Mayra Calvani's Blog - Posts Tagged "detective"

Mar Preston is the author of two mystery novels set in Santa Monica, California, featuring Detective Dave Mason of the Santa Monica Police Department. His girlfriend is a community activist, liberal in bent, which clashes with Mason’s traditional cop views. A third novel, set in a California mountain village features a County Sheriff’s Detective and an injured former Detective working as a patrol officer.

[image error]Thanks for this interview, Mar! When did your passion for crime and detective fiction begin?

Not until my forties until life settled down−and mostly importantly, after I wrote four unpublished literary fiction novels. I thought, well, mysteries can’t be as hard as literary fiction.  Silly me.

When did you decide you wanted to become an author?

When I felt comfortable that I could think up and tell a good story.

Tell us about your latest novel, Rip-Off.

High-tech burglary and murder are bad for business in the upscale, tourist-destination beach city of Santa Monica with its leftist politics, rich homeowners, its entertainment mega-businesses, and huge homeless population. Bad for Detective Dave Mason of the Santa Monica Police Department. 

A deadbeat burglar is found in the beach condo of a playboy studio exec. The dead body must link up with a string of high-tech burglaries, and the Chechens Mason keeps meeting must link up with each other somehow, but how?

The investigation involves Mason in the dark world of embezzlement and an explosion that almost kills him. The stakes rise when the investigation leads him to the Hollywood Russian community and he ignores a warning by the FBI and Homeland Security.

How long does it usually take you to write a novel?

Years.

Are you disciplined?

No, life is too interesting. Maybe that’s why it takes me years.

[image error]Describe a typical writing day for you.

One cup of coffee playing Spider Solitaire to warm up. Long sigh, then get at it. The first draft is agony. I love rewriting and making the story better.

I hear you’re quite inventive when marketing your books. Can you tell us about your latest marketing event?

Sell, pawn, mortgage all your possessions and hire a publicist. Few writers are good self-promoters. I comment on interesting blogs, praise and review other writers, search for opportunities to guest blog, publish short stories, support Sisters-in-Crime, arrange house readings, and spend a limited time on Facebook and Twitter. I wish I had a clone.

What are the three main ingredients of a good mystery?

An absorbing plot that keeps you turning pages, engaging characters, and a twist on the usual rules of crime fiction.

What is the most difficult part of writing crime fiction?

The reason why it’s so hard to get a cop to read a mystery is clichéd plots and characters. Authors really need to work to make a story realistic and founded in fact.  Cops consider CSI a comedy show.

What is the most rewarding aspect of being an author?

Holding a book that you’re proud of in your hand. Then it’s like childbirth. You forget all the agony that went into making that book and you foolishly start another.

What advice would you give to aspiring authors?

Write in whatever genre people are willing to read while you get the craft of writing polished to a high lustre.

What’s on the horizon for Mar Preston?

A New Adventure. I’m moving home to Canada after a 30-year vacation in California.

Connect with Mar Preston:

Author’s website: http://marpreston.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Mar-Preston/136299239777273

Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/YesMarPreston

RIP-OFF available on Kindle and print: http://www.amazon.com/Rip-Off-ebook/dp/B007WTYGI4

 

 

This interview originally appeared in Blogcritics

Dear Readers,

I’m currently representing author Christine Amsden, whose new adult urban fantasy/mystery novel, Cassie Scot: ParaNormal Detective, was released earlier this year by Twilight Times Books.

I have 20 print copies available for review. Please let me know if you’re interested!

About the book:

Cassie Scot is the ungifted daughter of powerful sorcerers, born between worlds but belonging to neither. At 21, all she wants is to find a place for herself, but earning a living as a private investigator in the shadow of her family’s reputation isn’t easy. When she is pulled into a paranormal investigation, and tempted by a powerful and handsome sorcerer, she will have to decide where she truly belongs.

From Publisher’s Weekly:

“In this entertaining series opener, Amsden (The Immortality Virus) introduces readers to the eponymous Cassie, a decidedly mundane member of a magical family. …Readers will enjoy Cassie’s fish-out-of-water struggles as she fights magical threats with little more than experience and bravado.”

Amazon link:
http://www.amazon.com/Cassie-Scot-Par...

Thanks in advance for your time and consideration. I look forward to hearing from you!
Regards,
Mayra

Robert Lane’s literary crime noir novels mix humor, action, and ageless moral themes set against the backdrop of the west coast of Florida. Cooler Than Blood is his second stand-alone Jake Travis novel after The Second Letter. His third book, The Cardinal’s Sin, will be released in October 2015.Q:

Congratulations on the release of your latest book, Cooler Than Blood. What was your inspiration for it?

