Plot 1: "Skin Deep" (possible title)
A woman is found dead. She is your typical well off white collar worker with a quiet and somewhat mild personality. A normal good person that one would not expect to be killed at all. There are three suspects: her ex-boyfriend (a respectful, popular, charismatic doctor), her friend (a stylish girl that likes going out to have fun - sales associate? tbd), and one of her co-workers (hard working trustworthy man/woman tbd). At first, the suspects seem to have your everyday normal relationship with the victim yet as investigation progress, you find out the dark side of each of them. All suspects have no alibi at the time of death and there is enough evidence on them as the murder. However, there will be a really cool twisted ending.
>>> So for this story line, the solution will not be presented in the end, but just a question of whether you can find the right suspect or not. You will have to search an recheck evidence in order to find this truth.
>>>> I have a pretty cool concept for the endpaper. I want it to be the photograph of the victim (like those autopsy looking ones) but the image on the back, you will see a smile. Kind of having the spooky factor~
Plot 2: "Missing" (possible title)
A classmate or co-worker hasn't shown up for a while and hasn't been responding to calls (either that or that you are a detective and a friend of yours hasn't responded back, etc). You get worried and check up on that person. At the house, you run into three other people, all who claim to be friends of this person. They all appear suspicious as at times, they would look at each other, pause, and say things or change topics, almost as if they shared some sort of secret. You learn to trust them though and get swept away in a "game" they play with the person, where each would take turns and create a "mystery" or "puzzle" that leads to a prize (they are big fans of puzzles and mystery novels). However, as the investigation and hunt progress, everyone is thrown into confusion as the intentional puzzles end halfway and the person in question appears to be just gone/kidnapped/disappeared, where one has no clue whether he/she is still living and thus, all three people that you have learn to trust are now all suspects to the case.
>>> For this case, I haven't come up with a solid ending but rather a few possibles: that the person in the end got stuck and thus couldn't get out (like fell into a ditch), got kidnapped after witnessing something (like a mystery within another mystery) or got killed by one or more of the suspects. It will be a surprise ending, somewhat unexpected due to the second mystery element.
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With these two plots, each has its own benefits. The first one is a bit more dark and will be neat as it leads you to hunt for the answer yourself. The second one is more linear as the right suspect or the truth will be revealed in the end. However, it is neat in the sense that it can be more amateurish and playful in its interactive elements and can thrive on mini puzzles, mind questions and the such, allowing a different path/opportunity. I am basically deciding between the two. Personally I like the first one a little bit more since I put more thought onto it but I see mass potential on the second one as well. I probably will need to go another and ask people for their opinion.
Binding
Yay! After researching for a long time and seeing what possible binding methods I could do, I've finally decided between three possible ones: buttonhole book binding, Z-fold flat back, and coil. At first, I had this idea where one can explore the spine and flip through it, but after some tests, I found that the book does not sit flat on the table, in which proves to be a hindrance to the type of book I'm making, especially since it is interactive and will contain other elements, etc.
Button-hole Binding
Z-fold flat back Binding
Aside from that, I will probably post up some images that I have in my library books later on or any interesting finds. I have about 6 books on criminology/forensics/etc, 3 books on mind puzzles and magic tricks, 3 books on superstition, forgery, legend breakers and spams (really interesting actually, I should share some stories) and 3 on essays and how to write children mystery novels. Hopefully with these books and with the research I've done online (probably post those links later on...), I can come up with a story line that is do-able and not fake. I really want this book to be pretty factual and not mess up on any scientific details that people can catch. I want it to be somewhat real, which is also why I wanted it to be a graphical based book.
The photographs in my book, especially in regards to people based ones will be cut off head shots. This will allow readers to not really see the people and thus can imagine for themselves the various people. It will allow them to associate with the book more? (or so at least I'm hoping).
I am a little bit happy that we are entering the good old Halloween season. I think I will have more chance of gaining materials and such~ Too bad it's not super gory or I would have met up with some haunted attractions to gain photos.
For the paper, I'm thinking of French folds to double up the sheets of paper so it is more durable to put interactive elements onto the sheets, but I still haven't target paper places to see other possibilities. I need to explore this.
To Do List:
- Research MORE! (for techniques, killing methods, forensics, printing, tricks, etc.) - basically read the books...
- Write the story and determine how many pages
- Take pictures of setting, background, etc.
- Find and take pictures of the three suspects and victims (look among friends and classmates?) - possibility of either candid shots (once) or mug like ones.
- Continue collecting miscellaneous objects and items lying around
- Explore various stores for paper, weird things > Look around in world
- Test out binding methods, interactive elements and determine what works best in book
