A True Event Can Make Riveting Fiction Glen David Gold’s novel Carter Beats the Devil (2001) opens with President Warren G. Harding gamely getting up on stage in a San Francisco theater to participate in a conjuring trick. Hours later, he’s dead. Were the two events connected? Suddenly the conjurer—the real-life Joseph Carter, a household name in […]
Category Archives: Writing Tips
How do they do it? The Literary Masters of Suspense and Their Secrets
How do they do it? The Literary Masters of Suspense As a mid-career novelist, I am attempting to forge fiction that is a hybrid of the literary and mystery and suspense genres. And I have my role models, novelists whose work while suspenseful, also showcase in-depth characterization as well as consistently elegant and thought-provoking sentences […]
Dark Obsessions: Finding Inspiration in My Favorite (Unwatched) Horror Films
Dark Obsessions: Finding Inspiration in My Favorite (Unwatched) Horror Films Sometimes the idea for book is born out of a newspaper article I skim in an airport. Sometimes it comes from witnessing a friend’s nasty divorce. And sometimes it lurches to life when I ask a friend too many questions about an article in […]
The Five Don’ts of Writing
The Five Don’ts of Writing Most of us have mulled over the myriad articles on ways to improve our writing, searching for that nugget of advice that will elevate our craft from mundane to marvelous. How many times have you clicked on that kind of article or stopped at the magazine page to see […]
Where’s the body? The importance of a corpse to a crime writer…
Where’s the body? The importance of a corpse to a crime writer… I’ve been talking to audiences about murder for a number of years now. As a result, I’m uncomfortably aware that a high percentage of perfectly ordinary people have thought about committing murder—and some have a specific victim in mind. The stories I […]
Fiction Writing from A to Z
Do you know your fiction writing ABCs? Fiction Writing from A to Z Reminders about our craft make our imaginations burst into creative mode. From A to Z, we find sources of inspiration to keep us writing. I’ve chosen the first word that entered my mind for each letter as a means to keep […]
Four Crime Genres, Four Techniques to get you that Contract!
Four Crime Genres, Four Techniques to get you that Contract! Psychological suspense, thrillers, horror, and mystery are popular subjects for a lot of genre writers. Yet all writers are already intimately familiar with these topics; so much of a writer’s life is an everyday encounter with most if not all of them. Supernatural self-belief, […]
If You Can’t Dream Up an Original Idea…Steal One
If You Can’t Dream Up an Original Idea…Steal One Like most published writers, I’ve moderated quite a few workshops in the art and craft of writing thrillers and mysteries. In virtually every one of these sessions, one of the attendees will invariably raise his or her hand and tell me that they’ve been trying […]
Ten Emotions I ALWAYS Experience whilst Writing a First Draft (and You will Too)
Ten Emotions I ALWAYS Experience whilst Writing a First Draft (and You will Too) by Louise Genson Amazement – It’s 3am and I startle awake. I’ve thought of the singularly best idea ever! I don’t know why no-one’s written it before. It’s original and clever and I know readers will love it as much […]
Rules for an Aspiring Techno-Thriller Writer
Rules for an Aspiring Techno-Thriller Writer: I’ve been asked several times for advice to a new techno-thriller writer. I started making a list, and it’s gotten a lot longer than I expected. These are all things I’ve learned since I got into the business. Some were as Tom Clancy’s co-author (apprentice); others were after I struck […]
The Necessity of an Antagonistic Setting
The Necessity of an Antagonistic Setting A trait of a bestselling writer is the ability to raise the stakes for the protagonist. A writer often turns to obvious means of adding stress, tension, and conflict through characterization, dialogue, plot twists, and emotive conflict. Those are powerful tools, but an antagonistic setting means shaky ground for […]
Writing Tip #1: Talk to Real People
Writing Tip #1: Talk to Real People As someone who has been writing police procedurals on the page and on the screen for more than thirty years, I take research for my books and TV shows very seriously. The absolute best way to draw your characters is to talk to real people about their stories. […]