Writing a Killer Thriller Read online

  For popular thriller or mystery-suspense series, I love following the exploits of engaging, charismatic characters like Joe Pike, D.D. Warren, Jack Reacher, Maggie O’Dell, Elvis Cole, Lucy Kincaid, Harry Bosch, Eve Dallas, Myron Bolitar, Eve Duncan, Jane Rizzoli, and Stephanie Plum — and the two hunks in her life!

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  Chapter 2

  KNOW THE BASIC INGREDIENTS OF A KILLER THRILLER

  To compete in today’s competitive publishing marketplace, your thriller needs clever plotting, with lots of conflict, tension, and suspense, and a few twists and surprises, especially at the end. You need some gripping, heart-pounding scenes, each connected to the next and the story as a whole, with lots of direct cause and effect. And for maximum intrigue and reader satisfaction, it’s important to drop little tantalizing details and hints along the way, which all make sense at the end.

  For these reasons, it’s best to try to sketch out some kind of overall plan or plot list in advance; otherwise, you could get bogged down and drive yourself crazy climbing out of plot holes and rewriting scenes where your story goes off on tangents or just meanders or sputters to a halt.

  Your thriller plot needs a solid foundation you can build on, or the whole story could collapse around you in a muddled-up heap. Unless you have at least a major story question/problem in mind, if you just start writing to see where it takes you, you may end up with a lot of “and then...and then...and then...” scenes, with no real point or connection. Not to mention clues that end up going nowhere. This would leave your readers confused and irritated and could sink your reputation as a thriller writer. Even a rough road map will help you stay focused as you’re writing. For an excellent overall guide, see the eight-point plot arc in Chapter 3.

  First, what are the basic ingredients of a riveting thriller?

  James N. Frey sums it up: “To create a damn good thriller, you need to create a clever hero and send him or her on an ‘impossible’ mission to foil evil for the benefit of others.”

  Here’s another definition of thrillers, from good old Wikipedia: “A broad genre of literature, film, and television programming that uses suspense, tension and excitement as the main elements. Thrillers heavily stimulate the reader’s or viewer’s moods, giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety, and/or terror. Thriller films tend to be adrenaline-rushing, gritty, rousing, and fast-paced.

  “A thriller provides the sudden rush of emotions, excitement, and exhilaration that drive the narrative, sometimes subtly with peaks and lulls, sometimes at a constant, breakneck pace with thrills. It keeps the audience cliff-hanging at the ‘edge of their seats’ as the plot builds towards a climax. Literary devices such as red herrings, plot twists, and cliffhangers are used extensively. A thriller is usually a villain-driven plot, whereby he or she presents obstacles that the protagonist must overcome.”

  Ian Irvine describes a thriller plot succinctly:

  “At its simplest, a story consists of a character (the hero) who wants something badly, and an adversary who is trying equally hard to prevent the hero from getting what he wants. In each scene, the hero attacks his problem in a new way, the adversary fights back, and the hero either fails or his initial success leads to a bigger problem.”

  Or, in my opinion, you could approach it a different way and say that the villain drives the story and threatens peace and security, and the hero spends the whole story reacting to the threats and trying to stop the villain before he reaches his ultimate goal(s) and commits the most horrifying, devastating acts.

  Either way you look at it, you need to get the readers emotionally involved from the very first sentence. Here’s how to do it, according to Jessica Page Morrell: “Involvement begins when you create a realistic world, implant an issue that demands to be resolved, and introduce a character or group of characters who are intensely interesting to readers.”

  Your plot needs:

  ~ A clever, resourceful, likeable but complex protagonist

  ~ A conniving, frightening, determined villain

  ~ An overriding, preferably high-concept problem

  ~ Other related conflicts

  ~ Interesting, unique supporting characters, usually on both sides

  ~ Plenty of intrigue, suspense, and tension

  ~ Some surprises or reversals

  ~ A final big, very close battle

  ~ A satisfying resolution, with a final twist or surprise, and all the major story questions answered.

  Also, your protagonist should have a character arc. He or she is usually not the same person at the end as he was at the beginning. The challenges and trials of the story have deeply affected them and changed them forever. Series characters tend to have a much less noticeable character arc.

  What’s high-concept fiction?

  Here’s a list of elements of high-concept stories, which apply to any popular genre, by Jeff Lyons, of Storygeeks.com. This list appeared in the July/August, 2013 issue of Writer’s Digest magazine:

  7 Qualities of High-Concept Stories:

  1. High level of entertainment value

  2. High degree of originality

  3. Born from a “what if” question

  4. Highly visual

  5. Clear emotional focus

  6. Inclusion of some truly unique element

  7. Mass audience appeal (to a broad general audience or a large niche market)

  Lyons adds that most stories don’t possess all seven qualities, but the more of them you can identify in your story, the higher the concept. He lists three thriller/suspense titles that each possess several of the above qualities: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn; Suspect, by Robert Crais; and Catch Me, by Lisa Gardner.

  For more details on this list and the explanations for each point, check out the magazine article or Jeff Lyons’ website, Storygeeks.com.

