The Alibi

Organ Farms and Body Donors

caption translation: When you do not donate your organs, you take somebody with you

Lisa S -- In an April '08 Edmonton Journal story, reporter Chris Zdeb writes that Canada has one of the lowest organ donation rates in the industrialized world - 13 donors per million people, compared with 20 per million in the US and over 31 per million in Spain (over 31 per million, but not 32 per million? Sometims journalist-speak eludes me).  Health Canada is understandably not happy about this situation, since each organ and tissue donor can help up to 80 people.  80!

With this in mind, I was interested to read that Texas State University-San Marcos will have a new body farm late this spring or early this summer.  A body farm is a large enclosure in which forensic scientists leave corpses so that forensic anthropology students can study patterns of decay, insect colonizations, and the effects of different containers (like car trunks and shallow graves) on this evidence.  The body farm is populated with corpses of people who left their remains to science for study.

Isn’t that bizarre? On one hand, we have people who refuse to give up their organs at all, and who cares how many people die waiting for working parts.  On the other, we have people willing to have their bodies eaten by insects like blowflies and beetles for science.  Of course it all comes down to our own individual relationship with death.  I get that.  But it still sticks in my craw, cause it's so damn selfish and superstitious to refuse to posthumously part with your guts and tissues.

Donate your damn organs people.  Dead bodies don’t need lungs.  Not even to make a good-looking corpse.

Fingerprint Profiling

Lisa S. -- Fingerprints are a useful tool for detection, but only if they can be matched to a fingerprint which law enforcement already has on record, or if they can be compared to the prints of a suspect.

But what if you could put together a lifestyle profile of the person who left the fingerprint behind?

A report in the journal Angewandte Chemie indicates that a team of British scientists led by David A. Russell have been able to use antibodies to differentiate between fingerprints left by a smoker, and those left by a nonsmoker.  The team is confident that they will be able to expand the information that can be gleaned from a fingerprint to include drugs, medications, and recently consumed food.  The information, they say, can even be used to detect doping in athletic competitions, and potentially to diagnose diseases.

Another benefit of getting information from fingerprints is that  it’s highly unlikely that any sample would ever get mixed up with another - after all, fingerprints are unique.  Much less prone to mixups than a blood sample!

As a crime fiction fan, I’m quite tickled to see one of the original, classic detection techniques paired with the more modern profiling technique.  As a science fan, I like the idea of soft-science psychological techniques being bolstered by hard-science chemical facts.  What can I say, I love me some solid proof.

There are a few detectives that I’d love to see get into some traditional-but-high-tech sleuthing.  When I first read about this technique, I immediately thought of Howard Engel’s Benny Cooperman.  Benny’s the polar opposite of classic hard-boiled detectives, and it seems to me that this kind of hybrid new/old style of bad-guy-hunting would fit him well.

I’m interested in hearing if there are any other literary detectives that seem to suit particular styles of crime detection.  For a television example, Law & Order: Criminal Intent’s detective Robert Goren is an uncanny psychological profiler.  Anyone got any more? If you do blog about this question, let me know in the comments - I’d love to hear your thoughts!

from Eurekalert!

Mystery and Crime Fiction for Kids

Lisa S. -- Raising a reader is a rewarding experience for a parent, and not just because when kids are reading they are both still and quiet.  Mysteries certainly have a place in classic children’s books; consider chestnuts like Nancy Drew or the Famous Five (or Encyclopedia Brown, as mentioned a couple of posts ago).  As a kid, I even followed the sleuthing adventures of Bunnicula’s Chester and Harold.

I was poking around the bookstore the other day and I noticed that there isn’t really much in the way of  modern traditional-style mystery fiction for kids, though.  I could find plenty of “30-second mysteries”, which are less mysteries and more word puzzles, but there doesn’t appear to be a heir to the Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys throne.  Is this because crime fiction and mysteries focus so unswervingly on forensic science? Certainly child detectives would never solve a mystery with DNA evidence, and blood spatter analysis is hardly appropriate fare for the under-12 set.

The same is true of television series aimed at children. If there’s any mystery-solving going on, it’s in the context of a superheroes-save-the-world mandate like the Teen Titans, or as part of life-in-general wackiness as in the excellent Jacob Two-Two series based on Mordecai Richler’s Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang.

I guess this is a call for Dick Wolf to create Law & Order: Kindergarten Unit.  Or maybe I’m with Ian Rankin when I say I’d really like to read crime fiction authored by J.K. Rowling, even if it is aimed at a boring old adult audience.

Rotten Apples and Cop Psychology

Lisa S. -- In November 2007, a study by LW Sherman published in the Journal of Experimental Criminology showed that “most crime is committed by a small fraction of all criminals, at a tiny fraction of all locations, against a tiny fraction of all victims, during a few hours a week”.  [via Eurekalert]

Those of us who haven’t yet become cynical and embittered (or, as they prefer to call themselves, “realists”) know that mostly, the kids are all right.  Sure, that lone guy walking down the street behind me late at night might creep me out a little, but the chances of him causing me harm are very, very low.  That’s the reality.  It’s not some magical formula of good behavior on my part that’s kept me from being victimized by a violent criminal, it’s statistics.

