Book Review 75: 'A Line to Kill' - The charm of a series and lessons in titling

1. The charm of the series

Each installment so far, such as 'The Word Is Murder' and 'The Sentence Is Death,' is prepared with a proper mystery to solve and its own unique development. In addition to that, each volume depicts the protagonist Hawthorne's past—why he left the police, why he lives apart from his family, and the mysteries behind his many plastic models and his luxury apartment—gradually revealing his background.

Changing the subject, it seems the drama 'Anti-Hero,' currently airing on TBS, adopts a Hollywood-style approach where four people are in charge of the script. It is a method where everyone works together to refine and confirm the overall flow of the one-cour story, while individuals are in charge of one or two episodes at a time. While properly resolving the foreshadowing for the entire story,
the content of each episode does not become formulaic. I think the actors and the direction also have an influence, but it seems the ratings are good partly because they are putting equal effort into the script. In a sense, this 'Hawthorne' series follows the same flow.

Each individual volume has a different mystery development, and yet, as a series, it feels like information is being disclosed little by little toward the climax ahead. In fact, according to the author, he is planning about ten books for this Hawthorne series.
Nevertheless, since each volume is a high-quality mystery, one can feel Horowitz's power as a writer.

2. The sense of distance between reality and the story

You often see this in TV dramas and novels:

"This story is a work of fiction..."

but in this Hawthorne series,

"The characters and organizations that appear are not necessarily fictional; many of them actually exist."

First, author Horowitz himself is the narrator of the story. He also introduces the work he is handling, his scripts, his dealings with his agent, and his life with his real-life wife. I also felt that he casually highlights his own career and turning points to date. Furthermore,
thanks to the detailed descriptions of real people, organizations, and jobs, even while knowing it is a created story, it felt like it reached the level of metafiction.

3. The skill of titling

'A Line to Kill' is apparently an idiom that means 'to remind one of unpleasant things' or 'to touch an old wound.'
In the context of this story, it refers to things like the criticism of Horowitz's past works and his reunion with a sadistic female detective who drags up grudges from two books ago, while at the same time, Hawthorne's past and his relationship with his family are gradually revealed, showing that things were not all smooth sailing. It is truly a state of 'being reminded of unpleasant things, having an old wound touched' for Hawthorne as well.
I was impressed once again by how the elements of the two characters and the title are linked.

Changing the subject, I have had more opportunities to interact with many people on this NOTE. I have also had more opportunities to read articles, but the first thing that catches my eye is the title. There are many ways to title things, but if it is a title where you can see the content just by reading it, or a mysterious title that makes you think, 'Oh? What does this mean?', it makes you want to open the article page.

I thought I would like to study how to create such titles.

Thank you for reading this far. I hope there is a word or lesson here that stays with you.