“He reached under his desk to turn on his Dell computer, then waited while the robot screamed as it connected to the internet. After checking his AOL email account, he logged into MySpace.”
How many of you can date that pair of sentences to a year or two time span? Ouch.Â
And that’s exactly why I won’t do it!
As a writer publishing crime thrillers, forensic mysteries, and suspense novels in today’s changing world, I try not to stay on top of the science. I work to stay ahead of it.
I won’t even tell you how my characters used a GPS! Is it a device they put on their dash with a suction cup? Is it an app on their phone? Google maps? I’m not saying. I don’t know what that will look like next year. And I don’t think you’ll ever hear me naming an email provider or a social media platform! But let’s talk about what is coming:
1 – blood analysis. We are getting better and better at analyzing blood and getting more data. We can now reconstruct partial genomes from old DNA and sometimes it’s enough for a match! This is helping to solve cold cases like the ones I follow in the Hangman’s Shadow series.
2 – We can get more and more information from DNA. We can now tell if the person likely had blue eyes, or curly hair, or was tall. We still don’t have a guarantee on those things, but it can help narrow down the subject pool and solve crimes (which is the part I’m mostly interested in! But you probably already guessed that.)
3 – We can get DNA from more and more places. Like half a fingerprint! If we don’t cover it in magnetic powder then we can scrape it. Because we are constantly able to get more DNA from smaller samples, this is now enough, and in the future the amount needed will get smaller. Also, there are new methods being pioneered as I write this, to lift the fingerprint and collect the DNA simultaneously, so we don’t have to choose. I’ve been using this in the NightShade Forensic FBI Files books!
4 – We can also now separate multiple blood samples from a single source. I touched on this in the Vendetta Trifecta – when Sin realizes she can’t clean the blood evidence she’s left, she mixes it. And this is EXACTLY why I write ahead of the science. When I wrote that, it was a game changer. They couldn’t find her. But now we can separate blood samples as long as the mix is 20% or greater. Thank God I had her mix it thoroughly and do some confusing spatter.
The story holds. You can read it today, and the science is sound, because I wrote ahead of it.
*There’s too much for just one post! I’m going to do a part 2!
If you’ve read all my books and want more authors who write with science, check out these…
Laura Griffin – She created the fictional Delphi labs in the Tracers series.
Axel Blackwell – is writing more from the police side of things, but stays on top of the evidence and such.
Happy reading!
