Derrick Stormblessed
asked
Lawrence Wright:
Last year, I read your book Going Clear and also The Looming Tower. I became fascinated with how cults lure people to believe. In hindsight, do you think there are other belief systems that you think could be worse? And what do you think about the TV adaptation of the looming tower? I wish you all the best and I'm looking forward to your new book. Oohh Last question, are you an atheist?
Lawrence Wright
People tend to forget about Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese cult that followed a blind yoga instructor. That sounds like a joke, but there were 50,000 adherents and many of them were scientists and engineers. They experimented with toxins and biological weapons. They actually killed people with sarin gas on Tokyo subways, which was supposed to be a prelude to depopulating the earth. It could have been far worse than al-Qaeda. As for the television adaptation, I was one of the producers. I wanted to make sure it honored the sacrifice of so many people on 9/11 and paid tribute to those who fought against the terrorists.
More Answered Questions
Cwiegard
asked
Lawrence Wright:
I enjoyed "Going Clear" as an excellent exploration of the dark side of human nature through the prism of a cult religion. I understand that a fiction pandemic thriller is a very different writing effort, but did your nonfiction career inform your new writing effort, either regarding human nature, the role of research in establishing realism, or some other way?
Srijan
asked
Lawrence Wright:
Do you have a specific place or thing which is very important to you during writing?
Tom Robinson
asked
Lawrence Wright:
The Looming Tower is one of the finest books of it's kind I have ever had the pleasure of reading. You clearly went to huge lengths both in terms of your research and your ability to translate this to the page for the layman. To what extend did the process and experience of writing this book as well as your other non-fiction works impact/tailor your approach to writing a fictional novel?
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