#19 Private Investigator

Hello everybody, today we have a piece titled ‘Private Investigator’ by AJW on Writing.com

At first it seemed like a typical rainy day. It was not until the end of the day that things were different. She walked into my office asking for help. I smelled her perfume through the door the moment she walked in. My secretary greets her and sends her inside to meet with me. She tells me her ex is going to kill her.

Let’s begin with the opening two sentences, which are mildly inefficient, operate with a different tense than the paragraph’s latter half, and most importantly, are contradictory.

The contradiction begins with “At first it seemed…” which is mostly fine, but the problem is the ‘abnormality’ doesn’t occur until the end of the day, which means the day, for the most part, was normal. Still, this would normally be irrelevant since it’s a common turn of phrase, except that “that things were different” emphasizes the normality of the day, highlighting the contradiction. Then there is the word ‘seemed,’ which has its own problem. The word ‘seemed’ is a soft contradiction, it says “something looks like A but its actually something else.” What that means in the context of this sentence is “The day seemed normal, but it actually wasn’t. It wasn’t until the end of the day…” If you ignore the echo and unauthorized contraction, you can see the contradiction ‘seemed’ has with the second sentence. It says something is wrong NOW, while the second sentence says things go wrong only LATER. Even if you ignore the initial contradiction, ‘seemed’ remains a problem.

After that there’s the tense swap (which we can’t resolve without further exploration into the narrative’s mystifying, doused depths,) and the simple inefficiency. Most of the inefficiency occurs in the second sentence, the most significant being structural; the author starts his narrative by connecting two points in time (the start and end of the day) but only one of them is relevant (the end.) Except even that is an inefficience because the time isn’t the instigating element, it’s an ancillary detail introducing/alluding to the instigating element; the core, important, moment/information is when she walks in. I would cut lead-in/introduction, it’s unnecessary.

My edit: It was/had been a typical rainy day for the most part, but that all changed when she walked in.

This is a little more generic than I would like. ‘For the most part’ can probably be deleted if you use ‘had been,’ and maybe if you use ‘was.’ ‘Had been’ indicates that the day’s at its end, but we cut the time hopping without losing the progression. ‘Changed’ is the same as ‘were different’ only it’s active and one fewer words (which has less to do with word count and more efficiency.) We may lose a little bit of atmosphere, but I don’t think so; the atmosphere comes from the rain, the perfume, and the secretary, not the sentence structure. ‘Into my office’ becomes self-evident as the paragraph continues, as does ‘asking for help,’ so we don’t need to tell the readers that outright. ‘Into my office’ is also a little confusing because we don’t know if the author means the reception room or his actual office.

For the fourth sentence (I smelled her perfume through the door the moment she walked in.) I dislike the ‘walked in’ echo, and this sentence doesn’t really flow well from the previous sentence, and honestly I just want to combine it with my edited sentence.

— It had been a typical rainy day for the most part, but that all changed when she walked in, smelling of perfume.—

This removes more than I would like, specifically, the smelling it through the door. We can somewhat convey the same impression by adding “into my reception office.” Or we could maintain the original structure and just do what we can to ameliorate the lack of rhythm—“I could smell her perfume even from the reception office.”— The problem with this is that it still reads like an interruption of the narrative. It reads like a random statement just thrown in, and has no relation to what precedes or follows it. (This is the original sentence’s flaw as well.) Maybe the solution is to combine it the other way… “I could/can smell her perfume as my secretary greets/greeted her and sends/sent her inside to meet with me.”

I think I prefer that last option, but it’s not perfect.

Apart from the tense, I have no qualms with the last sentence and, despite 700 plus words of criticism, I think this is a good starting paragraph. It has strong atmosphere (which can be a powerful draw) outlines immediate stakes and subverts the readers’ expectations (without offending their expectations.)

(Combing next several paragraphs for dialogue.)

“You should see the police. They can help,” I said

“I did, they did not help,” she responded

“Why do you think he is going to kill you?”

“I broke up with him. And he refused to accept it. Then when I started to see other people, he got really angry. Told me I will pay for this.”

Standard caveat of dialogue not being my forte aside, the corrections I would make here are fairly minor. The ‘I said’ is technically unnecessary from a comprehension standpoint, but it helps to smooth the transition from narration to in-story. The ‘she replied’ however, has no such use and can be deleted. Continuing, I dislike the double ‘help,’ which do echo slightly. Aside from rewording, the easiest solution is just to have her interrupt him, which is what I lean towards.

After that, ‘told me I will pay for this’ needs to be ‘would pay’ and to be connected to the previous sentence with a comma. Or altered to have a subject.

MY edits:

“You should see the police. They can—”

“I did, they did not help.”

“Why do you think he is going to kill you?”

“I broke up with him. And he refused to accept it. Then when I started to see other people, he got really angry. Told me I would pay.”

(Deleted ‘for this’ as unnecessary.)

(Section 3)

“So, he did not say the words, I will kill you?” I asked her

“No…”

“So, that is why the police would not help?” 

“You don’t understand. I know him. He will do it. Please, you have to help me.” She said in a desperate tone

Here, I would delete ‘I asked her’ and ‘the words.’ Both are unnecessary. I would also consider contracting ‘did not’ since ‘didn’t’ tends to read better, and ‘I will kill you’ should probably have the apostrophes on either side. After that ‘She said in a desperate tone’ is unnecessary, but you can maintain the impact with a well-placed exclamation mark.

My edits:

“So, he did not say, ‘I will kill you’?” 

“No…”

“So, that is why the police would not help?” 

“You don’t understand! I know him! He will do it. Please, you have to help me.”

All of my edits:

It was/had been a typical rainy day for the most part, but that all changed when she walked in. I could smell her perfume as my secretary greeted and sent her inside to meet me. She told me her ex is going to kill her.

“You should see the police. They can—”

“I did, they did not help.”

“Why do you think he is going to kill you?”

“I broke up with him. And he refused to accept it. Then when I started to see other people, he got really angry. Told me I would pay.”

“So, he did not say, ‘I will kill you’?” 

“No…”

“So, that is why the police would not help?” 

“You don’t understand! I know him! He will do it. Please, you have to help me.”

That’ll be all. If you like what you’ve read, please consider subscribing. Also, check out some of the author’s other content. https://www.writing.com/main/portfolio/view/ajw708