If the plot is introduced simply like this, most people may think that this story has nothing to do with mystery novels except for the death of a person.
But in fact, this book does have reasoning elements in it, because in the narrative of this book, Marquez used his most classic method, the circular narrative method.
Some people say that Marquez likes to play with logic when telling stories and is good at using a sense of logic to attract people.
At the beginning of each of his stories, he will throw a thread to the readers, not a period background, not a grand scene, but a micro-scene, a small thread close to the character himself.
The circular narrative method is a name given by Zhang Zhong himself, which comes from the beginning of "One Hundred Years of Solitude".
"Many years later, facing the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía will think of that distant afternoon when his father took him to see the ice..."
Before "One Hundred Years of Solitude", no one had ever used this narrative method - recalling the past from the perspective of the future.
It's a bit awkward to say, and it sounds a bit difficult to understand.
But this narrative method brings together the starting point and key points of a story, and then creates a sense of dislocation in space and time, so Zhang Zhong calls it a circular narrative.
In the past, everyone told stories in a straight line, but Marquez went in a circle.
And in this book, "A Murder Case Revealed in Advance," he used this technique again.
"On the day he was killed, Santiago Nasar got up at half past five in the morning because the bishop was coming by boat and he had to go to greet him."
A superb and captivating narrative technique.
In the novel, it is pointed out at the beginning that Santiago Nasar will be killed, and what he will do on the day he is killed.
Later, they revealed who the murderer was, but there were two things that made people wonder. Why did they kill him? How did they kill him? Didn't anyone in the town stop him?
This is where the element of reasoning lies. Even though the murderer and the victim are already in front of the readers, Marquez can still use superb narrative techniques and a strong sense of logic to lead the readers into the story.
Throughout the whole story, readers may feel that Nasser's death was too coincidental. If one of the coincidences did not match up, he would not have died.
This is indeed the case, which also shows that Nasser's death can actually be easily avoided.
If the bride didn't say his name, if the battle stopped the Vicario brothers in time, if he didn't go to his fiancée's house, if his mother didn't close the door... any assumption that becomes true can make this story go to another direction.
One direction.
The easier these assumptions are to realize, the more absurd the coincidence will be.
And hidden in the absurdity is a sense of fate that makes people sigh. It seems that Nasser's death is his fate.
Zhang Zhong recovered his thoughts. He had returned home from Hongyunlai, and "A Murder Case That Was Publicized in advance" was in his computer.
However, he was not in a hurry to send the book to Chen Qing because he wanted to change the story.
Change the story from Latin America to China.
This matter is not difficult. Such a ridiculous story would still not feel out of place in a small place in China.
…
It wasn't until the morning of the release of "Ender's Game" that Zhang Zhong sent the revised "A Pre-publicized Murder Case" to Chen Qing's mailbox.
However, Chen Qing must be very busy and did not bother to check the mailbox. Otherwise, according to Chen Qing's character, he would definitely call Zhang Zhong as soon as he saw the mail.
In fact, Chen Qing is indeed very busy, because today is not only the release time of "Ender's Game", but also the day when Qin Zhao was interviewed by Nanhuai TV.
In order to cooperate with the publicity, Chen Qing found Nanhuai TV and asked their reading column to conduct an exclusive interview with Qin Zhao.
Because there was cooperation between the two parties, this matter was accomplished without any resistance.
"Opening the Book is Beneficial" is a new program in Nan Huai Nong last year. The content of the program is to introduce a book or interview an author.
This column has introduced several of Zhang Zhong's books, and they have always wanted to interview Zhang Zhong, but Chen Qing refused on Zhang Zhong's behalf.
This time, the station director directly issued a task, saying that he wanted to interview a new author. Although director Luo Ji readily agreed, he still felt a little uncomfortable in his heart.
We are already preparing to co-produce "The Ordinary World", but we have never thought of inviting Zhang Zhong here? Now we have to interview the new author. All the reputation that "Opening the Book is Beneficial" has finally been accumulated has been consumed.
Later, Luo Ji felt slightly better when he heard that the new author to be interviewed was Qin Zhao, the author of "Swiss" recommended by Zhang Zhong last time.
But one day before the interview, he suddenly got another piece of bombshell news - the author they wanted to interview was only eleven years old!
Luo Ji's first reaction was disbelief. How could this be possible?
But after thinking that Chen Qing could not give false information, he became excited. For an eleven-year-old writer, this stunt was no less important than interviewing Zhang Zhong.
On the day of the interview, Luo Ji looked at Qin Zhao resting in the lounge through the glass.
The eleven-year-old child was holding a book in his hand. It was "Ender's Game" that he bought at the bookstore on the way here. Although Chen Qing was his agent, he did not get any privileges -
—For example, I saw Zhang Zhong’s book in advance.
"Is the protagonist a six-year-old child? This should be a science fiction novel."
Qin Zhao murmured to himself. In fact, if he had followed "Ender's Game" online before, he would not have said this, because the previous trailer had already said what kind of book it was.
He judged it from the "monitor", which was inserted from the neck to the stomach - it was different from the one in the corner. Qin Zhao raised his head and looked at the location of the monitor.
Luo Ji raised his eyebrows outside. He noticed Qin Zhao's movements and thought that the child was resistant to monitors or even things with lenses.
This is difficult to handle. We will be conducting interviews soon.
Oh, by the way, he came here to find out the procedures for Qin Zhaoqiao. Why was he standing outside in a daze?
Maybe it was because he saw the other person reading seriously and couldn't bear to disturb him.
…
"Ender's Game", before the Nebula Award was announced, Zhang Zhong published another science fiction novel.
Some people say that this is Zhang Zhong’s strategy to enhance his competitiveness in the Nebula Awards and Hugo Awards.
But most people don't agree with this statement, because according to Zhang Zhong's speed, this science fiction novel has been released for a long time.
But no matter what, Zhang Zhong finally wrote science fiction again. The science fiction party raised the banner one after another, and even shouted slogans: To hell with Poirot, March belongs to science fiction.