Richard Godwin's Blog, page 5

Chin Wag At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Simon Toyne

Simon Toyne worked as a TV producer before writing Sanctus. It was the biggest selling debut thriller of 2011 in the UK and has been translated into over 28 languages. He has a new book out later this year, Solomon Creed. Simon met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about the success of his fiction and working for television.

To what do you attribute the success of your first novel Sanctus?

Well there’s always an element of luck and timing in any success, which you can’t really control, but I would say the main reason Sanctus was successful is that it has a very strong, clear, big, intriguing idea at the core of it.

Sanctus was my debut so I had no readership to tap into, no one knew who I was, so the only thing that was ever going to get readers to pick it up over someone else’s book – an author they’d actually heard of – was the strength of the idea and the ability of the cover to convey it. I came from a background in commercial television so I applied the same process of trying to come up with a strong programme idea to a book.

‘Sanctus’ is basically a mystery. There is a huge, powerful secret at the heart of the story called the Sacrament with one faction trying to find out what it is and another trying to keep it hidden. So the hook of the book can be summed up in four words ‘What is the Sacrament?’. I knew what that message was before I wrote a word of the story. I have a notebook somewhere with ‘What is the Sacrament?’ scrawled at the top of page 2.

The trick as a writer, of course, is to make sure you ultimately answer that question in a way that doesn’t make the reader throw the book across the room. Your solution needs to be better than anything the reader has come up with themselves. You’ll have to read it to decide whether I managed to pull it off.

How has your career working for ITV influenced you as an author?

Before writing my first novel I worked for almost twenty years as a producer and director in British commercial television, which turned out to be the perfect apprenticeship for becoming a thriller writer. It’s also the same path Lee Child took and it worked out Ok for him too.

Working in television taught me the discipline of being creative to a deadline, how to construct an engaging narrative, about pacing and intercutting. It also taught me about editing, which I think is the most under-developed part of most writer’s repertoire. Learning how to look at something and see what’s working and what isn’t then completely pulling it apart and putting it back together in a much better form is something that happens on a daily basis in television. All programmes are made in the edit and I think it’s the same with books. First drafts are only really raw material but first time writers spend a lot of time, I think, assuming the first draft has got to be almost perfect and that the edit is only about tightening and correcting grammar. In truth, ninety percent of writing is re-writing. So TV taught me how to edit and not be precious about the material and for that I shall be forever in its debt.

Do you think it is possible to write a novel that is made for film?

I think most thrillers are made for film. They generally follow the same three act structure, have very clear, driven plots, twists all the way through and often a big one at the end. They also deal in strong archetypes – heroes, anti-heroes, villains – which suits a studio system always looking for vehicles for their biggest stars. It’s the more literary end of the novel spectrum that is less suited to film I think, often because not much happens in them and a lot more of the story is internal, which is hard to convey visually. You can do voice over of course but generally that’s quite distancing for an audience – being told stuff rather than shown it. There are notable exceptions – Goodfellas, Shawshank Redemption, the original cut of Blade Runner – but in the main I think thrillers and films work much better when the reader/viewer is discovering things for themselves.

Who are your literary influences?

I think any writer is influenced by all the book they read – good and bad. Bad books are useful when you’re unpublished because they encourage you to think you could do better. Good books show you where the bar is.

For my first three books I re-read ‘The Silence of the Lambs’ by Thomas Harris before starting each one to inspire and educate. It’s the perfect thriller I think, with ‘Red Dragon’ coming a close second. ‘The Tower’ is a bit of an homage to it in many ways with an FBI rookie agent swept up into a big investigation.

Stephen King is also a touchstone for my generation I think. When I was a kid we used to read his new books in the same way we listened to new albums, he was part of the culture. He’s having a bit of a renaissance I think, I thought ‘Mr. Mercedes’ and ‘Revival’ were both getting back towards his best.

I read a lot of sci-fi when I was younger and still love John Wyndham and Richard Matheson. Dickens and Hardy for their rich landscapes and plots. Dylan Thomas for the language. Orwell for the steely clarity and precision.

Of more modern writers I’m a big fan of James Lee Burke, Dennis Lehane, John Irving, Michael Connelly, James Ellroy, Neil Gaiman, Phillip Pullman. I’m also a great admirer of Lee Child, who I think is actually a great prose stylist. All his books sound like him and there’s a terse, musicality to his writing – like the blues. I think it’s one of the things that sets him apart from the crowd. He also shares my background in television so I can see a lot of the techniques I use in his writing too. I steal a lot of stuff from Lee’s books, and told him so once. His reply was – ‘I steal all the time too so you’re probably not stealing it from me.’

Do you think a lot of crime fiction sanitises crime?

Some of it does, but I don’t think it’s the job of crime fiction to necessarily show crime as it really is. Crime fiction is not documentary, it’s storytelling that is primarily about entertainment. Therefore a painstaking depiction of the results of crime, the pain and disruption it causes etc., is often secondary to the action, particularly in thrillers. It’s hard to move a story forward, chase leads, pursue the bad guys and so on, if you are spending pages describing the small, interior psychological damage of one person in the wake of something bad that has happened to them. This isn’t always the case, of course. Sometimes the story is as much about the effects of crime as the crimes themselves. ‘Breaking Bad’, for example, is a really good case where the whole spine of the story is a gradual study of the corrosive effects of crime on the main characters. I don’t think anyone watching ‘Breaking Bad’ would come out of it thinking that becoming a meth king pin might be a good career move.

What do you make of the e-book revolution?

I see it more as an ‘evolution’ than a ‘revolution’. It’s certainly changed the publishing landscape but I think in the US, who are probably a year or so further down the road on e-books than the UK, the initial take-up is now plateauing and the traditional book is clearly not finished, as was claimed. In truth, the majority of people still prefer a real book to reading something on an e-reader, myself included.

What has changed drastically is the importance of the backlist. It used to be of little value because bookshops could only really store lead titles but now you can order an author’s entire life’s work with the click of a button so it’s an important part of the publishing model and of any author’s currency.

The downside of e-books is that a book in e-format is so much easier to steal. E-readers have opened the doors to the pirates, which is bad for authors, many of whom struggle to make a living as it is. People need to realise that the value of an e-book is not in whether it had to be printed and warehoused and shipped somewhere, it’s in the fact that it took someone, probably with all the usual stuff like a mortgage and kids to support, a year of their life to produce. That book will entertain you for maybe 8 hours and take you away from the pressures of your own life, yet a lot of people baulk at paying, say, £3.99 for it, yet they’ll happily pay £3 for a coffee that will last them 5 minutes. I think the internet providers need to be challenged more on being responsible for the content they are hosting. If a store was selling stolen goods it would be closed down or massively fined and that’s exactly that’s happening with illegal downloading sites, but the big providers just shrug and say ‘it’s too difficult to police’. They say that yet they seem to know exactly what adverts to ping at me based on the contents of my emails. How hard would it be to block or at least vet all sites that use the words ‘Torrent’ in their description? Not hard I wouldn’t think, but no one’s prepared to do it and governments are too in thrall to big business to challenge wealthy multinationals.

Do you think publishing and media generally can be used as a form of social engineering and do bestsellers conform to certain moral dictates?

Clearly media can be used for social engineering through propaganda and advertising, and publishing is part of the media machine, particularly newspapers, which are very effective tools of opinion forming. Fiction is slightly different. At its best it reveals truths through elegantly contrived lies and makes the reader think and make their own mind up about things. I wouldn’t use fiction to try and socially engineer anything. It’s the wrong tool, like trying to hammer a nail in with a spanner: it would kind of work but there are other tools that work much better.

In terms of bestsellers, certainly in the crime and thriller genre I think there are definite morals undertows. PD James described the crime novel as being about the restoration of order from a situation of chaos, and that’s certainly tied up with a moral code – i.e. a crime is committed at the start and they are brought to justice by the end – the moral triumphs over the immoral. I think this is why crime and thrillers are so popular. They appeal to us because we fear chaos and anarchy and feel comforted by the restoration of order and justice.