So what happens to the people who deal with these rare but dangerous needles in the haystack? How many times in a row can you bite a bad apple before you decide that it’s not worth it, and maybe they’re all just rotten? I asked Mack Pettigrew over at A Cop’s Thoughts for his take on it.  He’s a Sergeant with the Ontario Provincial Police.  Here’s what he had to say:

I would have to say yes, it has certainly colored my perception of all people. Day in and day out officers deal with people no one else in society wants to deal with.  After dealing with these people most of the time it is hard not to have a negative opinion about people in general. Officers think to themselves how can people do these type of things to each other? My perception is simple. There is GOOD and there is EVIL. We the police represent the GOOD and we deal with the EVIL.

As time goes on in my career I have learned to stand back and look for the good in all people. Early in my career I did see all people suspiciously and wondered what they were up to. What most people are up to is living their lives. The bad guys are looking at living their lives just differently than the rest of society. I have met many bad guys and I have been to their homes. There are many reasons why they have turned from the norm, such as early abuse, addiction, peer pressure, physiological issues and some are just pure evil.

Officers today are better educated and opened minded than in years past and as such the new cops are bringing in a new attitude. Officers are better trained and we all get diversity and sensitivity training. This has made us  more tolerant and understanding professionals.

That's not a small thing that we ask our cops to do.  I'm very grateful to Sergeant Pettigrew for sharing his thoughts on the matter; it's not every day you can ask someone for their take on good and evil in human nature.

I plan to read more police procedurals over the next while, as I'm curious to see if and how crime fiction authors address this aspect of police work.

Masquerading as a Crime Fiction Writer

Lisa S. -- Every writer interviewed on Booked.tv has to answer our special Author Chat series of questions.  The variation in the authors' answers is very interesting I think.  So I wanted to play, too! Here are my answers to the questions:

1 What do you love about being a writer?
Connecting with a willingly captive audience.  I love to hear reactions from people, even if they’re less than complimentary.

2 What is your biggest challenge as a writer?
Finding compelling topics to write about, and avoiding over-editing.  I tend to tighten up my writing to the point that it’s just too staccato to enjoy.

3 If you were not a writer, what other profession would you want to pursue?
Starship Captain

4 In your opinion, what is the most influential crime novel of the last 100 years?
I have no idea, but I’d say in the last 20 years it was The Silence of the Lambs.  Hannibal Lector is one of those fantastic supercool villains that really inspire fans - Darth Vader is another one.

5 Which fictional hero do you admire or despise the most?
I’m extremely extremely fickle, and I don’t often get attached to detectives.  Although I did love Clarice Starling from the aforementioned Silence of the Lambs.  I alternate between admiring and despising Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade depending on my mood.

6 After writing, how do you spend the rest of your time?
I’m an obsessive information hound.  I spend a lot of time online reading - information, opinion, humour, you name it I read it.

7 What city or location has the most impact on your writing?
Vancouver, BC, and Yellowknife, NWT.  Both of these locations are very, very humbling.

8 Do your books have a message?
Oh hell no.  To quote Mark Twain:

“Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.” 

Trying to jam a message or moral into a story is the quickest way to kill it.

9 What are you currently reading?
Ruth Rendell’s The Water’s Lovely.  I love Ruth Rendell.

10 If you could meet any person (living or dead), who would that be?
Queen Elizabeth I. 

11 What is your greatest vice?
Tetris.  I can accidentally squander hours on that game.

12 What is your greatest extravagance?
Electronic gadgets and machines.  Blackberry, ipod, wii, laptop... actually these probably count as both greatest extravagances and vices.

13 What is your idea of misery?
Boredom.

14 What is your idea of happiness?
Total engagement in whatever I’m doing.  I like immersion.  I also like variety.

Other Stuff White People Like: Crime Fiction

Lisa S.  --  Who are the great detectives of western literature, and what colour are they? I was going through my (mostly British, American, and Canadian) collection of crime fiction novels and realized that there was not a single person of any colour in any of them.  Well, there are a couple in Giles Blunt’s Blackfly Season (which I really enjoyed by the way), but only because the plot turns on the villain’s ability to pass as Chippewa.  Now granted I don’t have the world’s largest collection of western crime fiction, but I think the question still needs to be asked:

What is UP with all the white people? And does anyone else find it ironic that a genre so closely associated with noir is so pallid when it comes to major characters? Does crime fiction all come from the same US city that gave us Seinfeld and Friends?

