The Easy Way to Write Thrillers That Sell
Rob Parnell
Language: English
Pages: 137
ISBN: B00G3DBC2S
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
When it comes to the bestseller lists, one particular genre stands tall. So much so, it’s probably seen as the most ‘respectable’.
It is, of course, the thriller.
Not only do thrillers make authors and their publishers very rich, they also make the most money in terms of film and TV rights, generating vast revenues worldwide.
Thrillers are also in hot demand for translation, serial and resell rights. Authoring a series of thrillers can literally catapult your career and your earning potential to the stars!
These days this is true even if you decide to self publish with Amazon. On any one day, a large number of Kindle bestsellers are fiction thrillers by independent authors! (Take a look at today's fiction top 100!)
But when it comes to traditional publishing, just look at the success of Dan Brown, Matthew Reilly, John Grisham, Jeffrey Deaver, Lee Child, James Patterson, Patricia Cornwell, Kathy Reichs, Richard North Patterson, Jonathan Kellerman, Michael Crichton, Sue Grafton, Sara Peretsky - the list goes on and on - all of these authors make a very respectable living crafting taut, psychological suspense fiction.
Wouldn’t you like to emulate the success of these writers?
Sure you would!
Now you can, the easy way. Welcome to: "The Easy Way to Write Thrillers That Sell"
Written by Rob Parnell - Kindle bestselling author - and "the world's foremost writing guru" - this new and fully up-to-date resource takes you through the critical basics of writing modern thrillers for publication.
From creating classic heroes and heroines, unforgettable villains, through research and plotting story, handling action, and building suspense into great denouements, to style, tone, credibility, etc, etc – in fact everything you might need to start a career in this exciting arena of commercial storytelling.
Whether you want to submit thriller submissions to traditional publishers or go it alone and create popular self published novels on line, this resource is most definitely for you.
Here’s a brief outline of the contents:
* Introduction: The Thriller: Form and Function - an analysis of the genre, its history and place in our culture, including a comprehensive overview of sub-genres.
* Lesson One: Imagining Classic Characters - your key to success. We explore how to create and develop believable personalities that will stand the test of time.
* Lesson Two: Effective Research - including easy, no cost ways to give your fiction total veracity – from info and advice on police procedure, to medical trauma, the law, corporate structure, weaponry and technology.
* Lesson Three: Backward Plotting – the secret to stretching the fictional envelope, and keeping those twists turning ever tighter.
* Lesson Four: Sex, Guns and Vitriol - how a stirring mix of ingredients can mark you out as a writer of originality and panache.
* Lesson Five: Outwitting the Foe - how set-up and preparation are essential to convincing resolutions, plus how to use false clues and secondary characters to intriguing effect.
* Lesson Six: Serialization - how to make your bestsellers run and run. Little known tactics for ensuring readers (and publishers!) clamor to buy your next book.
All this plus lots of useful exercises, writing advice and guidance that will build your raw ideas into a credible and compelling story in no time at all!
By absorbing this information, you will be able to create a complete template for a stunning piece of novel length fiction and gain a solid grounding in the requirements of this fabulous genre.
Click on the cover above to get a sneak peek!
Here’s a simple way to plot backwards: Take a piece of paper and write ENDING in the center at the top. Near the bottom, again in the central position, write INTRO. It’s best to do this in freehand because I don’t know of any software that will allow you to create something this organic. Under the ENDING tag, write a short heading which describes your finale. Killer revealed, or Justice prevails, something like that. Under INTRO, write a short heading to describe your start. Note: Remember to
vertical lines, on either side of the center line. This is a graphical representation of your 4-act thriller, where the diagonal up hill climb is your basic storyline. By the way, if you think in terms of your story “climbing” as in intensifying from beginning to end across the 4 acts, then you won’t go far wrong. Now, write short statements in each of the first three quarters that sum up the main thrust of each act. For the fourth quarter, write “the chase and the fight scene.” We talked a
are dead and the Mafia is implicated), there then follows the last quarter of the story where the hero (our Tom) devises his own final showdown with the mob to reclaim some of the blood money and restore the legal status quo. In many modern thrillers the ubiquitous “chase scene” is turned into a long “set piece” whereby all kinds of obstacles to the final confrontation have to be overcome. Like a roller-coaster ride, action and events and problems come thick and fast as the protagonist closes in
We also imagined that, at the end of the story, Geoff will have defeated the bad guy and justice will have been served in one way or another. Along the way, Geoff will have to be placed in situations that propel his agenda. So, we need to make a list of the critical moments in Geoff’s story: Geoff finds Nina murdered; Geoff is arrested but released; Geoff finds Juliet; Geoff uncovers a corporate scam; Geoff and Juliet investigate the crime; Geoff and Juliet confront Doubt; Juliet is
were seen as a luxury, Bodley Head were able to secure distribution deals in railway stations and newsagents – when other mainstream authors fought over bookshelf space and literary credibility, this was a breakthrough, and one that paid huge dividends. From a literary point of view, the important thing to remember about Christie is that story is everything. The author is in total control of the plot. She lets you know all you need to know (and a lot you don’t) but she never cheats. She held the