The only way out is through: Writing Ethical True Crime inspired fiction.
While true crime is nothing new, over the past few years true-crime inspired fiction and true-crime memoirs have become a best-selling and award winning sub-genre. Working in this area as a researcher and writer, Ruth McIver proposes that this imaginative and personal response to private and collective trauma, is both necessary and cathartic. However, these dark places are perilous, and the terrain we are navigating has no guide book.
This workshop attempts to shine a light on the questions crime writers working in this area want answered, such as:
What crimes are considered off limits for the fiction writer? Who decides the moment when ‘too soon’ becomes now?
We'll investigate the pros and cons of writing true crime inspired fiction– and how it differs from ‘straight’ crime fiction. We will explore how rhetorical choices ultimately display their ethical intentions.
As well as contemplating big questions, this workshop is also practical and industry orientated: we’ll examine research techniques for true crime, including how to balance the real and the fictive; explore techniques commonly used by writers in this genre (reframing, renaming and getting to the essence of the project) and look at pitches and synopsis.
The aim is learning to create fiction that could be considered both ethical and artful, which captures the complex cultural topography surrounding crime events.
Format
This is a live stream only workshop with a focus on craft; it will take place via Zoom. It is a level 2 course, suitable for beginner-intermediate writers.
About Ruth:
Ruth Mary McIver is a Dublin born, Melbourne-based writer represented by the Story Factory. She completed a PhD at Curtin University in 2019 in the arena of true-crime inspired fiction, which informed her debut crime fiction novel, I Shot the Devil. I Shot the Devil was awarded the Richell Prize and the Affirm Press Mentorship Award in 2018. In the same year, her first (unpublished) manuscript, Nothing Gold, which was selected for Perfect Pitch in Bloody Scotland, 2014, was runner up in the inaugural Banjo Awards with Harper Collins. I Shot the Devil was published in September 2021 in Australia and the UK. Ruth continues researching and writing true-crime inspired fiction and memoir and working freelance as a tutor. She likes music, podcasts, cats, drinking too much coffee, bonding with other people’s dogs and pining for the ocean.