  How and where to start?

  Here are James N. Frey’s basic steps for getting started (condensed, and my numbers and bolding):

  1. First, find a damn good germinal idea that excites you, that sets your blood on fire.

  2. Next, create a damn good three-dimensional thriller villain.

  3. Once you know the villain down to the bone, find his or her dark mission. This is the plot behind the plot.

  4. Then create a damn good three-dimensional hero.

  5. Now start planning your story, developing characters and conflicts as you go along.

  How to get ideas? “What if?”

  Watch/read the news every day. Read intriguing novels. Watch exciting movies and TV shows. Play the “What if?” game. Use your imagination to create “What if?” scenarios: What if (your character) picked up the wrong suitcase at the airport and....? What if the cab driver suddenly turned in the wrong direction and told (your character) he had his own plans for her? What if a patient was wheeled into the wrong operating room? What if their daughter went missing from camp? What if accompanying someone on a test drive of your car turned into a nightmare?

  Here are a few what if questions for some classic novels or movies. Match them with the titles below.

  – What if dinosaurs were cloned?

  – What if Martians invaded the earth?

  – What if women stopped giving birth?

  – What if a gigantic rogue shark started terrorizing a small island community?

  The Children of Men, Jurassic Park, Jaws, The War of the Worlds

  Brainstorm every day, on your daily commute or walk, in the shower, and when you’re dropping off to sleep and waking up. Write your “What if?” ideas down as you think of them, or use your smartphone or other little recorder to record them while you’re driving, etc.

  Pick a few of your favorite “What if?” questions, then build on them to see where you can take them. To turn your initial “What if?” question into a bestselling thriller, you’ll need to keep probing and adding depth by asking more questions, applying pressure to your character, and adding on
more dilemmas and conflict. In there you’ll come up with a villain. Keep escalating the initial idea by continually raising the stakes until you have five or six sentences or a half page that can form the basis for a whole novel.

  What’s the premise of your story?

  What’s your story basically about? What’s your main story problem or question? Can you state it in three or four sentences? Fill this in before you start writing, so you have a clear picture in your mind of your hero’s main challenge to guide you as you go along:

  (Protagonist’s name) is a ___________ who ________. But (first big encounter / conflict / problem). Now (action sentence). Will (name) solve / defeat / succeed / rescue (complete question)?

  Here’s a premise I devised for a gripping, entertaining story:

  (Hero or heroine’s name) wants ... (what will complete their life, make them happy, fulfill their main goal, satisfy their biggest hope or desire?). But he/she is hampered by ... (describe the misfortune, conflict, dilemma, problem, villain), and s/he has ... (time limit or other hindrance) to ... (describe the almost impossible task) or ... (describe a bad consequence that will happen). He/she has to choose between... and .... (Continue from there.)

  It’s important to have a short, sweet “elevator pitch,” an intriguing description of your story that you will use when people ask you, “So what’s your story about, anyway?” Or in case you’re at a writers’ conference and you end up in the elevator with your dream agent. You have only a few floors to convince them that your story is fascinating – make every word count! (But don’t try this in the restrooms, unless you want to get on their blacklist!)

  Now try to tell what your story is about in one sentence – your storyline.

  If you didn’t do the “What if?” exercise above, try now to express your storyline as a “What if?” question, with a maximum of two or three sentences.

  This would be a good time to run your basic premise and story outline past some smart friends or a critique group, just to be sure there aren’t any major flaws in your basic concept that would create huge, embarrassing plot holes down the road. It’s much better to work through the logistics now rather than after you’ve put hundreds of hours into writing the story!

  Character-driven or plot-driven?

  Should your thriller mainly be focused on the main character’s quest, challenges, and problems? Or should the character be secondary to the plot? Psychological thrillers are of course character-driven, as are many other subgenres to greater or lesser degrees. And it’s often the villain who drives the plot more than the hero or heroine, who are reacting to the threats.

  Unless you’re writing a military or techno thriller or a tough action-adventure, which are generally plot-driven, it’s usually best to go for a character-driven plot, where readers identify closely with the hero or heroine and follow their journey with trepidation, rooting for them every step of the way. Focusing on your character’s journey and struggles, showing us how they’re managing to cope at every turn, creates greater reader involvement.

  But as Ian Irvine points out, “before readers can identify with a character, he has to reveal his true inner self. Character is revealed most clearly through adversity and conflict, when the hero is desperate and has to give everything he has. When he’s forced to the limit, the reader will identify strongly with the hero.” So put your hero in lots of hot water.

  A little tip for writers who don’t like to plot the whole story in advance:

  One approach I’ve seen advocated several times is to plan your beginning and ending and main story question/conflict and a few plot points in between, then start by writing your ending (even if it changes later), then write your opening, then your second-to-last scene, then your second scene, then continue as you like.

