Just recalling that I used to read a ton of pulp adventure thriller writers as a teenager but never do anymore. Alistair Maclean, Desmond Bagley, Dick Francis, Clive Cussler, Robert Ludlum, Wilbur Smith (all incidentally available widely in India often in cheap pirated editions)
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Dick Francis (horse racing world adventures) was second favorite. Among the generics I think I liked Bagley best, though Nackean was more famous.
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This genre kinda appears to have died.
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Cold War genre really, even if not spy-vs-spy, which I never enjoyed as much, though some John Le Carre and Len Deighton were kinda good.
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TV basically replaced pulp fiction for me
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I read a ton of westerns too (Louis L’Amour and J. T. Edson) simply because they were easily available. But never enjoyed them as much. Less universal appeal than Cold War thrillers.
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Wonder why this stuff is so heavily gendered. All the writers and most readers are male. Though I think women read this stuff far more than guys read romances.
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Trying to decide if the spirit of thrilling adventure is kinda dead. It might be. It’s all procedural crime and bureaucracy now.
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Fingers crossed for post-Covid global reconstruction/climate action adventure thriller genre. Monosyllabic tough guys investigating vaccine and wind- farm corruption. Girl protagonists acceptable too so long as they’re monosyllabic and tough with no inner life. Voids ‘r us.
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Clive Cussler was my favorite as well. Recently re-read one of his books. Incredible journey back to my 12-year-old brain: Gadget-obsessed, intrigued by lost technology from ancient civilizations, extremely clueless about the nature of love and human relations in general.
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