When authors start crafting their crime novels, they may not be satisfied with documenting the crime alone. While the crime alone may be what drives the novel forward and what challenges the Characters in different ways, many authors feel that the crime itself has to have some kind of impact on the characters. You often see that officers get entangled with the crime, because it affects them personally or because they know something about the crime itself. Authors try to capture what it's like for some detectives to be truly affected by a crime and they want to show what can happen if people get too entangled in their work.
As seen on many television shows, officers and detectives may get so entangled in a case that they are told they will be removed from the case. Of course, there are some rules and regulations that officers have to follow, and, based on what people see on television, it appears that these Rules And Regulations are much more strict in real life. On shows and in novels, officers and detectives will be booted from a case but then return as soon as they apologize. Once you make a mistake in real life, you could possibly be removed from the case altogether.
Cops keep their distance from cases
As revealed by Express, according to the real-life police officer and novelist Lisa Cutts, police officers are not as deep into an investigation as some novelists or television shows would want you to believe.
In real life, there's not the sense of conflict that you will often find in novels when it comes to true crime. She explains that all novels need some further conflict to keep the readers interested and this is often where the police officer gets personally invested in the case.
She also points out that there's often something else that's faked in novels, which is the main character's role in the case.
She explains that readers will often find scenes where senior officers are shouting at the main character, claiming that he or she will be off the case. This is only added to increase the tension in the novel.
Several cases at once
In a book, a police officer works one case. Cutts explains that it is nothing like real life. She explains that investigators are so busy because they have to handle several cases at once.
She explains that it is common for investigators to be working on a stabbing on a Monday, the rape of a woman on a Tuesday, and perhaps a gang-related shooting on Wednesday. In real life, investigators don't invest all of their time in a single case until it is solved. It's all a balancing act between several cases.
She also points out that should a senior officer yell at someone that they're off the case, it may come as a relief. Cutts, who has worked as a real-life investigator, explains that some officers are so overwhelmed at times with the work they have to do that taking a break from a case or two may be a relief.
What do you think about cops not being as invested in cases as they are portrayed to be in novels?
