I have an idea for a suspense novel and I’m seeking feedback. Here goes:
William is a billionaire hedge fund manager about to serve a life sentence for fraud. His older sister, Evelyn, is a brilliant plastic surgeon who had her license revoked after she neutered her ex-boyfriend. They devise a plan to give William’s identity to a vagrant and make the vagrant’s death look like a suicide.
After a lengthy search, they find Frank planning to jump off the George Washington Bridge. Frank is an alcoholic homeless man who bears a close resemblance to William. Frank claims to have been an FBI agent and that his life was destroyed by a secret group called Olympus. He further claims that Olympus intends to kill the president, blame Russia, and seize power for themselves.
Dismissing Frank’s ramblings, Evelyn uses surgery to make Frank look like William and vice-versa. Then they dress Frank as William and push him over the bridge. William assumes Frank’s identity, and he and Evelyn move to Costa Rica.
But strange things happen, and William is kidnapped. Believing him to be Frank, the kidnappers interrogate William about Olympus and intend to torture him. But William escapes, and he and Evelyn realize that Frank hadn’t been paranoid. There really is a group called Olympus and they really are planning to kill the president.
Thankfully, Frank didn’t really die in the fall from the bridge. Now that he has William’s identity, he launches his own attack on Olympus. He meets up with William and Evelyn, and the three of them foil the terrible plan.
Even if a plot is derivative, it’s the execution that matters. You can enjoy Robinson Crusoe, The Swiss Family Robinson, Lost in Space, Robinson Crusoe on Mars, and The Martian.
what if Frank looked like Jimmy Durante or Rondo Hatton? Would Evelyn wanna be stuck with that?
did Evelyn drunkenly neuter her ex by accident, or was he a serial cheater who expected his wife to be removing only his appendix? What came of that episode?
hopefully Olympus had at least three - no! four! - methods of dastardly torture.
just to clear the air - when I first hear “Olympus”, I think of that butt-awful “Hercules” cartoon, so I just wanna make sure there’s no associations, there. (“Herc! Herc!”)
why Costa Rica? I was imagining more Peoria or Gary.
what did Frank land on to save him from the bridge fall? At the very least, he would end up paraplegic, but I’d go for quad, so that his legs would be in a cast, always having them forty-five degrees up in the air, and having to rig a special wheelchair (with rope and pulleys) to accommodate such an unwieldy set-up. I guess if Ironside could do it, he could, but it ain’t too sexy, and would ruin the tone, changing it from one of intrigue to one of hope and perseverance under trying circumstances.
Related question, if vagrant William (i.e. Frank, now remade to look like billionaire-crook William) is going to attack Olympus, is he going to be using William’s billionaire-resources to do so? If he has access to these, he’d also be subject to arrest for William’s crimes. Did William and Evelyn hide or offshore some or all of William’s assets so they could enjoy them in Costa Rica, as “Frank” and Evelyn?
Also, the motivation for killing the president better be pretty good, because as a tool for political change, it has limited utility. Olympus already sounds pretty clumsy as an organization, so I wouldn’t bet on them getting away with it. Odds are the entire gang would be quickly exposed and mercilessly hunted down by the new president, unless he happens to be in on it.