Sandra Brown

• Born: June 12, 1948
• Place of Birth: Waco, Texas

TYPES OF PLOT: Thriller; psychological

Contribution

After Sandra Brown’s suspense thriller Mirror Image (1991) made The New York Times best-seller list, she became one of America’s most prolific and popular authors, with a large and dedicated fan base. She has published over sixty-five novels, many of which are New York Times best sellers. Her works have been translated into over thirty languages, and millions of copies of her novels have been sold in audio formats. Brown began her writing career as a romance novelist, but in the early 1990s, her novels became increasingly more complex and suspense-filled as she steadily moved into the mystery, crime, and thriller genres. Her ability to combine two popular genres—romance and suspense—not only placed her novels in the popular subgenre known as romantic suspense but also positioned her as one of America’s top mystery writers. Fans highly regard Brown for her engaging, suspenseful plots, which feature false leads, sinister motives, positioned and highly detailed characters, and unpredictable endings. The Crush (2002) became Brown’s fiftieth New York Times best seller. Her 1992 novel French Silk became an American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television film starring Susan Lucci in 1994.

Brown’s awards include the American Business Women’s Association’s Distinguished Circle of Success, the B'nai B'rith Distinguished Literary Achievement Award, the A. C. Greene Award, and the Romance Writers of America’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

Biography

Sandra Brown was born on June 12, 1948, in Waco, Texas, to journalist Jimmie Brown and counselor Martha Cox. She grew up in Fort Worth, Texas, and attended Texas Christian University before attending Oklahoma State University and the University of Texas at Arlington, where she majored in English. In 1968, when she worked a summer job as a dancer at Six Flags Over America, she married Michael Brown.

Before Brown started to write for a living, she worked as the manager of a Merle Norman Cosmetics Studio in Tyler, Texas (1971-1973), as a weather reporter for WFAA-TV in Dallas (1976-1979), as a model for the Dallas Apparel Mart (1976-1987), and as a reporter for the nationally syndicated television show PM Magazine, which aired from the 1970s to 1980s. All her life, she had been an avid reader of detective novels, and after losing her job as a weather reporter in 1979, she decided to take a risk and write professionally. She describes that decision as a kind of epiphany and claims that from this point, she could see that she was meant to spend the rest of her life as a writer. After reading and studying a variety of romance novels and books on how to write, the burgeoning author placed her typewriter on a card table and began her writing career.

After attending a romance writers’ conference, Brown wrote her first romance novel, and her work was first published in 1981. Harlequin Romances failed to purchase her first novel, but Dell Books took a chance on the new writer. Two romance novels, Love’s Encore (1981) and Love Beyond Reason (1981), were accepted for publication within thirteen days. During the following ten years, the prolific Brown wrote an average of six romance novels per year using the pseudonyms Erin St. Claire, Laura Jordan, and Rachel Ryan (her children’s names). Brown became one of America's best-selling authors in 1991 when Mirror Image hit The New York Times best-seller list. She began to drop the pseudonyms and to use her own name. In addition to writing novels, Brown serves as the chief executive officer of her multimillion-dollar publishing empire. Regarding financial earnings, she is ranked among the best-selling authors, such as Tom Clancy, Stephen King, J. K. Rowling, and Danielle Steel.

Brown and her husband, Michael, a former news anchor and the owner of a video production company, produced an award-winning documentary film, Dust to Dust (2002), about asbestos contamination in Libby, Montana. They announced their divorce after fifty-five years of marriage in 2023.

Analysis

Critics say that more than any other factor, Sandra Brown’s strong storytelling ability and ability to combine romance, terror, and suspense set her apart from other writers. In addition, Brown appeals to male and female readers, who constantly change their minds about the identities of her villains. She manages to keep readers in suspense with her greatly detailed, richly plotted novels. Critics also praise Brown for her ability to weave false leads and highly unpredictable, sinister motives into her intricate plotlines. Although all of Brown’s thrillers have been called “vulgar” and “bloodthirsty” by reviewers, who note the “raunchy” sex scenes, Brown’s books continue to sell well.

Highly regarded for her novels of romantic suspense, Brown thinks of her books primarily as suspense crime novels that incorporate a spicy love story. Her plots generally follow a predictable outline, with each featuring a fiercely independent female protagonist who encounters an extremely violent situation, usually involving murder, and finds herself in dire need of masculine help. However, differentiating the good guys from the bad guys is never easy in the Brown novel. Brown’s plots invariably play out against a backdrop of complex family secrets that are revealed one by one and discovered when least expected.

Brown invariably makes her protagonist a high-powered, successful, career-minded woman who, although highly self-sufficient, finds herself in danger and needs help. For example, the protagonist of Brown’s Charade (1994) is a soap opera star in danger of dying unless she receives a heart transplant. Many of Brown’s novels are set in the Deep South, complete with swamps, plantations, and creepy Spanish oaks, which lends well to the menacing atmosphere surrounding her characters. Brown’s Mirror Image, Breath of Scandal (1991), and French Silk occur in New Orleans. This atmosphere appeals to readers desiring to escape their prosaic lives and enter a dangerous fantasy world of sex and high intrigue. Additionally, Brown’s suspense novels incorporate many highly complex characters, one by one drawn against their wishes into a dark, unfolding plot. The characters and Brown’s readers remain unaware of the hidden family secrets that act as the underpinnings of Brown’s plots, and it is the revelation of these secrets draws the characters into the never-ending action. In addition, Brown differs from other writers in that she breaks away from predictable, formulaic happy endings and often opts for dark endings.

