Missing Persons Appeals and Literary Studies: A Genre Fiction Analysis

Building on the linguistic perspective from the previous chapter, this chapter shifts to a more literary, genre fiction, and audience-focused approach to the data from the pilot study. This chapter examines the overlaps between missing persons appeals and crime fiction (in that an appeal is storytelling in its most basic form, centred around a verified or potential crime); appeals could therefore benefit from carefully utilising research done on audience response to crime fiction, if appeals intrinsically draw on or echo some of the genre’s tropes. It examines the function of multiple narrators/speakers in an appeal or crime fiction story, withholding information from an audience, the care needed with characterisation, and how to target an audience for maximum positive impact, among other considerations.