Murder Mystery Plot Points in a Flash

When I first started using Sudowrite, one thing I begged the developers for was a way to create murder mystery plots. In my genre, the murder mystery follows typical mystery conventions (a murdered person, a murderer, multiple suspects, clues and red herrings) to allow the reader to play along.

We even held a meeting to discuss it. Emails were sent and received. Whining may or may not have occurred. On both sides.

And, ironically, it was all in vain because the robot was just waiting for me to ask.

The strange thing about Sudowrite as a tool is that, while the developers have a lot to do with fine-tuning it to be a fantastic assistant for those who do creative writing and fiction, they aren't the only ones who make the robot do things. They may not even know all the things it can do.

Because this is artificial intelligence, you can still make it do things that the developers had no idea it could do simply by asking the right question.

So, following my begging, DMs, and emails to get my fancy murder mystery generator, one day (on a whim) I opened a new document and typed:

Mark Roberts was murdered. Tell me how he was murdered, who the three suspects are, and which one of them killed him.

Then I hit the Expand button.

Well.

That's embarrassing.

But let my embarrassment be your lesson—it can be just that simple, folks. You know how your mom used to say you won't know until you ask? Well, apparently that goes for working with artificial intelligence, too.

While the above was very simple, you can also make it a little more complicated. Flesh out a few more details shading the story, and you'll get a shadier...um, murder.

Well, you know what I mean.

and hit the Expand button once more to get your shades of urban fantasy or paranormal mystery.

Experimenting with prompts can help you come up with fresh ideas and explore different uses for Sudowrite that you may not have thought of (or that may not be readily obvious.)

Plus, it’s just a lot of fun to experiment with AI prompts - you never know what kind of creative inspiration you might stumble onto!