Crime Detective Mystery Thriller Group discussion

We will be reading Phantom Instinct by Meg Gardiner starting July 20th. Meg Gardiner will be joining us.

I've ordered it in from the library :) This time I'll be able to join in, hurray!

Sounds great Sharon. Looking forward to hearing your questions and comments.

I agree, and this looks good, but I doubt if I will be ready by the time.

Hi everybody --

Meg Gardiner here. I'm delighted you're reading PHANTOM INSTINCT, and I'm glad for the opportunity to join such an enthusiastic and thoughtful group to discuss the novel. If you have questions, hit me with them.

Talk with you soon.

Happy reading!

Meg

Thanks, Meg! Love your books!

Meg wrote: "Hi everybody --

Meg Gardiner here. I'm delighted you're reading PHANTOM INSTINCT, and I'm glad for the opportunity to join such an enthusiastic and thoughtful group to discuss the novel. If you ha..."

How lovely you are here, Meg: I haven't gotten the book yet (buried under books right now). Greetings and thank you for coming on our thread.

All I can say is that I'm up to Chapter 3 and I'm hooked. I have a feeling that I'm going to be up late reading this book.

Hello Meg and welcome.

I always start out with this question because the answers are usually different so, here goes.
In the book, Who Was that Lady, a biography of Craig Rice, a pulp fiction writer who wrote screwball comedies in the 40's and 50's, it was said that her writing process was that she wrote by the seat of her pants. She would lock herself in a room and after a few hours, she would be done with her book.
What is your writing process since I'm sure it's different from Craig Rice.

If I locked myself in a room for a few hours, at best I would get a nap, not a book. I admire writers like Craig Rice who can write by the seat of their pants. (And I suspect that authors who can do this have a strong, intuitive sense of how a compelling story should develop.)

I brainstorm, and outline, and write character sketches, and re-outline, before I sit down to type CHAPTER 1. That's because I learned the hard way that when I write on the fly, without a plan, I end up so far up the creek that I have no idea where I am, much less what happened to my paddle. I need to know the main characters, the core of the plot, and how the story ends before I can really dig into the writing. This can take several months.

Once I start the first draft of a novel, however, I feel free to adapt and veer from the outline if I come up with a better idea or a fresh twist to the story. That's the fun part of writing mystery/thriller fiction.

Who was that Lady by Jeffrey Marks was a good bio of Craig Rice but I have to say that if you want to read it, then be ready for a very sad and tragic story in many ways with some surprises you would not expect.

Will be getting the book later today, so I look forward to starting it!

Sounds great Jenn. Looking forward to your questions and comments.

At Thrillerfest, there was a seminar on how to make characters sound unique. I like the way this is done with Aiden Garrison in this book. It does make the story more compelling.

Glad to hear it, Ron. I'd love to know what suggestions the Thrillerfest seminar gave on making characters sound unique. I want characters to come across as the real, three-dimensional people they are. :-)

I wasn't at the seminar but my thought was that your characters are unique. One of the reasons I'm enjoying your book.

I'll be picking up my copy from the library tomorrow. Looking forward to jumping into reading it.

Thanks Meg for joining us! I read your Jo Beckett series a few years back and really enjoyed them.

Sounds great Dawn.

I'm about 30% into the book now and I'm enjoying it. Hope to hear from others also.

Picked up my reserved copy from the library today - will start on it tonight, snuggled up in bed :)

Well, I don't want to say too much about the characters yet so I'll raise a question instead.

I imagine that writing a stand alone psychological thriller is different than a series. Do you find that either one of them is more challenging than the other?

Stand alone novels present different challenges than series books, and can offer different rewards.

When I start a new series novel, it's like greeting old friends. I slip into a world I know well. And I love seeing everybody again. The challenge is to create a fresh adventure for these people -- a story that stays true to their lives, but doesn't repeat what I've written before. If writers aren't careful, a series can go stale. Every new series novel should, ideally, offer the characters a chance to grow, without bending their lives completely out of the shape that readers know and love. It's a balancing act.

And a series novel must generally focus on an issue that the hero has the skill set to tackle. I write two series. Evan Delaney is a legal journalist, so the novels are law-tinged. Jo Beckett is a forensic psychiatrist, so those books have a medical/psychological bent.

