Plotting and Writing Suspense Fiction

by Patricia Highsmith

Completed: January 18, 2021

• Writing
• 145 pages
• ISBN: 9780312286668
• Goodreads page

★★★★

I found this to be an excellent, quick read on the basics of writing fiction - from the basic idea, to development of the idea, to plotting, to drafting and revising. Just enough examples to give you a sense of how the typical writing process goes - nothing earth-shattering, but its also reassuring to read of the misteps along the way. It provides just enough structure to make you comfortable, but not a very formulaic treatment either. It’s such a quick read, that I’d recommend it to any beginning writer.

Like boxers, we may start to flag after thirty, that is, not be able to do on four hours’ sleep any longer, and then we begin to grumble about taxes, and to feel that the aim of society is to put us all out of business. It is then good to remember that artists have existed and persisted, like the snail and the coelacanth and other unchanging forms of organic life, since long before governments were dreamed of.

All book cover images are from Goodreads unless specified otherwise.