Writer's Blog - 3.

In trying to turn a short story into a full-length book, one of the problems that I had to address was the basic question of  who would be the guilty party.   In other words, "Who dunnit?" In the short story, I had created two sympathetic characters.  At least, the small audience who heard me read the story found them sympathetic.   One of these characters is a policeman, a detective - a bit of a wag who is nearing retirement.   The other is a 30-something writer with a tragedy in his past.   The problem was that, right at the end of the short story, it turns out that they were the ones who carried out the murder - and that they were also responsible for a whole string of gruesome events that followed it.   Perhaps my problem comes from an unrealistic ambition - the desire to give these two characters an extended life, an existence that would span several books.  Could you possibly do that, once your audience knew that your two main protagonists were at best, ruthless vigilantes?  I thought long and hard about that and concluded that I couldn't. I would try to keep the characters sympathetic and human.   Someone else must have done the horrible deed!.   But who? ©  David Gray