If you want to write in a genre, you have to read that genre. Experts in the industry are consistent with their advice that you must be an avid reader of a genre to write well in it. The books listed below will teach you about the genre and help you get a feel for all the different things you can do with it.
If you want to write in a genre, you have to read that genre. Experts in the industry are consistent with their advice that you must be an avid reader of a genre to write well in it. The books listed below will teach you about the genre and help you get a feel for all the different things you can do with it.
Back to Thriller Guide Remember to read the articles in the Essentials section. These cover all the essential skills you’ll need as a self-published author. They are not just for beginners either. They go in depth on how to successfully write, publish, and market your own books. Online Resources Learn to write thrillers from David Baldacci or Dan Brown at Masterclass.com Read this Reedsy post on how to write a thriller. Go to this giant thriller writing conference. Books to Read If you want to write thrillers, you must read them. Experts in the industry are consistent with their advice...
Back to Thriller Guide For this exercise, you should have a document open where you can write. Now copy the text in the box and paste it into that document. This will be the blueprint for your story. You’ll fill it in as you go through the exercise and end up with a basic outline for your thriller. You may want to post your story outline in the forums to get some ideas from other forum members. The Thriller Builder Our hero (her name here) must prevent (disaster here). They are in a hurry because (ticking clock here). The hero...
Back to Thriller Guide Please note that there are a number of thrillers that don’t follow this blueprint exactly, and most don’t follow it perfectly. If your book will still be thrilling and interest readers without one of these pieces, or with some of them done differently or in a different order, feel free to do your own thing. This blueprint is just so that you can understand the basic format that your readers will expect from the genre. ACT 1 – The People And The Problems The Hook The hook can be anywhere from 200 to 2,000 words, and...
Back to Thriller Guide Do you love a brilliant hero trying to save the world before he’s blown to bits by the time bomb in his shorts? Then you should be writing thrillers. If you read a lot of them, you already know the tropes to use, the cliches to avoid, and the basic structures they follow. If you haven’t read many thrillers, and just think they might be a good way to make money, you should go read a bunch of them and then come back. You must be very familiar with, and even love, thrillers if you are...
Let's start with what erotica is. Erotica is fiction where the primary focus is on graphic sex and the lead up to it. Where a thriller is about a ticking clock and action, a western is about gunfights, and a romance is about overcoming barriers to forming relationships, the primary goal of characters in erotic writing is to have sex and the climax (lol) is actual sex described in no uncertain terms.
There's a crime and it's going to get solved—often by a detective, but a surprisingly large amount of time by a little old lady or a bookstore owner.
No matter the subgenre, all horror shares an overarching theme: fear. Whether it’s splatterpunk, serial killer, supernatural, or anything else, every book in this genre is a spine-tingler. You can never go wrong in ramping up the fear factor, and the good guys don’t always have to win. And where there’s not fear, there’s tension. Every horror reader wants tension. They want to be concerned for the safety — and often sanity — of the characters. You need to make those characters relatable and then put them on a path to destruction. Like every thriller has a ticking clock, every...
Historical fantasy reimagines history if magic existed. The Napoleonic War with dragons. The Romantic poets as vampire hunters. Victorian England protected by a league of sorcerers. Let's face it, history is more exciting with a bit of fantasy thrown in.
