McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
Anyone have good tips on writing a Conspiracy Thriller?
kingaling:
I'm putting together a supernatural storyline that is based on an Assassin who's also a Sorcerer. Does anyone have any tips on what a Conspiracy Thriller should contain. I'm hoping to make this similar The Jason Bourne Series and could use some tips from people who've been there, or are struggling through something the same. Any tips would be of great help. Thanks.
ballplayer72:
speaking strictly as an audience member, to me the mark of a good conspiracy thriller is the ability to figure it out before the main character. However this has to be balanced otherwise it makes your novel lame. For example: Fight Club (click to show/hide)you didn't really know that Ed Norton was Brad Pitt and vice versa until the very end. However in movie tyler pops up in multiple flashes. And the narration passes tyler and follows him a bit when ed norton says :if you lose x number of hours etc. etc. when you wake up there could you be a different person? When i first saw the movie I thought to myself "would'nt it be nuts if he was like werewolfing into brad pitt? that would be crazy." but i didn't KNOW or even have real proof until the end. thats how it should work
meg_evonne:
--- Quote from: kingaling on March 13, 2009, 06:58:16 PM ---Does anyone have any tips on what a Conspiracy Thriller should contain.
--- End quote ---
uhmm a good conspiracy? sorry I'm in a snarky mood tonight. Seriously, I've been a Deighton, Fleming, Ludlum, McInness, Follett, Brown, Clancy etc fan all my life. In this genre--you either got the smarts or you don't.
Oh and an incredible sense of place and the ability to share it in exciting dialog and description.
An overwhelming ability to build and hold tension by the brilliance of your intellect.
The ability to write action scenes that rock and never get boring.
The smarts to always stay one step ahead of your very intelligent readers.
Entertaining your readers while at the same time you thumb your nose in front of their face--and make them smile in the process because you are so brilliant.
That all leads back to the same thing... brilliance in writing and a smart, snarky mind. There is no way to fake it. There is no way to stick things together with duck tape and think it will sail.
Now, how do you physically do that? Go to top and read ALL those books. If you've done that and are still wondering what makes this kind of book work? ..... better pick another genre. This even has a cliff notes version... movies. Again, if you can't chart it out in a movie.... better pick another genre.
Good luck with all that! :-)
kingaling:
uh..well. Yeah! Of course I need to know those things...but that's why I asked for tips. Like a guide to writing it. There are plenty of guides to writing standard mystery stories, but Conspiracy Thriller's have a lot more to them. That's why I was hoping for some details, not just vague "you need to know how to do this and that.." response.
Paynesgrey:
Don't Twist just to have a twist. Any twists, doublecrosses, etc, have to have some valid reason other than "Oh, shit! I need to have a clever twist!" Good guys gone bad, bad guys gone good, all have to have a compelling reason(s) which have been subtley worked into the story. For a character to believably change their stripes, it's got to be through development that is at least quietly mentioned, rather than a sudden "oh, snoggfarblers ate his first daughter 40 years ago. Didn't anybody but me know that until now?"
At all costs avoid "Hey, Anakin? Ya wanna be evil?" "ummnn..no." "C'mon, let's be evil. C'monnnnn." "Um...ok."
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