Many thrillers have been adapted to film. I spent one long afternoon going through the movie listings of the TV Guide and came up with everything from "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Jaws", to "Misery", "The Hunt for Red October", "Face-Off" and "Psycho". What did all of these movies have in common? While watching "The Rock", starring Nicholas Cage, it came to me. Each and every one of these movies put you on the edge of your seat.
That was a beginning. I went to my computer. During an Internet search, up popped a book doctor. Great, I thought, someone who has defined the genre for me. The web site described a thriller as an "especially intense form of action adventure novel . . . The modern thriller sets the tempo for successful contemporary entertainment due to its very fast pace, frequent unexpected plot turns, and ability to impart a thrill through daring deeds and narrow escapes." All right, so I needed car chases, buildings exploding, characters hanging from cliffs, or at the very least my hero to be held at gunpoint. But my book didn't have any of these things. Why was the agent calling my novel a thriller?
I read on. "The challenge in writing a thriller is to be as original as possible, create a big stake for the reader in the hero's survival, and develop fresh variations on timeless character archetypes . . . In its most sophisticated form, the thriller embodies powerful, classic elements taken directly from the Western culture's most profound myths, myths which recount the hero's journey from ignorance to enlightenment, enduring many mental and physical tests of courage and strength along the way." But whoa, wait a minute. Didn't this apply to all stories?
