E.A. Aymar's Blog, page 2

...Give a Speech to Graduates

I had the honor of giving a speech to the graduates of Marymount University's English department. I wrote about the experience here.

...Interview Jenny Milchman

(First, a brief housekeeping note. As I mentioned last week, I had the huge honor of giving a speech to Marymount University's graduating English undergrad and graduate students. I excerpted the speech for my monthly column at the Washington Independent Review of Books. You can read it here.)

I am really excited about having an interview with Jenny Milchman on my blog, and the timing for this interview is coincidental and awesome - her debut novel, COVER OF SNOW, was just awarded the Mary Higgins Clark Award (see the sidebar on the right for more information). It's well-deserved: Jenny's writing is tightly-written and carefully-plotted, and she keeps you immersed in her world until the final page. But, beyond that, Jenny's just a terrific person to know. I met her as a member of this year's debut class in the International Thriller Writers (she coordinates the debuts), and we became fast e-friends. She also has one of the most interesting approaches to marketing I've come across (especially nowadays) which she briefly discusses below, and more in length here. Finally, check out her blog, a collection of Made It Moments from writers that resonate strongly with both the published and unpublished.

 

What's your favorite joke?

OK, here’s how it goes…This guy wanted to go on vacation with his wife, but they have a hamster they’re very devoted to and can’t leave. But their neighbor promises to care for the hamster, come in every day, feed it, etc. So the guy goes. And when he calls to check in, he says, “So how’s my hamster?” and the neighbor says, “Well, I’m sorry to tell you, but your hamster died.”

“What?” gasps the man. “My hamster? Is dead? How could that happen? How could you just tell me like that?”

And the neighbor says, “Well, how I should I have told you?”

“I—I don’t know,” sputters the man. “You should have led up to it slowly, I guess. Prepared me. Maybe today you would say, ‘Well, your hamster ran up to the roof.’ And tomorrow you’d tell me, ‘Your hamster fell off the roof.’ And then finally…”

“OK, OK,” the neighbor says. “I get it.”

Years pass, and the man’s mother-in-law moves in with them. And one day, the man decides to go on vacation, and he asks his neighbor if he’ll look in on his mother-in-law. The neighbor agrees.

In the middle of their sun and sand, the man calls his neighbor and asks how his mother-in-law is doing.

“Well,” the neighbor says. “Your mother-in-law is on the roof.”

You’ve detailed how extensive your marketing campaign is for your novels. How did the idea for this type of campaign come about?

The thing is, it didn’t come about as a marketing campaign at all. It took me thirteen years to get published—years that contained a great deal of discouragement and disappointment and frustration—and when they finally came to an end, what I most wanted to do was get out there and go see the readers I’d waited so long to meet. The reason I kept at this, banging on that brick wall till my knuckles and finally my forehead bled, rather than just writing away in a garret somewhere, was so that I could have real readers who read my work.

That’s how’s the “Let It Snow” book tour came about. 7 months and 35,000 miles on the road, meeting people who love books. Booksellers, librarians, teachers, book club members…readers. My husband is lucky enough to work at a job that allows him great flexibility—and so we rented out our house to help pay for the trip, traded in two cars for an SUV that could handle Denver in February, and withdrew the kids from first and third grades. It was car-schooling, and hightailing it between bookstores, and when word began to get out about the trip, it took on a life of its own. I was thrilled. As much as the virtual world has allowed me to connect with people who are truly meaningful to me, there’s also just something about getting to see them face-to-face.

So many writers rely solely on the Internet for marketing nowadays, but you employ a more traditional, in-person approach. Do you think you’ll always use the latter method?

Maybe the best way I can answer that is to say that with my second novel about to come out, we’re setting out on another 4 months and 20,000 miles on the road! I can’t say whether we’ll always be lucky enough to get to do this, but I hope we can. Things will surely change as our kids get older, but I hope we can be flexible and keep combining what’s important to them with this way of doing things that we all seem to love. Getting to see someone’s avatar come to life—giving that person a handshake or a hug—brings the virtual world full circle in a way.

What’s the hardest part about being on the road?

Right now, I’ve been making beds, cleaning house, cooking, and getting kids off to school with all the requisite tasks that that entails. (Why is the missing sock always discovered just when the school bus pulls up?) So being on the road frees me of all of the above. I’m tempted to say what hard part?—but there’s got to be something. I’m having trouble thinking of it, though. I think that one reason this approach works for me is that I really love life on the road. There’s a freedom to it, and a closeness with my family. A sense of adventure as the world sails by, and we sail off in it. I will be happy to come back to the house we rented after the last book tour ended. And getting to write a new novel is awfully alluring (which I can’t do on the road). But when Willie Nelson sings, “My life is making music with my friends,” that’s kind of the way I feel, except it’s books, and readers are the friends.

