WORDS

by Melodie Johnson Howe

Words, words, words, words, words, words, words, words words, words, words words. (God, I love it when the writing flows.)

Hope. Morally bankrupt. Flag. Flag pin. Move forward. Continue on. Change.

Words.

Sexist. Racist. Ageist. Bitter. Low-class. America, Un-American. Guns. Ducks. Health Care. Surge. Pant suit. Double-down. Maverick. SUVs

Words.

The political season is upon us. Actually it’s all over us seeping into our very pores. And it’s going to continue on, while moving forward all the way to November. What is a writer to do?

This writer began to wonder what happened to the great political/ espionage novels? After 9/11 the time was ready for these types of books. But espionage and political have now turned into thriller. The word itself denotes adventure and excitement. A great ride. In reading these books I have found many writers to admire such as Daniel Silva, Gale Lynds, Vince Flynn, and Alan Furst (but his books are set in the past.)

Many of the books I couldn’t finish. Many of the books made me feel like a cheap date. I want to be taken seriously by the author I’m reading. I want to be loved for my mind not my body. But these authors won’t take me seriously. I have a hard time relating to heroes who remind me of Bruce Willis on acid. Even when I want to give these writers my time I feel they want me to hurry up. Maybe it’s because these books are written in quick cuts or short paragraphs. I just get settled in Paris, glimpsed the characters, when the author whips me off to Washington D.C. I settle into D.C. and meet a whole bunch of new characters, then I’m flying to an island off Italy. I feel like I’m reading a travel log. There is something predicable and repetitive in all of this. It’s as if the same author is writing the same book over and over under different pseudonyms.

I hate to sound like Edmund Wilson when he asked, “Who cares who killed Roger Akcroyd.” ( I took that personally.) But sometimes I wonder, who cares if the ticking time bomb goes off.

Our world is now a Byzantinely dangerous place where there are many ticking time bombs waiting to go off. Who is writing about this in a thoughtful and exciting way?

In my genre, mystery, I find that when politics raises it’s head, many writers lose theirs. They stop their novel dead and go on a personal political diatribe sounding like somebody on a tipsy rant at cocktail party.

I long for Graham Greene, the young John Le Carré , Ken Follet, Jeffery Archer, Helen MacInnes, and early Ludlum. Their books had long narrative driven chapters, not snippets. They were writing, well, like novelists. Not like Edward Sissorshands turned writer.

I can hear the cash register ca-chinging when I read these books. I can hear the publishers screaming for more. I don’t want much. I just want one writer to buck the trend and capture that ripe world of American politics. I don’t want a hero who walks around armed to the teeth, with all kinds of poisons and connectors and explosives in his Velcro zip pockets. Do these guys have Velcro zip flys, too? What about a character in a suit who has to do intelligent sleuthing, who has to think, who has to be politically savvy, and who has deal with lawyers! A character, male or female, who knows how to play the game but can still find the bad guys and then … blows their heads off. And if it’s not too much to ask, I’d also like some wit.

Could the readers and writers of this blog help me? Find me a good contemporary book to read that doesn’t make me feel cheap. Something that will take my mind off the real political season. A novel that will let me continue on while moving foreword, that will give me hope, but still let me be a maverick, drive my SUV, and put some change in my pocket. Oh, that’s not the kind of change Obama means?