By Tom Sawyer
Mysteries and thrillers. What
are the differences? The following was acquired some years ago, its original
source unknown. And while it is not gospel, it’s not a bad set of guidelines
for anyone with questions about the two forms.*
MYSTERY
A puzzle
Curiosity motivates
Protagonist has skills
Thinking is paramount
Action is offstage
Small circle of friends
Clues
Red herrings
Information withheld from audience
Audience a step behind
Mostly single Point of View
Whodunnit?
Suspects
Ending intellectually satisfying
Closure a requirement
Series expected
Usually 300 pages
VS.
THRILLER
THRILLER
A nightmare
Victim story (at top)
Protagonist must learn skills
Feeling is paramount
Action is onstage
Thrust into larger world
Surprises
Cycles of mistrust
Information given to audience
Audience a step ahead
Up to four Points of View
What will happen?
Betrayers
Ending emotionally satisfying
Can end ambiguously
Often stand-alone
Can be longer
*Generally speaking
About Tom Sawyer:
Novelist,
screenwriter, playwright, Tom Sawyer was Head Writer/Showrunner of classic CBS
series, Murder, She Wrote,
for which he wrote 24 episodes. He’s written TV movies, 9 network TV pilots,
100 episodes, on staff of 15 series. Edgar and Emmy-nominated, Tom wrote-directed-produced
the cult comedy feature Alice
Goodbody. Co-librettist/lyricist of JACK, an opera about
JFK, he’s taught writing at UCLA, now online at Screenwriters University, publishes
Storybase software,
authored Fiction Writing
Demystified. Tom’s latest conspiracy
thriller, bestselling No
Place to Run, deals with the truth behind 9/11
About NO PLACE TO RUN:
Attorney
Bill Lawrence’s client, a just-convicted hitman, confides a chilling secret:
information that will buy his freedom – evidence of a murder he carried out on
Sept. 11, 2001. Bill finds the documents, and knows that he, his family,
and his client must immediately disappear.
Uprooted without warning from career and lover, Claudia Lawrence, 24,
and brother Adam, 12, figure it’s the worst moment of their lives when, with
their parents, they’re thrust into Witness Protection. Not close. Next morning their mother and
father are blown to pieces by a car bomb.
Their father’s client is murdered in his jail cell. Within hours, Claudia’s accused
of their parents’ murders. She and Adam become fugitives, running from police,
and from rogue FBI agents determined to murder them. Their
key to survival: find the evidence their father had – before the bad guys get
it – and give it to the authorities. With ingenuity and daring, Claudia and
Adam locate this McGuffin, escape seconds ahead of the bad guys – and discover that
it makes no apparent sense. Now, they must figure out its meaning – and why people want them dead.
Over the next days of breathless chase and harrowing escapes, Adam and Claudia
lie, steal, and assume aliases as they outwit people ever more desperate to
kill them, while piecing the truth together with the long-distance help of her
lover, Nick. Their
quest propels them from Houston to LA, to a tiny North Carolina hamlet, to
D.C., to a Chesapeake Bay estate, where they confront the major heavy, finally
deciphering the puzzle – and its horrific meaning. In a mega-tense climax, facing almost certain death,
Claudia makes a moral choice few people ever have to face as she avenges the
murders of family and friends – and exposes the truly ugly conspiracy behind
the events of 9/11.
2 comments:
This list has some fantastic (and subtle) distinctions on it. Thanks so much for sharing it, Tom. Also...No Place to Run sounds fantastic. To be read!
I'll never forget my first experience of pitching my novel to a NY agent and my introduction to the world of genre. I thought my book was a mystery, and she explained that thrillers have a sense of urgency and usually conclude in about 48 hours. She liked my concept but brushed me off with, "You've got a thriller here and I don't represent thrillers."
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