top of page
Search

Corporate/financial thrillers: What's the draw?

Writer: Thomas Papa
Thomas Papa
Aug 24
4 min read

Updated: Aug 28

The corporate/financial thriller genre, though not distinctly included within many publication service providers' classification categories, ought to be ripe for readers’ indulgence. It's what pulled me to write Black and White Smoke.    


A volatile operating environment, cutthroat competition, and the need to adapt or perish; these are the harsh realities many businesses face. Moreover, the often-incompatible needs and wants of insiders and the covetous appetites of outsiders can lead to cauldrons of simmering plots and acts of subterfuge within companies.


Compelling characters, human fickleness, and high-stakes situations, which are rife in business settings, should be a source of great stories. Exhibit A are the unending incidences of corporate mayhem reported in the press and depicted by a ton of non-fiction business books such as Liar’s Poker, The Big Short, Smartest Guys in the Room about Enron, Careless People about Meta/Facebook, and Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup about Theranos. Exhibit B would be the gamut of business-focused TV shows and movies, including The Steal, Succession, Startup, Silicon Valley, Inhuman Resources, Margin Call, Dynasty, Dallas, and Falcon Crest.


Puzzlingly, though, while developing Black and White Smoke— I found that, unlike political, legal, and medical thrillers, corporate/financial thrillers aren't a distinct subcategory within the literary fiction classification system of most publication service providers. Did this perhaps reveal limited readers’ demand for business fiction?


“Who wants another story about work?”  “Corporate dudes are boring!” I’ve often heard.  This may explain the relatively limited enthusiasm for this genre. Indeed, a common misperception is that business is only packed with feckless pen pushers, who fill the day with tasks of fabricated importance and whose sole purpose is to kowtow to the whims of the company’s top dogs — all for a steady paycheck.


A different take is conveyed in an article by academic Mikkel Frantzen, who points out that there is a long history of literary works with a strong interest in economic and financial matters. He cites Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice (1600), Goethe’s Faust (1806, 1832), Honoré de Balzac’s César Birotteau (1837), and Theodore Dreiser’s The Financier (1912). Frantzen also points out that reader demand for financial thrillers is cyclical, yo-yoing along with the innovations and gyrations of the economic environment. The oil market crash, fluctuating gold prices, the Bretton Woods’ foreign currency trading liberalization ripples, financial market innovations including the rollout of securitization vehicles and a slew of exotic derivatives, and the 2007-9 global financial crisis—provided fodder for a raft of bestselling financial thrillers. Frantzen’s article and book, The Birth of the Financial Thriller: Making a Killing in the 1970s, give more color about the financial thrillers of the days gone by. Other pieces of interest on corporate/financial thrillers are Brian Lutterman’s Corporate Thriller: An Oxymoron? And Michelle Chihara’s Illicit, Offshore, Shadow, Invisible: Financial Thrillers and Global Capital.


Beyond market collapses and seismic disruptions, many other business settings can be fertile ground for crafting compelling stories and, even in recent times, there has been a good supply of gripping corporate/financial thrillers touching on varied themes. Below is a non-exhaustive list:


Admittedly, many of the above books are not exclusively about business issues and workplace/boardroom drama and dilemmas. They often have a cross-genre character. To varied degrees, they throw into the mix: organized crime, heists, political conspiracy, national security and related espionage, murder mysteries, romance, and family drama. This may indicate that, for commercial success, business stories have to be spiced up with the “tried and tested” reader hooks that are atypical of day-to-day business settings.


Some of the books, though, such as Lencioni’s fables and the Phoenix Project by Kim et al largely "stay in the lane" and they impart leadership and management lessons. The same can be said of Baker’s Whisper Network, which is more about the dynamics of a toxic workplace.


My book, Black and White Smoke, is also a corporate/financial thriller. Like other books in this genre, it reflects the murky waters, personal dilemmas, and dire consequences of the bungled decisions within companies. However, it’s not another family business succession saga. It’s not about the blingy escapades of Wall Street and Glitz Street, nor is it about the inexorable march to the top by pathologically wounded characters. International in coverage, it relates to hot topics of the moment, homing in on the competitive dynamics faced by an AI-driven, predictive analytics business intelligence firm. It has some action but is not heavy on violence and doesn't splash gratuitous sex. Though it weaves in corporate espionage and a few heinous acts, it’s grounded in business settings. The main vehicles of suspense are the wrinkles of its characters, dialog, mind games, and the ethical dilemmas faced by the protagonist and antagonists. Customer and editorial reviews of the book are accessible on Amazon, Goodreads, Readers’ Favorite, Literary Titan, Four Seasons, and BookLife.

 
 
bottom of page