What do you find most annoying about marketing (either something you don’t like, or something writers do that annoys you)?

I don’t like when anyone tells writers, “You have to do that if you want to sell well.” The truth is, none of knows what makes a book sell. We’re all taking guesses, we’re all doing what works for us. I wouldn’t say, “Here’s all you need to do! Rent out your house, hit the road for seven months…” Who knows if that would work for anyone else…who even knows if it’s “working” for me? What does “working” mean? So I prefer it when people share their experiences so that writers can take from them what resonates, and then go on to find their own personal way. We’re all on this road by ourselves in the end…but if we share what we learn along it, it becomes a little less lonely.

COVER OF SNOW and RUIN FALLS are standalone novels. Do you have any thoughts of ever writing a series, or connecting these books somehow?

Well, they’re standalones in one sense, but they’re connected by setting, which is the fictional Adirondack town of Wedeskyull. The recurring “character” is the town, which I hope readers will get to know in unfolding, onion peel layers, much as a real town is gotten to know. In my second novel, Ruin Falls, you get small updates about characters whom you first met in Cover of Snow. And one small character from my first book comes back to play a larger role in the second. My hope is that readers who read all the books will be insiders in Wedeskyull, experiencing details that others don’t. And that readers who only read one will get a good story that tows them along on its own.

Can you describe the moment when you found out COVER OF SNOW was getting published?

First, I have to share some numbers with you. Eight novels, three agents, a dozen submissions, and fifteen almost-offers in eleven years. That’s how long it took me to find a publisher for Cover of Snow, my eighth novel. By the time it happened, I didn’t believe it ever would. I had given up hope.

The way the book finally found its way to the publisher I feel I was meant to be with all along happened by the craziest of long shots. I had long admired the author Nancy Pickard, and in her 2010 hit, Scent of Rain & Lightning, Nancy achieved something I hoped to do myself—to use the setting and weather as a character. I told Nancy how much I loved her novel, and through a tangled sequence of events, she read my unpublished manuscript, and gave it to her editor, who bought it. I’ve been with this brilliant, visionary woman ever since.

When Nancy Pickard told me what she was doing, I remember thinking: “Wow. What an incredible thing for an author to do for an unknown. I am grateful, and if we were having any more children, I would name them all Nancy. But I’ve been around this block 15 times now. I don’t think no matter what someone does, it’ll ever happen.”

How did I feel when I finally learned I would be published? Pure disbelief.

What are your thoughts on the changing nature of publishing?

Oh wow, there’s a question you could write a whole book about. I’m going to keep it brief, though, because wiser people than I have written whole books. I think there are more ways than ever to get published today, to bring your work to readers, and that is a fantastic, liberating, democratizing thing. But with those advantages come risks…and overload of content and an ability to rush the process are two of the biggest. If I hadn’t had an enforced wait of eleven years, during which I wrote eight novels that hopefully got successively better, I’m sure I would’ve ducked out early. And when I look back at earlier books, which I would’ve sworn were publishable…they really weren’t. I’m glad in the end that it took as long as it did. Now I’m not suggesting everyone needs eleven years and eight novels. Most people I’m sure are much faster learners, or just better at this. But I do think it’s crucial to involve other people in the process of publishing, whether those are traditional gatekeepers, or ones the indie author seeks out for feedback and review.

Once the writer has a book many people agree is terrific, it’s a question of determining which publishing path will be right for you. Write for you. There is no best path; pros and cons exist along each. Do you want the control and infinite shelf life of indie publishing? The team approach and wide reach of traditional? All of this and much more goes into deciding which road to pursue. Once you’ve decided, you should get out there and ride it with all your heart.

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You can learn more about Jenny Milchman and her work at her site, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

...Interview Jenny Drummey

One quick housekeeping note. I was at the Maryland Writers Association conference this past Saturday, and had the chance to hang with one of my literary heroes (and blurbers of my book), Rafael Alvarez. On Sunday I exhibited at the Kensington Book Fesitval with Alan Orloff and other writers from Mystery Writers of America. And then, last night, I was the guest speaker for Marymount University's English Night, which was a great experience. I loved the teachers at that school, and I was really honored to be included in that event.

