Jeffrey Archer Books

Why They Are Good For Our Health

Jeffrey Archer ex-politician and novelist has written over 30 novels and other books including prison diaries and children’s books. We are looking at why Jeffrey Archer novel books are so popular having sold over 300 million copies worldwide in over 110 countries with 33 translations so readers all over the world of different speaking languages can enjoy his literature. His writing has topped the best seller lists around the globe and earned the author over £200 million in the process. We look at why his books are so popular and why reading them is good for our health.

Subject Matter

Jeffrey Archer writes about things that we enjoy reading about with such powerful emotions and plots that contain money, power, family troubles and criminals and the law. Sinking our teeth into a good book filled with drama, powerful people with big money and bigger family problems than most of us have is like viewing drama without actually being in the scene, We can take a step back and watch all the fascinating things the villains and heroes get up to and stay gripped until the very last page. We love to read about the poor becoming wealthy and vice versa and how the characters react. We compare those reactions to how we would react. Heroes are depicted as hardworking and strong and his villains bad and quite ruthless making contrasting characters.

We believe his stories that he writes in his fiction books as the author is an ex-politician and has met many people who work hard and can be ruthless in getting to the top in politics to further their career. Jeffrey Archer has faced the law being sent to prison for perjury in 2001. His writing helped him through plus getting to know the lives of the inmates gave him much knowledge of criminals and their criminal activities. Some of his novels have been inspired by real-life events including Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less was Archer’s debut novel published in 1976. The plot was based on a financial disaster. Archer himself had lost a lot of money on one himself as a result of a bad investment. The plot sees four men try to retrieve their money that they lost in an oil investment which turned out to be a scam by a conman. He wrote the book to try to earn some money after the scam left him broke. We are learning new things that we didn’t know before about organisations within his plots such as Parliament and the Courts. We get a view of criminals and the law and how and why they did it to how the process of administering the law works. We understand the jobs of law enforcement and what they go through. We are using our brain to piece it all together and can read all the darkness of the crimes from a safe view. By teaching our brain we can solve other problems that need sorting in our daily lives as we have built up a network of problem solving by seeing how various people in different organisations handle things that are thrown at them. We can see their failings and learn from them which could help us understand our own failings in life and to accept that nobody is perfect we all make mistakes no matter how clever we are or how powerful we may be in our own family setting.

The Speed Of His Plots

Jeffrey Archer’s storytelling in many of his contemporary novels is fast-paced and definitely not slow-burn. The twists and turns come thick and fast to keep you gripped. The characters’ lives change course unexpectedly adding to the suspense. He certainly doesn’t beat about the bush in his writing. Fast punchy words and sentences keep the pace moving. He can write it in one sentence where others may take three to say the same thing. His chapters end on a cliffhanger so you can’t wait to read the next one. The plot is not drawn out with unnecessary boring details, this prevents your mind from wandering off and staying with the words. This really helps keep our brains sharpened and focussed as we keep up with the plot. This acts like giving our brain some exercise which keep it healthy so we don’t suffer from memory loss later in life at the same time fast moving plots are training our brains to store and work through information faster and to keep our concentration despite any distractions.

Short Chapters

On average, each chapter is roughly about 10 pages long which takes up between 10-15 minutes to read depending on the speed you read a page. Shorter chapters means that busy people can read a chapter quite quickly then, if need be, put the book down and continue where they left off as when they have the time. This is great for people who travel on buses and trains or as a passenger on short car journeys. A quick chapter or two on their lunch break makes Jeffrey Archer books very popular for busy people. This has a positive effect on our health as it enables us to concentrate on the fictional plot and we completely forget about our often-hectic routines so our bodies relax and our heart rate and blood pressure is stabilising for a while giving our heart and muscles a bit of relaxation. The relaxation stops our minds from racing and thinking about our next movements as it concentrates only on the pages of the book.

Having read many books myself I find that my mind can wander off after reading too many pages in a single chapter and I have to skip back to where I was up to before my mind went elsewhere. I am not alone in doing this as lots of people do it and then find themselves flicking the pages forward to see how many pages are left until the end of the chapter as they don’t like leaving the reading until they reach the next chapter. This can leave us quite frustrated and unsettled which can cause anxiety. If this makes you feel anxious then Jeffrey Archer books may be good for you to read.

