I have long been fascinated with the writing of thrillers and current events. As writers, we are asked “where did you come up with this plot, character or what not?” Sometimes, the answer is elegant. “Well, I was working on an undercover assignment and I happened upon this woman who needed to end her involvement in some activity (perhaps life). I learned that . . . .”
But most of the time, in my case anyway, the actual answer is “I read it in the newspaper.” In my experience, most story ideas come from real life, personally experienced or in print. I am an avid reader of about anything I can get my hands on, and this is where I inevitably find ideas or storylines and characters. In the press on a daily and weekly basis, there are amazing thriller plots just sitting there.
On a blog like this, I think it would be cool to have a dialogue about such ideas. Life is stranger than fiction, so life can become fiction when mixed with a bit of imagination and make believe. Like Linux software, it is amazing what can evolve from such dialogue.
In this vain, I offer a few thoughts about current events in terms of thriller plots.
1. Evolution of the UN as a Real Force and End of War and Genocide
The world is now divided in a variety of different ways in terms of politics, religion, economic progress, disease and from innumerable other standpoints. There is no longer any dependable source of order. It could now be 2007 or 2017. For someone of my age (60), it could be any time after 1984 (the definition of future for Baby Boomers, which was the title of George Orwell’s mapping of the future in Animal Farm).
I wonder what the world would look like if some leader, perhaps like Lucius Alcorn in Jaegerman, were to facilitate the emergence of the United Nations as a real global force, complete with police and military capability. With such a unified political and military power, it may be that regional wars and genocides could effectively be precluded. It might even be possible to eliminate war (unless there are other worlds that need to be addressed).
Say this were to be the case, what would become of military arms contractors. Would they simply go away. Ormight they seek to destabilize the world to create new markets for the products. This is the stuff of thrillers.
Interestingly, the recent World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland focused on just such an emergence of the United Nations, or NATO. It is enough to make a thriller writer want to imagine future resurgences of force, as has occurred in the past. This was a central element of the Third German Reich. Could there be a Fourth Reich?
2. North Korea as a Private Equity Investment
The stories of the efforts of the rest of the world to address the nuclear ambitions and threats of the regime in North Korea are legion. It has often occurred to me in reading these stories that a food company, or an arms producer, for example, might find investment in North Korea to be an interesting private equity play. If such a firm can acquire a company with the market capitalization of many smaller countries, why not acquire a company and operate it on a for profit basis, using its resources and assets as would be the case with any other investment.
Perhaps a wealthy investment fund assassinated Kim Il Jung, developed a puppet to be the dummy for the ventriloquist of the investor group. It takes control of the country’s reigns of power, rewarding friends,killing foes,maintaining the wall around the country, all as occurs at the present time so there is no apparent change in direction. Funds are extracted from the Group of Seven and other countries for humanitarian relief, suspension of nuclear weapons development and so on. The country also continues its business of arms export, ranging from missiles to other systems. The people remain impoverished and starving, again as has been the case for generations so there is no apparent change. The funds are used for . . . well, just let your imagination roam across the horizon of possibilities.
3. Trading in Nuclear Materials
There are recurring stories of the location of stockpiles of highly-enriched, weapons grade uranium, typically from former elements of the Soviet Union. There are also grim suggestions that so-called dirty bombs could be smuggled into populated areas and exploded, causing unspeakable suffering, reminiscent of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
What if there were a means of trading such materials, like other commodities. If copper futures can be bought and sold, why not nuclear fissionable materials?
4. Satellite Destruction
In late January of 2007, the global press was full of the Chinese military shooting down one of its own old satellites. It took the Government of China weeks to publicly comment on the event, suggesting that perhaps it was done by rogue elements of the military or the Government itself was playing Cold War-type cat-and-mouse games with the rest of the world.
Just imagine what the world might look like if bad guys (take your pick) had this capability. Maybe such folks infiltrated the Chinese Army. Maybe they can manipulate Chinese defense systems to shoot down guidance or communications satellites, perhaps even spreading disease and death throughout the world. Is this possible?
Could make an intriguing thriller plot.
5. Cold War II
With the rise again of a monolithic Russia, could Cold War II be on the horizon, the New York Times wondered on 18 February 2007. What a world. Robert Ludlum has gone on, perhaps there is a genre here for the next generation of international thriller writers.
6. Drones for Sale
The Japanese press was full of a story of a prominent car company selling drone helicopters, designed for spraying agricultural chemicals, to a possible front company for the Chinese military. The drones could easily be adapted to transport and launch missiles systems.
To a novelist, the plotlines noted above don’t seem very far-fetched. Now do they?
Well, it finally happened. In the mail today came the first hard and paperback copies of Riddle of Berlin. My first fiction book to be in print. I am thrilled, of course. It has been a labor of love. It is like holding my babies long ago wondering what they would become in life (after counting their fingers and toes to make sure that they seemed functional).
Keeps It Moving With Extraordinary Characters, July 7, 2008
