Suggestions for a crime - not murder

How about a robbery or theft? The crime could be a break-in at a high-end jewelry store, or the theft of a famous family's heirloom.

If you don't know much about white-collar crimes like money laundering (neither do I), probably best to keep it simple.

Good luck!

Robbery
Armed robbery
Assault
Rape
Trafficking [which I think you said comes in later]
Rape
Arson
Kidnap
Extortion
Attempted Murder
Impersonating a Police Officer

Or

Combination of two of these
OR

A Co-conspirator to one of these crimes

There's not nearly enough stories written about arson.

Kidnapping/ransom stories always have a nice "race against time" feel to them. Of course, if your MC's daughter or whoever is held ransom, and he refuses to go to the police just because he doesn't want to get caught himself, that might make him a bit...unlikeable.

ok - thanks for the suggestions. i'm toying with the idea of kidnapping. there will be a sort-of love interest (a woman from the protagonist's past who re-enters his life, mysteriously). she could get kidnapped. that's a very cool suggestion, as were the others - thanks again.

here's my new question. the book will probably be called something like "The Small Rules", i'd like to explore the idea (from orwell?) that "you can break the big rules if you follow the small rules." that's why my main character is a drug dealer. he follows the small rules, so he can break the big ones.

i'd like the bad guy to get caught because he broke a small rule. small rules by my understanding are things like paying your taxes and being nice to people and stopping at stop signs.

any suggestions for how a kidnapper might provide a clue to his identity or whereabouts, by breaking one of society's "small rules"?

nanowrimo folks are awesome!

Mike...Unless your prepared to do something like "Ruthless People," something that was evidently a comedy from the get-go, I'd nix the kidnapping. Kidnapping is personal and carries some of the same penalties as murder, and can be nearly as devistating as a murder to those involved.

Your protag needs to be the hero. Hard to be a hero kidnapping someone. My vote would be for him to rob something of great importance to a really bad guy (of course surrounded by incompetent henchmen) that by the end sends the bad guy to jail, makes your protag the hero (maybe he even gets the girl), and gets perhaps clemency from the police for the small rules he has broken.

The quote seems odd to me and I can't locate it.

Nevertheless...best of luck.

-rick

any suggestions for how a kidnapper might provide a clue to his identity or whereabouts, by breaking one of society's "small rules"?

Maybe he's trying to blend into the background and not be noticed, but his ignorance of local customs leads to him making an impression in somebody's mind. For instance, some states require a car to pull over to the farthest lane if an emergency vehicle is parked on the shoulder, some don't. Some cities have ordinances against cell phone use while driving, others don't. Maybe the kidnapper violates a local traffic rule, gets pulled over, and the cop remembers him when questioned later. Or maybe he gets into an argument in a bar or restaurant over a local custom, sports team, etc. and the other person dimes him out.

Your question reminds me of Al Capone, who went to jail for tax evasion rather than murder and racketeering. What if the kidnapper doesn't go down for kidnapping but for something else? Maybe even framed? Could the drug-dealing protagonist plant some drugs on him or make it look like he was trying to cheat a mob boss?

One of the classic small rules that got a big time person in trouble was a set of unpaid parking tickets that, if I recall correctly, led the police to the Son of Sam, the man who was killing all those couples in 1977.

Other small rules could be things like returning library books on time (I work in a library and I would love to see a mystery where someone gets into big trouble for forgetting to return his or her library books), or failing to get a license for your dog (you could see how that would lead to big trouble -- the dog gets out, gets lost, the police find it, discover that it's not licensed, the guy comes in to deal with the licensing problem and the cops suddenly start looking at him more closely). Or any of the classic things that lead to someone's car getting stopped for a traffic infraction -- lots of drug cases start with someone driving a car with a missing tail light, or an out of date inspection sticker, and then when the police come to give the guy a ticket, they see something else that leads to other suspicions of other crimes and there you are.

It occurs to me that there could be a kidnaping in your book, but your guy wouldn't necessarily have to be the one doing the kidnaping -- in fact, it could be that the police think he's involved, when he really isn't (because of his previous relationship with the victim), and then he would have to find some way to find the real kidnapers, regardless of his feelings for the victim, if only to keep himself out of trouble.

Good luck with this.

I love your idea about small rules/big rules – although I’m not sure I follow your classification. A lot of people would put the pot dealing in the small rules – but I guess it depends on your moral package. Maybe it would help if you made it clear right away - not paying taxes, which you put in the "small rules", is also breaking the law, so apparently the law is not your reference here. Some will even argue that dealing pot does not really harm anyone, whereas not bringing your library books back on time could theoretically cause some pain to someone?
By the way, I think the library books idea is great, so is the cultural difference stuff, small things, like tips and smoking and picking up your dog’s poo (although I can’t really make any suggestion, since I don’t always know the American way of doing things) . This whole thread is quite stimulating!
And also : I knew a mean, mean woman, head of a small company, who claimed she could know if you were 'good' or 'bad', just by watching you on the small things, like your handshake or the way you took care of your hair and said hello. it just gives you a warm and wonderful feeling, being scrutinized by a perverse crazy old witch. This whole thing made me think of her for some reason. You can have her if you want.

My suggestion is to have someone disappear at some point in the story, preferably the first 1/3rd. I'm not suggesting having a child kidnapped, but more along the lines of someone maybe your sleuth suspected or was investigating disappears. There has to be some kind of urgency. The arson suggestion is a good one. Maybe your sleuth's family died in a house fire (and that's why he medicates himself with pot), and he wants to make sure that doesn't happen to someone else. You need to give your sleuth a why. It doesn't make sense that someone who is loose enough with his morals to take illegal drugs would care so much about money laundering to chase after the perp for 50K words.

How about a stalker?

dognapping

Maybe he's investigating an accident (hit and run-- no body has to die, but it's an offense.)

Of course, helping the cops with a larger problem *could* actually give him a bargaining tool. He could ask for immunity for his crime in exchange for helping the cops.

The framed angle-- or a blackmail angle-- is probably best. Otherwise, it seems to me that the police would be more interested in this larger crime than in him selling some pot. And last time I checked, it's quite possible to get out of any serious time for selling pot. Especially if there's not much evidence (plants) to hold against the guy. But framed/ blackmail is very plausible. Say someone's got some photos of the guy with his merchandise or something that could bring the police down on him.