MYSTERY
It was a mystery, a complete mystery: The Fictitious Books fibs Murder Mystery.
Splashed across the front pages of all the tabloid newspapers, it was instantly the scandal of the year. Who had killed Verity Trueword and why? There was no obvious motive. Everything seemed to point towards some kind of cover-up. Conspiracy theories were on everybody’s lips.
Detective Chief Inspector Frank Deverrix had been called to Fantasy Spire, the Head Office of Fictitious Books, to investigate the inexplicable killing of Verity Trueword, a young woman who had worked as a copy editor in the science fiction division of the publishing house. She’d been stabbed to death in particularly gruesome circumstances. A bloodstained knife had been found lying
near her body.
The police officers who were first on the crime scene had rounded up ten people for questioning, ten writers who’d been at Fantasy Spire when the murder had taken place. Deverrix was tasked with interrogating these ten suspects, all of whom had the reputation of being deliberately evasive in their own idiosyncratic way.
Deverrix was always wary of writers. You never knew where you stood with them. If fifteen years in the local homicide unit had taught him anything, it was that you could never trust a word that a writer said to you. They were notoriously unreliable witnesses who could make up the most outrageous stories at the drop of a hat.
He looked at the list of writers’ names that he’d been given. They all had a slightly unreal ring to them. He couldn’t put his finger on precisely why. He just sensed that there was something amiss. With names like that, they had to be hiding something.
Deverrix decided to start by questioning Zeb Solitanu. It didn’t take him long to reach the conclusion that Solitanu was lying, but he couldn’t prove it. After all, who in their right mind would maintain that they’d seen a spaceship flying over Fantasy Spire at the time of the murder? Every word that Solitanu uttered made his alibi seem less plausible.
Solitanu said that he’d been on the rooftop with his girlfriend Tia. But there was no sign of Tia now. She’d disappeared from the face of the Earth. Maybe the Martians had abducted her? Deverrix marked Solitanu down as a primary suspect. There was something decidedly shifty about him. He was even sceptical about the man’s identity. After all, what kind of name is Zebulon Solitanu?
He called Lucy Engellis over and asked where she’d been when Verity Trueword had been murdered. Engellis made a sweeping melodramatic gesture with her hand and explained that she’d been having a meeting with her editor at Fictitious Books. They’d discussed ideas for her latest theatrical production, a 21st century tragedy entitled Murderous Intentions. Deverrix was struck by Engellis’s determination to play to the gallery. She seemed incapable of making any connection between her fictional output and the brutality of the criminal investigation in which she was implicated.
As Deverrix was noting this down, George Ithaka came up to him with a knowing look on his face. ‘Have you thought of the possibility of a “post-truth” murder?’ Ithaka announced. ‘It’s just like the media deception I witnessed when I was in Paris in 1968. The governing elites used to lie their way out of taking responsibility for anything. They would make up all sorts of fictitious tales to cover their tracks. Mark my words, what’s happened here tonight is a government conspiracy.’
Deverrix looked at Ithaka in disbelief. ‘Some people just never grow up,’ he thought to himself. He was beginning to wonder if he would ever get to the bottom of what the popular press had been quick to publicise as the Fictitious Books Murder Mystery.
He decided to speak to Sienna Roxlade next. On the surface, she appeared more `normal’ than anyone else. Appearances 
though are deceptive. No sooner had Deverrix introduced himself than Roxlade was attempting to convince him that Verity Truelove wasn’t really dead after all. By now, she assured him, Verity would have been reincarnated as someone else. This new life would almost certainly be better than the one that had ended so tragically in Fantasy Spire.
Deverrix backed away from Roxlade in disbelief and bumped into Naomi Quicke. His mind still reeling from the notion of Verity Trueword’s reincarnation, he sought to establish where Quicke had been at the time of the murder. She made a scene of choking back her tears, and replied: `I was with Verity half an hour or so before it happened. She was one of my best friends. I feel suicidal. This is just catastrophic. I should have stayed with her. Maybe she would still be alive now if I hadn’t abandoned her. I feel responsible for her death.’
Deverrix didn’t know what to make of Quicke’s emotional outburst. Was she genuinely upset or was this just another ploy to divert attention away from her own guilt?
