Chess, Safe Houses, and the Art of Thinking Backwards: The Real Story Behind the Book’s Central Idea
Introduction Most advice about achieving goals moves in one direction: forward. Define the goal. Break it into steps. Execute the first step. Adjust as you go. It sounds practical. It usually is not. The problem is that forward planning is optimistic by nature. It assumes the path is roughly predictable, and that the obstacles you […]
Writing a Female Assassin Who Isn’t a Trope: What Isla Vranic Changed About How I See Women in Thrillers
Introduction The female assassin in popular fiction usually arrives as one of two things: a broken woman running from her past, or a cold killing machine with nothing underneath. Both versions exist to be explained. Trauma motivates the first. Emptiness defines the second. Courtney Murchie’s debut novel, Built from the End, offers a third option, […]
Why the Best Decisions in Life Start at the End: The Philosophy Behind Built from the End
Introduction There is a chess move most people never learn. Not because it is technically difficult, but because it requires a kind of thinking that runs against every instinct. You stop asking what you should do next. You start by asking: how does this end? That is the central idea in BuiltfromtheEnd, the debut thriller […]
