Scene of the Crime (33 page)

And there's one important difference between real crime and fictional crime. In real life, people love to kill each other at two o'clock in the morning.

You don't have to write at 2:00
a.m
. unless you want to. But, weirdos that we are, most of us want to.

TABLE 10
_

What Is That Thing?

When you know what something looks like but not what it's called -or you know where on some other object it's located but not what it's called—or you know from other research what it's called but you're a little vague about exactly what it is or what it does—special reference books might help you.

The Facts on File Visual Dictionary
enables you—as it says on the cover—to "look up the word from the picture and the picture from the word." It's well organized and extremely easy to use, and I consult it often.

A good encyclopedia, particularly one such as
World Book
that is designed largely for children's use, tends to be very well illustrated, with fine drawings and exploded diagrams. If at all possible, you should have at least one encyclopedia in your home. Often out-of-date encyclopedias, which for most purposes other than history, geography, politics, astronomy and physics are entirely adequate, are available from library sales or used bookstores for as little as twenty-five dollars a set.

As words change so much, and so many new words enter the language every year, there's really no substitute for purchasing a new dictionary at least every ten years. For most purposes, the most recent
Merriam-Webster College Dictionary
is adequate; when you need an unabridged, which is outside the price range of most of us, you can always make a trip to the library.

Any mystery or true crime writer should own at least one book on human anatomy.
Gray's Anatomy,
originally published in 1901, was republished by Crown in 1977 in a beautifully illustrated edition. It remains the classic in the field, and is generally available, particularly by mail order, at a reasonable cost. Any other good anatomy, such as Helen Dawson's
Basic Human Anatomy,
is acceptable, although most of them are not as well illustrated as Gray's.

I really haven't found any satisfactory substitute for
Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary,
which helps to clarify matters on which other medical forensic books are unclear.

Dictionaries of criminal slang may be very useful, but bear in mind that slang becomes dated quickly. This means that it is critical to use a slang dictionary written during, or historically written about, the exact period and area the writer has in mind.

A thesaurus can help the writer to locate a word conveying the exact shade of meaning s/he has in mind. A dictionary-style thesaurus, which enables you to look up a specific word and then look for related words, is usually easier to use than a topical thesaurus, but you may find you prefer the topical style. Either is excellent.

Afterword

I do not subscribe to the tenet that everything that is worth doing is worth doing well. Bed making, for example, should in my opinion be done as quickly and as seldom as possible, and when someone is writing a book, s/he may be excused for not sweeping the floor until the dust-bunnies start chasing the cats.

But every book that you write, published or not, is likely to outlive you. A published book will certainly outlive its author.

I keep thinking of a book I once read in which the author proclaimed that all the houses in Texas look alike (they range from mansion to shanty; tar paper siding to wood siding to asbestos siding to aluminum siding to brick to stone; wood frame to steel frame to adobe); that orange trees grow in Tyler, Texas (the closest to Tyler you'll find orange trees is the Corpus Christi area, almost a full day's drive to the south); and that the landing approach to a particular airport is over barren mud flats (when I flew into that airport, the approach was over a lush pine forest).

We can all make mistakes, and I make my full share of them. But there is absolutely no excuse for egregious laziness in writing. The information is available, and we have the responsibility to make our fiction as truthful in factual areas as we possibly can.

The fact that you're reading this book proves that you care. I hope I've helped you to meet your goals.