But a stand alone novel can be about anything.

For an author, that's freeing. It allows you to write stories that pull at your gut and clamor to be put on the page, but that don't fit with a series. And, importantly, it allows you to put the characters whose lives are most deeply affected at the heart of the story. For example, my novel The Shadow Tracer is about a skip tracer who goes on the run with her five-year-old daughter. It's her story; her life, and her little girl's, that are on the line. Because the book is a stand alone, I could tell it from her point of view.

The same thing goes for Phantom Instinct. Harper Flynn and Aiden Garrison are the people at the heart of the story. Writing the novel as a stand alone lets them be the main characters. And, because everybody here is still reading the book, I won't yet delve into their lives or the twists in the plot. (In my house, we have a Spoilers Jar. If you ruin the ending, you have to pay up.)

The challenge in a stand alone novel is to create a world from scratch. Who are the characters? What are their personalities? What's their background? What do they do for a living? Who are their friends, families, lovers? What's the setting? What research do I need to carry out? It's a lot of work.

But that's the joy of writing.

Wonderful answer. It's great to have you here because there is a lot of information that I didn't know about regarding this. I can really see the difference in writing two types of novels from this answer. It's something to think about as I'm reading more stand alone books and series as well.

I think that when we're reading books, we don't always know what is going on in the mind of the writer as he or she is creating the book. In Phantom Instinct, I can see the how the story is driven based on the last paragraph of Meg Gardiner's answer.
This is the first book I'm reading by Meg Gardiner so I would like to find out if others feel a little differently when they're reading this book now that we have some insight into what the ideas are based on the last paragraph.
I would also like to know for the people who read the series books if they have a different perspective based on the last answer as well.

I'm 50% into the book now even though I'm exhausted at night after running at the gym. Have to read this book before I go to sleep.

I am finished. This is my first book by this author, but I will be reading more! I will wait with my comments so I don't spoil anything.

My first book as well Jen but even though I'm not finished yet, I'm enjoying it so I'll be reading other books by Meg Gardiner as well. I'm glad you enjoyed the book.

Just finished Phantom Instinct. This was my first Meg Gardiner, and I really enjoyed it. I will be checking my library to see what other Meg Gardiner books I can borrow.

Susan wrote: "Just finished Phantom Instinct. This was my first Meg Gardiner, and I really enjoyed it. I will be checking my library to see what other Meg Gardiner books I can borrow."

I'm still reading the book Susan but I feel the same way.

Does anyone have any thoughts on the main characters in this book, Harper Flynn and Aiden Garrison?

I guess my question for Meg Gardiner tonight will be on plot devices. Do you have any thoughts on this?

I wanted to write earlier but had no power all last evening – I was wondering how/why the decision was made to have Aiden Garrison suffer from Fregoli syndrome, and did it evolve a lot of research?

Ron wrote: "Does anyone have any thoughts on the main characters in this book, Harper Flynn and Aiden Garrison?"

I liked how different parts of their lives were revealed gradually. You start to get to know them one way, and then you get more information that makes you think about them a little differently.

Katherine wrote: "I wanted to write earlier but had no power all last evening – I was wondering how/why the decision was made to have Aiden Garrison suffer from Fregoli syndrome, and did it evolve a lot of research?"

Great point Katherine. I would be interested in that as well.

Jenn wrote: "Ron wrote: "Does anyone have any thoughts on the main characters in this book, Harper Flynn and Aiden Garrison?"

I liked how different parts of their lives were revealed gradually. You start to g..."

I agree. I think that there was some twists and turns in the story as a result of the way we learned about the characters.

I've finished Phantom Instinct :) Really enjoyed it. I have to admit that at first I thought it was going to be a bit flat but it got very exciting the further into the book I got. The first book by Meg Gardiner I have read, I have another on my bookshelf which I now look forward to reading.

Thanks to everybody who's enjoying the novel. I'm glad to hear it.

As for Fregoli syndrome:

Phantom Instinct is about perception. The opening shootout leaves two damaged survivors who have to work together to stop a killer. Hunting him down, and coming out alive, depends on accurate perception—by Harper and Aiden, by the cops, and by the people the killer has in his sights, including Piper Westerman.

