Mystery is inherent to life. We constantly solve small everyday mysteries: Where are the car keys? What does that person do for a living? We bring together small pieces of information to form larger answers.
Just as, in a murder mystery, clues are assembled into the story of a murder.
My books are about that, the place of mystery in everyday life, they are page-turning mysteries and also novels about nature of mystery itself.
At one level, existence itself is mysterious. This is something we can usually push down out of awareness. In fact we have to do this in order to function. But it surfaces. At times can at times feel that there’s a deeper meaning to existence, and that it is all around us but just out of reach.
We feel there are things we should know, there is something we should be seeing. It’s at the corner of our eye but as we turn towards it, it vanishes.
This is related to the large metaphysical mysteries of life and death. We are all going to die and nobody knows what that is.
I have a notion that this might what underlies the longevity and ubiquity of the murder mystery: it’s a form that draws on the deep connection between death, life and mystery.
Characters in The Slipping Place use art to try to understand life. They are uncertain about the world, what other people are thinking, even their own motives.
IMAGE: Christian Richter Abandoned Buildingshttps://www.boredpanda.com/abandoned-buildings-urban-decay-photography-christian-richter/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic
JOANNA BAKER 