His imagination was by now awash with extravagant scenarios and motives that seemed to have been plucked from the pages of a fictional murder mystery rather than from the police environment that he inhabited. He decided to go out on the balcony to get some fresh air.
Michael Scriven was already there, nervously clutching a book by Jean-Paul Sartre. `You’re known as “Scribbler Scriven” aren’t you?’ Deverrix began, `the infamous peddler of fictions, fantasies and fairy tales?’
Scriven nodded in confirmation. ‘Yes, that’s me,’ he replied nervously.
`What’s your alibi then?’ Deverrix continued. He could see that Scriven was ill at ease.
`I don’t have one,’ Scriven replied. `I may as well confess straightaway. There’s no rhyme nor reason to my existence. I don’t belong here. I’m completely superfluous. I’m guilty. I won’t resist.’
Deverrix walked away in disgust. He had no time for middle class intellectuals making a spectacle of themselves. He marked Scriven down as the likely killer.
From the corner of his eye, Deverrix noticed Scarlett Moonstone sidling up towards him. She looked just like her name sounded: exotic. He knew that it would be pointless asking the obvious questions. Instead he tried a different tack: `Any murders in this Magical Miranda book you’ve written?’ he inquired. Moonstone smiled at him, acknowledging the adroitness of his line of inquiry. She conceded that there were at least thirteen. `They’re all purely fictional though,’ she insisted. `I assure you that they have nothing whatsoever to do with Verity Trueword’s death.’ Deverrix entered her response in his notebook and moved on.
Deverrix located Marec Slivenich in a corner of the room working on his laptop. `The other writers here are all old school,’ Slivenich confided. `They’re obsessed with pen and paper. They don’t realise that the real action is on the internet. The new realism is the hyperreality of cyberspace. I don’t really live in this world anymore. Verity Trueword understood that better than anyone. I wouldn’t be surprised if they killed her for it. They didn’t like the sound of what she was preaching. The only way to solve this Fictitious Books Murder Mystery is to investigate all those who feared the internet.’
Isobel Vellacott overheard what Slivenich had said to Deverrix and interjected. `You’re being unfair to us all Marec,’ she said. `You’re far too cynical. We all loved Verity. She was like a daughter to me. She viewed the world so innocently. We didn’t feel in the least threatened by her. Who could possibly have carried out such a monstrous act?’
Deverrix was unsure what to make of Vellacott’s public display of affection for Verity. Was it genuine or just as fake as her fictional writings? He noted that Vellacott’s latest book was entitled Monsters of Narratokia but said nothing.
A few minutes later, he sensed the fragrance of a familiar perfume nearby. Odette Chesnay was standing next to him. Deverrix was instantly seduced by her French accent. `The victim’s name, Verity, intrigues me’, Chesnay began. `Means “truth” 
doesn’t it? You know what they say: “truth is stranger than fiction”. Have you ever thought that it might be quite the reverse? The truth might be as false as the lies that are being peddled in this room right now. Truth isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.’ Chesnay walked away but the aroma of Chesnay’s perfume lingered.
Deverrix was left on his own to reflect on the intricate web of confusing fictions that these ten writers had been spinning around him. Slowly the mists began to clear from his mind. It was as if the aroma of Odette’s perfume had drawn him back to reality. Then the penny dropped and the solution came to him in a flash. He now knew who had committed the murder. The truth had been staring him in the face: how simple, how elegant…What a fool he’d been to listen to their deceitful words. Their entire narrative was a tissue of lies that only writers were capable of imagining.
‘Lies, deceit, fiction,’ he murmured. For some inexplicable reason Deverrix was convinced that all writers were disciples of Oscar Wilde. He recalled Wilde’s belief that `Lying, the telling of beautiful untrue things, is the proper aim of Art,’ and spent several minutes reflecting on the literary ingenuity of the Fictitious authors whom he had just questioned. His inevitable conclusion was that the Fictitious Books murder had been deliberately conceived as a work of Art.
He didn’t appreciate being led up the garden path. But now at least their evasiveness made sense. It had suited their purpose to fill his head with imaginary tales that would cover their tracks. Deverrix smiled with satisfaction as he walked towards the assembled group of suspects, confident that he had solved the Fictitious Books Murder Mystery.
•••
Read the profiles of all 10 murder suspects @ Fictitious Authors
•••
FICTITIOUS BOOKS MURDER MYSTERY
•••