Quote:
Originally Posted by Catlady
I read my share of espionage thrillers back in the day--I used to devour Helen MacInnes books--and I greatly prefer moral dilemmas to action scenes, but here I simply didn't care about what was going on or the people involved. Why not have Toby as the POV character throughout, with the story unfolding as he discovers it, instead of diffusing the impact with so much focus on what was going on with the other characters?
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Thanks for the reference to MacInnes - hadn’t heard of her.
Maybe he thought he was building suspence? I’ve followed a number of authors where the actual writing goes downhill over time.
For example, I thought Elizabeth George’s Inspector Lynley series becomes more convoluted after book 10 or 11. I initially stuck with them, but after a while, the characters were so out of character it seemed like she had forgotten who they were.
It’s interesting that in Bookworm_girl’s link to the BBC interview with Le Carré says he has written books he barely remembers now. He’s written 24. There’s probably a lot of pressure for authors to keep churning them out past their best, and many readers who stick with them out of loyalty.