whodunit
[hoo-duhn-it]
1. a narrative dealing with a murder or a series of murders and the detection of the criminal; detective story.
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“You know what? I
should be a detective.” Kris said as she
closed her book.
“Okay,
and what brought this on?” Jarred said,
not looking away from his computer screen.
“Well,
I’m really good at solving crimes and mysteries and stuff, so I’d make a great
detective.”
This
time, Jarred did turn to face her. She
had been reading a new crime novel, which she had apparently just finished.
“What
makes you say that? Have you ever solved
a crime?”
“Oh,
sure. Plenty of times.” She said proudly.
“Really?
When?”
“Well,
just now, for one. I knew who the
criminal was, like, halfway through the book.”
She held up the novel for him to see.
He sighed.
“You
know that doesn’t count, right? I mean,
that’s fiction. I really doubt the cops
will look at that as qualifying.”
“I know
it’s not real. But this isn’t the first
time this has happened. I always know
who the criminal is before any of the characters. My keen deductive mind is able to pinpoint
the culprit early. Sometimes as early as
the first time he’s introduced.”
Jarred
just looked at her and blinked slowly.
The sad part was she probably believed what she was saying.
“And
you really think the fact that you’ve read lots of murder mysteries—“
“—Solved
a lot.”
“—Okay,
solved a lot of those things makes you qualified for a detective?”
“Yup.”
“Kris,
you know being a detective isn’t all going out and solving crimes, right? First you’ve got to be a normal cop, which
you’d be terrible at, then you have to work your way up the ranks to becoming a
detective. And even then, most of what
you’ll be doing is probably not solving murders and such. Plus, the murders in those books are designed
to be solved. The authors want the
reader to solve them ahead of time so they can feel good about themselves when
the criminal is actually revealed.
Chances are if I read that book, I’d be able to piece it together pretty
quickly too.”
“Uh
huh. You just keep telling yourself
that.” Kris said.
“The
thing is, in real life, it’s not like that.
Real life crimes aren’t made to be solved. Most of the time, they’re made to not be
solved, if they’re put together at all.
Trust me, if I were to stage a crime for real, you’d never solve it.”
“You
really think that, huh?” Kris said smugly.
“I know
so.”
“Okay,
then prove it. I’ll give you a
month. Set up a fake crime, with
witnesses, a location, even a body or missing item or whatever you want it to
be. I guarantee I’ll solve it real fast.”
Kris
folded her arms and taped the corner of her book lightly against her leg. Jarred could tell she was convinced of her
own abilities.
“Okay,
fine. But if you can’t solve it within,
say, a week, then you give up on this dumb detective idea and aim for something
you can actually do.”
“A
week?” Kris said, mulling the time frame
over.
“Yeah,
a week. Any longer than that, and the “criminal”
will escape, never to be seen again.”
“Hmm.” She muttered, considering her options. “Okay, that’s fine. One month for you to get it ready, one week
for me to solve it. And if I do, I enter
the police force.”
“Right,
right. Don’t worry, I assure you that
you’ll never even get close. Now, if you’ll
excuse me, I have some criminal pursuits to plan.”
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If real life was like a crime book, nobody would ever be criminals again. Think about it. Every crime is fairly easy to solve, detectives are never killed, and criminals are pretty much guaranteed to be convicted. It's a criminal's nightmare realm.
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