I met Jenny because I have a disobedient parrot and Jenny specializes in training parrots. So she came to my house, worked with me, my wife and our bird (DoWop) and we got to talking and discovered that we both write. We kept in touch, traded and edited writing back and forth, and I soon realized, holy shit, she's the real deal. So I was beyond excited when she told me that her debut literary novel, UNREQUITED, had sold to Rebel ePublishers. The book is beautiful, and Jenny writes in a uniquely engaging style. I fell in love with it. You will too.

Here's my interview with Jenny. An excerpt of her book follows.

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What led to you writing UNREQUITED?

It started as a short story that I shared with my friend Mary Overton who said that she wanted to know more about the characters. I was not working at the time, so what else was I going to do?

How long did UNREQUITED take to write?

About a year and a half.

Do you have other books planned and, if so, will they continue the stories of any of these characters?

I want to resuscitate a novel I wrote and rewrote for about 10 years. I gave up on it when I realized that my last rewrite was like trying to stuff a fat guy into an undersized coffin. But all that effort taught me what not to do, and guided me when writing Unrequited.

I’ll perform an autopsy on my dead-fat-guy of a novel to determine cause of death. Maybe I can zombie-fy him and get him moving again.

The book is called Hurricane Frank, and the hurricane is a character, and, yes, he does get interviewed on a television show on the Natural Disaster Channel (in case you were wondering).

Why did you pursue an MFA in Poetry?

I wanted two years to devote to writing. Fortunately, I was savvy enough to know that a poet can’t pay the rent, so I didn’t go into debt for it.

Unfortunately, the more poetry readings I attended, the more aware I became of that poetry-reading voice – the affected diction that fails to cut through the impenetrable, self-referential thickets of the poet’s personal tropes. When I learned about Language Poetry (the free jazz of the genre) I wondered – who is reading this?

Poetry is like any other creative product: 99% of it stinks, but that 1% (A 1% that I can gladly get behind) is fantastic.

But being a poet did teach me about economy of language. From our friends Strunk and White: Omit needless words.

Do you put any parameters on your writing? Is there any topic you consider taboo?

Boring writing is my taboo. Great writing can make almost any topic acceptable. Perfect example is Hubert Selby’s Last Exit to Brooklyn: crazy good, but a book I would never read again. As soon as I finished it, I got it out of the house.  Almost every character is horrible or has horrible things done to them. He also wrote The Room, which is a prisoner’s monologue from his jail cell. He captured the madness that erupts in isolation, along with graphic descriptions of the torture he would inflict on his captors. I actually had to skip pages. There are some things you can’t unread.

I feel the same way about Requiem for a Dream, the movie based on Selby’s book. It was an incredible experience that I never want to have again.

Why birds?

I had too much free time.

But really, I blame David Attenborough! I watched his series The Life of Birds and that started my fascination. I got my first parrot 13 years ago, and have a flock of 4 now.

Birds are a lifestyle, they’re not a pet. The amount of work to keep a parrot in your home should be enough to turn most people off from acquiring them, but unfortunately it’s not. For ten years, I have been a volunteer for Phoenix Landing, a nonprofit that educates people about parrot care and finds homes for birds if their caretakers have to give them up.

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If you want to learn more about Jenny and UNREQUITED, visit her web site. And you can follow her on Twitter and Facebook. And now, here's that except I promised:

 

The phone in Frank Zimbalist III’s empty office kept ringing.

One female caller, pleased with the Zimbalist Holistic Recliner, offered to perform a number of potentially pleasurable acts on Frankie.

There were a few inquiries about buying the Recliner for institutions, and whether wholesale rates were available.

But most of the messages were from the same people: Dr. Gary Huff, or the representative from BeWell Enterprises, or that lady Frankie had met at the Sober Living Solutions conference in Tucson, or half a dozen other people who had Zimbalist Holistic Recliners.

The first message from each party was polite and professional. Some of the callers spelled out their names or repeated their phone numbers slowly, to make a busy man’s job returning phone messages that much easier.

They were certain, after all, that selling the remarkable Zimbalist was a demanding job. 

But as the number of unreturned messages from each party increased, the politeness and professionalism fell away.

By the fourth attempt, the callers barely contained their frustration. Some threatened that Frankie would be hearing from a lawyer. Some pleaded tearfully for him to please call them back.

All wanted to understand what the Recliner was telling them. They wanted to know what it was designed to do and whether they were using it in the right way.

One whispered, menacingly, that the Zimbalist had revealed his true purpose in life. If he fulfilled that purpose, it would be very unfortunate for Frankie.

