Just 'know what you want to say'

 

“If you have a craftsman's command of the language and basic writing techniques you'll be able to write - as long as you know what you want to say.” – Jeffery Deaver

 

Born in Illinois on this date in 1950, mystery/crime writer Deaver earned a journalism degree from the University of Missouri then went on to a law degree at Fordham before starting his writing career as a journalist.

 

Deaver said he gravitated toward journalism first because he was editor of his high school literary magazine and a reporter for the school paper.    But after some fulltime work on a newspaper, he switched back to law and practiced that before embarking on his very successful and award-winning career as a novelist. 

 

Deaver’s formula is to first do an extensive outline.  “The outline is 95 percent of the book,” he said.   “Then I sit down and write, and (for me) that's the easy part.”   In fact, he said it’s so easy for him to write that he can even do it in the dark.  “I can touch-type,” he said.  

 

Several of his books have been made into films, including The Bone Collector and The Devil’s Teardrop.  And his book The Never Game is the basis for the new TV hit series “Tracker.”

  

Many of his nearly 4 dozen novels feature a trick ending or multiple trick endings, a technique that has both endeared him to and frustrated readers.   “I believe,” he said, “my responsibility as a thriller writer is to give my readers the most exciting 'roller coaster ride' of a suspense story I can possibly think of.”