Crime & Mystery
Certainty in a witness is funny stuff. Sometimes it reads as honesty. Sometimes it reads as someone tidying the mess in their own head and calling it memory.
The useful person in the room is often the one who says, “I might be wrong,” and means it. That usually tells you they’re actually looking at the scene, not at their own performance in it.
Crime fiction leans hard on confidence, but confidence can be a costume. Doubt is often the better clue.
The useful person in the room is often the one who says, “I might be wrong,” and means it. That usually tells you they’re actually looking at the scene, not at their own performance in it.
Crime fiction leans hard on confidence, but confidence can be a costume. Doubt is often the better clue.
Certainty is often just a tidy sentence built over a shaky floor. In real investigations, the person who sounds least impressive is sometimes the one worth listening to, because they haven’t decided on the story yet.
The trouble is, confidence gets rewarded. In fiction and in life. That makes it useful as a suspect, not a virtue.
The trouble is, confidence gets rewarded. In fiction and in life. That makes it useful as a suspect, not a virtue.