The Sanctus trilogy certainly utilise moral dictates in their storytelling. They have religious themes woven into them and religion, organised religion in particular, is very proprietary about morality. One of the big themes of the trilogy is about personal morality and how it has nothing to do with spirituality and everything to do with being human.

Do you think killing and fucking are related?

Well the french call an orgasm ‘la petite mort’ – the little death, so clearly they do.

Both in fiction and in real life a twisted sexuality can certainly give rise to homicidal tendencies – Norman Bates being the obvious poster boy for that. He was based on Ed Gein, a real life serial killer with a whole locker full of sexual deviance. So, yes. I’m with the French.

What advice would you give to yourself as a younger man?

I would say ‘Don’t worry about things so much.’ I would also tell myself to kiss more people. My late teens and early twenties were filled with a procession of interesting and sexy people I desperately wanted to kiss but didn’t because I was far too timid and afraid of rejection. Looking back now there at least five girls I should have been more bold with. If any of you are reading this, and I’m sure you know who you are, I apologise – it wasn’t you it was me. You were beautiful and desirable and charming, and I’m sure you still are.

Graham Greene wrote, ‘There is a splinter of ice in the heart of a writer.’ What do you make of his observation?

It’s true, it’s true of any artist I think. Even in our darkest, most emotional moments there’s always a small part of ourselves noting it all down so we can drag it up and use it later to make our lies seem more real. The Polish poet Czesław Miłosz also wrote that ‘when a writer is born into a family, that family is finished’. I think these two quotes are related.

Thank you Simon for an informative interview.

Links:

The Sanctus Trilogy, quick links to Amazon:

The Key at Amazon UK and US

Sanctus at Amazon UK and US

The Tower at Amazon UK and US

See Simon Toyne’s Books page for other buy links

Pre-order a copy of Simon’s latest work, Solomon Creed, at Amazon UK and US

Find Simon on his website, Twitter, and Facebook

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Peter Leonard

Peter Leonard writes thrillers that have earned him wide critical acclaim. He is also the son of Elmore Leonard, one of the greatest crime novelists of all time. His latest novel is Eyes Closed Tight. Peter met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about his new release and the Raylan novel he is writing as a tribute to his father.

Tell us about Eyes Closed Tight.

O’Clair, a former Detroit homicide investigator, now in retirement, owns a motel in Pompano Beach, Florida. He runs the place with his much younger girlfriend, Virginia, a knockout who can fix anything. One morning he’s cleaning up after the previous night’s partiers when he sees a lovely young girl stretched out asleep on a lounge chair. He tries to wake her, then touches her neck and feels for a pulse. There isn’t one. Her skin is cold, body starting to stiffen, definitely in the early stages of rigor.

When a second girl is murdered, O’Clair knows someone is sending him a message. The way the girls are killed reminds O’Clair of a case he investigated years earlier. Now convinced the Pompano murders are related, O’Clair returns to Detroit Police homicide to review the murder file and try to figure out what he might’ve missed.

How are you progressing with your father Elmore Leonard’s unfinished novel?

I decided shortly after my father passed away that finishing Blue Dreams, the novel he was working on, was a bad idea. I felt odd meddling, insinuating myself in this novel where I didn’t belong. I decided instead to write a Raylan Givens novel as a tribute to my father. I could take my father’s beloved character and put him in my own story. My working title is: Raylan goes to Detroit. This is new and interesting territory for deputy U.S. marshal Givens. He ends up on the Fugitive Task Force hunting a ruthless drug trafficker on an odyssey that takes him from Detroit to Tucson, Arizona to San Diego, California and then south into Mexico.

Do you think much crime fiction sanitises crime?

I think the proliferation of crime novels and crime TV shows have educated readers and viewers, and that makes it more difficult to develop plots and story lines that are fresh and interesting. Crime fans are far more knowledgeable and sophisticated today. I don’t know that crime fiction sanitises crime as much as it blunts the impact of crime.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

Researching the Raylan novel, I spent some time with a young female deputy U.S. marshal on the Detroit Fugitive Task Force, accompanying her as she hunted bank robbers, murderers, and drug traffickers. I’ve written a short story, incorporating much of what I saw and heard. It’s called Armed and Dangerous. I’m in the process of selling it as a TV series.

Thank you Peter for a great interview.

Links:

Get a copy of ‘Eyes Shut Tight’ at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and Barnes & Noble

Find Peter Leonard at his website http://www.peterleonardbooks.com/

Chin Wag At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Gary Haynes

Gary Hayne is the author of two counterterrorism thrillers. They have been described as “Plots that seem as if they are lifted from today’s news on the threat of terrorism.” His latest novel, State Of Honour, focuses on his character special agent Tom Dupree. Gary met me at The Slaughterhouse here we talked about the age of surveillance and political realities.

How important is honour in your novel State Of Honour, and in the age of surveillance where political realities can be easily manipulated is a man like Tom apprised of the facts or a pawn?

Honour is integral to understanding the main character, Tom Dupree. Haunted by his past, in particular, a broken promise to his mother that led to tragic circumstances, his pursuit of the honourable life is partly a process of redemption, and partly an antidote for the dark and violent worlds he finds himself in.

But honour comes in many forms, depending on the individual’s perspective, and so other characters in the first book exhibit their own sense of honour, too. State of Honour is based both in the West and the Greater Middle East. It is the juxtaposition of these various senses of honour that interests me as much as exploring it within my main character.

As for surveillance, this is only useful if you know who you’re looking for and why. And even when you do know, it still takes huge amounts of effort to utilize it successfully. For years, bin Laden evaded the best surveillance systems in the world.

Tom is aware of the overriding geopolitical issues, but not the surveillance on the ground, that is the web of assets, agents and core collectors in the vicinity at any given time. The best surveillance in the counterterrorism world, even now, comes down to local boots on the ground, rather than drones in the sky.

I don’t see Tom as a pawn, but rather as a man who is willingly serving others in the best way he knows how. In the last analysis, he is aware of what he needs to be aware of. But the overarching game within a game, as I like to call it, is only understood in the context of State of Honour by the players (and the reader, of course!).

As a lawyer how do you view the UKUSA agreement?

In general it makes sense for the UK and the USA (and Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, collectively known as the Five Eyes) to have an agreement that shares security intelligence and which fosters these “special relationships.” It was conceived in World War II and grew to prominence in the Cold War. In those perilous times it was not only a pragmatic coalition, but one which might be the difference between a collective life and death.

Things have changed since then, not least due to the prevalence and sophistication of security monitoring. Putin’s violent expansionist politics and the rise of the death cult that is ISIS have brought about new threats, but these do not present a real danger to the foundation stones of Western democracy – freedom of speech and the rule of law – although they will be recurrent themes for the next decade or more.

As a lawyer my main concern is to uphold, in my own small way, the foundation stones. But the question is: at what cost? Many theorists have said that the main threat to the foundation stones are not external, but internal, meaning that our governments will utilize our fears, well-founded or not, to increase their surreptitious activities.

Do I want to live in a threat-free bubble at the cost of losing my individual rights? Certainly not. Do I think that a benevolent(ish) form of “1984” is acceptable? Certainly not. But a government’s first duty is the protection of its citizens and so a sensible balance has to be reached, one that is best overseen by the separation of the courts from the state, and the interpretation of laws passed by democratically elected governments with a real mandate on such important issues.

In my view, the sharing of security intelligence is important, but a government should not subjugate its own laws to that of another, just because it partakes in this collaboration.

What do you say to those people who view the activities of an organisation such as Echelon and the Menwith Hills listening station as invasive, or has privacy been erased by the internet?

The Five Eyes collect information in many ways. They are constantly monitoring all forms of communication, including email, social media and phone calls. They are checking for repeated, sensitive words in a particular context, and certain patterns of otherwise innocuous words. These trigger alarms in some of the most sophisticated computers in the world. 99.9% of this is just noise. The intelligence communities aren’t interested in eavesdropping for the sake of it. It simply serves no purpose, and they only dig a little deeper in instances where they have a real suspicion.