But that's a problem for everybody, because in this book, things may literally not be what they seem.

Perception involves a balance of vision, insight, memory, and judgment. And that balance can be skewed—by darkness, bias, lies, and bad neural wiring. In Phantom Instinct, perception can’t be trusted. How do you tell truth from lies when you can’t believe what you see?

Fregoli syndrome causes glitches in perception that mean Aiden doesn't always know what to believe anymore, because his own eyes deceive him. And Harper realizes that her only ally is unstable, paranoid, and mistrustful because he sees the same enemy everywhere he looks.

I researched Fregoli syndrome extensively before writing the book. As an author I found it fascinating. I used it to explore how it could challenge a character--especially a cop--to deal with his own demons under the life-and-death pressures in the novel.

The story is about trust, betrayal, and fatal secrets. Harper and Aiden are wounded warriors, broken and drawn to one another. Their wounds make them dangerous. They have to choose whether to risk trusting their hearts and their instincts. And the killer turns their faults against them, to put them and those they love in the line of fire.

In a thriller, if you don't put characters to the ultimate test, under the worst of circumstances, you haven't done your job as an author.

One of the surprises of the book to me was (view spoiler)[ the death of Erika. I had begun to think of her as another main character, and I guess I thought somehow she might miraculously survive the situation. (hide spoiler)]

Jenn wrote: "One of the surprises of the book to me was [spoilers removed]"

The author in me is pleased that the turn of events you mention surprised you. I'll wait to talk about spoilers until more folks finish the book, but then I'm happy to talk about it.

Meg wrote: "Thanks to everybody who's enjoying the novel. I'm glad to hear it.

As for Fregoli syndrome:

Phantom Instinct is about perception. The opening shootout leaves two damaged survivors who have to wor..."

The best thrillers in my opinion have characters that are challenged not just by the "case," but by something else as well. Not being able to trust perception is certainly a challenge that adds so much to the book. I too was truly surprised by the ending. After really enjoying Phantom Instinct, I look forward to reading another Gardiner book- any suggestions?

Jenn wrote: "One of the surprises of the book to me was [spoilers removed]"

In all the group reads that we had, I never thought of doing this. Nice work Jenn.

I finished Phantom Instinct. I was very surprised by the twists and turns in the book as well as the ending. Hope we can discuss this because I have to say that this was a very intense book all the way to a surprise ending.

Let me know when you want to dig into discussing the book. I'm ready. :-)

I have limited access since I'm on vacation this week. I'm curious as to how Piper fits into this. Anyone have any thoughts?

I haven't read Phantom Instinct yet but I have been reading the Evan Delaney Series and just wanted to let you know that I just love them. I just finished Jericho Point and all three are very intense and suspenseful. I am going to be reading the fourth book, next month and Im really looking forward to it. The suspense is just awesome!

Mary wrote: "I haven't read Phantom Instinct yet but I have been reading the Evan Delaney Series and just wanted to let you know that I just love them. I just finished Jericho Point and all three are very inten..."

Thanks, Mary. I'm delighted you're enjoying the Evan Delaney series. Phantom Instinct intersects with Evan's world in a couple of places. Glad the suspense holds you!

That's great to know Meg because after I finish reading the series, I plan on reading Phantom Instinct.

We only have Meg Gardiner in for a few more days. Does anyone have any further thoughts?

Hi all: I'm going to answer some of your questions behind a spoiler wall.

1. Detective Erika Sorenstam: (view spoiler)[ Erika did become a major character. She was Aiden's long-time partner and former lover, and she proved to be loyal, brave, and -- ultimately -- willing to sacrifice herself to save the others. She was a hero. And Aiden will never entirely get over her death. (hide spoiler)]

2. Piper: (view spoiler)[ As I mentioned in an earlier comment, Phantom Instinct is about perception. Aiden has a form of perceptual blindness. Piper has a form of emotional blindness, brought about by immaturity and grief for her brother, and Travis uses this to manipulate her. It skews her perceptions of the truth and lets her fall under his spell. Harper's perception of what's going on with Piper is also warped by her grief and love for the girl. But in the end, Harper sees that there's still hope Piper might be saved, and is not willing to give up on her. (hide spoiler)]