Bloody Inspiration Part 4: My Top Five Thriller Authors

News of Tom Clancy's death today got me thinking about the writers who have consciously affected my craft. I'm sure that my writing has been influenced by dozens of writers on a subconscious level, but I'm going to stick to the ones that I'm aware of, because I don't want to spend hours in psychoanalysis just to write a blog post.

Here they are in order of importance to me:

1) Barry Eisler
Signature book: Winner Take All (Rain Storm)
Signature character: John Rain
The stories set in the John Rain universe resonate with detailed tradecraft and sudden violence. Eisler conveys a sense of realism that is missing from many testosterone driven espionage thrillers. He also delivers a sense of characterization and true character (See Creating Complex Characters) that is unique in a genre of cookie cutter assassins, maverick FBI agents and special forces tropes. If there is anyone I want to compare my books to, it's Eisler's.

2) John Le Carre
Signature book: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Signature character: George Smiley
Where other authors treat spies as modern day daredevil adventurers, Le Carre offers a vision of agents and case officers that is much more human. Flawed personalities, personal distrust and institutional apathy hover over everything in his work. But there is also a charm and a wit that he will use to turn a phrase or describe a situation that is amazing to experience,  whether he is lifting you up or bringing you down. I hope one day to have both Le Carre's gift of language and his grounded characters.

3) Greg Rucka
Signature book: A Gentleman's Game (Queen and Country Book 1)
Signature character: Tara Chace
Rucka's Queen and Country story has found success both as a series of novels and comics. Rucka combines the bureaucratic infighting and troubled spies of Le Carre with the action and high body counts of James Bond. He also focuses on a female protagonist, something that is sadly rare in the espionage genre. Fortunately, I'm trying to change that with my novels.

4) Brian Azzarello
Signature book: 100 Bullets
Signature character: Agent Graves
Unlike everyone else on this list, Azzarello makes comics, not novels. But that doesn't diminish his craft in any way. 100 Bullets weaves crime, conspiracy, politics, sex, violence and social commentary seamlessly in a story that stretches from the discovery of America to the present. The visual nature of the story enhances the raw beauty of it in a way that prose can't accomplish on its own, no matter how much I try.

5) Tom Clancy
Signature book: A Clear and Present Danger
Signature character: Jack Ryan
Clancy's books don't really have a strong influence on my writing. I consciously avoid the type of highly technical descriptions that often left me confused and pulled out of the story when I read his work years ago. I also try to avoid the super patriotic undertones of good vs. evil that he fostered and the impossibly high, end of the world stakes that were common place in his books.

I do draw a lot of inspiration from the universe he created. It was through books like Patriot Games and The Sum of All Fears that I learned to appreciate the complex relationship between the US military and its intelligence services. His books taught me the importance of set ups and payoffs in a narrative that are pure art when done his way. Most of all, I constantly look to the work derived from the Ryan series and expressed in games like Rainbow Six, Ghost Recon and Splinter Cell. Clancy may not have invented Sam Fisher, but he is the godfather of the techno thriller and characters like Fisher couldn't exist without him.

So who are your favorite thriller authors? Who influences what you write and read today? I'm always looking for new authors, so please provide a book title if you can.

Have fun.
Gamal

See Also

Bloody Inspiration Part 1: Twenty one films that have influenced my writing

Bloody Inspiration Part 2: Ten inspirational comics

Bloody Inspiration Part 3: Top Books for 2012

Bloody Inspiration: Part 2 (My Inspirational Comics)

Many people don’t associate comics with dark themes, strong characters and compelling stories. I’m not one of those people. Comics are as important to me as movies or TV. As a child I learned to read through comics and as an adult I worked for Marvel Comics in a corporate capacity. If you avoid comics, you’re missing out.

Last week I wrote about the movies that inspire me, but my writing has been influenced by comics as much as any other medium. I don’t write stories about guys running around in leather and spandex, but a lot of my favorite comics don’t fit into the traditional superhero formula. If you like the following comics as much as I do, then you have a pretty good insight into the characters I create and the stories I write.

1. 100 Bullets: A nationwide mafia style drama wrapped around one of the most inventive premises ever.
2. Batman (Dark Knight Returns):  Redefined an icon and started a multi-billion dollar comics to movie success story
3. Daredevil (The Elektra Saga): Combined tragic romance with deranged killers and the desperate need for redemption
4. Grendel (Devil by the Deed, Devil Child & Black White and Red): The story of a gifted child twisted into an assassin, a crime lord and ultimately an icon of evil
5. Lone Wolf and Cub: a classic revenge manga that is sparse and beautiful in its brutality
6. Master of Kung Fu (1984-1989): a reimagining of a pulp series complete with betrayal, intrigue and of course…kung fu.
7. Queen and Country: A spy series that is part Jason Bourne, part George Smiley with a female lead that is more than a match for Bond
8. Sin City: The quintessential noir comic of the modern era, dragged down by an uninspired movie adaptation
9. Shi: A warrior priest fights with her own heritage and the yakuza in this modern interpretation of the Lone Wolf formula
10. Wolverine (The First Graphic Novel): A Japanese noir story that put this famous character on the map (and might be the plot for the next Wolverine movie…)

So what comics do you read (or have read) that have the same flavor as these? I don’t read comics as much as I want to anymore, but I’m always looking for new inspiration.

Have fun.

G