As for the Internet, your personal viewing history is more reliable than any autobiography could be. It is fairly easily available too, which is worrying.

The problem I have as a lawyer revolves around the question of intention. By this I mean that two people may look at the same sites for completely different reasons. One might be a potential terrorist checking out ISIS recruitment and bombmaking for the purpose of a domestic jihad, and the other might be entirely innocent. One has intention and one doesn’t. Increasingly, in my view, the demarcation line will blur, and what we do, even if innocent and without any harmful intent, will have the potential to be used as a completely unjustified and unknowable blackball that may, for example, limit our job opportunities. But I do not believe that the security services are overly invasive. Besides, if they are interested in you, you won’t know about it.

What is the likelihood of a false positive and how useful is it dramatically to a writer of thrillers?

Many thriller writers use false positives and I use them myself. It can help to produce a great twist, or be used as a red herring or a deflection.

The term is used widely in the sense of a medical misdiagnosis, and is, I suppose, the opposite of a placebo. I have seen research that states that people exhibit the symptoms of the disease they in fact do not have, which is both tragic and interesting. But In the counterterrorism world a “misdiagnosis” can have even more profound and often lethal consequences, of course.

It is useful dramatically but it cannot be overused, otherwise the reader will feel cheated. I utilized the technique quite a lot in State of Honour because I wanted to create a sense of disorientation in the reader that reflected the frenetic, three-day period that my hero, Tom Dupree, spent searching for the kidnapped US Secretary of State. One of the most powerful scenes in the book, or so my readers tell me, was a reveal that seemingly came out of nowhere. The trick is to use enough smoke so that the reader doesn’t anticipate it, but on reflection he/she can say, oh yes, I can see where that came from now.

How does a character like Tom fit into this global situation, that may be described as Manichean given the extreme polarisation of the conflict as represented by the media?

First off, he is a well-educated man who speaks several languages. But he would not describe himself as an intellectual. He has chosen an area of work that is physical as well as mentally rigorous. He doesn’t see the West and its enemies as polar opposites per se. In fact, it would be a disadvantage, because part of what makes a good special agent in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security is a degree of empathy.

In many ways, of course, the geopolitical world is polarised. The difference between those countries who strive, however imperfectly, to uphold the rule of law, and those states like Russia, and organizations like the Islamic State group, are so stark that it is difficult to see any form of compromise.

But Tom is focussed more on the characters that inhabit his immediate world, rather than the overarching geopolitical situation. I explore and comment upon these wider concerns in my novels, but I use other voices or the narrator to do so.

Who are your literary influences?

Joseph Conrad, Ernest Hemingway, Frederick Forsyth and James Lee Burke.

How has your work as a lawyer influenced your writing?

As a lawyer engaged in litigation, I deal with a lot of people suffering from varying degrees of stress. This is why I write about people in stressful situations, I suppose, namely thrillers. But I have always been drawn to the genre, even before I was a lawyer, so perhaps the link is a tenuous one.

But being a lawyer undoubtedly helps a writer understand the human condition, in particular, those forces that motivate people, even when they are saying the opposite. It has also crystallized my belief that most people are infinitely complex, and that out there among us are people we now call sociopaths, people who are so difficult to understand that the only conclusion is that they lack something that the majority of us possess.

As a lawyer I deal with tens of cases at any one time, which results in having to assimilate thousands of pages of often difficult facts. This undoubtedly assists in writing thriller plots with their twists and turns and reveals. I have good research skills, as most lawyers do, which were honed over six years of training. Sometimes winning a case can come down to examining one sentence written on a piece of paper. This focus on the minutiae assists in uncovering the root of what I am researching, which is particularly important when writing counterterrorism and political thrillers.

Graham Greene wrote, ‘There is a splinter of ice in the heart of a writer.’ What do you make of his observation?

For me, it’s a warning to writers. A novel should not be used to espouse a particular social or political ideology. Writers do, of course, reveal something of themselves via their narrator or characters, but a novel is neither the best nor the appropriate vehicle for this type of opinion.

Novels should be plot and character driven, not ideologically driven. He was also suggesting, I believe, that novelists should go further and not attach themselves to belief systems, which are by their nature, confining. The splinter of ice in the heart symbolises detachment.

What are you working on right now?

I’m just finishing a stand-alone thriller based in the UK. It’s about a seventeen-year-old girl and her journey with a man she hires to help her find her two missing brothers. I’m also completing a WW2 novella based on the last days of Berlin. Then it’s the next Tom Dupree thriller.

What advice would you give to yourself as a younger man?

Find out what makes you want to get up in the morning, what you are truly passionate about, and start doing it. Aim to be the best you can at it.

Thank you Gary for an informative interview.

Links:

State Of Honour can be had at Amazon US and UK

Get a copy of State Of Attack at Amazon US and UK

Find Gary at his website, on Goodreads, Facebook and Twitter

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Steven James

Steven James is the critically acclaimed author of more than thirty books, including his bestselling Patrick Bowers series. One of the nation’s most innovative storytellers, he developed his skill as a performer at East Tennessee State University (MA in storytelling). His new novel is Checkmate.

Steven met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about his new release and his views on plots in novels.

Tell us about Checkmate.

Checkmate is the eighth and final book in the Patrick Bowers chess series.

And I have to say, it’s been quite a journey.

I started working on the first draft of The Pawn nearly a decade ago. Now, with the release of Checkmate, a sweeping chapter of my life is coming to a close.

This book starts when a clandestine FBI facility is attacked and FBI Special Agent Patrick Bowers is drawn into the vicious, ruthless story that a killer from his past is bent on telling the world.

While researching the book, I heard about some abadoned gold mines that still supposedly existed buried deep beneath Uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, where the story takes place. Fascinated, I dove into researching the area. People kept telling me that the mines were there, but no one knew where.

Then I found the map.

It was located in the archives at the UNC Charlotte library and it showed where 63 abandoned gold mine shafts were, all close to the football stadium where the Panthers play.

That gave me just what I needed: a map to long-forgotten secrets buried deep in the city, and a starting place for Bowers as he’s caught up trying to stop one of the deadliest attacks ever planned on American soil.

Checkmate is a wild ride full of intriguing plot twists and turns and it has a climax that even I didn’t see coming until I was nearly finished with the book. It’s one of my favorites for the series and ties up a lot of plot threads and questions from previous books.

Do you believe that plot is character based or purely situational?

I tend to agree with Ray Bradbury who said, “Remember: Plot is no more than footprints left in the snow after your characters have run by on their way to incredible destinations.”

Engaging stories are always about characters that we want to see succeed, or at least that we want to see escape the turmoil they find themselves caught up in as the story proceeds.

Stories pivot on tension as the characters try to answer deep questions or fulfill their unmet desires. I think it’s best to start at that point—a character who’s facing a struggle, and then follow him as he tries to fight his way through it. The situations, the problems only have deep meaning when they’re wedded to the deep desires of a characters that readers care about.

Are your fictions redemptive?

Yes. As a Christian I believe in the reality of evil, but also the reality of hope, of redemption for a broken race of hurting people, and I think that comes through in the stories I tell.

I’m convinced that all great literature asks big questions and this series has given me the chance to explore a number of issues related to justice, truth, and the bounds of human

nature.

However, rather than start with a lesson that I want to teach, when I write fiction I start with a moral dilemma or a question I’d like to explore. In this book, it was the question of hope and truth—which is more important?

I let Patrick Bowers wrestle with this issue when he’s forced to decide if he’s going to share the truth with a woman even though he believes it will shatter her.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

This looks like a year of closure: Over the next six months I’ll be finishing up the third book of a young adult trilogy of thrillers. (Blur came out last year, Fury releases in May 2015). In addition to our wrapping up the chess series.

