Problem with plausibility of key subplot in novel

SAWeiner

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Greetings. I've been trying to make a murder mystery novel sellable that I first started writing in November, 2011, almost 9 years ago. I have a subplot that I see as crucial to the story, but which almost all my Beta readers dislike, mainly because they don't find it believable. This subplot involves the protagonist, a government employee, being under extended surveillance for alleged time fraud. I actually had a similar experience of being under extended surveillance myself, which was my impetus for writing the book. Of course, I've heard the saying, "Truth is stranger than fiction." I also know that if I'm getting the same reaction from multiple readers I need to take heed. How can I fix things?

Thanks so much for your help.
 
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Ari Meermans

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Time theft in various forms is definitely a "thing" so what did your betas find implausible? Was it the way it was discovered? The way the character was surveilled? Some other steps taken in the surveillance? Something else?
 

ChaseJxyz

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How extended is this surveillance? If they're a government employee, their phone/tablet/laptop is already tracked by IT, along with whatever systems they're logged into, along with any sort badge swipe in/outs....so it doesn't take a rocket scientist or James Bond to figure out what's going on.

Person says they were at the office 9-5 Thursday. The building requires you to badge in/out, so there's a record that they badged in at 9 and out at noon (presumably for lunch) but never came back. Or they were logged onto their work station 9-noon. Or that their work phone (which is probably an iPhone) was on the work campus from 9-noon. This would be a lot more difficult to prove if they are remote only, like because of covid, but I imagine that's not the case when you first wrote this. It would be more difficult to do this if their job requires them to be on the road all the time, such as an on-the-road manager for a transit system, but they would be driving a company car and that would be tracked (plus the fact that they weren't responding to calls during the times specified). But if they're, like, a senator idk if they're going to be putting in time sheets.

I've worked for local government before and have several friends who have for local, city, and federal, so I may be able to give you some info. What exactly does your protag do, and what level of government do they work for?
 

SAWeiner

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How extended is this surveillance? If they're a government employee, their phone/tablet/laptop is already tracked by IT, along with whatever systems they're logged into, along with any sort badge swipe in/outs....so it doesn't take a rocket scientist or James Bond to figure out what's going on....

I've worked for local government before and have several friends who have for local, city, and federal, so I may be able to give you some info. What exactly does your protag do, and what level of government do they work for?

The protagonist is a government attorney, whose job would take him out of the office, typically to various courthouses in the area. So, electronic logging in and out at the office was of limited value. Also, the setting is in NYC, so he'd travel by foot or subway, not in a car. He was being watched and followed in person when he'd arrive and leave. His being watched and followed was too much for my readers, including my wife!
 
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Ari Meermans

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I can think of several reasons a government attorney would possibly be under surveillance but not for time fraud . . . government-employed attorneys don't have billable hours.
 

SAWeiner

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Actually, attorneys working for New York State like myself or my protagonist are supposed to keep designated hours and put in at least 7.5 hours a day. But again, what matters here is perception---getting people to believe. It is so frustrating for me that I can't make this happen!!!
 
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Lauram6123

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He was being watched and followed in person when he'd arrive and leave.

Yeah, I'd have a hard time believing that. I can't imagine a government agency having the resources and manpower to actually follow its own attorneys around. I could imagine them being tracked in other ways, however, but being physically followed? I would need some explanation of how that made sense for the employer.
 

Chris P

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Yeah, I'd have a hard time believing that. I can't imagine a government agency having the resources and manpower to actually follow its own attorneys around. I could imagine them being tracked in other ways, however, but being physically followed? I would need some explanation of how that made sense for the employer.

My reaction too, and for the same reasons. I know a person who was fired from a US federal government job for time theft, but I don't know how it was detected or documented.

It would be more plausible to me, but only marginally so, if the HR or internal affairs department contracted out to a private investigator to tail a suspect employee for a couple days. In fact, it would add some credibility if you said the agency had to have third-party evidence to prevent accusations of discrimination, retaliation, etc., but again I would need some good reasoning. For sure, though, no government at any level has the type of funding or personnel to have an on-staff spy snooping around the local bars and coffee shops looking for staff who should be in meetings.
 
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ChaseJxyz

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Better question: WHY is this a key subplot of the novel? Is being tailed causing your character to do something they otherwise wouldn't do? Are the surveillance guys supposed to witness something else that later causes trouble?
 

SAWeiner

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My reaction too, and for the same reasons. I know a person who was fired from a US federal government job for time theft, but I don't know how it was detected or documented.

It would be more plausible to me, but only marginally so, if the HR or internal affairs department contracted out to a private investigator to tail a suspect employee for a couple days. In fact, it would add some credibility if you said the agency had to have third-party evidence to prevent accusations of discrimination, retaliation, etc., but again I would need some good reasoning. For sure, though, no government at any level has the type of funding or personnel to have an on-staff spy snooping around the local bars and coffee shops looking for staff who should be in meetings.

While the agency itself wouldn't, there are other branches of the government that can get involved. The state has an Inspector General's Office, with staff including investigators, and does conduct joint operations with other law enforcement agencies. They have in fact followed employees around, as confirmed by reports on the IG's website. How though do I get people to believe this?
 
