So I’ve enjoyed the serial killer story for decades now-although I did take a break when I got old enough to notice that the base plot line of 98% of them is a man doing horrible things to women-but now I’ve really started to notice that many of them seem to be having way too much fun describing those horrible acts.
I picked up the latest Karin Slaughter as an audio book, and a little over half way through we have a new character, an FBI agent who has been dealing with a killer who has taken years and years to reveal when he left the bodies of 12 victims, all young women. Now I have the sinking feeling that we are going to be regaled with the details of each murder. This does nothing for the plot of the character development. It’s just gratuitous. And it happens in more and more thrillers or mysteries-the crimes are called “unimaginable” and then are carefully described. (although if they really were, how did the killer come up with them?)
I get it when the details of the killings are what leads to the apprehension of the killer, but it often is just gore for gore’s sake. These aren’t horror novels-they’re murder mysteries. There has to be a way for authors to get the point across without quite so much detail that doesn’t move the plot at all. It’s the same thing as authors spending paragraphs describing people’s clothes and cars as status markers, irritating as f*ck.
by BakerB921