W.E.B. Griffin’s series all seem to have a protagonist who comes from a very wealthy background and then, through some circumstance or other, finds himself in either the military or the police.
Most Larry Niven protagonists are pretty much the same: usually male, super good at math, very athletic, unconventionally attractive, and very sexually hip.
Guy Gavriel Kay has written some great books, but the protagonists could easily switch from one book to another and hardly miss a beat.
JG Ballard, who is known for lead characters that are “helpless observers” who watch things unfold around them without any power to influence events. If you’ve ever seen the movie Empire of the Sun (his book was adapted for the screenplay), the English boy is based in own experiences as a boy in a Japanese internment camp in the war. I think it explains a lot about his later writing style.
David Baldacci, whose work has gone way downhill in the past 10 years or so, so be wary.
David Morrell, who wrote Rambo and a bunch of other spy/adventure/thrillers.
John Le Carre, great Cold War spy novelist.
Len Deighton, another great Cold War spy novelist. Something I find particularly interesting about him is that many of his characters turn out to have family connections spanning decades, even though they don’t appear in the same book. Or some people that appear as dottering old folks in one book will turn out to have been very different and far more sinister in anther book set many years earlier. He also writes novels of other eras, particular WWII, including from a German perspective.
Thanks a bunch, you guys. Seems this is mostly an action/suspense writer’s habit.
I’m hoping to write a more in-depth response once my internet stops being slower than a crate of turtles.