Also, in my spare time I’m writing a book on the craft of novel writing as a followup to my craft book Story Trumps Structure: How to Write Unforgettable Fiction by Breaking the Rules, which came out in 2014. Lots on my plate, but I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Steven thank you for a great interview.

Links:

Get a copy of Checkmate at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk or click here for more on Checkmate to include all buy links

See all Steven James books at his website and Amazon author page

Find Steven at his website, Goodreads, Facebook and Twitter

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Robert Dugoni

Robert Dugoni is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous legal thrillers. His latest novel is Your Sister’s Grave. It deals with a Homicide Detective’s investigation into the events surrounding her sister’s murder. Robert met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about his new release and the legal system.

Tell us about Your Sister’s Grave.

My Sister’s Grave is the first novel in the Tracy Crosswhite Series. Seattle Homicide Detective Crosswhit was one of the detectives in Murder One. I’m not sure why or how I conjured her up, but she is a former chemistry teacher who became a cop. So I immediately started to think about her background. Why had she left teaching? Why become a cop? Why wasn’t she married? What was it like being the first female homicide detective in a predominantly male profession? What had she been through? Although that was percolating, I really didn’t have a story for her. So I let it sit a while. Then I was reading the newspaper and I happened upon an article on the removal of the hydro-electric dams in Washington State to restore the spawning grounds of the wild salmon. I read about how lakes above the dam receded and they were finding all kinds of things at the bottom. And I thought, what if they found a buried body, a body of somebody missing just before the dam went on line. Then I thought of Tracy Crosswhite and began to concoct a story around her. Ultimately I decided the body found was a younger sister, Sarah, and Sarah’s disappearance was what motivated Tracy to become a cop, though not without consequences. Now, 20 years later, the forensics in the grave seem to confirm what Tracy believed all along, that the evidence did not add up and that the man convicted of the murder might not be the killer. To find out what happened to her sister, Tracy must get a new trial for a convicted rapist and murderer, but is she opening the door to even darker secrets in her small hometown of Cedar Grove, and greater dangers?

As a former lawyer how do you portray the legal system in your fictions and are your novels redemptive?

Most trials are boring, frankly. There are a lot of rules and attorney’s spend a lot of the time dotting their I’s and crossing their T’s so that they can preserve the record in case of an appeal. There are also a lot of foundational questions that an attorney must ask that are also not very exciting, name, residence, background, credentials. Readers don’t want to go through this monotony. So, as with any scene, I do my best to drop the reader into the trial at high moments of tension or at moments where information that the reader needs is revealed. Then I try to get out at a high point of tension or with a question unanswered.

As to whether my novels are redemptive, I think to an extent almost all novels have some redemptive quality because the character is on a physical and a spiritual quest of some kind. Readers like to see both wrapped up. They like to see the journey completed and they like to see that the journey has changed the character in some way. Now, does this mean that the character is going to have an enormous life change, move to Tibet and become a monk? No. Redemption often is more subtle.

To what extent do you think writers of crime fiction are expected to sanitise crime?

Interesting question. I was watching a true crime show the other day and was just horrified at how horrific violent crimes are. They are so gruesome, so violent. I’m not sure there is any way to capture that in books, or that writer’s should. I know I don’t like to read books that are too dark, or too violent or too graphic. I just don’t want to go there. In a sense, I treat my crime books like the way I write love scenes. The actual act always takes place off camera. I fade to black. I also don’t try to get too descriptive. That’s a personal preference and one I think my readers appreciate. My readers read for the mystery. They want to find out who done it! They want to get into my characters and become a part of the book. Yes, they like to be moved – frightened, saddened etcetera, but no one has ever asked for more violence.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

I’ve signed a deal with Thomas & Mercer for two more books in the Tracy Crosswhite series. I’m finishing up the edits to the sequel, today, on Super Bowl Sunday and I have a start on the plot to the third in the series. Beyond that I am continuing to teach and attend various writing conferences around the country and try to keep fans and students updated on my website at http://www.robertdugoni.com/ and http://novelwritingintensive.com/.

Thank you Robert for a comprehensive and perceptive interview.

Links:

Get a copy of ‘My Sister’s Grave’ at Amazon US and UK

Read more about ‘My Sister’s Grave’ here

Other books By Robert Dugoni

Find Robert at his website, on Facebook and Twitter

Click here to learn more about the next Novel Writing Intensive events to be held and how to register.

Chin Wag At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Gunnar Angel Lawrence

Gunnar Angel Lawrence is the author of Fair Pay. The sequel, The Perfect Day, is about a terrorist attack on Florida. It is based on real plots discovered by American troops during the Iraq war. Gunnar met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about the novel and surveillance.

Tell us about your novel.

The Perfect Day is the result of two years of researching the real life plot discovered by our troops during the later parts of the Iraq war. It was a plot that has been in motion since 2004. Documents were found in an Iraqi terror training camp including blueprints of American schools, public targets like theme parks and shopping malls. There was a mock high school built within this terrorist camp with classrooms, a gym and even posters advertising a school dance in English. The plot entails several undercover terror cells within the United States of America who would on one day rise up and conduct attacks against the targets they were trained to attack. It was the very real existence of this plot that inspired the book and of course I set these attacks beginning in the tourist capital of the world, my home town of Orlando, Florida. It is the sequel to my thriller, Fair Play.

How do you view the role of the NSA and do you think surveillance protects or limits civil liberties?

There is a fine line between surveillance of potential terrorists meant to protect lives and the systematic collection of every piece of data on every American for some ambiguous future purpose. The NSA has the singular job of preventing terrorists from succeeding in their goal of killing as many people as they can, so it is understandable that some surveillance is necessary. Unfortunately, as with all government agencies there is abuse of the power they are given. For the NSA to collect phone metadata, record the phone calls and emails of ordinary citizens without a warrant is absolutely a violation of the civil liberties guaranteed to us by the Constitution.

Some people justify the practice by convincing themselves that since they have nothing to hide, they have nothing to be worried about because the NSA won’t find anything. And as such, they don’t care that there is someone listening to every call and reading every email they send. The truth is that every American is guaranteed at least an expectation of privacy in their day to day lives and that there are many Americans with nothing to hide who are angry that someone may be spying on them. It really isn’t a matter of whether or not one has something to hide or not. The Constitution is the founding document of our country, to arbitrarily choose portions of that document as being irrelevant endangers the entire thing.

Do you think that modern technology and the internet have increased voyeurism and if so how has that influenced the way we think today?

There has always been, I believe, a sense of thrill that people have at watching others without their knowledge. The Candid Camera television series proves that the desire to spy on others predates the era of the ubiquitous camera phones, security and traffic cameras. Today, we have similar programs, Cops, Police Chases, America’s Dumbest Criminals, etc, where we get to see some people at the absolute worst moment of their lives all for our watching pleasure. Modern technology has helped fuel the desire by making it possible to share these videos via the Internet and social media. With the advent of the camera phone, it is also more likely that at any given time, you are being recorded by someone. There are news stories almost on a weekly basis of people who have either set up a hidden camera/microphone or hacked into the feed of someone elses’ security to watch from a distance.

As with any new technology there are pluses and minuses that we have to deal with. The knowledge that one might be caught on tape can lead to a change in behavior. For some that would mean preventing them from doing something they would regret, for others, sadly it would mean their shot at their ’15 minutes of fame’. There are websites out there that encourage others to make videos of fighting or rioting and post them. There is actually a sort of honor in being featured online as the aggressor in a fight. So yes, the new technology has changed some behaviors, but there was and always has been those who get a thrill by taking advantage of others and acting like thugs. Nowadays, it is just easier to see more of them doing so.

Who are your literary influences?

I’ve been reading mystery and thriller books since I was in middle school. I loved the ingenious twists and turns of Agatha Christie novels. Steven King was a big part of my high school reading years. Lately I’ve been reading the Patrick Bowers series by Steven James and anything I can get my hands on by Vince Flynn. When I’m slowing down the pace of my reading of thrillers and horror novels I sit down with a Nicolas Sparks novel. And when I am in the mood for the classics I reread Bram Stoker’s Dracula, or Papa Ernest Hemingway. I love living in the worlds they create and there have been very few authors that I have read that haven’t influenced me in some way.