  Resources:

  James N. Frey, How to Write a Damn Good Thriller

  Ian Irvine, 41 Ways to Create and Heighten Suspense, www.ian-irvine.com/suspense

  Jeff Lyons, Storygeeks.com, article in Writer’s Digest magazine

  Jessica Page Morrell, Between the Lines

  Back to TOC

  PART II

  DESIGN A KILLER PLOT

  Chapter 3

  BUILD YOUR STORY ON A SOLID FOUNDATION

  Why worry about a structure at all?

  Your story needs some kind of general blueprint so it doesn’t meander all over the place, darting here and there, trying this and that, confusing the readers, then sputtering and dying. Or overwhelming the readers with violence, chases and explosives, with no real point or substance. Without some kind of general storytelling guidelines as underpinnings to focus your plot and provide reader satisfaction, the possibilities of getting bogged down and confusing or annoying your readers are endless.

  SOME BASIC PLOT AND STRUCTURE GUIDELINES

  There are all kinds of excellent craft-of-writing books out there (see my list of resources at the end of this book) that go into detail on how to plot and structure a compelling novel that sells, including a great book devoted entirely to this subject, Plot & Structure, by James Scott Bell, so for this guide, I’ll just briefly outline various plot structures and how they relate to writing a thriller or other fast-paced fiction.

  MYTHIC STRUCTURE – THE HERO’S JOURNEY

  This age-old structure from the earliest tales, first described by Joseph Campbell in 1949, outlines the basic steps of a mythic tale, many of which still apply to modern-day thrillers. Although much more complex and detailed than this, the hero’s journey can be simplified into these rough steps:

  1. We are introduced to the hero in his normal world.

  2. The hero is challenged – a “call to adventure.”

  3. The hero faces a difficult decision whether to accept the challenge or try to ignore it.

  4. The hero “crosses the threshold” into a dark world to confront evil.

  5. The hero faces various challenges and gets into various battles with forces of evil.

  6. The hero has a “dark moment,” where he is challenged to the maximum and must overcome doubts and fears in order to continue.

  7. The final battle is fought.

  8. The hero is victorious and returns to his own world – “the crossing of the return threshold.”

  THE CLASSICAL THREE-ACT STRUCTURE

  Most writing “gurus” recommend the tried-and-true three-act structure, which has provided a secure framework for adventure stories since the beginning of storytelling. The three acts are basically the beginning, the middle, and the end.

  Act I, or the Beginning:

  This section, roughly the first quarter of most novels, but often shorter in thrillers (first fifth or sixth of the book), comprises the hook and setup, where you:

  ~ Introduce your main character (as soon as possible, preferably in the first paragraph) – who.

  ~ Present the protagonist’s world – what, where, when.

  ~ Establish the tone and style for this book.

  ~ Disrupt your hero’s world. Show, almost immediately, the first event or action that causes a disturbance in the protagonist’s world.

  ~ Complicate things more. Add a bigger problem, the first big threat that poses the main story question and compels the protagonist to take on the major challenge.

  ~ Introduce the main opponent of the story.

  This first act needs lots of tension, conflict, and intrigue, to drive the story forward and keep readers turning the pages.

  Act I ends with the threatened protagonist forced into making a difficult choice and going through what James Scott Bell calls “the first door of no return,” into the second act.

  Act II, the Middle:

  Your protagonist is now committed to the battle. This section, which makes up about half of your story, is the heart of it, where the main confrontations and most of the complications take place. This is the “cauldron” or “crucible” the hero is stuck in – he can’t go back and can only move forward.

  Act II is where you con
tinually heighten the conflict and tension, throwing your hero increasing challenges and troubles, forcing him to draw more and more on courage and resourcefulness he didn’t even know he had.

  Also, deepen relationships with your protagonist and other people in her world and develop any subplots in this section.

  Near the end of Act II, create a turn of events that sets up the final confrontation of Act III. It might be a huge setback for the hero, or a major discovery fraught with danger. Or a major piece of information, an epiphany or revelation that compels the protagonist forward to finally defeat evil, protect innocents from danger, and restore justice. Your hero or heroine can’t turn back at this point and is forced to go through what Bell calls “the second door of no return.”

  Act III, the Ending:

  This section, about the last quarter or fifth of your thriller, is where your hero is challenged to the max, in a life-or-death struggle with the villain. It’s your hero’s darkest moment.

  The cunning villain almost wins, but the hero manages to defeat him at the last minute in a nail-biting climax.

  Finally, the main story questions are answered and any loose ends tied up in a quick resolution. Leave the reader with some resonance, a sense of satisfaction, and the desire to read another novel by you.

  FREYTAG’S FIVE-ACT DRAMATIC STRUCTURE

  In 1863, Gustav Freytag, a German, advanced his theory of a five-act dramatic or narrative structure that divided a story into five parts: exposition, rising action, climax (or turning point), falling action, and resolution. Here’s a brief explanation of each of the five main parts of a story, according to Freytag:

  1. Exposition – Story Setup

  The exposition introduces all of the main characters in the story and shows how they relate to one another, what their goals and motivations are, and the kind of people they are. Most importantly, the audience gets to know the main character, and the protagonist gets to know his or her main goal and what is at stake if he or she fails to attain it.