NYT and USAT bestselling author and screenwriter, Cindy Dees, brings her formidable skills as a master storyteller and veteran writing teacher to this encyclopedic series analyzing the major tropes used in commercial thriller fiction, film, television, and more. In this volume, Cindy does in-depth analysis of 40 iconic thriller tropes found across all sub-genres of thriller fiction. Written by a working writer for working writers, this is a comprehensive reference guide and brainstorming tool to help you quickly generate ideas, create characters and plot, revise and edit, brand and market your story. You’ll write faster, cleaner, and deliver your audience a story they’ll recognize and love. If you’re writing a novel, script, play, comic, graphic novel, video game script, or other story format that includes a thriller element, this book is for you. Each trope entry includes: · detailed definition and analysis · list of adjacent tropes · list of reasons why audiences love this trope · descriptions of all obligatory scenes necessary to structure this trope correctly · list of additional key scenes important to this trope · an extensive list of questions to think about when writing this trope · an extensive list of traps to avoid when writing this trope · examples of each trope in action taken from television, film, and novels …writers in every genre and format of fiction are going to want these guides in their shelf of go-to reference books… …a tour de force how-to on creating stories audiences adore… …the books every writer has been waiting for—a comprehensive walk-through by an industry pro of everything to think about when building a story of pretty much any kind…

Science as well. Finally, all those who were mesmerized by the Thomas/Hill hearings, the Gulf War coverage, and other recent media events will find it enlightening and instructive.

This is the first comprehensive examination of the remarkable singing groups in the U.S.A., Canada, and Europe known as "barbershoppers." In both male and female a capella quartets and choruses, the barbershop singers concentrate on a song literature that was popular in the period 1860-1930. Their purpose is spelled out in the title of a male group founded a half century ago in Oklahoma: the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA). Today, the SPEBSQSA consists of approximately 40,000 men in the United States and Canada, with affiliated chapters in thirty other nations. Two women's groups who share the ideology of the SPEBSQSA are Sweet Adelines International and Harmony, Inc. The entertainment provided by these groups - in both concert performances and international competitions - is enjoyed by a wide public. In 1988 a special committee began to reexamine SPEBSQSA's basic purposes and organization - vis a vis social and aesthetic changes. The committee members decided to create for this reexamination a task force of distinguished scholars with expertise in sociology, ethnomusicology, and music education. Each scholar was invited to research barbershopping as it related to a specific discipline. The historian emeritus of the SPEBSQSA was asked to provide a broad history of the movement. Their work is presented in the current volume - a book that will be of interest to many people: educators, musicians, counselors, social scientists, historians, recreationists, health workers, gerontologists, and - of course - the 75,000 men and women who call themselves barbershoppers.