But then there were the calls from Dr. Gary, who always remained calm, evenly modulated, patient. Dr. Gary did not believe in getting angry over the phone. He left the same message every time.

When Frankie nervously called in for his messages at the end of each day, he never knew what craziness he might hear on the other end of the line.

But Dr. Gary’s voice was always professional and kind.

Because of this, even though Frankie Zimbalist was on the run from a bunch of patent lawyers and ex-wives and other bloodsuckers, Dr. Gary was the only one he considered calling back, the only one whose number he had written down. Once he could be somewhere for a few days and just think. Once he could get himself together and away from all the revelations the chair that bore his name had given him, he swore, he promised, he included in his prayers every night before he started drinking, he would “call that Huff guy back. Out of all of those sonsabitches, God, he’s the one who deserves to know the truth.”

Read more here.

...Announce My New Gig

Just a short post to announce that I'm going to be a regular contributor to the Washington Independent Review of Books. This is absolutely one of my favorite sites and I was honored to have a piece appear on it earlier this year. My debut piece as an official contributor was just published, and new essays will appear on a monthly basis.

I'll still keep this blog running with interviews, announcements, etc., and links to WIRoB will be posted here and in the Publications tab.

Cool? Cool.

EA

...Interview Chris F. Holm

(First, a small bit of news. One of my favorite publications, the Washington Independent Review of Books, invited me to become a regular contributor to their site. So, once a month, I'm going to write a column about...shit, I need to think of something. Anyway, I love that site, have published there before, and I'm really excited to write for them on a regular basis. Now on to the interview.)

 

I've come across Chris F. Holm's name so often that I'm starting to think of him in terms of "your favorite writer's favorite writer." Bloggers, reviewers and fans have been justly excited about his Collector series since its inception. His soul-collecting protagonist, Sam Thornton, travels across the United States with a world-wearied perspective that never descends into defeat or risks losing the reader's engagement. The books are fun and emotional, and do a great job of creating scenes that linger long after the book is finished (check out the battle in New York in DEAD HARVEST as an example).

 

He's also a super nice guy. He blurbed my first novel after I timidly e-mailed and asked him and, as any writer will tell you, getting that kind of encouragement means the world.

 

Here's his official bio:

 

"Chris F. Holm was born in Syracuse, New York to a mother from a cop family and a father from a long line of fantasy and sci-fi geeks. He wrote his first story at the age of six. It got him sent to the principal's office. Since then, his work has fared better, appearing in such publications as Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Needle: A Magazine of Noir, and THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. He's been longlisted for a Stoker Award and nominated for an Anthony, a Derringer, a Silver Falchion, a pair of Spinetinglers, and a handful of House of Crime and Mystery Readers' Choice Awards, racking up a couple of wins along the way. His Collector novels recast the battle between heaven and hell as old-fashioned crime pulp. Chris lives on the coast of Maine with his lovely wife, crime-fiction reviewer Katrina Niidas Holm. No, she hasn't reviewed his books."

 

And here's my interview with him:

 

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What's your favorite joke?



 

I'm from a cop family, and I hang out with crime writers, which is to say all the jokes I know are in poor taste. So allow me to dodge the question. You know the impatient cow joke?

 

"Knock knock."

"Who's there?"

"The impatient cow."

"The impatient c--"

"MOO!"

 

Well, my wife loves that joke. Only when she first heard it, she never managed to tell it right. It always came out "Knock knock MOO!" Turns out, it's much funnier that way.







What other art forms inspire you, or do you enjoy (TV shows, movies, musicians, etc.)?



 




Uh, all of the above. I'm a huge TV geek. Twin Peaks, Sports Night, Buffy, Fringe, The X Files, The West Wing, and The Wire have probably taught me as much about good storytelling as any books I've ever read.







I confess, the PG-13ing of America has caused my love of movies to wane, since it's rendered most genre flicks toothless, but they're still an influence. Any facility for action staging I might have, I've no doubt lifted from Die Hard, Aliens, and The Terminator. Carpenter, Cronenberg, and Craven taught me a thing or two about scaring people. And I'm convinced my love of pulp adventure was fostered by Spielberg and Lucas from a very young age.



 

And as for music... I grew up on the fringes of a hardcore punk scene. Watching kids my age climb up on stage and play taught me artists aren't some mysterious other species; they're just normal people who had the guts to put themselves out there. My tastes in music have mellowed some -- and diversified considerably -- since then, but it's a lesson I've carried to this day. Without it, I may have never dared to try my hand at writing in the first place.






