Recently, some contemporary media feel particularly catered to Generation Z — as in, for our low attention spans and addictions to short-form media. “Murder Mindfully” by Karsten Dusse — written originally in German and recently translated into English by Florian Duijsens — is one of these pieces of media. There is a fine line between guiding your reader and overstating your point, and this book leaned heavily on the latter, creating a story that was too easy to read.
“Murder Mindfully” centers around criminal defense lawyer Björn Diemel as he tries to get his life together for his wife and young daughter. His marriage and mental state are in a shaky place due to his highly stressful job, made worse by the fact that he legally represents crime kingpin Dragan Sergowicz and his empire. In an attempt to improve both his personal and professional life, he starts seeing a therapist, who offers him several mindfulness tips that he takes to heart — though maybe too much so.
Every chapter starts with an excerpt from a fictional book written by Björn’s therapist: “Mindfulness for Managers.” The excerpts talk about strategies for living a more mindful life, each one focused on a different aspect of life that Björn struggles with. These excerpts were fine in isolation, but Dusse often repeats them word-for-word in subsequent chapters alongside Björn’s internal reflections. This double-dipping of quotes quickly becomes predictable and weakens their effectiveness. It became easy to stop reading them at the start of chapters, knowing they’d make an appearance later on.
Dusse’s chapters were — in general — extremely short, often beginning with a two-paragraph summary of what happened in the chapter before. While it was partially helpful to have reminders of the sometimes confusing plot, it also felt like Dusse was trying to hold the reader’s hand. Summarizing wasn’t limited to the start of chapters either, and it tended to overpower the action. Important character-building scenes, such as Björn spending time with his family, were dismissed by being written as summary. As a result, it was difficult to care about his relationship with his daughter and wife to the extent the narrative demands.
Even once the novel gets past its summary and repetition, many scenes are disappointingly dull. For a book with the word “Murder” in the title, there’s a lot less real action or mystery going on than one might suggests. Much of the text is comprised of Björn’s elaborate schemes and internal monologue, and while it’s witty and interesting at times, it began to feel like the story’s juiciest scenes were passed over.
The greatest strength of “Murder Mindfully” lies in its humor. Björn is a textbook unreliable narrator, and it’s funny to watch him justify his morally gray actions. Amid the surrealism, the novel incorporates interesting societal commentary. This is evident when Björn and his wife struggle to enroll their daughter in preschool and have to interview at several different programs for a spot. Eventually, the crime syndicate Björn represents takes control of the preschool and secures a place for his daughter. Later, owning the preschool gives the syndicate power over a policeman who is similarly desperate to enroll his child in preschool. Moments like these take normal issues that average families face, and magnifies them to fit the murder mystery genre.
As I read “Murder Mindfully,” I couldn’t shake the feeling that its well-written dialogue and theatrics made it better suited for a movie or TV show. Visual media, especially TV, are consumed casually; viewers allow shows to play in the background, binged and clipped for short-form consumption. Books can’t exist in the same way. They must be read with full attention to be understood.
“Murder Mindfully” seemed to rely on the qualities that help TV and movies succeed: interesting plot, humor and dialogue. The constant summarizing and repetition would serve as a great episode recap, especially considering the way some TV writers are being taught to “dumb down” their scripts due to the rise of casual viewing.
Unsurprisingly, the author, Dusse, is also a television writer, and the book has already been adapted into a German Netflix original series. There is a great story in “Murder Mindfully,” with multidimensional characters and a unique plot; I just don’t think a novel was the best form for it.
Arts Writer Amany Sayed can be reached at amanysay@umich.edu
