Lisa Gardner: 10 Lessons I Learned in 30 Years of Writing Suspense

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When people first meet authors, they always ask the same question—how did you get started in this business? I’m a bit a rarity. Wrote my first novel at seventeen, sold it at twenty, hit the bestseller lists at twenty-eight. Trust me, if you’d told my 12-year old bookworm self, armed with a library pass and overactive imagination, that this would be my life, I never would’ve believed it. And yet, a sometimes heartbreaking, always incredible three decades later, here I am. Better yet, here’s what I’ve learned along the way.

1. Write from the Heart

Needless to say, I’ve sat through a lot of advice on trends over the years. Write whatever you want to write…but make it about vampires. Wait, domestic suspense is in…or is it international thrillers…unreliable narrators…books with the word girl/she/her in the title? These fads are all true and yet none of them matter. As writers, we think in story. Good news, so do readers. What is the best thing you can possibly be writing right now? The book that keeps knocking at your mental door. At seventeen, I had this scene I couldn’t get out of my head—a woman who ran a shelter for homeless youths, witnessing a murder one night, and the killer spotting her. Maybe other people dream of rainbows and fluffy bunnies, but clearly they were never meant for crime fiction.

2. Always Respect Your Readers…

So I drafted a novel. A truly dreadful story where plot holes were abundant and plot twists few and far between. Which I dutifully sent off to acquisition editors to earn some of my first feedback. The critique that most stuck with me—readers are too smart for you to write this stupid (harsh but true). This editor also introduced me to one of the basic tenants of thriller writing that I’ve adhered to till this day—true plot complications come from the good guys doing everything exactly right, but the bad guys being smarter, faster, better. This is what readers expect and deserve, a true battle of wits. If you don’t know what’s going to happen next or how your character is going to get out of this terrible predicament, perfect. Now you’re on the right track. Keep chugging.

3. …But Don’t Read the Reviews!

A mere three years of revision work later, I sold my first novel. And yes, I absolutely cried the first time I saw my novel in a bookstore. Then I discovered the torturous world of reviews. Reader A loved this about my novel. Reader B thinks that was terrible, but did appreciate this element, which by the way, Reader C strongly feels I could’ve done without. Readers are smart. I am one, after all. And the first thing I had to remember is that no one shares the same opinion. Part of the whole fun of book clubs is debating what everyone liked and didn’t like in a novel. As a writer, however, you must believe in your own instincts, or you’ll never reach The End. And yes, some days, this is the hardest and loneliest part of the job.

4. Change Is Good

After selling my first book, I wrote a dozen more romantic-suspense novels. But I found myself getting restless. I loved the character-driven approach. However, I was also more and more fascinated by police procedure. I wanted to include more details, which rapidly became too much for the genre. One of the toughest moments of my career, realizing I had bigger ideas for bigger books which would involve change—publisher, agent, you name it. Terrifying stuff for a barely making it author. And yet, sitting down to draft my first true thriller, The Perfect Husband, became positively invigorating. All artists have an internal voice speaking to them, sometimes even screaming. Listen to that voice, even when it seems impossible, and great things may happen next (or not, but don’t worry, the voice will suggest another option; no one said success was easy).

5. Don’t Get Attached to Bestseller Lists

My second thriller, The Other Daughter hit the New York Times bestseller list. This was it, what all the hard work and heartache had been about. Then I sat down the next day to gleefully type away and realized…I had nothing. Blank screen remained the blank screen. Apparently, novel number three didn’t actually care about my sales success with novel number two. Which turns out to be the point. Bestseller lists are about publishing success, but writing is always writing. That’s between you, the blinking cursor and the voices in your head (and possibly your loyal canine/feline companions). I remember early in my career listening to a talk by Jayne Ann Krentz aka Amanda Quick aka Jayne Castle. Someone asked her the secret to her success. Her answer: writing. (insert mic drop here)

6. Careers Aren’t Linear

After hitting the New York Times bestseller list a mere ten years into my career, I became an ‘overnight success.’ Except, pressure was now on to sell even more books across more countries in more markets. Which sometimes actually happened, and sometimes didn’t. There were covers we realized were a problem after the fact. Publishing dates we definitely regretted. Logistical, international, cosmic difficulties that derailed best laid plans. And when that happens…you write the next novel, and the one after that and the one after that. And maybe you go from standalone (The Other Daughter) to series (Detective D.D. Warren) to an entirely different series (missing persons expert Frankie Elkin). Keep excited, keep believing and good things will happen.

7. Reward Your Efforts

Writing is hard! I keep waiting to feel like I’ve mastered the craft and can spit out high-stakes thrillers every time I sit at the computer. Nope. Creating something from nothing is torturous. Period. And yet this is what we do. So respect your inner artist. For whatever reason, the first 100 pages of each novel taunt me. When I cross that threshold, I get a reward—maybe dinner at a special restaurant or a day off to binge read a favorite author, whatever works. This business isn’t meant to be easy, so appreciate and acknowledge the effort. It will keep you going even on the bad days.

8. Never Stop Reading

I can’t believe how many authors say they don’t read anymore. Seriously? Books are what got me into this mess; I’m not giving them up now. My fav Christmas gift, a debut novel, Mother Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon that I’m now reading in a book club with yes, my mother and my daughter. How cool is that? Novels, like every other art form, are constantly evolving and changing. I love discovering that next new voice that blows me away (Riley Sager a few years ago) or an existing author whose work I’ve stupidly missed (Simone St. James, whose entire backlist made for a happy month of binge reading). It’s good to be humbled and in awe. It provides incentive to forge ahead.

9. Make Friends

When I first started out, my publisher sent me on book tour with fellow authors to grow our mutual careers. Two of my early tour buddies: Karin Slaughter and Tess Gerritsen. Trust me, there’s nothing like three weeks of airline peanuts to forge lifelong bonds. People often think of authors as having adversarial relationships. Absolutely not. Another person who hears voices in their head telling them how to get away with murder? Can’t wait to meet them! God knows my own family doesn’t want to sit through one more lecture on the merits of plotting versus pantsing. Join a writers group, find your people and thirty years later you don’t just have a career, you have a community, and that makes all the difference.

10. Always Enjoy the Ride

In the beginning, all you want to do is sell your first book. Then you want to sell more books. Hit a bestseller list. Hit higher on that list, stay longer. Next thing you know, your entire career has gone by with you still waiting to feel like you made it. Want to know a secret? Writers are way too neurotic for such sentiments. Let it go. Enjoy each new and exciting idea. Bask in the glory of an afternoon where the words on the page are even better than the ones you had in your head. Celebrate the first time, fifth time, hundredth time of reaching The End. When I initially considered writing about Franke Elkin, changing up from police procedurals to an amateur sleuth who specializes in missing persons cold cases, I was terrified. Then I was electrified. What was once old, became new again. And now, thirty years later, here I go again, down the rabbit hole of creating my next thriller in a sometimes heartbreaking, but always incredible business. Time to get to work.

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