Crime Writer Margot Kinberg

One difficulty that faces fictional murderers is what to do with the body of the victim. Of course, there are plenty of novels in which the body is left where the murder occurred. But in other cases, there’s a real effort to hide the body. At the very least, that delays the discovery of the murder, and it may confuse the investigation. And there’s nothing like a vacant house, apartment, or business for the purpose. After all, it may be a while before the house is purchased or the apartment or business property occupied. And even if that’s not the case, there’s little to tie the body with the seller, buyer, or renter of the property. There are a lot of examples of this strategy in crime fiction. Here are just a few.

In Elizabeth Kent’s The House Opposite, we are introduced to Dr. Charles Fortescue, a newly minted New York physician. One hot summer night, he goes up on the roof of his apartment building to get some fresh air. While he’s there, he notices some commotion in the apartment building across the street, the Rosemere. Things die down, and Fortescue manages to get to sleep. The next morning, he’s called over to the Rosemere. It seems that the body of an unknown man has been discovered in a vacant apartment. Fortescue is asked to help with basics such as how long the victim’s been dead and how he might have died. Detective Merritt is assigned to the case, and he begins the investigation. Fortescue can’t deny an interest in the case, so he asks some questions of his own. It soon turns out that the man was likely killed by someone who lives in the building, since no visitor was admitted on the evening of the murder. It’s a difficult case, and several people’s entanglements have to be sorted before Merritt and Fortescue find out the truth.

Agatha Christie’s The Man in the Brown Suit is the story of Anne Bedingfield. Her beloved father recently died, and she’s now a bit at loose ends. She is drawn into a web of intrigue, jewel theft, and more when she witnesses a Tube accident one day. A man falls onto a live track after being badly startled. Among the dead man’s possessions was a house agent’s order to view a property called Mill House. Oddly enough, a woman’s body was discovered in that house not long before, and Anne thinks the two deaths are related. So they turn out to be, and Anne finds herself up against a dangerous killer.

As Barbara Vine’s A Fatal Inversion begins, Alec Chipstead and his wife are the new owners of Wyvis Hall in Suffolk. The place had been vacant, and the Chipsteads have been looking forward to settling in. When their beloved old dog passes away, they want to bury it on the property. To their shock, they find the remains of a woman and a baby. They contact the police, who begin to investigate. In the meantime, we meet Adam Verne-Smith, who inherited Wyvis hall from his grandfather, and owned it for a time. In fact, he lived there during the summer of 1978 with some friends. It was supposed to be an idyllic summer, but it turned dark and tragic. Everyone promised not to reveal what happened, and not to be in contact with each other. Now that the remains have been found, though, those secrets may very well come out, and that could cause disaster for more than one person. Now, the group has to decide what to do, and what (if anything) to say. And all the time, the police are getting closer to the truth.

Lynda Wilcox’s Strictly Murder introduces Verity Long, personal assistant to famous mystery novelist Kathleen ‘KD’ Davenport. Her job is to research true crimes and share what she finds with her boss, who then uses them as inspiration for her novels. Verity decides to look for a new place to live and gets a house agent’s order to view a property that interests her. When she gets there, though, she finds a dead woman in one of the bedrooms. It turns out that the woman was TV celebrity Jaynee ‘JayJay’ Johnson, and that she was murdered. The police investigate and, of course, Verity is an important witness. She takes an interest in the case since, as she sees it, she’s involved anyway, having found the body. She starts to ask questions and soon finds out that the victim had made her share of enemies, so there are several suspects. And the killer is determined that Verity won’t find out the truth.

In Sinéad Crowley’s Can Anybody Help Me, Yvonne Mulhern is a new mother who’s just moved from London to Dublin with her husband, Gerry, and their newborn daughter, Róisín. Yvonne doesn’t really know anyone in Dublin, and Gerry is busy trying to get his budding career off the ground. She’s exhausted, as new parents often are, and looking for support, so she joins an online support group called Netmammy. Things go well at first, but then, one of the other group members goes ‘off the grid,’ and Yvonne gets concerned. She goes to the police, but as you can imagine, they can’t do much. Then, a woman’s body is discovered in a vacant apartment. Detective Sergeant (DS) Claire Boyle, who’s expecting a baby herself, investigates. She knows about Yvonne’s visit to the police, and now she wonders whether this could be Yvonne Mulhern’s online friend. Each in a different way, she and Yvonne work to find out the truth about the disappearance and the dead woman.

And then there’s Dennis Shock’s Murder on Liberty Bay. Lily Pine has just moved to Liberty Bay in the US state of Washington, after her husband’s death. Her plan is to open the restaurant he always wanted to have, as a way to remember him and make his wish happen. When she goes to the restaurant to find out what needs to be done to open it, she finds a man’s body. She contacts the police, and Detective Doug Miller begins the investigation. The dead man turns out to be Clark Robbins, and before long, both Lily and the police learn that more than one person had a good reason to want him dead.

See what I mean? Empty houses and shops and vacant apartments can be very effective places to hide a body. And in crime fiction, that can add an interesting touch to a story. These are just a few examples; over to you.

*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Tom Waits’ House Where Nobody Lives.