Writing a Thriller

by Andre Jute

This book guides the reader through a number of identifiable stages including the following: choosing the initial theme of a story; the creation of characters; detailed plotting; research; cutting and rewriting and common writer's block. It also examines the process of finding and keeping a suitable publisher.

Genres: Writing, Nonfiction

188 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1987

About the author

André Jute was educated in Australia, South Africa and the United States. He has been an intelligence officer, racing driver, advertising executive, management consultant, performing arts critic and professional gambler. His hobbies include old Bentleys, classical music (on which he writes a syndicated weekly column), cycling, hill walking, cooking and wine. He designs and builds his own tube (valve) audio amplifiers. He is married to Rosalind Pain-Hayman and they have a son. They live on a hill over a salmon river in County Cork, Eire. There are around three hundred editions of his books in English and a dozen other languages.

Reviews

[Carolyn McBride · Rating 1 out of 5]

Any book that makes me want to throw it across a room deserves one star.
Never before have I encountered an instructional book so verbose and full of itself. Yes, it was originally written in the '80s, but the language was so high-brow and self-important, I actually had to go back and see if it wasn't written 100 years ago! Are we sure the author wasn't paid by the word?
100 years ago when serial fiction was all the rage and writers were paid by the word, it made sense to use this sort of language. That's what readers expected. But no book discussing how best to write a thriller should sound like Charles Dickens and Sherlock Holmes on drugs.

For example,
"But many (writers) know that the process of creating characters from a handful of dust does not stand close examination while true faith in this miracle (as contrasted to lip service induced by fear of the libel laws) can be an important impediment to the regular and consistent creation of varied, individual characters."

This is the author's style throughout the book. I had to read whole paragraphs over and over again to get through all the extra words, just to find the point! The book goes on and on and on in this manner. One statement takes five lines of the page.

My takeaway? Boy, am I glad I didn't spend money on this!

Go study any of the writing books by James Scott Bell instead. At least he is a best-selling and successful novelist who can point to his own catalogue as examples of how to write. Oh, and he doesn't try and claim that an adventure story is a thriller. (Pro tip, kids, the two genres are vastly different!)

This book is only good to put under a table leg to stop the wobble. Or fire starter.

[Stephen Hayes · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the things that I am still a bit confused about is literary genres, and people seem to have so many different names for them that it gets very confusing. Some are used by publishers to say what kinds of books they do or don't publish, and those are reasonably clear -- crime, romance, children's etc. So when I found a couple of books on writing thrillers in the local library,I read them to try to answer the question "What is a thriller?"

The first one I read, Writing the Thriller (my review here), was also because I was doing a final edit on my children's book, The Enchanted Grove. My book is an adventure story, rather than a thriller, but where does one draw the line? And even adventure stories have thrilling scenes in them, where the characters are in danger, don't they?

Writing a Thriller by Andre Jute at least answered that question for me. The adventure story has the characters in danger from external enemies. In the thriller the situation is complicated by betrayal from within. The thriller is therefore more complex.

The only problem with that definition is that many books advertised as thrillers might not actually be thrillers.

I found this book more useful for clarifying that and similar questions that I had. But it is also an older book, and may not be so useful to would-be thriller writers in the information it gives on the publishing process and manuscript submission. Clearly, it was written when word processors were in their infancy, and assumed that most people would be typing their story directly onto paper, and editing the paper typescript, and cutting and pasting literally with scissors and paste, and not in the sense of the Microsoft Windows metaphor.

The book also cites some of the thrillers that the author himself has written as examples, Reverse Negative and Sinkhole, but I notice that neither has a single review or rating on GoodReads. And, on a personal note, the author seems to have a strong prejudice against missionaries, and as a missiologist, I have a particular interest in missionaries, but that is just a personal prejudice and shouldn't affect one's evaluation of the book.

If you're thinking of writing a thriller, it could be a useful book to read, bearing in mind that it deals with dated technology. But the actual writing advice is generally useful.

[Alanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

The last few chapters were quite informative. 3.5 stars.

[Vincent Darkhelm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent novel-writing guide. Informative and entertaining throughout.

[Matt Posner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is awaiting a new edition. Andre sent me the original text for personal use. The book features his usual powerful fluency and verbal agility. There is a section about how to edit your own work that any novelist can benefit from reading. I highly recommend the old edition for this section and believe the new edition, when it comes, will be powerfully authoritative.

[Fausto Genao · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meah... tiene una que otra info interesante, pero en general no me satisfizo.

[K.A. Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm fortunate to have gotten a copy of this book. Very educational.