Author Interview with Adrian Dawson.

Born in Yorkshire, England in 1971, Adrian Dawson'sprofessional career has spanned design, illustration and animation and he isnow Creative Director at a UK Creative Advertising Agency. Adrian's firstnovel, Codex, was accepted in 1999 bythe first agency he sent it to – at the time, the same agency as J.K. Rowling -but they were unable to place it. After many years of trying to place Codex, it was ultimately taken on byLast Passage and became the Number One Best Selling Thriller Novel on the UKiBookstore of 2010.
Hello, Adrian; your latest book is Sequence; perhaps you'd give us someinsight into it in a few sentences?
Sequence is a bookset in two distinct timeframes. One story progresses day by day whilst anotherjumps forward a few years at a time, ultimately landing in 2043. How and whythose two stories converge is extremely shocking. If it's true, it could changethe face of the planet forever.
How did you come to write this particular book?
I was a little annoyed that 'Time Travel' had such a badrep., even when covered by well respected authors such as Michael Crichton. Igot to thinking that I wanted to write a time travel novel in which the sciencewas accurate, the consequences were real and the whole thing held an air ofpossibility. More importantly, I wanted to write a novel in which, despite timetravel, not one single event in the past could be changed. Then ask the question…so why bother? The answer may surprise quite a few people.
Do you have a favourite character from the book? If so, who and whythis particular one?
One of the 'lesser' characters in the novel is Tina. She isautistic, mute and phenomenally intelligent. She can't communicate with othersnot because she is on a lower plane but because she is on a higher one. For thebulk of the novel she is who she is and perhaps seems a little like abackground character. Through a devastating event toward the end of the novelshe becomes the key to everything that is happening and I feel for her. I didwhen I wrote her and I do now.
Where can people buy your books?
Waterstone's, WHSmith, Amazon, iBookstore. All the usualplaces, really. "Available from all good Bookstores. And some bad ones!  ;0)"
What qualities does a writer need to be successful?
Luck. When Codex was first rejected by publishers in 1999 itwas because it was deemed to be too 'millenial'. Then, from mid 2000 (Angels& Demons) onwards everyone was saying that it was a bit 'Dan Brown' andnone of the big publishers would touch it. In 2010 I had a lot of officialreviews saying that it was 'like Dan Brown but better'. If, in 1999, someonehad seen its potential it could have had an almost Dan Brown like level ofsuccess. Maybe.
What's your working method?
Index cards. I start with the ending first, and then ensurethat everything tapers towards that point. I have one index card for every chapter with all the major events listedout. I need to do this to ensure that every piece of the puzzle arrives on timeand fits where it should. Then I walk the dogs, write the chapter in my head,come home and commit it to paper.
What's the single biggest mistake made by beginner writers?
I've never copied anyone else, but the years of peoplethinking that Codex was copying Dan Brown when it was written years earlier hastaught me that bandwagons don't take you anywhere nice. I see a lot of peoplewho want to write copying plots, styles or characters from the big sellers.Don't. Write what you want to write, how you want to write it. We need morerule-breakers coming through.
To what extent are grammar and spelling important in writing?
In the novel itself, hugely. In the way characters speak ornarrate not at all. People use bad grammar in real life and realism comes fromreflecting that. I'm very careful with my speeling though.
How much do you revise your MS before sending it off?
I have a period where I read a chapter at a time, walk thedogs again and mull it over, then I have a period where I open the MS at randomand tweak. This lasts a few weeks usually.
As a writer of Thriller fiction, to what extent do you think genre isuseful in the publishing world?
I'm not a 'literary' writer, and yet one well known reviewersaid of Codex: "The prose is a joy to behold in the early chapters as theauthor exercises his literary muscle and produces some of the best craftedsentences I have read this year." To me, genre is irrelevant. Genre is what abook is about, not what a writer is about. Genre is the flimsiest of tagsdesigned to help place things on shelves.
Many authors see marketing as a bind. What's your opinion on this, andhow do you deal with it?
I'm a Creative Director at an Advertising Agency so I findit very hard to turn over my publicity to others. On the plus side, it meansthat I have the skills to program and control my own web presence. For the mostpart, however, I find it a bind.  That iswith the exception of Book signings.   Ilove meeting readers, and talking about the plot of the novel, or the sciencebehind the story.
What sort of displacement activities keep you from writing?
Anything. Everything. My writing covers a wide range ofsubjects because I'm into so many things. I then find it hard to get down toactual writing because I'm into so many things.
What support, if any, do you receive from family and friends, writinggroup, or dedicated professionals?
My three stand-outs are my girlfriend who checks everythingI write and then annoys me by finding things I'd missed because I was inmid-flow. Then there are two local guys, one in his seventies who is a novelisthimself and one who runs the Nottingham Writer's Studio and is working on hisfirst novel. The three of them offer all the help, advice, encouragement andcorrections I could ever need.
Is presentation of the MS as important as agents and publisherssuggest?
Not at all, as long as it's legible. I'm sure that a lot ofexciting and unconventional writers have been lost in the slush pile over theyears because their submissions followed rules that they were told to followand their unconventional nature was lost along the way.
How long does it take you to write a novel?
I have three on the go at the moment – [Sequoia] which is the follow-up to Sequence, plus Memory andRemote. I only write one at a timewhilst I research and plot the others but it means that by the time I settledown to write, say, Memory it will be a couple of months at most.
Who or what inspires your writing?
Every strange event I've ever read about, every strange factI ever learned and, more importantly, every strange person I've ever met.
If there's a single aspect of writing you find frustrating, what is it?
Finding the final piece of some very complex jigsaw.
Is there a particular feature of writing that you really enjoy?
Finding the final piece of some very complex jigsaw.
Do you believe creative writing is a natural gift or an acquired skill?
The gift is wanting to write and the wanting to write meansthat you do write which, ultimately, makes you better at it.
What are you writing now?



I've not looked back through all the other interviews, but Iguess that the #1 answer to this question is '…these answers'. (SA – in fact, that has never been the answer)Apart from that, I'm working on [Sequoia]which is immensely rewarding because I'm trying to combine the most accurateforecast of what 2043AD might be like with the most accurate portrayal I canmuster of 1645AD. In case you were wondering, they're both dirty, horrible,wretched places to be.
Do you have a website or blog where readers can visit?
www.adriandawson.co.uk- there's a little bit of something on there for everyone from my dailyramblings, to research, to current promotions (there's a fantastic competitionrunning in conjunction with Sequence to locate and find some treasure!) and ofcourse sample chapters of both Codexand Sequence.
Given unlimited resources, where would you do your writing?
Anywhere with a stunning view and an MP3 player.
Where do you actually write?
I write in detail in my head, almost 24/7, but the actualstenography happens in many different places. When I first write a chapter Ilike to be at my desk as I have a Mac Pro with two 30" screens and I have theresearch occupying all available screen real estate. When I tweak chapters thatcan happen almost anywhere: at my desk, Macbook Pro on my sofa, iPad on thetrain. Often I have conversations between characters in my head whilst I'm outand about and by the time I get home, ten minutes will have that conversationadded to the novel.


Adrian is hosting a Twitter Book Club tonight between 8 and 9 o'clock (BST). If you want to get involved, please use the hashtag #Sequence; the link is  http://www.adriandawson.co.uk/index.php/categoryblog/273-twittersequence.htm