What do you make of the E Book revolution?

E Books have opened a whole new world to writers who perhaps would never have gotten published traditionally, not for lack of talent, but just because of the sheer number of submissions that must be sifted through to get to books that traditional publishers will take a risk on. One in ten thousand manuscripts submitted gets traditionally published, if my stats are right. It has spawned off shoots of genres never considered before. Steampunk, splatterpunk, are just two examples. It has created large fan bases of authors previously unheard of. It is also doing to brick and mortar book stores what email did to the fax machine. Smaller book stores can’t keep up with the ease of shopping online and having the book delivered to a reading device.

E Books have made vacation or travel much easier on the avid reader. One lightweight device with thousands of books on it, and the ability to download a new book with the touch of a button. I don’t believe that paper books will completely disappear but the revolution shows no sign of slowing down. Rather than lament what we have ‘lost’ to the progress and technology of today, we need to embrace it. If we don’t, we could end up becoming obsolete.

Do you think much crime fiction sanitises crime?

I think audiences, both readers and television/movie fans have become at least partially desensitized to crime. They have been exposed to cannibalism, beheadings, and murder on an almost daily basis from just watching the news. The bar for shock value has been significantly raised over the past few decades. With compelling characters like Hannibal Lectre and Dexter Morgan in literature there is an effect on readers that lets them explore their dark side without having to surrender to it.

The writer has a couple of options in meeting these readers where they are. Some choose to go over the top of the bar in a big way in an attempt to reach the shock value they feel their story needs. Multiplying the level of gore in their story gave rise to the Splatterpunk genre. It has been proven that there is a serious market for those types of books. The other option is to completely tone down gory descriptions of any kind and concentrate on the characters or the intricacy of their plot. There really isn’t a right or wrong option as it is the writer’s story and in some cases, the characters tell the writers what to write and how.

Much crime fiction is redemptive structurally, given the fact that many crimes go unsolved do you think that the genre lacks realism?

I believe that one reason people read crime fiction is as an escape from reality. The truth is that reality is complex and can be overwhelming. We have people who kill for no reason, kids killing kids because the Slenderman told them to. Abusive husbands beating and killing wives and successfully defending their actions as being a part of their native culture. We have murders with no motive, murders with a racial motive and with the dismal solve rate on crimes in many of our cities, readers want to escape into a world where things make sense. They want justice for victims, that often doesn’t happen in real life. It can be frustrating to see a Casey Anthony or OJ Simpson getting away with murder. It can be disheartening to see that the justice system in our country is more about what deals can be made behind closed doors than about truly dealing out justice to those who deserve it. It was the Casey Anthony trial that inspired the first book in my series, Fair Play. We watched the drama unfold over the course of more than a year, and the resulting acquittal angered us all. The question that prompted me to write that book was, “How can an attorney work to release someone he or she knows is guilty and not have some remorse?”

Sitting back and reading a murder mystery where the killer is chased, caught and brought to justice may indeed be unrealistic, but it’s something that readers, especially today, crave. Sometimes fiction provides a structure that just isn’t present in reality, a dream world that can make the harshness and frustration of reality fade away, if only for a weekend or two.

Graham Greene wrote, ‘There is a splinter of ice in the heart of a writer.’ What do you make of his observation?

Writers have to have a sense of detachment from the worlds and characters they create. Many times they get familiar with these fictional creations. They may know background information on them that never gets revealed in the final novel. They know the inner struggles their characters have, the intensity of the emotions they experience and the complex history they have. In their minds, they ‘live’ with these characters before, during and after the book is complete. The writer knows that at any time, he or she may have to kill of one of these beloved characters.

Sometimes a writer may even shed a few tears for the fictional death of the fictional character they created. I’ve done that a few times. The first time I found myself really upset, and I could not understand why. Then there are the real life events that severely affect writers: the death of a parent or a friend, an accident or similar tragedy. Writers may tap into their real life emotions and real experiences to write heavily emotional scenes. It’s that sense of detachment that may save a writer’s sanity, so I suppose Mr. Greene is correct.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

2015 will be a very busy year for me. I am working closely with the Indie Author community and have spent the last six months organizing the Saint Cloud Author Symposium scheduled for January 31st at the Veterans Memorial Library. I wanted to provide a venue for indie authors, publishers, agents and more to come and meet each other and their fans. When that is done, I will be working to finish the third book in my Detective Paul Friedman series entitled, The Consortium. One of the characters in The Perfect Day is Monica Quinn, she is a Certified Fraud Examiner who uses accounting to locate and convict the bad guys. I was a member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners for a while and I believe there is some serious action that takes place in the job as a CFE. For those unfamiliar with the work of a CFE, it’s like C.S.I. without the bodies. I was wanting to spin Monica off in her own series in the future. She is a single mother with an autistic son who it turns out plays an important role in The Perfect Day.

I’m also working on finishing a book of horror short stories entitled ‘Fear’ that I have been procrastinating on for a couple of years. I am hoping that I will be able to slow down on my day job and focus more on writing this coming year. It would be absolutely a dream come true.

What advice would you give to yourself as a young man?

Don’t give up your dream. My father was none too thrilled to have a son who wanted to be a writer. He hammered it into my head that I needed a J O B. I bought into it. I gave up as a young high school student and pursued a career that I truly wish I hadn’t. I want to wake up every morning eager to get to work in writing, and if you can do it, do it with all your strength. I would tell myself that anything is possible if you work hard at it, that a degree in Creative Writing is just as meaningful as a degree in Business Administration. Nothing gives me more pleasure, more excitement than writing, I love it and truly wish that I had told my father that. Perhaps I would be no better off than I am now, but I will never know. As the saying goes, “Don’t follow your dreams, chase them.” HERE.

Thank you Gunnar for a perceptive and informative interview.

Links:

‘The Perfect Day,’ sequel to ‘Fair Play,’ can be had at these online stores:

Smashwords

Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Other books by Gunnar A. Lawrence:

Amazon Author Page

Gunnar can be found on Facebook and Twitter

 

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With James Sallis

James Sallis is a seminal American novelist, poet and musician whose works encompass crime fiction and the avant garde. He is the author of the popular Lew Griffin novels and the recent novel Willnot. In addition, he has written and edited a number of musicological studies and works of literary criticism, including The Guitar Players, Difficult Lives, a study of noir writers, and Chester Himes: A Life, a biography of one of his literary heroes. James met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about his new release and the age of surveillance.



Tell us about your latest novel.

The latest, delivered to my agent last week, is titled Willnot, that being the name of the town in which it takes place, one founded as an idealist commune, in that long American tradition of utopianism, and still, two generations later, filled with eccentrics and contrarians. A concentrate of America, in short; the title is adapted from Bartleby’s “I’d prefer not to.” It begins with bodies found buried near a gravel pit; an AWOL Marine sniper born and raised in the town mysteriously returns, as does a dying old man; and the life of the town, related by a physician whose father was a hack science fiction novelist, goes on.

Do you believe we are living in an age of surveillance?



My own government is monitoring internal communications of sovereign, non-hostile nations and, under shelter of the patriot act and endlessly recycled fear, keeping unconstitutional watch on its own “free” citizens. Do you really need to ask me that?

How much does the loss of identity and freedom feature in your writings?

All of it may well be about not the loss of, but the continuous struggle for, identity and freedom.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

Black Night’s Gonna Catch Me Here: New and Selected Poems, containing poems from 1968 till the present, will be out from New Rivers Press in April. We’ve just completed negotiations for graphic novels of Drive and Driven, which should be published by IDW late in the year. And I’ve had several conversations with publishers concerning a collection of my writing about books: introductions for novels by Marek Hlasko, Jean-Patrick Manchette, Boris Vian, Charles Willeford and others; 36 review columns for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction; 45 essay-columns for The Boston Globe; selected reviews from the L.A. Times, Washington Post, and such. And I’ll be starting a new novel any day now, of course – lighting the next, as Phil Dick said, off the smoldering butt of the last.

