The contract is the promises made to the reader that have to be kept, so earn readers’ trust. “These are the elements that not just thrillers have but all stories have,” he explains at his publisher’s offices in New York. Will Robert Langdon find the virus and save the world? Will Ahab catch the whale? Will the Jackal shoot his target?”Īmong his first lessons are the three Cs: the contract, the clock, the crucible. “Build the foundation of your novel with a single brick: make it simple, make it easy to follow. Like parts of a car engine, the key elements of a thriller include a hero, a goal, obstacles that seem to make it impossible and, of course, a moment when the hero conquers the villain. “Every single idea has been done over and over and over,” Brown explains in the film. Ian Fleming’s James Bond, for example, always defuses the bomb and gets the girl. The good news, Brown assures writers staring at a blank page, is that your idea does not have to be startlingly original. His class includes chapters on finding that idea, choosing a location, creating heroes and villains, doing research (but not so much that it’s an excuse to procrastinate), creating suspense, writing dialogue and editing and rewriting.
#Who wrote the da vinci code how to#
The 54-year-old can’t tell you what idea to have, he says, but hopes to provide a roadmap on how to turn it into a story. A screen caption says: “ Dan Brown Teaches Writing Thrillers.” Brown, who has shifted 250m copies of his novels and seen them translated into 56 languages, is the latest big name to join MasterClass, the online celebrity tutorial company (he is donating his fee to charity).ĭespite the distinctly old-fashioned format – middle-aged white man dispensing wisdom direct to camera – this is Brown’s love letter to the creative process. He settles into a chair, leans against a red cushion, crosses his legs and smiles. Out steps the master of the page turner in blue shirt and jeans, his sleeves rolled up. Suddenly, unexpectedly, a bookshelf swivels on its axis to reveal a secret passage. It roves around a dimly lit, dark wood library. The camera pans across a vintage typewriter, intricately sculpted animals, antique bowl, statuette of a monk and relief carvings of knights. The scene begins under a vaulted ceiling and medieval candelabra reminiscent of the Great Hall in Game of Thrones. T he piano music is insistent, melodramatic.
0 kommentar(er)
