Blog | Alison Morton's Thrillers

How I did it

Here’s a copy of my article in Mslexia magazine (as promised in my previous post ):

It’s a great mag – worth every penny. Here’s how you can subscribe.

In Mslexia – national (and international) fame!

Shortly after Military or Civilians? was published, Danuta Kean invited me to submit a short piece for the Mslexia magazine’s spot called How I Did It. In a bit over 200 words, under headings The Book, The Long Haul and The Advice, I outlined the experience of publishing my ebook.

A frisson of excitement rose up through me when I clicked on the link to access the latest issue and one of delight when I turned to page 57 to see my words “in print” in such a prestigious magazine (I’ll scan it for next post.).

I want to thank Danuta and Mslexia magazine for including my book, but I also want to say that Mslexia is a great few bob’s worth and even more so when you subscribe. Tagged as the magazine “for women who write”, it’s serious without being po-faced and accessible to unpublished and unpublished writers.

it’s given me ideas and information, so a great resource, but above all, it’s made me think about aspects of my writing that I hadn’t thought of before.

And that’s a good thing for any writer. A very good thing.

What’s a thriller?

When I mentioned to a new friend that I wrote thrillers with an alternate history setting, she batted aside (or maybe ignored) the alternate history bit and asked, “What do you call a thriller, then?”.

Er, isn’t it obvious?
Apparently not.

Merriam-Webster defines a thriller as “a work of fiction or drama designed to hold the interest by the use of a high degree of intrigue, adventure, or suspense“.

So are Georgette Heyer’s The Talisman Ring and The Reluctant Widow thrillers? Is Florence and Giles a Gothic thriller, a historical novel or literary fiction? Are C J Sansom’s Shardlake historic novels also thrillers? Does Kate Mosse’s Sepulchre qualify?

Or are we looking at books by Lee Child, Tom Clancy, or J D Robb which send adrenaline pumping around the body, keeps the reader glued to the book and on the edge of their seat? Whatever the tension level, the protagonist hits, and has to deal with, a problem – an escape, a mission, a mystery or a death threat; he or she always faces acute danger.

Literary devices such as cover-ups, red herrings, plot twists and cliffhangers are crucial to maintaining tension. And, of course, the plot always has a good, meaty villain often just as clever and cunning as the protagonist and who presents obstacles that the hero must overcome. The tension rachets up throughout the book and leads to a highly stressful climax often via car chases, shootouts and physical and/or psychological confrontations.

So is it all car chases, bombs and fights?
Common subgenres include psychological, crime and mystery thrillers, not to mention spy and political, historical and sci-fi/alternate history thrillers.

Crime thrillers often centre around murder, ransoms, heists, revenge and kidnappings. Mystery thrillers are more investigations, either “whodunit” or “whydunit”. Psychological thrillers feature mind games, psychological themes, stalking, confinement/deathtraps, disturbed personality, paranoia and obsession. Fringe theories and false accusations are common in many thrillers, especially catastrophe/disaster/environmental ones while threats to entire countries, espionage, gadgets, technology, assassins and electronic surveillance are common in spy thrillers. And the huge range included in speculative fiction (romance, adventure, literary, space opera, time-slip) naturally includes alternate history thrillers.

You’ll have to wait until the next episode to find out about what exactly makes up a thriller…