The Collector series has such a large mythology behind it. Do you have plans for any type of "spin-off," or more stories told from characters other than Sam?

This question presumes I have plans for anything ever, which I never do. I can't think more than five minutes ahead at any given time. But I've certainly thought about exploring other characters within that world. Three fan-favorite characters from the first two books wind up traveling together at the end of THE BIG REAP, and I'd like to think they're out there fighting evil Supernatural-meets-A-Team style. That'd be a kick to write. And without giving too much away about what the future might hold, if ever I write a second trilogy, it may well be told from the point-of-view of a handler with a stable of Collectors.

At times, it seems as if Sam has a growing attraction to evil, or that evil feels he can be manipulated. Is that part of a larger pessimistic philosophy behind the series, or his character?


 

It's funny; I don't think of the series as pessimistic. I think it's about a guy trying to do right. Trying to figure out who he is and where he fits in, in a cruel and messy world. And he's doing it with no promise of reward, no hope of salvation from on high. Sometimes he slips -- lets his guard down -- and learns a tough lesson. But I think Sam's arc is still redemptive, overall. 



What's been your best moment in publishing?

 
That's a tough question; there've been so many. But the first time I held a real, live copy of DEAD HARVEST in my hands is up there. It was the culmination of a lifelong dream.



On a related note, how did you end up with Angry Robot books?


 

Oh, the ordinary way. I wrote a book. Sent out queries. Got an agent, who shopped but never sold that book. Wrote another one in the meantime that turned out to be DEAD HARVEST. That one, she sold. And the rest, I guess, is history.



What are your thoughts on the changing nature of publishing? More specifically, do you think small presses and self-publishing have been beneficial or detrimental to writers/writing?


 

I think small presses, in general, are -- and always have been -- wonderful for publishing. They can take risks the big six can't or won't. They can put out stuff that otherwise might not find a home. And thanks to the explosion of e-readers, they can do so on a scale unimaginable in decades past.

 

Self-publishing is more value-neutral, in my opinion. I'm not against it by any means; heck, I've self-published two short story collections. But I think there's this notion among writers that self-publishing is the easier route, and that's wrongheaded. Sure, you can publish these days with the click of a button, but making sure a) your work is of publishable quality and b) it actually gets in front of readers' eyeballs is damn hard. That said, used correctly it's a powerful tool.

 

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You can follow Chris on Twitter here and visit his web site here.

 

And, as always, find me on Twitter here and Facebook here.

 

Marketing, bitch!

...Interview Steve Weddle

I came across Steve Weddle's name after a number of review sites heaped praise upon his debut novel, COUNTRY HARDBALL. I bought the book, read it, and quickly realized the praise was well-earned. Set in Arkansas and revolving around a number of disreputable and damaged characters, COUNTRY HARDBALL is a collection of connected stories that range from moments of quiet reflection to startling violence. There's a powerful undercurrent in the book, a sense of longing and wishful recovery that haunt it and it's characters. Personally, I kept thinking of Sherwood Anderson's classic, WINESBURG, OHIO, as I read Steve's work...although Steve's Arkansas makes Ohio seem like a minor paradise.

Anyway, I'm basically saying it's a great fucking book, widely considered one of the strongest releases in 2013, and Steve was nice enough to let me interview him:

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What’s your favorite joke?

Light beer.

(Ed. Note: Okay, I like that response.)

Given that short story collections are traditionally harder to publish than novels, did you receive push back from anyone regarding the idea of a novel composed of connected stories?

No. This isn't a collection of previously published stories, though some had been published before. Those folks I worked with rightly looked at this book as a singular story, broken into fragments of perspective. Of course, I don't usually pay much attention to people who tell me I can't do something, so they might have been there on the edges somewhere. 

Along that note, were there any significant changes in your approach as you wrote COUNTRY HARDBALL?

I wrote the stories individually, when I had available time. Later I started piecing them together into a whole, which wasn't as difficult as it could have been, I suppose, since I had the overall plan in mind. The final story in the book was written to tie many of the loose ends together, so that also helped. I'd written three novels in a straightforward manner before this, so writing in this fragmented way helped me focus on particulars better, on making each part work.

You mentioned in a prior interview that you were working on a sequel to COUNTRY HARDBALL. Do you have a definite ending in mind for those characters and that world, or is their story still developing?

If I had an end in mind, I probably wouldn't bother writing the book. I'm only interested in characters that continue to develop.

