Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thumbs Down | 2010 | Raymond Benson | Buy |
| 2 | The MacGuffin | 2017 | Raymond Benson | Buy |
Raymond Benson’s shorter fiction includes Thumbs Down (2010) and The MacGuffin (2017), two standalone pieces that sit between his longer novels and his collected short stories. These works gave Benson space to tell tighter, more focused stories without the commitments of a full novel or a franchise tie-in.
The MacGuffin borrows its title from Alfred Hitchcock’s famous concept, the object or goal that motivates the characters but matters less than the suspense it creates. Benson has cited Hitchcock as an influence on his thriller writing, and his shorter fiction reflects that interest in mechanics of suspense at a compact scale.