Black Sunday

[NOIRTRASH]

BLACK SUNDAY by Thomas Harris

Harris invented Hannibal Lector. BLACK SUNDAY is his first book. Its about a nut job prisoner of War who conspires with Muslim terrorists to bomb the Super Bowl.

I'm almost to the end so I cant spill the beans on how it ends. But Harris was no master craftsman when he wrote this, and I have a hunch about the end.

The form of the book is excellent and it moves fast, but Harris fucked up all over the place with miracle coincidences and lucky guesses by the FBI, Mossad, and CIA. They pluck gold nuggets from their butts every time. The bad guys can do nothing right.

It includes a PC turd tjats too obvious. Harris doesn't do PC, so I saw it immediately.

But the form is better than usual, and can get your mind right if you wanna try action-thrillers.

 

[SamScribble]

Don't you just hate it when the good guys get all the breaks?

I've been researching several cases with a view to perhaps writing a crime thriller for my next book. So far, the bad guys are winning - hands down.

 

[ElectricBlue]

But the form is better than usual, and can get your mind right if you wanna try action-thrillers.

John Frankenheimer made a fairly ordinary movie of it, with Robert Shaw and Bruce Dern - 1977 (god, that old!)

 

[NOIRTRASH]

Don't you just hate it when the good guys get all the breaks?

I've been researching several cases with a view to perhaps writing a crime thriller for my next book. So far, the bad guys are winning - hands down.

Harris did a good job with all the flashbacks the nutjob has, I was impressed, but mostly impressed with the form/strucruee, its a good pattern to grasp.

 

[NOIRTRASH]

John Frankenheimer made a fairly ordinary movie of it, with Robert Shaw and Bruce Dern - 1977 (god, that old!)

The book came out about 1974, I think.

I took from it a plot bunny for a hard crime vampire tale in the LW category.