Technology has a strange way of hiding in plain sight
It sits quietly in our phones, our offices, our relationships. It connects us, protects us, and exposes us; often all at once. And somewhere along the way, it became impossible for me to tell stories without it.
That is how my journey as a techno thriller author began.
Not with a grand plan, but with discomfort. With the feeling that the world around me was changing faster than the stories being told about it.
Where Technology Meets Storytelling
In India, technology isn’t just infrastructure. It is a need. It is power. It provides access. It is accessible. And sometimes, it is a threat.
I live in a country where ambition travels at broadband speed and where data leaks are whispered about but rarely understood. Writing as atechno thriller author felt natural because the raw material was everywhere. Much after I wrote, came 2024, when we realised that a missed call on WhatsApp can change a life (Pegasus).
A coder in Bengaluru isn’t just a coder. A startup founder isn’t just building a company.
A WhatsApp message isn’t always just a message. Technology adds layers, and thrillers thrive on layers.
Why India Is the Perfect Setting for Techno Thrillers
Most people associate techno thrillers with Western settings; intelligence agencies, foreign governments, shadowy labs. But India doesn’t need borrowed backdrops. We are already living inside the plot.
We build global software. We manage international systems. We store data for the world; often without fully understanding how vulnerable that makes us. For an Indian techno thriller author, this reality is impossible to ignore.
In my stories, technology isn’t a gimmick. It’s a character. Sometimes helpful. Sometimes dangerous. Always watching.
Secrets Are the Real Currency
Every thriller begins with a secret. In techno thrillers, those secrets are digital; encrypted, leaked, and manipulated. As a techno thriller author, I’m less interested in explosions and more interested in what people hide:
- The message they didn’t delete
- The access they shouldn’t have
- The truth buried under convenience
Secrecy has always existed in our families, institutions, and friendships. I do not think technology has removed secrecy. It has only amplified it, and that has provided incentive for hackers to break into it. What is a secret, has to be worth something. It is valuable!
No wonder then, that when secrets surface, they destroy more than they protect.
Chaos Is Not a Bug. It’s the Setting.
India is not orderly. It never has been.
We are chaotic, layered, contradictory, and that chaos is fertile ground for thrillers. As someone committed to techno-thriller writing, I don’t try to smooth that chaos out. I lean into it.
My characters don’t live in clean systems. They live in overlapping loyalties, broken rules, emotional debts, and moral grey zones. Technology enters this chaos and doesn’t fix it. It accelerates it.
That acceleration, the speed at which things unravel, is where my stories live.
Relationships Matter More Than Gadgets
One misconception about being a techno thriller author is that the story is driven by tech alone. It isn’t.
Technology is only interesting when it collides with human emotion. Love. Friendship. Betrayal. Ego. Fear. In my novels, people don’t fall because of technology. They fall because of what technology allows them to do.
That’s where the tension comes from. Not the code, but the choice.
Writing to Understand the World
I don’t write to predict the future. I write to make sense of the present. As a techno thriller author, my stories are questions more than answers:
- Who holds power when everything is digital?
- What does loyalty mean when surveillance is constant?
- How fragile are relationships in a world of permanent records?
Each book is an attempt to decode the noise around us – the alerts, the headlines, the rumours, the silences.
Why I’ll Keep Writing Techno Thrillers
India is only getting more connected. More ambitious. More exposed. That means the stories will keep getting sharper, darker, and closer to home. For me, that’s not intimidating. That is necessary. Being a techno thriller author in India means standing at the intersection of progress and consequence. It means telling stories that entertain, but also unsettle.
Because the biggest danger today isn’t hidden in the shadows. It’s logged in, synced, and waiting.
