My second published work, Binary, is a short story in the compilation Cracked Ice: What Happens when the Lights Go Out?. This is the second collaboration I’ve been involved with, the first being The Legacy Letters. Both these collaborations are a fundraiser for my writer’s group, Oklahoma Christian Fiction Writers. All proceeds go to our group.
I had a lot of fun writing this story. It was my first attempt at writing a murder mystery, and was a fantastic exercise. I had to learn how to write a character so that 3 different interpretations of that character could seem valid all at the same time, depending on who the reader thinks he is. It was fascinating to explore layering duplicity in a single character presentation.
It was also a great study for the next set of scenes in my debut novel, which is the first book of The Virid Flame series. The scene is a high-society dinner party with heads of state, ambassadors, and other luminaries. My protagonist, a lady swashbuckler, doesn’t want to be there but needs information that only the guests possess. Four other key guests all have their own motivations, public and private, and their own goals for this dinner. All are duplicitous in various ways, and I need to write their dialogue so that it can be read two or three different ways at the same time. What a mess!
Binary was excellent practice for this tricky writing technique. Based on the commentary from my fellow writers about Binary, I was rather successful. I had multi-published authors with three different opinions of “whodunit”. Many were convinced of their solution, others seeing it equally a few ways, and still more completely mystified. Only two of them hit on the correct solution to the mystery from the start.
I’d love to see if you can solve the mystery of Jacob and John in Binary. Check out Binary and other stories in Cracked Ice: What Happens when the Lights Go Out?