What, if anything, has surprised you most about the publishing world?

I've been surprised at how open people have been about helping a first-time author and at how people have gone to so much trouble -- email, letters, reviews, and so forth -- to say they've liked the book. I mean, for so long it was just me up before the sun writing things into a notebook, working to understand a character's choices. And now, you know, so many people want to chat about it. It's wild.

Has the success of COUNTRY HARDBALL had an effect on your writing?

To me, the "success" was getting the book done and feeling good about where it ended up. We've gotten great reviews and good sales and people, as I've said, seemed to connect with it. I suppose "success" has too many meanings based on your own perspective. So, at least for me with this book, success means I want to keep working on stories like these, this gritty literary fiction. 

I know you dislike genre categorization, but people have occasionally placed COUNTRY HARDBALL in the field of “southern noir,” and that genre seems to be blowing up right now. What do you think has led to its increased popularity?

People seem to like the gritty realism of "southern noir." I have the feeling that someone has written about how downturns in the economy send people to more violent, rough fiction. And maybe someone else has written about how a bad economy makes people want to read escapist fiction, with heroes slaying dragons. I don't know. I think now you have a number of exceptionally talented "rural noir" writers -- Bonnie Jo Campbell, Daniel Woodrell, Tom Franklin, Honey Brown and more -- and whether the location is southern or midwest or wherever, the tone of debt-beaten people trying to salvage their best lives is pervasive. These talented folks, and others like them, are helping to push us all forward -- readers and writers.

(Ed. Note: Along with Steve's list, I'd add Frank Bill and his terrific novel, DONNYBROOK. Gritty, entertaining, bruised prose.)

What pisses you off about publishing or marketing? It's not giving interviews, is it?

What pisses me off is that most people don't appreciate how difficult marketing is. I've been blessed with great folks at Tyrus Books and F+W Media helping get Country Hardball into the right hands. I never cease being amazed at how much work that can be.

What’s been your best moment in publishing (so far)?

 

Being able to thank dozens of amazing  people -- and especially my lovely bride -- when I wrote the acknowledgements page.  Honestly, how many people get to do that?

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If you're interested in learning more about Steve and his work, you can find his web site here. He's also a contributing blogger to Do Some Damage, a collaborative blog about crime fiction that you should definitely add to your blogroll. You can find Steve on Twitter here.

And, as always, I'm on Facebook here and Twitter here. Social Media!

...Interview Nik Korpon

I'd come across Nik Korpon's name here and there over the last couple of years but, stupidly, took my time when it came to reading his work. Last year, Spinetingler Magazine named him one of the "top ten noir writers everyone should know," and I promptly bought his short story collection, Bar Scars, and read it beginning to end in a day. Fans of crime fiction and, in particular, noir (or just good writing) should do the same. Nik writes in a crisp brutal prose that shines a light onto his characters without basking in sentimentality. One of the things I, personally, love most about his work is that it provides a unique but informed perspective on noir, and on Baltimore - he's a studied expert of the genre and the city, but he reintroduces both to readers through his own style. As Spinetingler wrote, "Korpon is the unheralded resident poet of the neo-noir scene."

I had the chance to meet Nik at Baltimore's recent Noir at the Bar and asked if I could interview him for my little blog. He said yes. Here it is...

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What's your favorite joke?


Two fish are in a tank. One looks over to the other, says, “How the hell you drive this thing?”

(Editor's Note: HA!)

I have a terrible sense of humor. It’s some radioactive mix of Woody Allen and Steve Coogan.

What other art forms inspire you, or do you enjoy (TV shows, movies, musicians, etc.)?

The easy answer is TV, especially right now. There are so many good shows on. Though I don’t want it to end—this New Golden Age, they’re calling it—it’ll be a nice respite when there aren’t so many shows on that I want to watch and I can catch up on everything I’ve missed so far. It doesn’t help that we don’t have cable and have to find everything on pirated sites online.

Obvious answers aside, I draw inspiration from everything. Sometimes I get ideas from a song lyric, especially old blues dudes or bands like Lucero, or I read a story that just slays me and I want to write that story, which ends up morphing into something completely different. When I was in grad school—or, really, at any point before I had kids—I went to museums a lot and would listen to Angelo Badalamenti and stare at Caravaggio paintings until I felt something possessing me. I’d try to translate that feeling into a story and would ultimately fail, but I think it did something to me inside, opened something, you know?

