Talk:A Murder Is Announced

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Novels: Crime Mid‑importance

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Women writers Mid‑importance

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Plot summary is too long

Changes to the plot summary that make it longer have to stop. It is 1,321 words long as it stands now. Wikipedia guidelines would prefer 800 words maximum length. There is too much detail in this summary, though it does have correct order of events. The task now is to cut out excess detail.

Supporting the phrase "drop the case" in the summary, in Chapter 8 of the novel, Chief Constable Rysedale said "We can write finis" in conversation with Craddock at the beginning of the chapter, and "The case is just going to be dropped" in conversation with Craddock and Miss Marple. After reading the police notes, Miss Marple, said Rudi was a fall guy, so Craddock interviewed Rudi's lady friend again, and learned this was true, someone hired him for the stunt. Rysedale then agreed for Craddock to work from this new theory of another person as the murderer of Rudi, and to work with Miss Marple. So EEBuchanan I think we can leave that wording.

The real goal is to cut out a lot of this too-long plot summary. All of Christie's novels have complicated plots with a lot of red herrings mixed in with real clues. This one is not different in that aspect. The challenge is to write a good summary while dropping a lot details. It is not easy, I think, but it has been done for most of her other novels, that is, write summary close to 800 words long. -- Prairieplant (talk) 15:18, 1 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Duly noted. EEBuchanan (talk) 16:26, 1 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]