More Holistic Assassin and Detective Discussion

writing
#1

Back to this topic. Because I’ve been thinking about it after it cropped up in this discussion.

I tried to come up with a story a few times for an idea I had. Male killer versus female killer. The man picks a target and goes out to hunt her down. Just so happens the woman he picks is also a killer. She didn’t pick anyone specific to go after. Rather, she made herself someone that others would seek out and waited until the right person crossed her path…er, maybe, came into her sphere of influence would be more a more fitting phrasing. Seems like a pretty good example of a linear vs holistic murderer. Perhaps that would work for an assassin as well, though “assassin” seems to suggest something other than “whoever comes along”. Another difference seems like Linear gathers intel on the target, Holistic builds a relationship to get to know the target.

After one of them is killed, maybe the sequel would need to have a male detective working against a female detective. Lol. The Linear detective would look for what the murder might have accomplished, what it might have lead to, while Holistic tries to figure out what was driving the killer to kill. Maybe Linear is looking for the murder weapon while Holistic is wondering why a knife from the kitchen instead of the wrought iron poker next to the fireplace? Linear asks who had access and who was here while Holistic asks who knew this person and who might have had a grudge against them. Linear tries to build a case while Holistic looks to see what the case is missing or where a piece doesn’t seem to fit. I used the list in this article to come up with most of that.

From the other thread…

I can see both Linear and Holistic in the examples above using Induction, or Deduction, or probabilities or whatever to get what they’re after. A bit late in the night to go into examples of it for now, though. Don’t know if that adds anything to the Holistic assassin/detective discussion but thought I’d throw out there since I’m still trying to wrap my head around Holistic methodologies.

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#2

This is the problem I have with the whole linear vs. holistic thing. “Means, motive and opportunity.” Aren’t those things that any good detective would look at?

Maybe another way to approach it would be to find examples of holistic characters in not-traditionally-holistic genres and see what makes them different.

The one that pops into my mind: My wife convinced me to watch some old episodes of Scandal last year. I had the idea that the MC Olivia Pope was usually a holistic thinker. Another example might be Revenge. Anyone agree or disagree? Have other examples?

#3

I imagine an actual detective would, yes. But maybe a more linear detective prefers to start with the more linear questions and is still able to work with the more holistic ones, since he should be able to do both. But in a story, maybe we should see him/her as more focused on one area over another.

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#4

Hmmm…detective holistic vs lawyer linear.

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#5

I have what is probably a terrible way of approaching linear vs. holistic, but it’s all I’ve got:

Linear: “Given what just happened, where do I look next for the answer?”
Holistic: “Given all that’s happened, what’s really going on here?”

Very often in detective stories, the expression of either problem solving method is illustrated through a “you’re looking at this wrong” moment. Imagine two detectives are staring at the body of a murdered man whose gold watch was stolen:

Dumb detective: “Looks like somebody wanted a gold watch real bad.”
Genius detective: “Don’t be foolish. You’re missing all the other elements. Look how vicious the stabbing was . . . how the body was placed face up even though the wounds were to the back . . . there’s much more to this than a gold watch.”

I’d argue (perhaps incorrectly?) that the above makes the genius detective a holistic problem solver. You could just as easily find a story in which . . .

Dumb detective: "What a vicious killing . . . the placement of the body is bizarre . . . I can’t even begin to imagine where we’d start looking for the killer. Should we look for "
Genius detective: “Don’t be distracted by nonsense and extraneous details. Just follow the money: who wanted that watch?”

I’m happy to be corrected on all this, but it always seems to me that the holistic problem solver tends to see the complexity and seek to find how everything fits together, whereas the linear problem solver sees the straight line and seek the most logical answer.

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#6

@decastell, I hope those are good examples because I can totally grasp that! Haha. And like @Lakis pointed out, real detectives are surely looking at both. But in a story that’s saying “this type of thinking wins out” you’ve gotta have your detective lean heavily to one direction to make that point.

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#7

I agree! That’s actually a super helpful shorthand.

#8

A good example of a linear detective vs. a holistic detective is in the tv show http://www.usanetwork.com/psych Lassie is linear. Shawn is holistic.

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