Matt Ferraz's Blog - Posts Tagged "killilng-dr-watson"
Fandom is afoot!
Underachievement is like a plague nowadays. Many of the people I admire and respect are thirty-somethings who live with their parents and have no jobs. They spend most of their day watching movies in their computer screen, reading comics and discussing pop culture on the internet. People like these have a lot to offer, but could never direct their potential towards something that would give them a prestigious position in society. They could have been so much, but that, for lack of money, social skills or plain bad luck haven't got a chance of becoming 'someone'.
So why not write a book about them? Why not tell a story from the point of view of someone who had a lot of potential, but wasted it with too much TV and junkie food? That was the genesis of Jerry Bellamy, a grocery store bagger who knows everything about his favourite TV show 'The Baker Street Sleuth', but leads an empty and lonely life, and would do anything to have the chance of being somebody. And if that chance comes in the shape of chasing a serial killer, that only makes things more interesting. Killing Dr. Watson is, at the same time, a satire and an homage to nerds and geeks everywhere, specially those who are crazy about criminal TV series. And also about what happens when we don't want to see the difference between what our life could be and what it actually is.
So why not write a book about them? Why not tell a story from the point of view of someone who had a lot of potential, but wasted it with too much TV and junkie food? That was the genesis of Jerry Bellamy, a grocery store bagger who knows everything about his favourite TV show 'The Baker Street Sleuth', but leads an empty and lonely life, and would do anything to have the chance of being somebody. And if that chance comes in the shape of chasing a serial killer, that only makes things more interesting. Killing Dr. Watson is, at the same time, a satire and an homage to nerds and geeks everywhere, specially those who are crazy about criminal TV series. And also about what happens when we don't want to see the difference between what our life could be and what it actually is.
Restritcted View
From time to time you get to see a piece of art in a way that wasn't what the artist intended. I don't think that film makers of the past would think of people watching their flicks on the screen of a computer, or that a writer would consider how it would affect his story if the reader skipped a page for accident. And I'm pretty sure that playwrights, actors and directors give much thought to the people sitting in the restricted view seats.
From those of you who never been to a restricted view seat, just try to imagine watching a play where you don't know which of her suitors the heroin kissed, simply because there's a piece of curtain or a column in front of you that doesn't allow you to see that part of the stage. Whenever I have a chance to watch a play, it's usually with restrict view, mostly because it's cheaper and because the goods seats get sold out in a second. That means there's parts of the play that won't be visible, and that I have to figure out important scenes by myself.
Killing Dr. Watson starts at a TV series convention where Jerry Bellamy goes to see his hero, Sir Bartholomew Neville. Soon he'll be investigating a series of murders, not knowing that almost everything he needs to solve the mystery is right there, at that beginning – but on restricted view! Isn't that what crime fiction is all about? Knowing what was there, on the stage for everyone to see, except we couldn't figure it out because that damn piece of curtain didn't allow us to see the whole stage at all times?
Once I was watching a film on TV and the power went off for five minutes. I never knew what happen in that gap, before the power came back. In the climax, when the identity of the killer was revealed, I had no idea of who that chap was. Was he the final girl's boyfriend? Her brother? Someone who just lived in the same building? All I had was a “it was you all the time!” shouted by the heroin as she took off his mask. In a way, I had seen a different film than the people who never lost those five minutes.
What I try to do when writing the finale of a crime story is giving the reader that chance to see something in the killer's motivation that I myself might have missed. That's a good chunk of the fun. My job is to answer the questions: who? why? and how? As my reader unveils the mystery, he might answer these questions before the detective. Are his answers the same as mine? Maybe, maybe not. We are all in a way looking from our own restricted views. What happens in that hidden part of the stage is what makes it all so damn fascinating.
From those of you who never been to a restricted view seat, just try to imagine watching a play where you don't know which of her suitors the heroin kissed, simply because there's a piece of curtain or a column in front of you that doesn't allow you to see that part of the stage. Whenever I have a chance to watch a play, it's usually with restrict view, mostly because it's cheaper and because the goods seats get sold out in a second. That means there's parts of the play that won't be visible, and that I have to figure out important scenes by myself.
Killing Dr. Watson starts at a TV series convention where Jerry Bellamy goes to see his hero, Sir Bartholomew Neville. Soon he'll be investigating a series of murders, not knowing that almost everything he needs to solve the mystery is right there, at that beginning – but on restricted view! Isn't that what crime fiction is all about? Knowing what was there, on the stage for everyone to see, except we couldn't figure it out because that damn piece of curtain didn't allow us to see the whole stage at all times?
Once I was watching a film on TV and the power went off for five minutes. I never knew what happen in that gap, before the power came back. In the climax, when the identity of the killer was revealed, I had no idea of who that chap was. Was he the final girl's boyfriend? Her brother? Someone who just lived in the same building? All I had was a “it was you all the time!” shouted by the heroin as she took off his mask. In a way, I had seen a different film than the people who never lost those five minutes.
What I try to do when writing the finale of a crime story is giving the reader that chance to see something in the killer's motivation that I myself might have missed. That's a good chunk of the fun. My job is to answer the questions: who? why? and how? As my reader unveils the mystery, he might answer these questions before the detective. Are his answers the same as mine? Maybe, maybe not. We are all in a way looking from our own restricted views. What happens in that hidden part of the stage is what makes it all so damn fascinating.
Charing Cross Road's Basements
I've been wandering around Charing Cross Road a lot, and if there's something that fascinates me about that neighbourhood is its bookshops' basements. Not every bookshop has them, only the older ones. Usually the ground floor has the catalogued books, separated by theme and author, and each one has its price tag. But when you go to the basement, the books all have the same price (usually seven or eight quid) and you have to find the one you want by yourself, because they aren't catalogued in the shop's system.
The stairs are usually very old, and going down them to the basement is like going back to the womb, where everything is simple and comforting. When you're in that basement, you can hear the tube train passing by your side, as you forget the traffic up there, where London is alive and agitated. You see those old, rare books, and some of them haven't been opened for years. There's a scent of old paper and dust that plays with your nose, making you sneeze. Those books have been waiting a long time for the right person to come by and claim them, and if that person isn't you, just return them to the shelves, so they can continue their waiting.
As you walk upstairs the light of the day gets in your eyes, and you know you're back to the world. And if you carry a book with you up those stairs, you are bringing it back to life - all that for eight quid! Not a bad deal.
The stairs are usually very old, and going down them to the basement is like going back to the womb, where everything is simple and comforting. When you're in that basement, you can hear the tube train passing by your side, as you forget the traffic up there, where London is alive and agitated. You see those old, rare books, and some of them haven't been opened for years. There's a scent of old paper and dust that plays with your nose, making you sneeze. Those books have been waiting a long time for the right person to come by and claim them, and if that person isn't you, just return them to the shelves, so they can continue their waiting.
As you walk upstairs the light of the day gets in your eyes, and you know you're back to the world. And if you carry a book with you up those stairs, you are bringing it back to life - all that for eight quid! Not a bad deal.