Thank you Jim for a versatile and insightful interview.

Links:

For all things James Sallis, go to The James Sallis Web Pages

For all James’ books, see his bibliography and Amazon US and UK author pages

‘Drive’ links: Amazon US and UK

‘Driven’ links: Amazon US and UK

‘Others Of My Kind’ links: Amazon US and UK

‘The James Sallis Reader (The Point Blank Reader)’ links: Amazon US and UK

And look for ‘Black Night’s Gonna Catch Me Here: New and Selected Poems’, published by New Rivers Press, coming April 2014

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Terry Irving

Terry Irving is a journalist and an American four-time Emmy award-winning writer and TV producer. His novel, Courier, is a motorcycle thriller in which the protagonist realises people are trying to kill him and he doesn’t know why. It has had some vicissitudes in its publishing history. Terry met at The Slaughterhouse here we talked about his move to self-publishing and promoting the novel.

Tell us about the struggle to stay alive in the Exhibit A mess.

Let me take you all the way back to the beginning. I’d written a book, “Courier,” and found  an agent, and then got a series of lousy but time-consuming jobs which took me completely away from the whole thing. Then, as usual, I was fired again (the problem with being a grumpy old man) and I rewrote the book for the sixth time.

Then I went ahead and began the process of self-publishing the book—as much for the experience as anything else. I certainly didn’t expect to make any money; I’d already published a couple of tiny books to a resounding silence. Finally, in January 2012, everything was complete and my finger was literally on the button (or key) to put “Courier” on the Amazon site. (Actually, it was on the site but only I could see it—I did buy 3 copies of that first edition. I think they’re lost—they’d be collectors’ copies.)

Just then, my agent emailed that some crazy Brit was going to take the book with him on vacation and would get back to me. After I got over my fit of jealous rage that the bastard could take a vacation and I couldn’t, I put the Amazon Createspace edition on permanent Hold. Well, the crazy Brit, a genuinely wonderful guy named Emlyn Rees, came back from Vacation and wrote me an email that I still have framed and mounted on my wall—right above the computer—for those days that I feel blue.

It starts out with “I genuinely love this novel.”

Yeah, Emlyn had me at “hello.”

So, I canned the self-published version (although I did like the self-designed cover)

So, everyone negotiated happily for a long period. I basically went along with whatever they offered but the niceties have to be maintained. Finally, I got a contract for two books with an option on a third with Emlyn’s Exhibit A Crime Fiction division of Angry Robot Books. Exhibit A seemed happy:

Then I almost had a heart attack. Courier wouldn’t be published for 18 months!  I completed the sequel “Warrior” by September 2013 and then found out it wouldn’t be published for another 18 months! What were they doing over there? Using out of work monks to handwrite each copy?

On the other hand, I received my first royalty advance check.  That was a pleasant feeling.

OK, it was one/twentieth of what I needed to live on for a year, but it was pretty cool all the same.

OK, I eventually calmed down and began to breath again. While I waiting for my big “launch,” I wrote a paranormal thriller, ghost-wrote a right wing thriller about overthrowing a liberal president, and developed a massive social media machine.

Finally, i got to see the cover that Exhibit A had designed. Wow, it was love at first sight.  I wish I had looked that good when I was 21—or ever.

So we get close to the Big Launch. I had a long distance phone call from England where they told me they weren’t going to do any marketing for the book (why couldn’t they have saved the money on the call and bought an ad somewhere?) Emlyn—sensing doom I suspect—left for the warm sun (?) of Brighton Beach and was replaced by a new editor who was… personality challenged, let’s say. A perfectly nice guy but not warm and encouraging.

So on May 1, 2014, I had my Big Launch. Despite the fact that I was dropping $2500 a month into a PR agency that everyone else just loved, I was getting no marketing, no real media—just online stuff in Fantasy Romance and YA websites—and no speaking events. They did send me a long list of how many people had refused to speak to me each month which did wonders for my ego.

I held the Book Launch in the parking lot of the biggest local motorcycle dealer.

I scrambled around and found a book convention to attend. I didn’t even know that book conventions existed. The one I found was just down the street and I didn’t notice that the name “Malice Domestic” meant that this was for “cozies.” These are murder mysteries without violence but often with recipes for fudge or crewel patterns included. And there is alway a dog and a cat. Let’s just say that I stood out a bit.

I did get a chance to speak for 15 minutes in a small room. Of the five people who showed up, two asked where the author who had been originally booked was speaking., I said, very nicely, that they could wander off—I wouldn’t mind—and then I talked about “Love in the Land of Motorcycles,” a short speech I’d made up when they’d requested a subject for my big debut. I wish I had a recording of that—wow, that’s a real leap.

My book leapt onto the market and I put that massive social media machine into gear. Sadly, once my relatives and the people I’d worked with over the years had bought their copies, sales dropped off.

Off a cliff, really.

That’s when I realized that my social media monster was mostly made up of other aspiring authors who were no more likely to buy my book than I was to buy theirs. At least I’d gotten rid of most of the 12,000 zombies I’d populated my Twitter feed with at first.

Then my wife and I went to my first Big Event. Thrillerfest—the annual meeting of Thriller Writers in New York City. It was glittering, it was opulent and it was all on credit cards.

On June 7, there was single note posted on the Exhibit A website:

News about Exhibit A

As you will be aware, Angry Robot Books has a history of innovation and we continue to go from strength to strength. We’re constantly trying out new concepts and new ideas, and we continue to publish popular and award-winning books. Our YA imprint Strange Chemistry and our crime/mystery imprint Exhibit A have – due mainly to market saturation – unfortunately been unable to carve out their own niches with as much success.

We have therefore made the difficult decision to discontinue Strange Chemistry and Exhibit A, effective immediately, and no further titles will be published from these two imprints.

The core Angry Robot imprint is robust, however, and we plan to increase our output from 2 books a month, to 3. We have no plans to cancel any titles other than those of Strange Chemistry and Exhibit A.

A day or two later, I had my big moment in the sun at Thrillerfest—the ITW Debut Writer’s Breakfast. 60 seconds to make it or break it with the whole world watching. As usual, I hadn’t prepared anything, but I stood up and said something like:

“This story, my story, is a story of hubris—like the Greek plays—where overweening pride brings the hero down. I thought I would write a book and be a hero. It took 8 weeks to write the book. 8 months find an agent. 3 years to find a publisher. 18 months before the damn thing hit the market. That was on May First. On June 7th, my publisher shut down. So (I held up Courier) I’d really appreciate it if you talked to your agents and publishers about what a great book this is. OK?”

The woman who was writing this up for Book Week or something said the book didn’t seem that bad so I guess I wasn’t really all that clear.

Now, I’ve worked in tech startups and been in charge of two of them when they dropped off the agonizing edge of the cliff and went directly into bankruptcy. Yes, I was a babe in the woods but eventually even a sweet idiot like me begins to see patterns. One was intended to drive down the price of the parent stock so that the bankers who’d bought the company could drive everyone out before beginning to enforce their patents. The other was a 3 Billion dollar division whose sole existence was to raise the price of the parent company before an upcoming sale. The second the sale went through, every dime we spent was money wasted (because the price was already set, you see) and we were laid off almost before they could finish telling us that no one would be laid off.

So I was a wee bit suspicious about this deal and I wasn’t buying that Exhibit A and Strange Chemistry were both going down because we authors hadn’t “carved out our own niche.” Of course, when you looked at the trade papers, it turned out that the Grandparent company had a CEO who was also the Editor-in-Chief. To me, that pretty well meant that no one else in the company had a clue about books. Guess what? The day before this big announcement from Angry Robot, their owners had announced a “reassessment” of the company. I’m sure it had nothing to do with the CEO/EIC going off to a job at Random House.

