8 Comments
Dec 6, 2022Liked by Chrissy Hennessey

I'm not normally a thriller person, but I did enjoy The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz. Good luck with your revision!

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I also enjoyed The Plot, though the ending was a bit of a stretch for me. I'm hoping to work some elements of the genre into my revision without going quite that far. 🤞

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Dec 5, 2022Liked by Chrissy Hennessey

I do love a literary thriller! A couple I find particularly interesting are Tana French's In the Woods and Jane Harper's The Dry -- Both became the first in a series, but to me have a different feel from the later entries. As if they were in kind of the same position you were for writing those books and then just settled into writing thrillers for the following ones. I was a bit disappointed in Kate Atkinson's Case Histories and I think maybe it's because as the first in its series I was hoping for a similar effect that I didn't get? Anyway, I'd be curious to hear about any you end up enjoying.

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Thank you for these great suggestions! I actually already requested In the Woods and it's waiting for me at the library - so glad you liked it! I will also check out The Dry. And I'll definitely report back on my THRILLING experiment. 😉

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Dec 4, 2022Liked by Chrissy Hennessey

I love thrillers but often find them too commercial, especially the openings which seem very formulaic. I can’t think of any I would wholeheartedly endorse, except perhaps I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh which I read years ago and really enjoyed. Good twist in the ending which I didn’t see coming.

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I actually don't love most thrillers for the same reason, but will check out I Let You Go. I'm hoping to find elements of thrillers I like and weave them into what's already working in my draft. We'll see if it works!

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Is your personality reflected in your writing? By that I mean style. .

Put it another way, if people didn't see the byline, would they know it's you?

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Yes, I think so! I've been writing for a long time and I've definitely developed my own style and voice. I like to think that style comes through in this newsletter too, though obviously the medium is very different.

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