A: I yearned for a classic crime tale, in this case a kidnapped young woman, that, through twists and turns, circles back to my protagonist, Jake Travis. I desired a story arc, that in ways Jake could have never foreseen, threatens Kathleen, the “world’s most important person,” to Jake.  I wanted the story to force him into moral choices that will define and shape him. Where’s the inspiration? Instead of a faceless victim that the reader would have no feeling for, I was intrigued with the idea of a young woman who lost her father at a young age. She relies on the memory of her father and the lessons he taught her while boating, to persevere a kidnapping ordeal. The time she and he spent on the boat is all the fuel she has to survive her captivity. The only thing real, and inspiration, is the boat, but we all know the formula—1 percent inspiration and 99 percent work.

Q: Tell us something interesting about your protagonist. 

A: Jake Travis has struggled with who he is and is just now learning to accept himself. He cannot resist the thrills found on the edge of life, but they come with heavy consequences. Unfortunately, some of these consequences are moral ambiguities that are likely to re-occur. It’s the central theme in his life, and central themes do not fade or resolve.

Q: How was your creative process like during the writing of this book and how long did it take you to complete it? Did you face any bumps along the way? 

A: My books are character driven—I have little clue as to how they will end. I usually see the end coming somewhere around two-thirds of the way through. That’s good—I think. Hemingway said if you know where your story’s going, so does the reader. Total writing time is about nine months, with half of that time in re-writes and crafting the words. Writing is a bumpy road. Sometimes it comes out smooth and clean, but that’s just the space between the bumps.

Q: How do you keep your narrative exciting throughout the creation of a novel? 

A: I don’t let myself get bored. Add humor. Conflict. More conflict. Physically move Jake.  In Cooler Than Blood, Jake gets a lead, hops in his truck with Garrett, and the story explodes as he meets other characters who, in turn, lead to the core of the story.

Q: Do you experience anxiety before sitting down to write? If yes, how do you handle it? 

A: Not really. My secret is I flip open the laptop and hit it hard and fast. If I waited, even a minute, I know self-doubt would gain a foothold.  Also, I usually exercise before I write—let the endorphins meet anxiety at the gate and thrash it away.

Q: What is your writing schedule like and how do you balance it with your other work and family time? 

A: I run or swim early in the morning and then write until my mind shuts down. By late in the afternoon, it’s been recharged enough to go a couple more hours. If I had sixteen free hours, the best I could do is write during five to six of those hours, and not congruently. That leaves plenty of time for other activities and obligations.

Q: How do you define success?

A: Doing my best used to be my mantra, my measuring cup for success. After I read Haruki Murakami’s excellent book, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, I altered that stance. Success is exceeding my capabilities. Doing better than I thought I could do. Freeing my mind of self-imposed limitation and handicaps. That’s pretty elusive…but so is success.

Q: What advice would you give to aspiring writers whose spouses or partners don’t support their dreams of becoming an author? 

A: Get a new a partner? That could be expensive. How about this: forget them. It’s your dream. Since when do you need the outside world to validate your goals and aspirations?

Q: George Orwell once wrote: “Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.” Do you agree? 

A: I suppose I do, but that seems a little heavy, dare I say Orwellian? Lighten up. I don’t drill too deep into my compulsions, who’s got time for that? At some point, during the writing of every book, I’ve sworn off writing and rue the day I ever started. Is that so different than other professions and activities in our lives, or do writers just whine more?

Q:  Anything else you’d like to tell my readers? 

A: While reading my books, I hope you laugh, I hope you get choked-up, I hope you turn the page quickly to see what happens next, I hope you come across a mirror and ponder yourself, and I hope that is some small, immeasurable, speck-of-dust manner, all that gobbledygook gives you a better understanding and acceptance of your world.

Anne K. Edwards enjoys reading as well as writing and would be hard put to choose one over the other since her love affair with the printed word started with reading at age six. When she found she could write stories as a third grader, she found a certain sense of self-fulfillment that lonely kids often miss. That love of words stayed with her and finally found satisfaction in her first publishing contract. Since then, each book or story she writes adds to that private happiness. It is only exceeded by having readers tell her they read and enjoyed one of her books. She’s here today to talk about her latest book, This and That—Collection of Light and Dark Tales. 

It's nice to have you here, Anne. Do you have another job besides writing? 

I’m retired now, but did work much of my life as a secretary. The pay wasn’t good and I changed jobs frequently for that reason. The work isn’t particularly fulfilling either, but the advent of the computer did make it somewhat easier. I usually looked forward to the end of the day when I could escape  into the worlds I could create and live vicariously through my characters.  The best thing that happened outside of writing was a move to a farm where we associated with horses and several cats.  I’m still here.

Were you an avid reader as a child? What type of books did you enjoy reading?

I was and still am an avid reader. As a child I always preferred books that were not on a reading list and ahead of my age group.  I went through stages of westerns, romance, history and so forth.  I love a good historical tale, fact or fiction, biography, some sciences like anthropology and others.

Tell us a bit about your latest book, and what inspired you to write it.

