The Challenges of Writing Techno-Political
Thrillers
by
John Wayne Falbey
There
are two areas that I consider to be especially challenging in writing a current
techno-political thriller. The first involves the technology part. It’s
critical that the author gets the science right; otherwise, it’s science
fiction, and that’s another genre. To get the science right, research is key.
That raises questions, such as: When to conduct the research – before starting
the book or during the writing of it?, Where to conduct it? and How much is
sufficient?
When? Obviously it needs to be done before you begin writing about
the subject to which it pertains. Jim Rollins, the noted NYT best selling
author, does most of his research up front. He gives himself 90 days to complete
it, and then begins writing the story. With my novel, Sleeping
Dogs: The Awakening, I did the bulk of my research on genetics –
an underlying theme – up front, then researched other topics, such as the toys
of the über wealthy, sophisticated weaponry, etc., as situations
developed during the writing of the book.
Where? For my first novel, The
Quixotics, written before the technological revolution, I did
most of my research in the library. Now I do most of it online. Caveat: don’t
rely largely on a single source. For example, Wikipedia is very easy to use and
covers just about every topic you can imagine. But it’s open-source, meaning
that anyone can contribute to it and those contributions may not be accurate or
current.
How
much research? You should be able to
discuss the topic intelligently and in some depth with experts on the subject.
Your readership may include some of those experts. Readers don’t praise or
patronize authors who have no real grasp of the subject.
The
second challenge in writing thrillers is to blend reality with fiction. Most
authors with whom I’ve discussed this topic admit that they have a tendency to
base characters on people they know. It’s a better policy to build your
individual characters from a composite of people – ones you may know well and
others whom you may only have observed somewhere or read about. I did this with
the personalities of the six members of the black ops unit in my novel Sleeping
Dogs: The Awakening. Interestingly, many people I know think
they recognize themselves as one or the other of these characters.
When
basing characters on other people, the writer has to use caution not to openly
commit libel or callously invade the privacy of a fellow human being. That’s
not always as easy as it may seem. There’s something of an exception in this
area, however, and that’s the public figure. Part of the price of fame and
glory is the surrender of a portion of your right to privacy. I would not
suggest you go so far as to use the same name for your character as the person
on whom he or she is based. That may be crossing the line.
As
for blending reality into the story line of the thriller, that’s relatively
easy. Read newspapers and magazines, tune in to the news media on radio and
television, and follow blogs and online forums. Despite the bias inherent in
much of what you see and hear, there’s enough political intrigue in the world
today for any serious writer to craft a good techno-political thriller.
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Genre – Techno-Political Thriller
Rating – PG
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