I can see the meeting so clearly, the suits are all around the table with quivering jowls. They know they have to sell this turkey before it begins to smell—after all it’s a company built on “tea cards” of British Uniforms of the Boer War and Polish Fighting Aces of World War 2, combined with an insane English company that produces slaughter-thrillers with more gore per page than most big city medical examiners combined with science fiction (actually pretty good stuff, but I’m not in the mood to admit it right now). So they have to sell off Angry Robot.

But wait. Angry Robot has these two messy little imprints that haven’t “carved a market niche.” Well, they clearly have to go before it goes on the block. You want a nice, neat package when you go to put yourself on the market for a quick sale.

The meeting breaks up in happy smiles and general back-slapping. Everything is now fine. They’ll pull the rug out from under those poor schmucks who were writing for Exhibit A and Strange Chemistry and we can even make it look like it’s their fault. Who cares about these guys?

No one.

So, this grave crisis affects absolutely no one at the parent or grandparent company. Angry Robot is purchased by September by some guy who wants to combine it with holistic, wellness publishing. Unless they’re bringing back leeches and bloodletting, I can’t see how that synergy is going to work but what do I know?  Apparently, they also went bankrupt but I only know that from the trades. They certainly didn’t act bankrupt.

When Neal Stephenson invented cyberspace, he referred to it as a “mutually-agreed hallucination” (OK that might have been William Gibson who wrote that but it’s not really important). The hallucination in this case was that either Exhibit A or Strange Chemistry had ever existed—much less been closed. My contract was with Angry Robot, I was paid by Angry Robot. People kept telling me that I didn’t have a publisher and I would respond that that wasn’t what my contract said. I talked to a lawyer and he pointed out that Exhibit A had no legal existence whatsoever. However, everyone appeared to have mutually-agreed that Exhibit A did exist and so could cease to exist.

One of the great examples of this was an email I received in November that pointed out that I hadn’t had a publisher since July. I responded that SOMEONE was still selling paperback copies of Courier all over the world. Perhaps we should find out who that mysterious company was and make sure we got a cut of whatever royalties might be coming in.

Other authors tended to sink into despair or, in one case, have to be restrained from flying to England and putting C-4 to the entire High Street operation. The scary thing is that’s he’s superbly skilled in that sort of thing.

I mean, in reality, not just in books.

Moving on. It would take weeks for anyone to find anyone home at the offices of Angry Robot, my non-publisher. There were rumors that they were in bankruptcy (which would have put the rights to all books into permanent limbo) and verbal guarantees that all our rights had been reverted. I jumped ugly all over my agent (who truly didn’t deserve it) and got a letter in September that gave me all my rights back albeit with the puzzling note that “normally, it would take six months to make the reversion but we’ll move yours up.”

My calendar skills aren’t all that great but June to December sounds a lot like six months to me. What am I missing?

Well, let’s not worry about that. What the letter did say was that they would continue to sell the electronic version of Courier until December 31st and the paperback version until December 31st or whenever the existing stock ran out.

Imagine my surprise when I returned from a (useless) trip to Bouchercon on November 18 and found that the ebooks were missing from Amazon, B&N, and I could only imagine all the other online outlets. No notice. No “so sorry, we need the 24 bytes of space it’s taking up in the computer.” No nuttin.

That was the 18th. I had a brand new cover (looks different, doesn’t it?) and a really bad version of the text up on Amazon Direct Publishing by the 20th. (I’d already gotten permission from the artist to keep using the cute biker on the cover.) I made up a name for the Publisher—The immortal Sean Lynch (Wounded Prey) had referred to all the Exhibit A writers as a gang of ronin so the name was obvious—Ronin Robot Press. A quick Google of the name appeared to indicate that no one else owned the name or the website. In another two days, I had managed to proof every damn letter of the text (never try to OCR pdf files and expect it to work), learn how to create a .mobi file so I could tell how it looked, worked out the fairly difficult Amazon Previewer system, and even designed a new Icon for my new company.

I think he’s cute and my Great Great Uncle John was the illustrator who first drew him so I figure I have more rights to his image than most.

We got the new version up quickly enough that the 32 reviews on Amazon didn’t disappear into the ether. On the other hand, Amazon had decided that this was a “new” release and placed us 50th in Hot and New Kindle releases.

I mean, I wasn’t going to correct them.

Then Nick Wale, the “Amazon Whisperer” in England that I hired to run online ads sprang into action. Finally, we had our hands on the controls at Amazon [insert evil cackle] and so we went to town. He changed all the Keywords, dropped the price, and then threw Courier into an Amazon Free Promotion (which has to be the most counter-intuitive action in the universe—give books away to increase your sales? What?)  I went back to my social media buddies (I am desperately trying to be human with everyone, it’s more fun and strangely works better) and begged them to get everyone they knew to “buy” my free book. In an amazing case of serendipity, Burke Allen, a PR guy I’d just hired in Virginia finished reading the book on Sunday and was so inspired that he shot a press release across the wires that was picked up everywhere. Well, by motorcycle magazines, free Kindle giveaway blogs, and community magazines.

Right out of the start on Day One, Courier the Kindle had gone from the—who knows, after

#589 out of all Free books and

NUMBER ONE in Suspense: Historical

Number One in Thriller: Political.

Oddly, paperback sales kicked up as well and headed for the 10,000 mark, which was effectively as high as it’s ever been since the launch in May.

Nov 25

WHOOOO HOOOOO

BROKE THE TOP 100 FREE BOOKS ON AMAZON!!!

‪#COURIERREAD IS AT #93

THANKS EVERYONE!!!

3,090 people downloaded Courier on the first day! And it didn’t stop.

Nov 26

#44 Free in Kindle Store

#1 in Thrillers > Historical

#2 in Suspense > Political

Nov 27

Courier is holding at #42 on the Amazon Top 100 Free books

and #1 in Suspense Historical

and Thriller Political.

By the end of the promotion on Saturday the 28th, I was still just holding on in the Top 100 Free and 6,919 people had downloaded copies of Courier, I had 7 new invitations to speak, and a regular opinion column on a local online paper.

Do you think Marshall McLuhan was right when he wrote, ‘The medium is the message?’

I’d be more likely to go with the adage, “Freedom of the press goes to the guy who owns one.”

You’re the head of Angry Robot, how do you go about making it into a good business?

You know, I don’t have any animus towards the CEO of Angry Robot. They are a tiny publisher who has managed to stay alive being bounced from corporate parent to corporate parent. They appear to do a good job of finding new science fiction and splatter-gore authors (and some very respectable ones have moved over) and they market with an ironic flair that matches their market. Just staying alive in today’s publishing world requires some amazingly fancy footwork.

As I’ve explained, the authors at Exhibit A got caught between one vine and another (that’s a Tarzan reference.) If Exhibit A had lasted another six months, it would probably have been even or making a profit. Several of the authors were selling well and one or two had movie  options. I have the feeling that the CEO was feeling the chill of sharks on the back of his neck for the past year because I didn’t think that enough attention was being paid.

The only thing I thought was unfair (and far too many of the other authors bought it hook, line, and sinker) was the implication that we had failed to make our mark and so were being cut off. I can understand why a corporation looking for a quick sale isn’t going to say “Jeez, we’ve got these two new units that are losing money so we’re going to scrape them off and make our balance sheet go in the black” but to blame the authors for failing with their first or second books and no marketing support is a bit harsh.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

One of the essential aspects of a television producer’s psychological makeup is a dogged refusal to give up. When I was training younger producers at MSNBC, they were doing a remote production with a satellite truck and I  got a call about 15 minutes before air with the panicked news that the generator on the truck was belching smoke and “you’d better have the backup tapes ready.”

I said, “The next person who utters the word ‘tapes’ is fired. You have a problem, fix it. You’re in a major city, do you think that’s the only satellite uplink in town? Get on the phones and start calling.” then I hung up.

We had to switch on one camera for a bit at the top of the show but they had another satellite truck and an optical line feed by ten after the hour.