This and That—Collection of Light and Dark Tales is an assortment of short stories written over a period of several years. They are varied in subject and genre. For instance, in this book, the reader would learn how the devil outsmarts himself when he leaves Hell, why Death had to hire a private detective, and what happens when the sun sends a ball of fire toward Earth.  These tales were a pleasure to write and that is what inspired me to write them. I wrote them when I suffered writer’s block or was between projects.  They filled what would have otherwise been wasted time.

Did your book require a lot of research?

No. I rarely do research these days because over the years when I did a log of non fiction reading, I managed to store information I could use as backdrops for books. For instance, I write mysteries, but I don’t spend time on dna and fingerprint evidence research as this is the sort of material mystery readers in general are familiar with. I don’t use a lot of scientific jargon or crime scene description, nor do I spend a lot of the readers time on things I believe they already have in their minds to help comprehend the basic mystery.

What was your goal when writing this book?

No specific goal was in mind as the stories were written for fun and one at a time with months in between. The goal for each story is to write a good story for the reader, one that I hope they enjoy as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Agatha Christie got her best ideas while eating green apples in the bathtub. Steven Spielberg says he gets his best ideas while driving on the highway. When do you get your best ideas and why do you think this is?

My best ideas come, like Christie and Spielberg, when my body is busy with one thing and this lets my mind range freely on other things. I used to get great ideas or solutions to problems with a book while I was cleaning out a stall, or weeding.  Those times, the rote of the work let my mind work on writing related matters.

Do you get along with your muse? What do you do to placate her when she refuses to inspire you?

My muse is a nutty critter called Swamp Thingy. We don’t get along for many reasons, such as he is a real complainer. Read his column One Muse’s Opinion on my website www.AnneKEdwards.com and you’ll see what I mean.  He’s turned my mind into a bog and then whines it’s wet.  There is no placating him.  Yes, I know, muses are supposed to be female, but this one is a weird guy built like the blob. For some strange reason, he does give good ideas most of the time, but when he stalls and produces aome half baked idea, I could give him such a boot.  If anyone out there knows where I can trade him in, please let me know.

What types of scenes give you the most trouble to write?

To this, I’d have to answer action scenes with several people in attendance. It is very difficult to keep track of say five or so characters at the same time during a conversation that includes all of them. One must include facial expressions, dialogue, body positions and changes, and perhaps the shifting background such as shadows or people in the background coming and going. Such scenes get a lot of information into a story at the same time so the author cannot concentrate on only one or two.

Do you write non-stop until you have a first draft, or do you edit as you move along? 

I edit over and over and over as I write. I learned to do this because by the end of the story, I only have to reread once for typos and other errors. I usually find editing as I write, the development of scenes, characters and dialogue feel more natural and that helps me write the next scene because I have a clear picture of what is the story’s past and can safely draw on it to push the tale forward.

As a writer, what scares you the most?

Not being able to write, no matter what the cause.

Do you have an agent? 

I don’t have an agent. I admit to going through a short phase of wanting one to take me under their wing, but when they said they’d read the manuscript only to return it unread or half of the pages missing or not at all, I began to think this was not for me.  About that time the Internet publishers began to accept submissions and I was off.  I quit sending out manuscripts and the waiting of six to twelve months or more without word from the agent and I always queried before sending to them. I learned from this experience that agents would put your work in a slush pile and at some point take another job and leave behind that pile of manuscripts without returning them or letting the author know they were moving on and the work wouldn’t. No other agent in that agency would take on the work either, even if the prior agent had requested changes that had been done. The secret of my not wanting an agent any longer was I factored in all that wasted time when I could have been submitting it to online publishers.  Perhaps these were new agents, editors changing jobs and the like, but they did keep me from submitting elsewhere. I came to believe ‘you got to have an agent’ is a myth spread by agents who fear losing control of the markets.  I don’t know if that’s really possible, but for myself, I lost my acceptance of their mantra.  I do know you don’t need an agent to be published online by a good publisher, but you do need to submit your best work.

What is your opinion about critique groups? What words of advice would you offer a novice writer who is joining one? Do you think the wrong critique group can ‘crush’ a fledgling writer?

I think a good critique group in which the author and their work fits, such a mystery writer into a mystery critique group, is a very good tool. You not only can learn the craft better from experienced or published members of the group, but you can hone your writing and your own critiquing skills. I would advise a novice writer to ask questions to find the right group and not to join the first group that appears. Some groups are headed by a founder who is on an ego trip and who will not allow other opinions than their own. Some groups don’t seem to have a goal such as helping other writers or sharing information. Some groups have members who only offer critiques in a very negative form and nothing a writer does will please them. Those are groups to stay out of.  Ask other writers in your area where to start, or perhaps the local bookstores or libraries will know.  And if you join a group that does not work out, do not apologize if you feel it best to drop out. After all, you are in the group to learn.

What is the best writing advice you’ve ever received? 