Crime fiction authors cross gender lines all the time (although female writers seem more inclined to create male detectives than vice versa), they explore characters from different socioeconomic backgrounds, religions, family backgrounds, regions.  They get inside the heads of the mentally ill.  But they don’t really cross the skin colour line - not unless a character’s non-whiteness is somehow integral to the plot.  So why is that? Is crime fiction so white because white people (authors and audiences alike) don’t, or won’t, relate to nonwhite people? It’s an unpleasant idea but one that is worth confronting and considering.

Certainly one contributor to this issue is the overall whiteness of crime fiction authors.  Brian Lindenmuth over at Fantasybookspot takes on the under-representation of black American writers in crime fiction, and gives a great beginner’s overview to some of the oughta-be greats including Iceberg Slim (Pimp)and Chester Hines (The Real Cool Killers).  He quotes Mark Gerald of Old School Books:

“In their lifetime, most wrote for publishing houses that didn't appreciate their talents and didn't have a clue as to how to market and sell them. It is little wonder their works failed to catch on. History has been even less kind. Today, it is almost as if these authors never existed, and their searing, scorched-earth accomplishments are all but forgotten.”

Recommended reading: Traces, Codes, and Clues: Reading Race in Crime Fiction, Maureen T. Reddy

Who Popped You?

My first few forays into crime fiction were with Encyclopedia Brown.  That kid knew everything, plus Sally Kimball was a cool tomboy sidekick.  Encyclopedia and I solved mountains of mysteries, picking up on subtle clues like the saltiness of lox, or the reflective properties of windows when it's light outside and dark inside.

The series appealed to my smartypants self, not only because Encyclopedia's creator, Donald Sobol, never talked down to his audience, but also because I could solve most of the mysteries.  Plus the books were usually light and thin, which made them ideal reading-after-lights-out material.  And really, Encyclopedia was SO MUCH COOLER than those dopey Scooby kids.  I thought it was love, I really did. 

I was wrong.

When I was about 16 I picked up Ruth Rendell's The Crocodile Bird, and discovered a whole world of crime and mystery fiction that didn't rely on that one small clue the criminal overlooked.  Victims were the Bad Guys, murderers were sometimes right, and Why was a much bigger question than How.   I stopped reading for the crime scene details, and started reading for the twisted characters that Athena-ed out of Rendell's head.  I even hunted down books Rendell wrote under the nom de plume Barbara Vine.  This time, it was love.  Twoo Wuv.

I think what happened was that I discovered the heart of crime fiction.  My affair with Encyclopedia was entirely cerebral, but with Ruth Rendell I found something visceral.  I don't rack my brains to try to beat RR's Inspector Wexford to the solution, I'm too busy obsessing about the enormous pussy pimple on someone's chin, and what that might ultimately mean.

Two for the Show

This booked girl is branching out and has invited Lisa S., a friend and colleague to share this blog space with me. We're now plural (Booked Girls, with an "s") and it means you will soon have twice the tips and tricks for exploring your crime fiction passions. Enjoy and if you have any feedback for either of us feel free to drop us an email at bookedgirl@gmail.com.

Patry Francis' THE LIAR'S DIARY

Patry Francis' new book THE LIAR'S DIARY was released today. In a nasty twist of fate Patry, who was recently diagnosed with cancer, is facing a series of aggressive cancer treatments when she should be on the road sharing the story of her new novel. Today is THE LIAR'S DIARY blog day with an aim to get the word out on her new book. Author J.D. Rhoades shared these quotes through his Facebook club in support off Patry's latest story:

Patry Francis writes with a quietly intimate voice, subtly weaving her spell as the tension slowly but surely builds to a fever pitch. Packed with jaw-dropping revelations, LIAR'S DIARY still manages to save one last walloping shock for the end.
-Tess Gerritsen

The Liar's Diary is a beautifully written first novel by an author who has previously distinguished herself through her poetry and short stories.
-Mystery Scene

I was hesitant to start Patry Francis's debut novel, The Liar's Diary, as mysteries are not usually my first choice. However, I was drawn in after just a few pages. The novel starts off with two very unlikely women who are vastly different becoming friends. As it progresses, it becomes an obsessive love story and murder mystery. You won't see the disturbing ending coming.
-Publisher's Weekly

Crime Investigation Games

Thanks to a friends very generous Christmas gift of a Nintendo Wii, I am a newly converted gamer. I find myself losing many an hour perched on the edge of my sofa waving my hands rather inelegantly at my TV. One can only imagine how ridiculous I look to those peaking in my living room window. It reminded me that I've never posted some of the links I have to various interactive crime scenes games available on the Net. So to test your interactive investigation skills here are a few great places to explore when you're in the mood to participate instead of just read about crime investigation:

Suicide or Murder: An Interactive Investigation 
Booked.tv
Solve the Murder 
The Crime and Investigation Network
Web of Mystery
Gumshoe Online
Interactive Investigation
The Virtual Museum of Canada