A few questions with author John Connolly

 

NY Times Best-selling author John Connolly was kind and generous enough to answer a few quick questions for us. A huge thanks to John for that as well as a huge thanks to Clair Lamb for arranging it. John is one of my biggest influences so this means the world to me. His work is always emotional, insightful, entertaining, and razor-sharp.

THE BURNING SOUL is out in paperback on June 21 in the UK and June 26 in the US.

 

THE WRATH OF ANGELS will be out on August 30 in the UK, and we’re waiting on a final date in the US.

 

John is also co-editor, with Declan Burke, of an anthology called BOOKS TO DIE FOR, coming on August 30 in the UK and on October 2 in the US. There’ll be a signing event for BOOKS TO DIE FOR at Bouchercon.

 

Me: Thanks so much for taking the time to answer a few questions, John! Who were your biggest writing influences?

John: In the genre, probably Ross Macdonald and James Lee Burke: Macdonald for his compassion, and Burke for the sheer quality of his prose, and the way in which he describes the natural world. I doubt that I’d be writing what I do had I not read those two. Mind you, Ed McBain’s Let’s Hear It for the Deaf Man was the first mystery novel I ever read, I think, so I owe the late McBain too. But most of my reading is outside the genre, and more and more so as I get older. I think Bleak House by Charles Dickens is the greatest novel in the English language, although interestingly Sara Paretsky chose to discuss it as a mystery novel for an anthology that I’m co-editing later this year, so I guess it’s all in the eye of the beholder.

Me: Excellent. I’ve yet to read Bleak House so will move that to the top of my TBR pile. Whose writing do you enjoy most out of your current peers?

John: That’s a bullet I’ll have to dodge, as there are just too many of them to mention, and I risk leaving someone out. I do think that the growth in Irish mystery writing in recent years has been remarkable, and there is such an array of tone and style among the writers who have emerged. Declan Burke’s blog is a good starting point if people want to find out more about Irish mystery writing.

Me:  Thank you. What was the impetus for creating Charlie Parker?

John: I’m not sure that I thought in those terms when I began writing the books. The first piece of fiction that I wrote – almost eight years after I left school – was the prologue to Every Dead Thing, so he pretty much arrived with his baggage in tow. Like most writers, I simply wanted to write, and mystery fiction seemed like the form that would best allow me to explore the subjects and themes that interested me. But I suppose Parker now is not Parker as he was, just as I’m not the same writer who created him, as nearly two decades have passed since I began writing that first book. He’s more complex and nuanced, I hope. Then again, people still come up to me and say that Every Dead Thing is their favorite of my mystery books, which possibly suggests that it’s all been downhill ever since…

Me: Lol. You have definitely not gone down hill ever since.  Thanks so much for your time, John. And thanks again to Clair. Can’t wait to read the new novels coming out later this year!

Happy Memorial Day to everybody! If you haven’t read any of John Connolly’s work I strongly urge you to give it a try, whether you pick up the Charlie Parker series, The Book of Lost Things, his collection Nocturnes, or the YA books featuring Samuel Johnson. Find out more at John’s website.