A good author once gave me some very basic advice and I’ve found it to be true. Keep writing. Read, read, read, and study what you read. Pay attention to your own mistakes and those of other writers and learn from them. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.  Learn to self edit your own work. Then keep writing.

Do you have another book on the works? Would you like to tell readers about your current or future projects? 

Yes, I do have a new mystery in the works, a second in a series starring Hannah Clare. I am also looking to finish some children’s books for publication. They may end up self published because I do not want to put in a lot of time trying to make them fit publishers specific guidelines by stretching the story or changing things to suit someone else. A publisher told me and I believe correctly in referring to a story, it is what it is, and she is so right. The children’s books are written to show kids can think and make decisions without adult input. They are really people, smaller perhaps than adults, but by the time they are seven or so, they already know things they can do and can’t, how to make some decisions, and right from wrong.

I enjoy a good murder. Oh, not necessarily an actual murder, but the kind of murders that occur between the pages of a good book. People ask me all the time, “What made you write about such gruesome stuff?”  I rarely have a good enough answer for them and the person asking usually leaves somewhat disappointed. How do you explain to the casual observer, reader, or even fan that you are possessed of a mind filled with all sorts of criminality?

Writers of thrillers, crime fiction, mysteries, etc. dwell in worlds bathed in foggy nights and overcast days. Peaceful ponds and lakes are actually places where bodies rise to the surface, pristine winter snows hide the corpses of hitch-hikers, runaways, or promising college students. We who write about crime must lurk in these dark places, it is who we are. And as a consequence we must also rise squinting into the sun and seek justice for those who have been so wronged. We create doctors, lawyers, detectives, housewives, writers, and even vampires who are willing to use their knowledge, skills, instinct and need to bring the bad guy to justice; to solve the very crime or crimes that we previously have so painstakingly committed on paper. It’s like knitting a wonderfully intricate afghan and then carefully pulling it apart as soon as it’s done.

But, alas, it’s what we do. Oh, and don’t get it wrong. Sure we create great antagonists. Some are evil geniuses, some are sociopaths and some are complete pychopaths! We use words like unsub, perp, the suspect, and so on to describe them, but isn’t the blood actually dripping from our hands?

It takes a very special mindset to just be a writer in the first place: to tackle

head on that blank page and build a world in which you hope to immerse your reader. And it’s even more special when it’s a criminal mind.

////////////////////////////////////////////

Title: Chickenhawk

Genre: Thriller

Author: Arnaldo Lopez Jr.

Publisher: Koehler Books/Café Con Leche books

Purchase on Amazon

About the Book:

Chickenhawk is an urban crime fiction novel that showcases New York City’s diversity, as well as the dark side of race relations, politics, sexuality, illness, madness, and infidelity. Eddie Ramos and Tommy Cucitti are Manhattan North Homicide detectives after a serial killer that manages to stay below their radar while the body count keeps climbing in a city that’s turning into a powder keg.

About the Author:

Arnaldo Lopez Jr. has been employed by New York City Transit for twenty-eight years and was formerly employed as a dispatcher with the NYPD.  Mr. Lopez is also a speaker and trainer, speaking on subjects as diverse as terrorism and customer service.  He created the civilian counter-terrorism training program currently in use by New York City Transit and many other major public transportation agencies around the country.

As well as writing, Mr. Lopez is an artist and photographer, having sold several of his works over the years.  As a writer he’s sold articles to Railway Age magazine, The Daily News magazine, Homeland Defense Journal, and Reptile & Amphibian magazine; scripts to Little Archie and Personality Comics; and short stories to Neo-Opsis magazine, Lost Souls e-zine, Nth Online magazine, Blood Moon magazine, and various other Sci-Fi and/or horror newsletters and fanzines.  He was also editor of Offworld, a small science fiction magazine that was once chosen as a “Best Bet” by Sci-Fi television.  Chickenhawk is his first novel.

Connect with Arnaldo Lopez Jr. on Facebook and Twitter.

Joseph B. Atkins is a native North Carolinian who worked on tobacco farms and in textile mills in his youth, served with the U.S. Army in Vietnam, and studied philosophy in Munich, Germany. A veteran journalist, he worked at several newspapers in the South and as a congressional correspondent in Washington, D.C., before becoming a professor of journalism at the University of Mississippi. Atkins is author of Covering for the Bosses, a book about the Southern labor movement and journalists’ failure to tell its story. His fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine and Hardboiled, and his novella, Crossed Roads, was a finalist in the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Awards in New Orleans.

Q: Congratulations on the release of your latest book, Casey’s Last Chance. To begin with, can you gives us a brief summary of what the story is about and what compelled you to write it?   

