Pressure Points [Mass Market Paperback]

Larry Brooks (Author)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback
• Publisher: Unknown (2002)
• ASIN: B00147ZTIQ
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,167,638 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Larry Brooks is the author of five critically-acclaimed thrillers, and the guy behind www.storyfix.com, one of the fastest-growing and most respecting writing sites on the internet.

Brooks' resume reads like a Cheesecake Factory menu, an analogy that honors his favorite restaurant. Born and raised in Portland, Oregon in 1952, he graduated with a degree in marketing communications from Portland State University in 1975, where he attended in the off-season during an unremarkable five-year career as a professional baseball player (he pitched in the Texas Rangers organization).

This led to his first published writing: a magazine article on the life of a minor league pitcher. Still not keen on a writing career - he had his eye on the money back then, like most of the newly graduated- his first lives in a business suit had more than a few more swings and misses. He likes to say he was history's worst stockbroker for the world's largest brokerage firm, then the world's worst personnel manager in a major department store (remember what Dirty Harry said about Personnel managers?), in addition to a couple of other humbling career fliers he chooses to forget. Each abandoned career resulted in another published magazine piece lampooning the experience, and his interest in writing began to emerge as his best - and perhaps last - viable career option.

In 1983 he answered an ad for a "script writer" at a small audio-visual production company - eight arteests and a slide projector. Cut to 1996, when the company was one of the largest marketing and training firms in the western U.S., and Brooks was the executive creative director and a partner, with some 120 employees and a portfolio with more corporate videos, brochures, websites and other useless stuff than Harlequin has romances. He and his partners sold the business in 1999, at which point Brooks took the money and ran toward the career he'd been quietly cultivating on the side for the prior two decades - writing novels and screenplays.

His first published novel, DARKNESS BOUND, was based on one of his original screenplays, featuring - here's a surprise - a stockbroker who hates stockbrokering. It debuted in October 2000, spending three weeks on the USA Today best-seller list. His second novel, PRESSURE POINTS - an ad exec who hates the ad business - appeared to solid reviews in December 2001, with comparable sales. His third novel, SERPENT'S DANCE, was a February 2003 release from Signet paperbacks, and was also well reviewed despite selling like parkas in Pakistan. And his fourth, July 2004's BAIT AND SWITCH , earned a starred review from Publisher's Weekly, who also named it their lead Editor's Choice for that month, and at year end to two of their lists: Best Overlooked Books of 2004 (the only paperback so named; perhaps, says Larry, a dubious honor) and Best Books of 2004 (lead entry, mass market).

His book on writing - Story Engineering: Understanding the Six Core Competencies of Successful Writing - will be published by Writers Digest Books in February 2011. That book leverages the growing audience for his writing-skills website (www.storyfix.com), which explores a fresh and rhetoric-free perspective on writing fiction from a carefully articulated model and plan, rather than the seat-of-the-pants creative chaos so many writers employ.
Screenplays for all his books are in various stages of development.

In late 2002, Brooks' script for the adaptation of DARKNESS BOUND was named a finalist in the prestigious Don and Gee Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting, sponsored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the folks who bring you the Oscars. It was one of ten scripts selected out of 6044 submissions, which he hopes you find impressive, especially since he didn't end up winning one of the five Fellowships. He got the t-shirt anyway.
Brooks has been developing and teaching writing workshops since the mid-1980s.

He has been named a Mentor by the Oregon Writer's Colony (www.oregonwriterscolony.org), and teaches at writing workshops around the country.

Brooks is very happily married to his wife of nearly fifteen years, Laura, an artist and interior designer, who wants you to know she "is not the Dark Lady" (the villainess from his first novel), though central casting might disagree. He also has a wonderful son, Nelson, who is 19 and a sophomore at USC; three supportive step-children, Tracy, Scott and Kelly; and seven step-grandchildren who have no clue what "Poppy" does for a living. Nor,, says Larry, do they give a rip, as long as he keeps tossing them around at family gatherings.
Larry and Laura divide their time between homes in Portland and Scottsdale. He is at work on a new novel, as well as his writing book and the continued growth of his website.

Feel free to contact Larry at his website (www.storyfix.com), or email him at [e-mail], or contact Sons of Liberty Publishing.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars a compelling thriller with lots of surprises, November 27, 2002

By 

audrey (white mtns) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Pressure Points (Paperback)

I enjoyed this thriller about executives at a week-long seminar in a secluded West coast setting. Though there was quite a bit of corporate/business jargon that went right past me, the author did a good job of establishing an interesting set of characters -- some in depth and some kept mysterious until later in the story -- and setting an atmosphere filled with tension. Three executives at a Seattle ad agency are attempting to buy out their boss's interest in the company, and he tells them he will do so IF they all complete a seminar that he regards highly. Right away you wonder if the seminar is legitimate, what the boss has planned, etc. As the seminar progresses you, like the participants, begin to wonder what is real and what is staged, and who you can trust and who you can't.

The writing and plotting are very well done and I, like other reviewers, stayed up late so I could finish it -- which is the mark of a successful thriller, right? I thought the ending was somewhat less than satisfying, but certainly exciting.

I would recommend this book to a friend who enjoys thrillers, especially if they're an MBA.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A seminar to die for..., December 28, 2001

By 

Katherine Adams (Salem, Oregon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Pressure Points (Paperback)

Start the coffeemaker; you'll be up all night reading this page-turner. From the first paragraph to the last sentence, Brooks keeps the reader wondering which characters -- if any -- will ultimately survive "The Seminar," a secretive retreat aimed at executives needing a shot of self-awareness.

A trio of ad agency managers are coerced into attending "The Seminar" by a boss with an unusual motive. The threesome have their own reasons for attending the retreat, but they quickly realize soul-searching can mean deadly discoveries.

Brad, Mark and Pamela -- the characters who launch this roller coaster plot -- are not typical mystery/thriller stereotypes. They're frightening real people. You'll find yourself wondering who can be trusted, and who would kill to cover up a trail of lies.

Don't cheat and read the last page. The twists and turns that drive this book will throw you a curve long after you ponder the last sentence.

If psychological thrillers without cliches are your cup of tea, then hustle out and grab this one. It's a fast-paced and satisfying read.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Worth reading, December 16, 2001

By 

Frank (Stockton CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Pressure Points (Paperback)

This book is well worth your time. My favorite aspect of the book is that the characters have mixed motivations: the good guys have a bad side, and the bad guys have a good side. The book is a page-turner, well-written, and has its fair share of plot twists. The only quibbles I have are that, in the denouement, the guilty party seems a bit too omnipotent and omnipresent, and that the end drama was inserted into the Prologue, and trumpeted on the front art and back cover. I'd rather read the book wondering what problems are going to happen at the seminar, instead of feeling like I had read the end of the book before going to Chapter 1.

I also wish those who write reviews would read the reviewed book first. In this instance, the "#1 reviewer" comments that agency owner Wong "has not even shown up at the office in months. Unless he sells [three key employees] the company, they will quit and start a new company. At least half the present clients of Wright and Wong would come with them. Wong agrees with the stipulation that the threesome come with him on a retreat first." In fact, according to the book, Wong had been gone two weeks at most -- from "the annual holiday bash" to late December. Wong took 18 weeks a year vacation, not 18 weeks in a row. The workers calculated that _all_ the company's clients would come with them. And Wong's stipulation was that the three go on a retreat _without_ Wong, not with him. Maybe Ms. Klausner, who managed to post _85_ reviews in November 2001, should cut back on her production in favor of accuracy.