How to Write a Novel

Joel Brown: I can't write military thrillers or what Tom Clancy wrote, which was called techno thrillers because I'm not a former Marine. There's research I can do, but I'll never be able to fit the role of somebody who's actually lived that life. What makes my novels distinctive is the political and geopolitical construct. And so putting my characters in these scenarios that you think, oh, I just pray that never happens, but what if it did? That's closure to what I actually know.