A: It’s 1960 in the South, when the region is about to bust wide open with the struggle over civil rights. Casey Eubanks is a small-time hustler in North Carolina on the run after a fight with his girlfriend Orella leaves his cousin dead. A crony sets him up with a big operator in Memphis, Max Duren, a well-heeled, politically connected former Nazi who needs a hit done on labor organizer Ala Gadomska for stirring up workers at a Duren garment factory in Mississippi. Casey’s hired, but things go wrong, and he’s on the run again—from Duren’s goons as well as the cops. Enter Martin Wolfe, an alcoholic journalist who tries to recruit Casey to join him and rogue FBI agent Hardy Beecher in a plan to bring Duren down. Casey steals Wolfe’s car and returns home to Orella, where a bloody shootout with a Duren goon convinces him to join Wolfe and Beecher. It’s Casey’s last chance, a wild plan that might work but could also blow up in their faces.

Several of the major characters in Casey’s Last Chance also appeared in an earlier, unpublished novel of mine, and I wanted to see what the future had in store for them. Also, on a trip to North Carolina a few years ago, a 90-year-old cousin of mine told me a story about the black sheep of the Atkins family, a man who’d been in and out of trouble and prison most of his life. After many dissolute years, the black sheep tried to return home but was turned out by relatives, who bought him a bus ticket to Charlotte and told him not to come back. Soon afterward, he’s walking down a city street, has a heart attack, and dies. The relatives pooled resources to pay for a headstone and grave. This inverse version of the prodigal son’s story helped inspire Casey’s journey.

Q: What do you think makes a good hardboiled crime novel? Could you narrow it down to the three most important elements? Is it even possible to narrow it down?

A: It’s tempting to resist labeling, but it is what it is. I wrote for many years in a kind of Southern gothic mode, still do, but then I discovered Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, James Cain, Cornel Woolrich, that rich and very American school of hardboiled crime writing, where the writer, as Chandler once said, gives “murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons.” I thought to myself about these writers, “These are my people!” Much maligned by the literati in their day, they’re viewed as classics today. Lots of imitators are around, but the real deal can be found in the following: (1) A lean, honest, cut-to-the-chase writing style; (2) A storyline that deals with real people in real situations, even though it’s fiction, and written with authenticity; (3) A sense of the bigger picture, that underlying the actions and behavior of the characters are things in American society that help prompt them. I think my writing today is a combination of Southern gothic and hardboiled. I believe the South is every bit as noir as San Francisco or New York.

Q: How did you go about plotting your story? Or did you discover it as you worked on the book?

A: A writer friend of mine gave me great advice along the way. In an earlier version of my book, I ended the story long before the final end that was published. “You’re just half way there,” he told me. “Now take it all the way.” And I did. That same writer gave me good advice again as I neared the final version of my novel. This time, he said, you’re taking too long to get to what this story’s about. I sliced the first three chapters to start where the published version now starts. That was hard! I had then to go back and work key elements from those three chapters back into the book in ways that would fit and be natural, but I did it. Keep the reader in mind as you work your way through the story. You want to keep that reader hanging on to the strap, gasping for air half the time and not daring to let go! End each chapter on a note of suspense so that reader just absolutely has to go to the next page, the next chapter.

Q: Tell us something interesting about your protagonist and how you developed him or her. Did you do any character interviews or sketches prior to the actual writing?

A: Casey Eubanks is a guy haunted by his late mother’s sexual promiscuity, his family’s rejection of him, the lack of respect he gets from others. His girlfriend Orella is the only one who ever gave him that respect, but he has a hard time taking a chance on a woman, and he’s quick to see betrayal in them. He’s an angry man who blames others for his problems but deep down knows he’s at the bottom of most of them.

I have a book of extensive notes and character bios, clipped photographs (of real people past and present who I think looked like my characters), hand-drawn maps of rooms, buildings, and alleyways, pages of historical facts and other jottings, all of which helped me keep track of the tiniest details. If a character has dark brown eyes on page 30, he better still have dark brown eyes on page 230! Casey is loosely based on the earlier mentioned black sheep of the Atkins family, something that I’m sure has my father turning over in his grave! Still, I never got to know that black sheep like I know Casey.

Q: In the same light, how did you create your antagonist or villain? What steps did you take to make him or her realistic?

A: I’ve always been fascinated by old Nazis who escaped the hangman and are living out their lives in some remote backwater. I’ll never forget the great Jewish actor Nehemiah Persoff’s brilliant performance of one once on Twilight Zone. My German mother actually spent months in a Gestapo prison for a minor offense during World War II. A bit of anger can be a great motivator in writing. Don’t ever let it blind you, but I tell my students anger and especially righteous indignation helped spur a lot of the great writing and reporting in our country. My villain, Max Duren, is not only an old Nazi but he also looks suspiciously like a really bad boss I once had! Of course, that boss didn’t commit murder and mayhem, but I sometimes evoked him in the wee hours as I imagined Max the Big Mahah moving about his suite in the Peabody Hotel in Memphis.

Q: How did you keep your narrative exciting throughout the novel? Could you offer some practical, specific tips?

