David Morrell has written more than two dozen novels. In none of them, he says, is there "a corpse discovered [or] a detective dispatched to follow clues." Still, he finds himself almost always introduced at his readings as "a mystery writer." This bothers him. In his mind, he's a thriller writer, and his attempts to set the record straight to his audience tend to be met with, in his words, "universal bafflement."
Two years ago, at a mystery and suspense conference in Toronto, a band of writers, many of whom were members of the Mystery Writers of America, including David Morrell, decided to form their own group, the International Thriller Writers, with the express purpose "to enhance the prestige and raise the profile of thrillers, to award prizes to outstanding thriller novels and authors, and to create opportunities for collegiality within the thriller community." This June, ITW will hold its first "thriller conference" and will publish an all-ITW anthology of thriller stories edited by James Patterson. Is the birth of the ITW offshoot the result of a semantic debate (Morrell has written at length about the finer plot points that distinguish mysteries from thrillers), or is it rooted in concerns about how book buyers perceive the market?
The Old Guard
The MWA has been around for 61 years; it sponsors the well-regarded annual Edgar Awards (see sidebar below), and has become the professional club for many writers, be they writers of mysteries, thrillers, spy novels. But what constitutes a mystery writer over the years has clearly changed. The very first mystery novel dates from before the Civil War—Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White (1860). Since then, the works of Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, Mickey Spillane, Jim Thompson, Raymond Chandler, Daphne du Maurier and many others, abetted by dime-store mysteries, mysteries for kids (Hardy Boys, etc.) and ElleryQueen'sMystery Magazine, have widened the appeal of mystery, so much so that Collins's Victorian tale would today have to be pigeonholed in one of mystery's many niches—perhaps as a cozy.
Although it's hard to say what would qualify as the first thriller (it was probably a movie), one might point to Ian Fleming's James Bond series or John le Carré's George Smiley titles as instances of storytelling with a sweep and nuance that just didn't feel like a mystery. Since then, techno-thrillers (Tom Clancy), medical thrillers (Robin Cook), legal thrillers (Turow, Grisham) and, now, theological thrillers (at a theater near you) have added to the scope of thrillerdom.
But what distinguishes mysteries from thrillers today is less visible in plot lines than in sales performance. While one can hardly claim that mysteries are going out of fashion, one can't deny that the blockbusters of recent vintage are predominantly of the thriller variety. While mysteries and thrillers together absolutely dominate hardcover fiction sales, a closer look at the names at the top of the list, in sales for '05, for example—Grisham, Brown, Patterson, Cornwell—reads thriller all the way, not mystery. And though Mary Higgins Clark and Sue Grafton are more identifiable as mystery writers, and sell extremely well, it is clear that the mystery bestseller ranks are thinning somewhat. "Over the last 20 years," notes Simon Lipskar of Writers House, "a lot of the big commercial blockbusters have been thrillers." David Hale Smith, of DHS Literary, is more blunt: "Thrillers are the most commercially successful category of crime fiction. When publishers are trying to move authors into the ranks of the bestsellers, they begin to package them more as thriller writers or suspense writers than mystery writers." He points to Michael Connelly's The Poet, published 10 years ago, as a prime example. "It elevated his game, brought in a serial killer with a high-concept twist and, all of a sudden, Connelly's a thriller writer. But then he goes back to writing Harry Bosch novels, and now his publisher is packaging them as Michael Connelly thrillers, even though they're still the same hardboiled police procedurals."
Putnam publisher Neil Nyren makes the same observation, but stripped of references to lucre. "Thrillers are a more visceral experience," he says, "while mysteries tend to be more cerebral."
Sign of the Times
"Visceral" might be code for something else. Margaret Marbury, executive editor at Mira, which is publishing the ITW anthology, Thriller, says that thrillers today "are the closest book format to TV and movies. People looking for entertainment that provides a quick fix can make an easier transition to thrillers than to most book genres." Marbury also believes that thrillers appeal more to younger readers and, most importantly, to men.
Although there is no reason to doubt the word of ITW founders that their organization is dedicated to building "a comradeship of like-minded people in a more focused environment," as Morrell puts it, they are clearly committed to selling books. Toward that end, the organization has taken a page (two, actually) from the Mystery Writers playbook. Whereas the MWA has its Edgar Awards, given each year in a range of categories to honor the best of the mystery genre, the ITW has announced its Thriller Awards, to be handed out at ThrillerFest, the first annual ITW conference, to be held June 29—July 2 in Scottsdale, Ariz. And, just as the MWA sponsors anthologies, ITW has Thriller: Stories to Keep You Up All Night, which was bought at auction by Marbury for a six-figure sum and will roll out with 120,000-copy printing. Marbury says the book itself is "exciting and special," but its real purpose may lie in the promotional opportunities that surround its publication. Thriller will launch with a "Thriller Weekend," a series of bookstore events across the country featuring various contributors. Barnes & Noble will host events on June 1, with Borders to follow on June 2 and independents over the following two days. "It's a way to build buzz nationwide, which simply hasn't been done on this scale before," says Marbury.
ThrillerFest, to which the public is invited, is offering some unusual programming twists. MJ Rose, the group's marketing chair, says that the organization wanted to make this convention "as interactive as possible and three-dimensional." The convention will feature a staged trial of author Lee Child's protagonist, Jack Reacher (with members of the press slated for jury duty), a mock autopsy hosted by Tess Gerritsen, and workshops conducted by active and retired special operatives.
Common Ground
Should anyone think there is a blood feud in the author ranks, MWA executive v-p (and ITW member) Reed Farrel Coleman is quick to dismiss the notion. "If anything, ITW is the best thing that could have happened to us—it's the wake-up call we needed, because some members [of MWA] had been dissatisfied over the years and felt that our organization wasn't doing enough to promote certain segments of our membership." ITW cofounders Morrell and Gayle Lynds concur. "I'm not aware of any rivalry existing," Morrell says. Lynds is even more emphatic: "The idea that there's some sort of balkanization happening in the mystery community implies that there's a war going on. If anything, I'd compare MWA to the family dinner table, where we all sit around together for the main course. But after dinner, people then go off and do their own thing."
All well and good. The only fly in the dish is that in today's markets, readers have to be wrested from other entertainments and, more than ever, there is the danger of overpublishing. True, thrillers are riding high, but agent Nat Sobel, for one, issues a note of caution: "There will always be a number of writers who come along showing great promise who disappear after four books," he says. He thinks that the thriller field is getting "overcrowded" and that publishers must be aware that "with everybody looking at BookScan numbers, there's a higher mortality now." James Ellroy, Sobel points out, had five books that did poorly until The Black Dahliacame along. "Today that writer would have found it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to sell that sixth book. He would have been replaced by somebody else, maybe somebody with less talent."