Simple Language

Jeffrey Archer is a very highly intellectual person yet he keeps his words simple so many more people can understand the language and tone making reading that more enjoyable. Rather than use grammar that sometimes gets in the way of reading as many people do not know exactly what a word means as the word is too obscure. People of all adult ages and from all walks of life enjoy his novels for the simple language he uses. When he has written his draft, he cuts out words that he may have written being an intellect and changes the sentence to simplify it. This is a very healthy approach as we are feeling anxious about ambiguous words that we don’t really know the meaning of. Not being able to understand certain words makes us feel less intellectual than others which in turn dampens our mental state by making us feel less self-confident than other cleverer people.

Clean And Polished

Archer’s writing style means that readers don’t have to read explicit or course language which may make the reader feel disgusted which would affect their mood. This is reassuring to those that don’t want to read very graphic sexual language or constant swearing. Keeping your mood at a happy pleasurable pace that you expect from reading a book keeps the reader content.

Powerful Establishments

Many of Geoffrey Archer’s plots are centred around powerful establishments like banks, parliament, police and Scotland Yard and courts like the Old Bailey which brings a lot of intrigue to his plots with thefts, corruption and organised crime not only make for good reading but educate us as you know if somebody who has the real-life knowledge of institutions like the police and the courts, banking and criminals he is likely to use that knowledge to write his ‘fiction’ as there will lots of his knowledge in the plot with various name and place changes. Having himself been elected to Parliament at the young age of 29 Jeffrey Archer has saw first-hand the turbulence, drama and shifts of power as a Member of Parliament. Reading about politics helps us understand the news more around politics and makes us feel more confident to talk about political issues to people around us. Confidence helps us grow and become less anxious and stressed thus benefiting our health. We become less intimated as we build up our knowledge which boosts our confidence making us feel better about having conversations that we were not particular confident talking about before we read the book, especially to people who were ‘more in the know’.

Having a couple of hundred million in the bank would certainly bring elements of ‘realness’ in his plots where banking was concerned, like in his Clifton Chronicles. Through reading books like this we can empathise with the characters who are rich or facing financial ruin enabling us to be more sympathetic to people in our real lives. Showing compassion is good for our souls as it makes us feel better which is always good for our health. We are looking into a world of others (albeit fiction) and see how they are dealing with the problems of either being rich or being poor. We can work out in our minds how we would deal with that situation which broadens our minds and we are often left with the feeling that we are glad it is not us in that situation and this makes us feel better about our ‘ordinary’ lives. For some readers it gives them optimism that they want to be rich and powerful making them aim for bigger things. They become mentally stronger, more determined and rearing to go to get rich. Having a purpose keeps you going and makes you thrive. You are keeping your brain sharp and this wardens off later health problems such as dementia and Alzheimer’s disease by up to 40%.

Many think the opposite way and become content with what they have knowing that big money can ruin your life and those around you.

Jeffrey Archer Best Sellers

Kane and Abel (1979). Two men born on the same day in different parts of the world, one into wealth the other into poverty have a 60-year rivalry and dislike of one another until they realise that their lives are intertwined.
The Prodigal Daughter (1982). A political drama where a woman marries one her family’s rivals and ends up becoming the first female President of the United States after overcoming intense political hurdles.
A Prisoner of Birth (2008). Four middle-class men frame a working-class man for a murder he did not commit. He escapes prison and seeks revenge on the men.
Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (1976). After being swindled of their cash four men seek to get all of their money back, not a penny more, not a penny less.
First Among Equals (1984). Rivalry between four politicians sees the battles between them and their personal lives as they each fight for the top job of Prime Minister.
As the Crow Flies (1981). A man from a humble background works his way up to achieve a large department store after battling life’s trials and tribulations and business rivalry.
False Impression (2006). After the 911 attacks an art expert who is presumed dead flees the country to solve the brutal murder of an aristocrat linked to a valuable Vincent Van Gogh painting.
The Fourth Estate (1996). Two media moguls battle for dominance.
A Matter of Honour (1985). After opening a latter of his late fathers, a man is hunted across Europe by British Intelligence, the KGB & CIA.
The Eleventh Commandment (1998). An assassin has to flee when he is betrayed by his own government.