A: Yes, as I said earlier, end each chapter on a note of suspense. Write in a fluid way that also makes that happen from sentence to sentence. Don’t get bogged down trying to tell too much at one time. Learn to sprinkle telling details and important information through your novel like so much stardust. Tantalize the reader, give him or her just enough to make them want to know more, and be cruel enough to make them wait a bit. Writing is an amazing exercise in honesty, truth, integrity. Keeping that reader in mind helps keep your ego at bay. You’re not writing to impress your readers with how smart and clever you are. You’re writing because you have a great story to tell. George Orwell said, “Be a windowpane.” He means don’t stand between your reader and the story. Make the reader even forget he’s reading a story. Make him live it!

Q: Setting is also quite important and in many cases it becomes like a character itself. What tools of the trade did you use in your writing to bring the setting to life?

A: I made the South my “beat”—both as a journalist and fiction writer—a long time ago. It was my great dream once to leave this damned frustrating region, and I did. A year in Vietnam, four in Germany, and eight in D.C. made me see the South in a whole different way. I returned a student wanting desperately to understand the forces that have made it what it is. Casey goes from one end of the South to the other, and this setting is a character in the book, just as Balzac’s Paris or Algren’s Chicago are to their books. Yet the setting ultimately is a metaphor. What you’re really probing is the human condition, yes, in a particular place and time, but still the human condition that transcends place and time.

Q: Did you know the theme(s) of your novel from the start or is this something you discovered after completing the first draft? Is this theme(s) recurrent in your other work?

A: I see a consistency in my work as a journalist and as a fiction writer. I may be a professor and writer today but I’m also still a working-class guy. My father was a tool & die maker, my mother a seamstress for many years, and I did blue-collar work into my late 20s. Most of the people who populate this novel are working-class folks, doing what they can to survive. Big forces are at play that affect their lives in significant ways and make it hard for them to see their way out. Not letting them off the hook, but it’s true. That was a theme of my book on the Southern labor movement, Covering for the Bosses, and it underlies the predicaments my characters in the novel find themselves in. The people running the South in both books have certain fascist characteristics that cannot be denied. It’s no accident Max Duren got himself a nice little setup down in Dixie.

Q: Where does craft end and art begin? Do you think editing can destroy the initial creative thrust of an author?

A: Over-editing can definitely drain the juice out of a piece of writing. The writer can do this himself, and I may have done this with my first and still-unpublished novel. I kept taking it out of the oven and tampering with it, adding a bit of spice here, a squeeze of lemon there, then putting it back in till I burned the damned thing! Know when to let go. Eudora Welty once said a writer should quit on the third draft. Hemingway used to tease F. Scott Fitzgerald about excessive rewriting, yet Hemingway could be guilty of this too. It’s like everything. Every writer needs an editor, and it’s the rare early draft that doesn’t require a bucket-full of red ink, yet that can be overdone, too. Both the writer and the editor have to know when things are just right. I’m not sure there’s a demarcation line between craft and art, but you’ve reached the summit when you’ve created something that somehow just needed to be created. Writer-artist Chuck Trapkus told me that once, and he was quoting stonecutter Eric Gill.

Q: What three things, in your opinion, make a successful novelist?

A: You’ve got to strive for honesty in your writing. It takes a certain amount of integrity to avoid the shortcuts--the tired cliché, the borrowed phrase, the hackneyed description--and carve out a language that’s uniquely your own. Of course, we all start out borrowing, like I did in the 8th grade when I fell in love with Edgar Allan Poe and began churning out imitations so poor that Poe turned over in his Baltimore grave. You’ve got to work hard to find your own voice, of course, and not let every gust of wind throw you off course. If it knocks you down, pick yourself back up, and go at it again! Finally, you’ve got to define what success means to you. If it means a mansion on the hill and late-model sports car with a buxom blonde in the front seat, then you’re shooting for a different kind of success than I am. Not that I’m eschewing the fun money brings! Success for me is connecting with readers in a real and important way, where something I’ve written affected them and maybe, just maybe enriched or simply made their lives better in some way. The writer who achieves this has a deep empathy for people and the human condition. The ancient philosopher Philo of Alexandria once said, “Be kind to others for everyone is fighting a great battle.” The writer who’s successful in my book is the one who has a real and motivating sense of the truth of those words.

Q: A famous writer once wrote that being an author is like having to do homework for the rest of your life. What do you think about that?

A: You can say the same thing about a reporter, a journalist. You’re always taking notes of observations you make going through life. You never know when you might need them. I’ve kept a journal since I was maybe 14 years old, and I’ve gone back to them many times to refresh my memory about certain experiences or events. The writer of fiction should do this as well. Here I go quoting other people again, but a late good friend of mine, Marty Fishgold, once told me, you spend the first half of your life going to the carnival, and the last half telling people what the carnival was like. Well, I would amend that to say, you’re still going to the carnival the last half of your life, too!

