Yzabel / November 10, 2005

This thought hit me yesterday, while watching an episode of Monk, and this is probably why I’m going to link this to mystery novels and other kinds of “investigation” stories. How noticeable is a detail for an untrained person? To which extent can we consider that our characters are able to notice certain types of details more than other types? Of course, there’s a difference to be made here between knowledge learnt from books/school, knowledge learnt from experience/training/practice, and knowledge that one can happen to have because they stumbled upon it at some point in their lives, without their career and social/familial situation explaining it. The latter is always the one that is the trickiest for me: what is acceptable, and what is just a deus ex machina mechanism chosen by the author as a convenient solution?As an example, here is a scene from the episode in question: the corpse of the victim is found by a woman. After said woman is questioned by the police, she takes her car back (the one she has come to the crime scene with) and, incidentally, has to adjust the driver’s seat. A tiny detail, but one that bears an important meaning later on in the story. A detail that I, being a driver and pretty short, have noticed immediately. It is evident to me that, if a person enters a car and has to adjust the seat in such a way, the previous driver was a taller person. After all, you can’t really drive well if your feet don’t even touch the pedals. However, would such a detail be so easily noticeable to someone who doesn’t drive, who’s never set foot behind a steering wheel? This is the question I’m asking myself.There are things I know that aren’t explained by my personal and work experience, nor by what I’ve learnt during my various education degrees. Mostly, they’re completely theoretical, and I’m not sure at 100% whether they’d actually work in real situations or not, yet the fact is, I know them. I know, for instance, that if you block the cylinder on a gun while the hammer is pulled, you can’t shoot. Vaguely knowing how a good old Peacemaker works, I can conclude that it’s logical, and that this knowldege indeed is probably true. I’m not supposed to know that, though. I’m not a cop, I’ve never received firearms training, and I haven’t even touched a gun once in my life (except a paintball one, and the one they use in the LaserQuest games). If I were the heroin of a mystery novel, and this particular detail a very important one to solve the murder, how would the author explain that I know that, me, the 26-years old graphic-designer whose craft is with computers and nothing else? (By the way, I can’t remember where I’ve learnt that. I’m of no help here.)I guess this is a matter probably left to each author’s appreciation, but… I can’t help wondering!details, monk, writing