I’ve gotten into the habit of only being able to listen to certain records when I’m writing. For instance, with this latest book, sort of a gritty future-dystopian civil-war type thing, I listened to nothing but Beach House (usually Bloom, which is a breathtaking record) and The Wolfe Tones (an Irish Republican folk band) when I wrote the first draft. The second draft, it was only Nick Cave’s Push the Sky Away and sometimes No More Shall We Part. Edits were a Hank Williams collection I found on Spotify and Neko Case’s Furnace Room Lullabies. I think hearing the same music flips a switch and lets your brain know it’s time to work.

I'm impressed with your unwillingness to pull punches in your writing. Have you published something that you later worried went too fall?

The opposite, actually. A lot of times I’m worried I don’t push far enough. I listen to a lot of writing podcasts on my way to work because I can’t stand the radio and NPR gets depressing after a while, and one of the things I hear a lot is writers being disturbed by what they’re writing, or pushing against their childhood trauma to find some emotional resonance, and I worry because I’m not experiencing that. (Granted, I worry about pretty much everything, as my wife will attest.) Maybe it means I’m completely desensitized to tragedy, or that I’m able to dissociate real life from fiction, or that I’m just not a very good writer. I don’t know.

I’m not a fan of excessive violence, though a lot of what I write has some element of bloodshed (I mean, it’s crime fiction for god’s sake, not to mention I’m a big fan of boobs and explosions) but I try to fit in as much honest emotional violence as the story allows. Sometimes that goes too far, like the ending of a book where a guy finds his kid drowned in the bathtub after his wife fell out with a needle in her arm, but that’s also an issue of overkill and trying too hard to be 'noir,' whatever the fuck that means. But the real ‘too far’ things—crimes against kids, rape, etc.—I don’t write about because I’m not terribly interested in exploring those subjects and, most of the time, they’re just plot devices to give the male protagonists something to rage against (see Laura Lippman’s “Is the first victim a woman?” litmus test).

Is there a philosophy or inspiration that is central to your writing?

Heh. Philosophy… It depends what I’m drinking. If it’s bourbon, I just want to tell some good stories and keep people entertained. If it’s a good wine (on that rare occasion) then I want to create beautiful things. So, when I’m actually sitting down to write, it’s somewhere in between. Basically, I want to affect the reader. That old Chuck Palahniuk line: make them laugh, make them cry, make them learn something. Except not learn anything, unless it’s how to break into houses or fence stolen goods.

It’s not ‘inspiration’ specifically, but I have noticed patterns in my writing over the last few years. A lot of my longer pieces deal with fathers and sons, or brothers turned against one another, usually with one of them in the surrogate father role. And the last three things I’ve written have involved thieves as a main character. I’m not sure what exactly that means, though it might be some manifestation of being uncomfortable in my own skin for the first 25 years of my life, thieves appropriating things from other people or something. I’m not sure. The scenarios for an interesting story just sort of bubble up and I follow them wherever they go. Where they come from, I’m not sure I care to know.

What's been your best moment in publishing?

Any time someone says “yes”?

I hate the process of getting blurbs, but I love the feeling of having writers who I admire the shit out of say nice things about my own writing, as narcissistic as that sounds. I was very flattered to have Ray Banks, who is a phenomenal writer, say he wanted to steal lines from my book. I got a Happy New Year email from Don Pollock the year after he blurbed my first novel. This was pretty early in the game for me and he was just starting to blow up (I think this was 2011) and I remember still holding writers up on pedestals, being completely blown away that this stunning writer was sending me a random email. But really, I’ve met so many nice, genuine people through publishing stories that any time I share a spine with great writers I know and enjoy reading is pretty damn awesome.

What are your thoughts on the changing nature of publishing? More specifically, do you think small presses and self-publishing have been beneficial or detrimental to writers/writing?

I’m definitely not the best person to ask about this because I’ve never self-published. Well, I did once, but it was just repackaging published stories as part of a giveaway thing I was doing on Goodreads. But I think indie presses are an essential part of the writing world today, presses like Civil Coping Mechanisms, Dark House, Snubnose, One Eye Press. I’m indebted to them because, without them, guys like me would never have a chance, and I’m sure there are hundreds of people in the same boat. I signed with an agent (the awesome Brooks Sherman at The Bent Agency) last winter, but everything I did before that was indie. And, unfortunately, my words seem to be the culling song for presses because everyone’s gone dark right after they publish my book.

