entangled withâ€"the rescue of a female escapee from a polygamist compound run by self-proclaimed fundamentalist Mormonsâ€"I felt it was important to distinguish these individuals from the mainstream Mormons headquartered out of Salt Lake who gave up the practice of polygamy over a hundred years ago and excommunicate any of their members who continue practicing it. For similar reasons, I also thought it was necessary to include something about mainstream Mormonism in my story.
The girl Zack was married to as an example was a Mormon, even though he isn't. His ex-brother-in-law is also a Mormon and provides the main vehicle through which assorted historical elements about Mormonism are presented, though these are never permitted to interfere with the key story line.
The bottom line on all this is to say that your lead personality in detective fiction should be based on something you identify with personally, which is how you'll make him or her your own. If I had copied Dashiell Hammett's character, or Chandlers, or any one of a half dozen others, my character would not have been unique, which would have influenced my story and made it somewhat unremarkable . And if your story is not unique, it has little chance of developing a robust audience or distinguishing you as a writer.
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About the Author:
Michael Snow is the author of ZION'S WEB, the first in the Zachariah Burton detective series. As well as writing stories, Michael maintains a blogsite which incorporates some handy and highly fascinating blogs including information about creating a fictional detective.
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