tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18499463.post6881199483386104340..comments2023-10-31T11:37:50.028-04:00Comments on on life & other inconveniences: Reality in MeasuresSandra Ruttanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06109584805469336742noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18499463.post-48094910018844215602007-03-06T08:09:00.000-05:002007-03-06T08:09:00.000-05:00Well, I do agree James that you don't want to bore...Well, I do agree James that you don't want to bore people to tears. There has to be balance, for sure.<BR/><BR/>I take it that documentary was probably an hour long...<BR/><BR/>Bill, interesting points. Totally agree about Homicide - great show. And I think you'd find The Wire to your taste. It's a very fine line. Reality is, people will overlook a few things if they're really interested in your work, but as you said about the one book you couldn't take seriously, if it already has issues a glaring technical error will just compound the problems a reader is having.<BR/><BR/>It's a very delicate balance!Sandra Ruttanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06109584805469336742noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18499463.post-91118703857070391822007-03-06T05:58:00.000-05:002007-03-06T05:58:00.000-05:00Since I work as a Communications Officer (that's a...Since I work as a Communications Officer (that's a fancy way of saying I work in a 911 center) for a police department, I really appreciate the mistakes I see in terms of police dramas.<BR/><BR/>I read a book where a police officer ran a guy's license plate for her relative to find out who the guy was and where he lived. The relative claimed she had a friend who thought the driver was cute. There is no way this would happen. People who get caught doing this get fired. It's happened where I work (shortly before I started working there, in fact). Knowing this made it impossible for me to give the book any serious credit beyond that point (and it already had plenty of other issues, too).<BR/><BR/>I have to agree that real police prodedure can seem rather boring, but there are also golden opportunities to be mined from the reality. Just look at "Homicide: Life on the Streets." I think this one of the first police dramas to actually acknowledge that some cases just don't get solved... that detectives have more than one case they're working on at a time.<BR/><BR/>I'm still waiting for the drama that blows away this myth. An idiot calls 911 and says, "You need to send the cops here now!" and then hangs up. Cops show up with lights and sirens. The reality: we call back and go, "You want police, then you need to tell us what's going on." Otherwise, we don't send police speeding down the road (which endangers other motorists). It just don't happen, people.Bill, the Wildcathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16137557955170758994noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18499463.post-28298020622955646212007-03-05T23:36:00.000-05:002007-03-05T23:36:00.000-05:00True to life police procedure is ditch-water dull....True to life police procedure is ditch-water dull. I saw a documentary recently about a forensic team working in Essex on a single murder scene. They spent two weeks in one house, nineteen hours a day looking for evidence. That's not going to work in fiction.<BR/><BR/>The trick is making the deliberate errors either easy to overlook or believable, while you sweep up your reader in the excitement of the chase. Why worry about the case being thrown out of court on a technicality when you're in control of the courtroom scenes anyway?JamesOhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09332376784689207703noreply@blogger.com