Audiences have a seemingly endless appetite for ripped-from-the-headlines plots, as thirty years and multiple iterations of the Law & Order franchise will attest. A faux newspaper headline even features in the opening credits of Law & Order: SVU, in case viewers missed the point.
These shows typically open with an incident reminiscent of a notorious crime, but the writers then tell a story of their own devising, featuring the series’ established characters, and delivering a neat ending that might ultimately bear little resemblance to the way events actually played out.
Headlines have inspired many of my own mystery stories as well, but curiously it’s never the crime stories that catch my interest. For instance, a spate of stories about Harry Styles, the singer/actor who rose to fame in the boy band One Direction, made me wonder about his old bandmates. How do they feel about the meteoric rise that left them all behind? For that matter, how do the aging members of NSYNC feel about the fabulous solo success of Justin Timberlake?
My story “The Boyz in the Band,” in the forthcoming Bouchercon conference anthology Tales of Music Murder and Mayhem, explores how those left-behind band members might view the one among them who made it big. How far will they go in trying to capitalize on that former bandmate’s success?
“The Grift of the Magi,” which appeared in the anthology Hook, Line and Sinker, tells the story of the escalating squabbles over a valuable painting owned by a divorcing couple. It has its origins in a news story about the spectacular art collection a billionaire and his wife were compelled to sell off to settle their acrimonious divorce.
And my story “The Wonderworker,” which won the New England Crime Bake Al Blanchard award for best short crime fiction, was inspired by the breathless news coverage of the famous and/or wealthy parents who bought their children’s way into selective universities in the Varsity Blues college admissions scandal. In my telling, a similarly scheming father will do anything to hire the one wonderworking admissions consultant who can guarantee his child a place at Harvard.
Usually, by the time my stories make it into print the news items that inspired them are no longer front-page fodder. But the human experiences and emotions that inform them, making them newsworthy in the first place, remain. We may never have been famous, but we understand envying others’ success. Maybe we’re not billionaires, but breaking up can be very hard to do, especially when money is involved. And presumably we all want what’s best for our kids, even if we don’t choose problematic means to achieve it.
Will Rogers famously said “All I know is what I read in the papers.” I hope he read beyond the headlines, because there are a lot of stories waiting there to be told.
Mary Dutta is the winner of the New England Crime Bake Al Blanchard Award for her short story “The Wonderworker,” which appears in Masthead: Best New England Crime Stories. Her work can also be found in numerous anthologies including the Anthony-nominated Land of 10,000 Thrills: Bouchercon Anthology 2022. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and the Short Mystery Fiction Society. She lives outside of Birmingham, Alabama (the Magic City) and teaches at The University of Alabama at Birmingham. Visit her at marydutta.com and enjoy her blog at Writers Who Kill.
Mary,
Thanks for stopping by It’s Not Always a Mystery today.
I enjoyed reading about your writing inspirations, Mary. And congratulations on making it into the Bouchernon anthology.
Thanks for stopping by today, Kathleen. While Mary’s inspirations are interesting, I love how she takes the headline and makes a deeper twist for her excellent stories.
Great article, Mary! Your short fiction is awesome. I agree that finding inspiration from real life events—but imagining them playing out differently—is a great way to approach writing crime fiction!
Ashley-Ruth, appreciate you leaving a comment today. You are definitely right about the use of real life events but with an imaginative twist. I know you do that, too. Looking forward to when your Claymore finalist becomes a published book that I can buy to read your stories.
Interesting twist on headlines. Thanks for sharing, Mary.
It is interesting to think about going deeper into what the headline itself says. Thanks for stopping by today.