The bigger publishers have taken a beating, both financially and in their reputation, and I don’t think it’s unwarranted. Most of the ways they operate are archaic. But, I think there’s a new breed of indie coming up, presses like Angry Robot and Exhibit A, that have the mentality and adaptability of a small press, but have the distribution of larger presses. Curbside Splendor is doing something like this too, I believe. I think (and hope) that this is the new norm because, for all of the amazing things a small press can do with experimentation and shining a light on new voices and all, none of it really matters if no one can buy your book, right? Despite all the end-is-nigh articles you read on the internet, this is an exciting time to be writing.

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You can learn more about Nik Korpon and his work at www.nikkorpon.com, find him on GoodReads and follow him on Twitter.

And, as always, find me on Facebook here, GoodReads here, and Twitter here. There. Now you're all social-media'd up.

...Get Interviewed

The book reviewing site, Fast Page Turner, interviewed me about the Dead trilogy this week. You can read the interview here. They also reviewed the book a week earlier, and you can read their review here.

...Defend Pop Fiction

I wrote this for the Washington Independent Review of Books, one of my favorite sites. It's about how I came to writing thrillers, and why thrillers don't suck.

You can read it here.

...Say Goodbye to Mason

I went downstairs this morning and Mason, our pet rabbit of ten years, was dying.

He was old – ten years is a long life for a rabbit - and he had recently gone blind, suffered weight loss, and had a surgery to remove a cyst on his leg. But, despite all that, he was happy and ate all the time and didn’t show the worst health signs a rabbit can (gastro distress). He wasn’t in pain.

Mason was a brown lop-eared rabbit with soft wide eyes. Nancy – my wife now, girlfriend at the time – and I adopted him and named him after George Mason University, where we had met years earlier as undergrads. She lived in a studio apartment back then, and Mason quickly made himself at home. We didn’t know a lot about rabbits…for example, I didn’t know that they played with toys. Mason would pick up a rattle and swing it up and down, usually at five in the morning, which irritated me and cracked Nancy up. He was also very picky about the setup of his pen. He preferred his litter box directly in front of the door, and would drag it over, which irritated Nancy (who wanted it and its layer of rabbit poop tastefully hidden in the corner). He would grab the edge of it with his teeth and drag it over, then stomp in annoyance.

Rabbits aren’t solitary, so we got him a little girl rabbit named Abby, and Mason deeply loved Abby. She would hop out of their pen while Mason was eating and hide in Nancy’s closet, and then Mason would run to the door and hurriedly look around until he found her. Abby only lived a year due to sickness, but we matched him up with another rabbit named Emma, who is nine years old and still with us - Emma won’t be matched, because it distresses a senior rabbit to add another to their environment (but she’ll get lots of attention from us).

So Mason liked the ladies, but the one he liked best was Nancy. Mason and Emma actually had their own room (Nancy and I over-spoil our animals, we know), a spare bedroom we don’t use next to our den. Nancy and I watch TV in the den and, every night at 10:00, for almost all of his life, Mason would hop to the baby gate that sealed their door and wait for Nancy to pet him. And she would patiently sit with him for hours, stroking his coat or playing with his ears. He would lie there, contentedly, while we watched TV.

Mason traced the course of the beginning of my relationship with Nancy. Even if he wasn’t there, he was in our lives – when we got engaged in Baltimore, married in Bermuda, visited Venice, went through a brief and somewhat-embarrassing bed and breakfast phase…wherever we went, we always returned home to Mason, and he always hopped to the baby gate to wait for Nancy at 10 every night.

This morning, I went downstairs and Mason tried but couldn’t move. Nancy and I stayed with him and held him as he died.

I know some people don’t have empathy for pets, particularly a pet that’s not a cat or dog. I’m a softie for animals, but I get that. I didn’t know rabbits were little bundles of personality until I had one. I didn’t know how loyal they were, or sweet, or that they played games or hopped over to see you. I didn’t know they would sneak over to you and take a bite out of your food when you weren’t looking, or hop onto the bed of your studio apartment and wake you up, or lick your hand to show you affection, or do crazy little pivots when they ran and wanted to have fun, or slept cuddled next to their partners, or carried a bag of treats while they ran madly around their room…

It doesn’t really seem fair that you can save an animal’s life, rescue it and care for it and give it a much better life than it would have had elsewhere and, no matter what, death comes. Death is always there at the end, and there’s hopelessness in that. But if you give in to that hopelessness, then death wins.

But I’m not sad.

I honestly can’t think of that little clown without smiling. Death loses; it can’t take that away. We live when we remember. Even if he isn’t with us, he’s in our lives.

I love you, Mase. Rest in peace.