Q: Are there any resources, books, workshops or sites about craft that you’ve found helpful during your writing career?

A: I got inspired early in life reading great writers like Edgar Allan Poe, Jack London, and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Later I discovered Dorothy Day, Raymond Chandler, and modern writers like William Kennedy and Andre Dubus. Reading about their lives as well as reading their work inspired and encouraged me. Books and essays on writing like Nelson Algren’s Conformity, Hemingway’s On Writing, and Jon Winokur’s compendium, Advice to Writers are rich in wisdom about this craft. Get to know some writers. I treasure the many hours I’ve spent with my good friends, novelists Ace Atkins (no relation) and Jere Hoar, talking about not only writing but also horses, dogs, guns, crime, film noir, women, and bourbon while we shared a few glasses of the latter!

Q:  Is there anything else you’d like to share with my readers about the craft of writing?

A: Only to say that beginning or struggling writers should go about discovering the passions that drive or motivate them, the ur-sources of what fire may be in their bellies. Maybe it’s an anger or righteous indignation about certain injustices out there. Maybe it’s an intense desire to understand why people are the way they are, what connects them or separates them. Maybe it’s a desire to come to terms with certain unresolved things within one’s own life, a desperate need for answers that may or may not exist. Find those driving forces, set out to get to the truth that underlies them, and do it in a way that’s honest and not afraid of hard work. If you do this, I know I’d like to read your book when you’re finished!

 

 

 

 

Harley Mazuk was born in Cleveland, and majored in English literature at Hiram College in Ohio, and Elphinstone College, Bombay U. Harley worked as a record salesman (vinyl) and later served the U.S. Government as a computer programmer and in communications, where he honed his writing style as an editor and content provider for official web sites.

Retired now, he likes to write pulp fiction, mostly private eye stories, several of which have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.

Harley’s other passions are reading, his wife Anastasia, their two children, peace, running, Italian cars, and California wine.

Q: Congratulations on the release of your latest book, White with Fish, Red with Murder. To begin with, can you gives us a brief summary of what the story is about and what compelled you to write it?   

A: White with Fish, Red with Murder is the story of private eye Frank Swiver, who accepts an invitation to a wine tasting on a private rail car, and brings along his secretary and lover, Vera Peregrino. They’re two thirds of a love triangle. The host, Frank’s client, General Thursby, wants him to find proof that a friend whose death was ruled accidental was in fact murdered. Thursby suspects Cicilia O’Callaghan, widow of his late friend, an old flame of Frank’s, and the third leg of that triangle. But Thursby takes two slugs through the pump, and the cops arrest Vera for his killing. Frank spends his nights with Cici, and his days trying to find Thursby’s killer and spring Vera. But soon he realizes he must change his way of thinking, or risk losing both women . . . and maybe his life.

I felt compelled to write this story because I had read all of Raymond Chandler’s fiction, and most of Dashiell Hammett’s. I loved it, and I wanted more, even if I had to write it myself. I tried to reproduce the feel of their stories in characters, atmosphere, dialogue, and plot so that readers who liked Hammett and Chandler will feel as much at home with Frank Swiver as they would with Sam Spade or Phillip Marlowe.

Q: What do you think makes a good mystery? Could you narrow it down to the three most important elements? Is it even possible to narrow it down?

A: Character, plot, and pace. A good private eye story is not about the eye, but about the characters –the client, the femme fatale, the villain or antagonist. The characters must be believable, well-rounded, and distinct from one another. They must be driven by desires they are powerless to resist. Character is revealed in action. The plot must be credible; it has to be of a certain magnitude to hang a novel on it. And it’s good to have a couple different things going on in the plot. The best way for a writer to conceal a mystery is by interesting the reader in solving some other mystery. Finally, pace. You don’t necessarily have to write a thriller, but it needs to be a page turner. You want the reader to wonder, what happens next. A fourth element, close behind these three, is setting, environment, or a sense of place.

Q: How did you go about plotting your story? Or did you discover it as you worked on the book?

A: I’m certainly in favor of knowing where you’re going when you set out. I was working towards a certain ending that I had in mind, but in this novel, the characters revealed to me how to get there and what to do along the way as the book progressed. For example, no one saw the murder, but private eye Frank Swiver questioned the seven suspects present, each of whom had a story, a version of the truth. By studying everyone’s comings and goings, their desires, and their versions of the truth, Frank gathered the clues he needed to put the whole mystery together. By following along with Frank, I learned what I needed to know to write my way to the ending.

Q: Tell us something interesting about your protagonist and how you developed him or her. Did you do any character interviews or sketches prior to the actual writing?

A: Because of his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, Frank Swiver is a pacifist, unusual in the tough, fists and blackjacks world of private eyes. He was a conscientious objector during WW II. As it happens, I was a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War, so I didn’t need to interview Frank. We shared the same values.

