English Crime Fiction Essay

Crime Fiction, more than any other genre, engages the reader through the art of suspense. The short stories “The Red Headed League” written by Arthur Conan Doyle and “Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dhal, along with the T.V. episode “Third Floor Flat” directed by Christopher Gunning all use suspense to engage their audiences. Dhal uses both creativeness and clever use of manipulation of plot structure to intrigue the reader and build suspense. Similarly, Gunning misleads the audience’s interpretations of the story creating the sense of confusion, shock and suspense. “Lamb to the Slaughter” is told in a third person limited. The narrative is told from the point of view of Mary Maloney. A perfect example of this view is the quote from the story “Mary Maloney simply walked up behind him and without any pause, swung the big frozen leg of lamb high in the air and brought it down as hard as she could on the back of his head”. This use of narrative voice is effective as it allows the reader to form an opinion of Mary. It also does not reveal her true motives for murdering her husband which adds to the suspense of the story and leaves us wondering.

Gunning manipulates the audience’s interpretation of the characters in “The Third Floor Flat” to create suspense. Donovan is shown discovering the body. The close-up of his shocked face and startling soundtrack encourages the audience to believe his innocence. The discovery that he is indeed the murderer creates a whole new feeling of confusion.

Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Red Headed League” engages the reader through the art of suspense. The story focuses primarily on Homes’ investigation of Mr Wilson’s story. The plot structure quickly establishes the orientation and complication allowing the story to focus on building rising action and as a result suspense. “The Red Headed League” engages the reader through suspense allowing the story to build to a final climax at which point the reader discovers the reasoning