Hard-boiled/noir/whatever

[mrissa]

So you have the blonde walking into the cynical detective's office. You have some "broad" in an evening gown singing torch songs in a club that's maybe on the edge of sketchy. You have probably some thugs somewhere, somebody covering up something horrible for someone they love.

What else have you got? What are your favorite stock elements for this kind of story? Tell me, that I may warp them!

(I'm heading down to St. Pete for lunch as soon as I get my shoes on, so I won't be able to respond to answers right away.)

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The case is never what the client says the case is.

Clients always lie. They're worse than suspects that way.

The detective will be betrayed. By the client, by a friend, by the only person in the case he genuinely likes.

Heh. Ohhhhhh, is that part ever taken care of already.

There is no California, but the rest of it can be taken care of.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

California is just because my default noir setting is Raymond Chandler with a side of Ross Macdonald.

It's that sense that the detective is the only person awake in the world that matters.