It’s a state of mind at the network level. You don’t just have second options, you have third, fourth and fifth options. I know producers who have booked entire facilities (or put them on first right of refusal) just in case a major transmitter AND it’s backup went down, I’ve seen those big airconditioner trucks from Dulles Airport brought in and piped into an overheating tech trailer through the local volunteer fire company’s air hoses.  I was on the team as ABC came into South Africa only days before Nelson’s Mandela’s release and watched secretaries direct multi-camera setups, translation being done by someone listening to an earpiece and speaking into a microphone that was fitted neatly into the cleavage of the reporter who had been using it only a moment before, and new video editors being brought in to replace the ones that had literally gone up in smoke.

I know of producers who have jumped out of helicopters that couldn’t quite land, scrambled through moving freight trains, or  run into traffic, stopped a car, and jumped in with “I’ll give you $50 bucks to get me to WWWW Television.”

Actually, that last one was me.  Several times.

So, I get depressed and down and outright grumpy. I have days when i simply go to bed and sleep through the blackness. But hell, I’m clinically depressed, I’d have days like that even if I was the next Tom Clancy. The next day, I get up and start to type again.

Right now, I’m trying to work out how I’m going to keep the paperback edition of “Courier” available after New Year’s Day. One option is to buy out the remainder from Random House, the US distributor, ship them over to Amazon and sell them through Amazon Fulfillment. Or I could go to IngramSpark and get a Print-on-Demand deal so that any supplier, from the individual bookstore to the chains—well, Barnes and Noble anyway—can simply order books and get them in the same shipping time as if they were already printed and in the warehouse.

Of course, I do have other freelancers that I’ve worked with and I guess I could go all the way and become a publisher.

The point is, it’s very difficult to find something that I really and truly give up on. I’ve written 25,000 words in one 18 hour stretch (rewriting on deadline but still…) I’ve completed TV packages with the complexity of any 3 month magazine piece in less than 12 hours (used to specialize in it, actually.) i’ve written obituary scripts for people I’ve never met and made them sound warm and real. I’ve worked the floor at Comdex (an old computer exposition that used to be important) and demonstrated a complete online education network that didn’t exist and where none of the 18 programs on the network ran longer than a minute—short attention spans, remember?

I suppose more importantly than anything else, in September of 1984 when I was 32, I put one kid into college with no loans, bought a house in the most expensive county in the US, and my wife had a baby. I’ve lived without money and paid for both private school and college for both kids. And every creditor was paid—eventually.

I’m learning a whole lot about the book business and I’ll work out some way to survive. My problem is that I know I need to learn a LOT more about writing and all of this takes time away from that essential task. I know I’m not as good as a lot of writers and, well, I want to be that good. That’s more important than all the rest of this stuff.

And this is a tweet from late that night

Nov 25

WHOOOO HOOOOO

BROKE THE TOP 100 FREE BOOKS ON AMAZON!!!

#COURIERREAD IS AT #93

THANKS EVERYONE!

3,090 people downloaded Courier on the first day! And it didn’t stop.

Nov 26

COURIER IS #FREE

#44 Free in Kindle Store

#1 in Thrillers > Historical

#2 in Suspense > Political

Thank you Terry for a perceptive and comprehensive interview.

Links:

Get a copy of ‘Courier’ at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk

Find Terry on his website, Twitter, Facebook, and Goodreads.

Quick Fire At The Slaugherhouse: Interview With Paul D. Brazill

Paul Brazill writes gritty and unflinchingly realistic crime fiction. He has a new novel out, Guns Of Brixton. Set in London it is a brilliant mix of Brazill’s sharp observation and wry humour, local culture and razor sharp dialogue. Paul met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about his new release his use of location.

Tell us about Guns Of Brixton.

When London gangster Mad Tony Cook gives aging thugs Big Jim and Kenny Rogan the simple task of collecting a briefcase from northern courier Half- Pint Harry he doesn’t suspect that the courier will end up dead in his lock-up or that Kenny and Big Jim will then dress up in drag to rob a jeweler’s shop and lose the coveted briefcase. A fast-moving, wild and hilarious search for the missing briefcase quickly ensues, with fatal consequences. Guns Of Brixton is a foul-mouthed and violently comic crime caper that is choc-full of gaudy characters and dialogue sharp enough to shave with.

How important is location and local London colour to the novel?

Very important. A book like Guns Of Brixton has to be set in London as ‘the smoke’ a place full of oddballs and misfits. A place where anything can happen. Or course, its a faux London just as GOB is a faux gangster novel- more Carry On Cabby than The Driver. It’s an idea of London that’s been created by films, books, TV series and songs rather than the dull, day-to-day reality that most Londoner’s live.

How different is it to your other works?

Guns Of Brixton is more out and out comic than a lot of my stuff. More broad and much less dark. And gleefully absurdist.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

I’m finishing Holidays In The Sun, the follow up to Guns Of Brixton. This is darker and more violent but no less absurdist.

The Neon Boneyard will be out over the next couple of months- a gritty, supernatural noir.

I’ll have a few stories in magazines and anthologies, including the next issue of All Due Respect and Spinetingler Magazine.

Paul thank for a succinct and insightful interview.

Links:

Get a copy of ‘Guns Of Brixton’ at these online stores:

Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com

Barnes & Noble

WHSmith

Or from the publisher, Caffeine Nights Publishing

Read more about ‘Guns of Brixton’ here

Find Paul D. Brazill at his website, on Twitter  and Facebook

Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With T. Jefferson Parker

T. Jefferson Parker is the critically acclaimed author of numerous crime novels, among them Laguna Heat. The paperback made The New York Times Bestseller list in 1986. He has a new novel out, Full Measure. Jeff met me at The Slaughterhouse where we talked about the novel and the frontier.

Tell us about Full Measure.

“Full Measure” is a story of American brothers. One, Patrick Norris, is recently returned from bloody combat in Sangin, Afghanistan. His older brother, Ted, is a stay-at-home dreamer, a bit of a lost soul. Their family avocado groves — a third generation Norris family concern — have just been burned to the ground by a wildfire. So the brothers must team up and try to help rescue what’s left of the family business. Of course, complications ensue.

How much do you think the frontier is still part of the American psyche?

I think the frontier is alive and well and American as always. But it’s not so much a geographical frontier anymore. We can’t go farther west, so that leaves space, the deep, maybe some tiny corners of Earth itself that are still unseen. And all of that inner territory between our ears. It feels to me like the pull of the frontier is still in us. You see busloads of people arriving in LA every day, wanting to start over, grab hold, carve out a piece of the American Dream. I guess the last true frontier is possibility.

Do you think much crime fiction is redemptive?

There seems to be a fair amount of redemption in thrillers these days, where a character has misbehaved in the past and now must set things right by meaningful action. My Charlie Hood protagonist certainly feels, throughout the course of the six-book series, that he’d like to execute his mission (preventing the flow of guns from the US to Mexico) but his enemies have ways of thwarting him. But he’s more after satisfaction than redemption. I haven’t really delved into a character deeply in need of redemption since “Where Serpents Lie,” which was 1998. I’m more interested in heroes who, in spite of their very best efforts both past and present, may or may not be sufficient for the task at hand. That’s the way I think most people are.

What else is on the cards for you this year?

I’m touring in America now for “Full Measure.” I’m busy almost every day of October and into November, then things will loosen up. I’ve got a very solid new novel close to finished and hope to be done with it by the new year, or maybe end of January. I can’t talk about it yet because it isn’t done and I don’t want to jinx it. I’ve got a short story to finish by the end of October too. So I’ll be busy.

Thank you Jeff for an insightful and tight interview.

Links:

‘Full Measure’ can be had at the following online stores:

Amazon.com (hardcover and audio CD)

Amazon.co.uk (hardcover, paperback, and audio CD)

Barnes &Noble (hardcover and Nook eBook)

Book Depository (hardcover)

Books-A-Million (hardcover and audio CD)

Click here for a complete list of all T. Jefferson Parker books.

Find T. Jefferson Parker at his website and on Facebook.