Liars and How to Write Them

Next week’s blog post will be a bit delayed to fit in our guest, mystery writer Marilyn Meredith. Please join her on September 27^th as she talks about the food her character, Deputy Tempe Crabtree, enjoys.

In our mysteries and thrillers, we always have at least one person lying. Sometimes to protect themselves. Sometimes to protect another. How is your amateur or professional detective supposed to know who is telling the truth?

Unsurprisingly, there’s been a lot of research in the area of truth-telling. Bering, in his article, said that Macchiavelli’s book, The Art of War, instead should have been called

The Art of Lying since so much of his book focused on deception and deceptive practices.

Bering goes on to describe traits of effective liars which I found repeated in other articles. To synthesize, this post lists traits of effective liars and some ways to unmask them. You’ll have to decide how to use the info with your detective, amateur or professional.

Lying is a very common behavior, even among the law-abiding. Sometimes we lie to protect people’s feelings (“No, that dress doesn’t make you look fat.”), impress others (“I was at the top of my law school class.”), avoid trouble (“No, I didn’t take the last cookie.”), or get what we want (“If you do this for me, I’ll make sure you don’t regret the favor.”)

I have my culinary mystery protagonist, Alli, cross her fingers when she tells a fib or lie in order to obviate the consequences. The reader knows she’s lying and she knows she’s lying, but for her own “good reason” thinks it’s justified in a particular situation.

It makes sense that the more you have observed a person in normal circumstances, the more likely you are to spot the discrepancies that signal a lie. In your story, your liar could be someone the detective knows well, or it could be that the detective spends a lot of time with the liar in order to have more observations to compare.

By the same token, liars are on a continuum. Sociopathic liars, those without a conscience, are skillful and may not even believe they are lying since what they tell you is what is in their own best interest and therefore it is true for them. They go through their lives telling lies regularly. Whereas, the little old lady next door may be so truthful that even a white lie is easy to pick up on.

Minda Zetlin gives five ways to spot a liar: observe normal behavior for comparison, listen carefully (e.g., they should use words “yes” or “no”), look for “hot spots” (use body language giveaways), ask follow-up questions, and ask if they’re telling the truth.

Sara Murphy adds to the list with, liars are likely to: gesture with both hands, scowl and grimace, make eye contact, use filler language (like “um” and trip over words), and avoid first person.

Rick Newman says that liars: talk more than others, swear more often, and tend to speak in third person.

If you want to portray a liar, you would likely describe a babbler who makes faces and moves around/fidgets. Heesh doesn’t tend to use “you” or “me” in speech. Your liar looks you in the eye and tells the untruths thinking that you’ll be less suspicious of a someone who appears direct. Your liar will circumnavigate questions like “Did you steal from your company?” by saying, “I wouldn’t do something like that,” rather than giving a yes or no.

There are lots more articles and books out there, so keep digging to find the traits you want your liar to demonstrate. And make sure your detective knows how to observe those traits to unmask the deception.

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