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SAWeiner

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Better question: WHY is this a key subplot of the novel? Is being tailed causing your character to do something they otherwise wouldn't do? Are the surveillance guys supposed to witness something else that later causes trouble?

More than one person involved in the surveillance was present at the time of the murder. A photo of the protagonist was taken, standing near the victim right before her death. Also, the murder victim, the protagonist's ex-lover, was involved in setting up the investigation to get him in trouble.
 
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Woollybear

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I've seen authors 'get readers to believe it' about remarkable things, using various tricks. So, peruse titles that do this sort of thing.

The first one that comes to my mind is the device used in the crime fiction: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Larsson injected factoids about the scale of human trafficking and rape before each chapter.

Example: before the story begins, the factoid: Eighteen percent of the women in Sweden have at one time been threatened by a man is presented to the reader.

I love stories that do these sorts of public awareness raising. Since this is your genre, you might want to take a look at that title and how Larsson handled it. I can imagine you presenting all manner of factoids from law and government, to good effect.
 
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Chris P

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While the agency itself wouldn't, there are other branches of the government that can get involved. The state has an Inspector General's Office, with staff including investigators, and does conduct joint operations with other law enforcement agencies. They have in fact followed employees around, as confirmed by reports on the IG's website. How though do I get people to believe this?

I believe the part about an inspector general's office. I know for a fact that at the fed level, each department-level agency--State, Labor, Agriculture, etc.--have their own IG offices, and some sub-agencies do too. And yes, it's their job to catch rule breakers. But usually these offices do little more than desk audits or paper trail collation. At most (and I've been involved with this for an EEO office) they take a statement from an employee filing a complaint, or from other employees who might have witnessed something. Sending out an incognito inspector to sit in the lobby of a courthouse to see if the attorney shows up for a scheduled meeting? Nah; only under exceptional circumstances, if then. They would take a statement from others they knew were in the meeting, but that's about it. Why would they devote staff time when an email from the judge saying "Yeah, dude was a no-show" would give them all the evidence they needed?
 
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Kat M

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I'm wondering if you need some more worldbuilding here. It seems to me what you're describing is something that can and does happen in the world of government attorneys, but judging from the responses here (including my own) that's not common enough knowledge for us to accept it without question. So, how can you set up in the book that this can and does happen?

Some thoughts—if it can and does happen often, then perhaps we could see it happening to someone else before the protagonist, so that the characters' responses show the reader that this is a normal part of the world.

Or, has your protagonist always expected/feared/figured this would happen to him eventually? So when he realizes he's being watched, you can show how normal it is based on his reaction?
 

ChaseJxyz

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More than one person involved in the surveillance was present at the time of the murder. A photo of the protagonist was taken, standing near the victim right before her death. Also, the murder victim, the protagonist's ex-lover, was involved in setting up the investigation to get him in trouble.

Ahhh, okay. I think it might make more sense if he was being investigated for something way more serious. Like embezzlement. Time card theft is very boring and easy to prove. But being corrupt or setting up quid pro quo things would give him a stronger motive to want to kill her (because that would be jail/public scandal instead of just being fired) and it would give more of a reason for PIs/whatever to be following him around.

I'm thinking of various episodes of SVU where various judges/police chiefs have been put under suspicion for trading sex for favors or were complicit in human trafficking or distributing child porn. They were put under surveillance 24/7 and SVU are actively looking for ways to get evidence so they can arrest them. I'm sure there's been at least one episode where a different police unit was investigating them for some "normal" type of corruption but discovered these sorts of things and handed it off to SVU.

So my recommendation would be to up the "crime" he's being investigated for. It'll make the surveillance more believable and it'll give other characters more reason to believe he committed the murder. Up the stakes!
 

Putputt

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I'm a believer that anything can be believable as long as the execution is done well. Most stories are about strange/unexpected/rare events, and whether or not they're believable depends on how the writer presents them to the reader. One of my books is about a woman who kills her blind date and then her family effectively carts the body around a lavish wedding, which is just about as ridiculous as you can get. There are several ways of making a ridiculous plot more palatable. You could have one of the characters point out just how unlikely X could happen, thus acknowledging that this is a very rare incident. You may need to show the domino pieces that are required to fall in order for unlikely event X to happen. You need to set it up with little clues leading up to the reveal -- maybe a side character who's very invested in proving X, or a policy change which might affect X. It really all depends on the execution, because I can think of so many implausible plots which I willingly bought into because the book was written so masterfully.
 

Elenitsa

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I'm a believer that anything can be believable as long as the execution is done well. Most stories are about strange/unexpected/rare events, and whether or not they're believable depends on how the writer presents them to the reader.

Thank you very much, @Putputt! You answered an unstated question of mine, which gave me confidence to keep writing.
 

SAWeiner

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Thanks people for your input. The catch with world building is that it can require exposition which slows things down. I meanwhile have to think about having my protagonist be under suspicion for something more serious.

If anyone else wishes to comment, please feel free.