Q: In the same light, how did you create your antagonist or villain? What steps did you take to make him or her realistic?

A: The villain goes back to some of the most basic ideas I learned reading Edgar Allan Poe’s first detective story, and to the idea of the duality of human nature. In some ways the antagonist is the opposite of the protagonist, Frank. He’s the animalistic side of Frank’s nature, and the dark side.

Q: How did you keep your narrative exciting throughout the novel? Could you offer some practical, specific tips?

A: Well, Raymond Chandler says, “When in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns.” I didn’t do that, but I kept the spirit of this excellent advice in mind. Consider variations on that theme—even a car chase, for instance. Also, I try to think of my book as a series of dramatic scenes that will tell the story. A novel’s a big piece of work, so it helps me to get my arms around it by breaking it down into scenes. I think, how will I move the plot along in this scene? How will I reveal character?

Q: Setting is also quite important and in many cases it becomes like a character itself. What tools of the trade did you use in your writing to bring the setting to life?

A: What I tried to do in White with Fish was create a story world--a noir-ish version of 1948 San Francisco. I used descriptions of specific locations and objects, details, and stylized dialogue to give the novel verisimilitude, and try to give the book the feel of a more human, less technological world than the one we live in.

Q: Did you know the theme(s) of your novel from the start or is this something you discovered after completing the first draft? Is this theme(s) recurrent in your other work?

A: Themes! Ah! I think I have a sense of the themes of my work inside my subconscious when I start writing. But I can only articulate the themes after the first draft is complete. Some of the themes in my writing have been recurring—non-violence, the duality of human nature, the breakdown of civil order, and classic noir themes, like love, lust, greed, lying dames, violence, double-crosses, and murder.

Q: Where does craft end and art begin? Do you think editing can destroy the initial creative thrust of an author?

A: I for one, can’t imagine always hitting the mark on the first or only creative thrust. I believe editing and revision are a part of art, maybe 60 percent or more. Just don’t throw out what is good and true and right about that initial draft when you’re editing. Fix the structure to support the plot and the theme; develop and strengthen what is good and what could be better, and cut what doesn’t work so well.

Q: What three things, in your opinion, make a successful novelist?

A: Perseverance is necessary. This is especially true in marketing your manuscripts—pitching your novel to an agent or a publisher, or submitting shorter fiction to the right journal or magazine. Nearly 35 publishers declined my novelette, “Pearl’s Valley.” But it will be released as a standalone book in April by Dark Passages [ https://darkpassagespublishing.com/ ]

Discipline—To me, discipline means to write every day. The surest way to improve your skills and grow as a writer is to write. Write every day. If you write 500 words a day—a page and a half—you’ll have a first draft of a novel faster than you ever expected.

Creativity—Creativity is the fun part of making a successful novelist. You can start with the tropes of your subgenre—like I use tropes from hard-boiled fiction and from noir fiction. But you take them and make them your own—that’s the creativity part.

Q: A famous writer once wrote that being an author is like having to do homework for the rest of your life. What do you think about that?

A: I don’t know. As another person (who should be famous), said, “If you’re doing what you love, you’ll never have to work a day in your life.” Though I may have dreaded homework when I was in school, I love my writing, now, and I think I will for the rest of my life.

Q: Are there any resources, books, workshops or sites about craft that you’ve found helpful during your writing career?

A: You should keep a handful of reference books, such as Strunk and White and a dictionary on hand. Stephen King On Writing tells you everything else you need to know to write good narrative prose, and it’s a good example of the craft, presented in a fun, entertaining style. I also use Janet Burroway’s Writing Fiction, and Ursula LeGuin’s Steering the Craft when I need examples of different techniques, such as third person limited omniscience point of view. I’ve taken online writing classes from Stanford that have been excellent, and I’ve participated in classroom workshops at a place in Bethesda, Maryland called the Writer’s Center. If you’re a genre writer, like me, consider joining a group of like-minded writers for different kinds of support. For example, I’m in Private Eye Writers of America, and in the local chapter of Mystery Writers of America.

Q:  Is there anything else you’d like to share with my readers about the craft of writing?

A: Well, classes and workshops can be great and can give you a good foundation in the craft. But I truly believe there are two keys to being a writer. 1.) Read good writing. Reading is learning to write by osmosis. See how the great writers tackled a particular problem, or learn how contemporary writers in your genre handle a specific sort of scene. And 2.) write. Everything you write is practice and experience. There will be good stuff even in your earliest writing that you can build upon.

I’m always happy to help if I can, and I’d enjoy hearing from other writers, and my readers. Harley.c.mazuk@gmail.com

 

Harley Mazuk [http://www.harleymazuk.com/] is a mystery writer living in Maryland. His first novel, White with Fish, Red with Murder [http://www.drivenpress.net/white-with-fish-red-with-murder] is out now, from Driven Press. [http://www.drivenpress.net/]