Charade

In Charade, if soap opera star Cat Delany does not receive a heart transplant, she will die. After the operation, Cat, who is simply happy to be alive, is stalked by a killer who seeks revenge on her because she is the recipient of his former lover’s heart. Suddenly, Cat’s world closes in on her, and she finds she can trust no one, not even the new love in her life, the crime writer Alex Pierce, who might be her stalker. This is another fast-paced Brown book that maintains suspense by hiding the killer's identity. It also contains Brown’s formulaic, independent female heroine who finds herself in a vulnerable situation at the hands of a handsome predator.

French Silk

French Silk is a romantic suspense novel set in one of Brown’s Deep South locales, New Orleans. After evangelist Jackson Wilde is murdered, District Attorney Robert Cassidy finds himself with a long list of suspects. Wilde’s young wife, Ariel, who has been having an affair with her husband’s son, tops the list. However, the search for the killer soon zooms in on Claire Laurent, who owns the French Silk mail-order lingerie company, a target of Wilde’s antipornography campaign. As the weather in the city heats up, more problems develop for District Attorney Cassidy, who finds himself falling in love with the suspect, who has been lying to him to protect her mentally deficient mother, at whose hands she suffered as a child. Although Laurent is attracted to Cassidy, her abusive childhood causes her to remain terrified of commitment, so she keeps him at a distance. Once again, French Silk contains Brown’s trademark independent female protagonist who needs male protection and her penchant for dark family secrets.

Chill Factor

Chill Factor (2005), unlike many of Brown’s thrillers, is set in winter in a small North Carolina town where yet another independent woman finds herself in dire need of rescuing after she is trapped in a mountain cabin with a man who might be a killer. After the loss of their three-year-old daughter, Lilly and Dutch Burton decide divorce might be the solution to their ongoing problems. When Lilly’s car skids off a mountain road shortly after she leaves the Burtons’ cabin, barely ahead of a storm, she hits a handsome hiker named Tierney, and she and the injured man wait out the blizzard in the cabin. Lilly calls her husband, Dutch, but he cannot reach her because of the snow. Later, Dutch finds out that Tierny is a serial killer who has recently killed five women. As in her other novels, Brown casts the killer as a writer.

Ricochet

Set in the Deep South, Ricochet (2006) is filled with Brown’s nonstop suspense, steamy settings, and sex scenes. From the minute Georgia detective Duncan Hatcher sees the shy, refined, and lovely Elise Laird at a police awards banquet, he cannot help but fall in love with her. However, she is off limits because she is married to a local judge, who constantly ruins Hatcher’s chances of bringing the region’s drug lord to justice. After Elise, a former topless dancer, shoots a burglar in self-defense, Hatcher is called to her fabulous home, where she confides in him that her husband, with the aid of the drug lord, set her up to be the victim of the intruder. Hatcher attempts to downplay his increasing feelings for her, and Elise soon vanishes, but not before another body turns up.

Breath of Scandal

The Deep South, in this case South Carolina, is the setting for Brown’s popular Breath of Scandal (1991). Jade Sperry, another of Brown’s strong female protagonists in need of male help, is bent on avenging the pain and suffering inflicted on her by three classmates who raped her while she was in high school. The rape caused her boyfriend to commit suicide, and she found herself pregnant as a result of the attack. Another of Brown’s highly intelligent protagonists, Jade worked her way through college as a single mother and became successful despite the scandal and the trauma. However, she cannot achieve a lasting, fulfilling relationship with a man until Dillon Burke, the handsome contractor she puts in charge of a construction project, comes into her life.

Exclusive

Like many of Brown’s other books, the political thriller Exclusive (1996) is full of family secrets that create nonstop suspense. Reporter Barrie Travis is granted an exclusive interview with the First Lady of the United States after the death of her baby, seemingly from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). However, Barrie discovers that the baby might have been the victim of murder and that a former presidential adviser—who is possibly the First Lady’s lover—might be involved in the death. All this is just the beginning of the unveiling of the First Family’s dark secrets.

Other Works

From 2000 to the late-2020s, the New York Times bestselling author published at least one romance thriller each year. Among these are Play Dirty (2007), Lethal (2011), Mean Streak (2014), Thick As Thieves (2020), and Out of Nowhere (2023). She attributes her ideas and inspiration to curiosity and observations of the people around her.

Bibliography

Beardon, Michelle. “Sandra Brown: Suburban Mom and Prolific Bestseller.” Publishers Weekly, vol. 242, no. 28, 10 July 1995, p. 39.

"Books." Sandra Brown, sandrabrown.net/booklist. Accessed 20 July 2024.

Brown, Sandra. “The Risk of Seduction and the Seduction of Risk.” In Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women, edited by Jayne Ann Krentz. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992.

Machan, Dyan. “Romancing the Buck.” Forbes, vol. 159, no. 11, June 1997, pp. 44-45.

Rapp, Adrian, et al. “A Romance Writer Gets Away with Murder.” Clues: A Journal of Detection, vol. 21, 2000, pp. 17-21.

Raskin, Barbara. “Moguls in Pumps.” The New York Times Book Review, 31 May 1992, p. 739.

Rice, Melinda. “How to Become a Best-Seller.” D Magazine—Dallas/Fort Worth, vol. 27, no. 6, June 2000. p. 80.

"Sandra Brown." GoodReads, www.goodreads.com/author/show/6218.Sandra‗Brown. Accessed 20 July 2024.