title: Writing the Thriller: How to Craft Page-Turning Suspense with Instruction from Best-Selling Authors
author: T. MacDonald Skillman
description: The first thing T. Macdonald Skillman sets out to do in <i>Writing the Thriller</i> is define the thriller. Unlike the mystery, she says, "Suspense is emotional. It's surprise and confusion and fear and anticipation. And suspense is danger. Immediate danger." Thrillers come in a variety of guises: action-adventures; legal, medical, techno-, and political thrillers; psychological suspense; romantic-relationship suspense; women-in-jeopardy suspense. Skillman addresses each element of fiction writing--such as setting, dialogue, and point of view--as it applies to the various types of thriller. For all thrillers, she says, it is best to begin "in the midst of the action or danger"; any subsequent back story should "add a new dimension to the suspense itself." And the pacing should be "like climbing a long, steep series of stairways.... As you cling to the railing at the bottom of the last set of stairs, your heart is pounding; your lungs are burning." Most useful here are Skillman's case studies in plotting, for which she creates eight plots (one for each type of thriller) using the same cast of characters.
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  A CAIN/HARPER THRILLER (#1)
  
  D.P. LYLE
  
  SUSPENSE PUBLISHING
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  SKIN IN THE GAME
  
  A CAIN/HARPER THRILLER
  
  by
  
  D.P. Lyle
  
  DIGITAL EDITION
  
  * * * * *
  
  PUBLISHED BY:
  
  Suspense Publishing
  
  D.P. Lyle
  
  COPYRIGHT
  
  2019 D.P. Lyle
  
  PUBLISHING HISTORY:
  
  Suspense Publishing, Paperback and Digital Copy, October 2019
  
  Cover Design: Shannon Raab
  
  Cover Photographer: Shutterstock.com/ Arlo Magicman
  
  Cover Photographer: iStockphoto.com/ dlewis33
  
  ISBN: 978-0578516950
  
  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved
  above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced
  into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means
  (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the
  prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher
  of this book.
  
  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and
  incidents are either the product of the author’s imaginati