Monday, September 10, 2007

His Final Bow?

Where do fictional detectives go when their authors no longer write new novels? Do they, like old soldiers, just fade away? Is there some literary limbo where detectives no longer the focus of their creator's attention continue to sleuth along? Doyle resurrected Holmes in The Adventure of the Empty House with a shaggy dog-tale of Tibet and a Norweigan named Sigerson. But who believed any of that?

I ask because Midnight Ink has turned down the third Nicky D'Amico mystery, leaving some considerable doubt as to whether or not there will be any more adventures for Nicky and his best friends, Roger and Paolo. Not to mention any more of those characteristically bad theater pieces poor Nicky managed through the chaos.

I don't know much about metaphysics, but I loved both the Twighlight Zone and Outer Limits as a kid, so I do believe I am fully qualified to speculate on that special place where furloughed fictional detectives retire or, as I am more inclined to think, freelance. Picture it, Nicky D'Amico, freed of his author's obligations, begins to wander into other gigs, hired for cameo appearances in other theater mysteries. Or maybe, since the public last saw him heading up those steps at Murder House to retrieve his missing notes, he spends a fictional eternity haunting the very resort hotel he was initially going to free of sham ghosts?

Then again, it's probably most likely that Nicky will hang out where he started. He'll be rattling around in my head, popping up now and then to whisper in my ear of mysteries to be solved, boys to be cruised, and reasons why it's a bad idea to invite Paolo home to meet the family. No matter where he hangs or what he does, of this I am certain: though he is unlikely to ever appear again in public, someday a small bit of him will surely slip into a new amateur sleuth. Maybe that's the answer: they don't faded away, they just transform themselves.

9 comments:

Deb Baker said...

It IS hard to let go of those wonderful characters we've spent so much time with. Mystery theater is big right now. Maybe Nicky would like to walk back on stage in another venue. Or he could help you and the new kid solve crime from the back seat.

Joe Moore said...

Chuck,
I've always believed that my characters had lives before each story started and their lives continue after the last page (assuming I didn't kill them). Nicky, Roger and Paolo will live on in the pages of your books and in the minds of the readers. They have been permanently stored away in the reader's mental bookshelf. And with any luck, they might appear again in one of your future books. That's the great thing about the written word--for better or worse, it lasts forever.
Joe

Nina Wright said...

Chuck--Even if you don't find a new home for their continuing fictional adventures, I fully expect Nicky, Roger and Paolo to make cameo appearances in another book.

I know theatre people, and those three have too much panache to exit quietly! Merde.....

Nina

Keith Raffel said...

Living in alternative worlds the way we do.... We're all a little nutso, aren't we?

Bill Cameron said...

Not me. I'm completely sane. Everyone else is crazy.

Mark Terry said...

I'm fairly convinced they have normal lives inbetween adventures. And I hope Nicky et al will either acquire a new outlet or you will rise like a Phoenix.

Mark Combes said...

I've met Chuck. He's crazy....

That's why Nicky et al will never die! Chuck's too crazy to let that happen!

Candy Calvert said...

Hey, Chuck, tell Nicky and gang that they can hop aboard ship with Darcy and Marie--I know those girls will be sailing, even if a publisher never cracks a bottle of champagne over their bow again.

Tell the guys to wear their pirate gear!
Aaargh!

Candy

Anonymous said...

When I see some of the absolutely dreadful things that have been done with Sherlock Holmes by contemporary writers who didn't know the era or social structure of his origins, I think I'd be at least a little bit grateful if a character of mine was preserved in a steady state rather than morphed by less loving hands.