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Dagger
Only hard men survive along the River and Jim Dagger is the hardest of them all. He makes sure he wins every lucrative job and he crushes anyone who gets in his way.Then Nathan Sullivan arrives.Dagger may have met his match at last, but before there can be a final reckoning the two men have to deal with contraband runners and unscrupulous businessmen who also ply their trade along the River.Murders – old and new, desperate rescues in raging seas, violence and treachery confront Nathan, and the River may claim more lives before matters are finally settled with the ruthless King of the Jim Dagger.
413 pages, Paperback
Published July 23, 2020
About the author
Geoffrey Bird
8 booksWhat are your five favourite books. Why?
The Cruel Sea (Nicholas Monsarrat).
This is a book I return to time and time again. For me it has everything: drama, action, love, treachery, honour, bravery, every element of the human condition and, most of all, it’s not about impossibly heroic characters - it’s about very ordinary people dealing with a war and dealing with the effects of that war. It is moving, uplifting, harrowing and stirring. Truly a marvellous story.
Lonesome Dove (Larry McMurtry).
An epic tale, brilliantly written. Gus and Call are memorable characters and the descriptions of people and situations are superb. A deeply moving story.
Shadow Hunters (David Mace)
A Cold War tale of a hunt for an enemy who may or may not be there. A very well-written and atmospheric story; the personal rivalries between the pilots and the scenes in the air are gripping.
Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
What makes this novel such a delight to read is the discovery of so many insights into Scarlett’s character. This, coupled with the relentlessly unfolding events of the Civil War, make this a thoroughly captivating story. The movie (epic though it is) really doesn’t do this tale justice – there’s so much in the book to enjoy and savour.
The Day Before Midnight (Stephen Hunter)
The characters in this story really come alive. Their dialogue and thoughts are brilliantly written. The action scenes, always written with a strong focus on what the participants are thinking and feeling, are vivid and tense and make this a quite excellent novel.
What is your writing process?
When the process is triggered (and it can be anything: One Man’s Empire has its origins in a tea-room menu; in the case of Linden Grove the title just popped into my head as I was working on something else) I mull over the idea, jotting down whatever thoughts come into my head, adding notes about characters, scenes, situations, always building it up into some kind of structure. Mixed with this is research into whatever I find I need more detail for. Then there will come a point when I’ve got so much material that I need to organise it into an outline.
On this point I should say that I don’t write the outline in minute detail; I’m of the Irving Wallace school, favouring the careful development of the main stories and subplots and ensuring the whole thing has the proper perspective and balance, yet sometimes sketching scenes or characters or situations in only very broad strokes, thus leaving room for invention and spontaneity in the writing.
The first draft is always the hardest part but after eight or nine thousand words a momentum develops and that carries me through the writing of the full novel. I’m quite thorough with the revision and rewriting; I like to be sure that I’ve done the best I can with each sentence, each scene, each chapter.
What books and/or authors have influenced the type of novels you write?
Specific books have been influences rather than the complete works of any particular author. For example, the novels from Alistair Maclean’s golden period (generally from Night Without End (1959) to Bear Island (1971) ) are still high examples of adventure and thriller writing. Wilbur Smith’s Hungry As The Sea, most of Desmond Bagley’s work, Stephen King’s Firestarter and the novels listed in My Five Favourite Books all colour my writing to a degree.
What is the story behind your latest work?
‘Jim Dagger’ has its roots in elements of another novel I planned (but didn’t develop further) and in discovering the surname in a list of old Cheshire names. The writing of it took me on a boat ride the length of the Manchester Ship Canal, and entailed much pleasurable research involving old maps and photographs. The names of some of the characters went through several transformations but Jim Dagger was settled from the beginning.
What is the greatest joy of writing for you?
Seeing a novel-in-progress build
The Cruel Sea (Nicholas Monsarrat).
This is a book I return to time and time again. For me it has everything: drama, action, love, treachery, honour, bravery, every element of the human condition and, most of all, it’s not about impossibly heroic characters - it’s about very ordinary people dealing with a war and dealing with the effects of that war. It is moving, uplifting, harrowing and stirring. Truly a marvellous story.
Lonesome Dove (Larry McMurtry).
An epic tale, brilliantly written. Gus and Call are memorable characters and the descriptions of people and situations are superb. A deeply moving story.
Shadow Hunters (David Mace)
A Cold War tale of a hunt for an enemy who may or may not be there. A very well-written and atmospheric story; the personal rivalries between the pilots and the scenes in the air are gripping.
Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
What makes this novel such a delight to read is the discovery of so many insights into Scarlett’s character. This, coupled with the relentlessly unfolding events of the Civil War, make this a thoroughly captivating story. The movie (epic though it is) really doesn’t do this tale justice – there’s so much in the book to enjoy and savour.
The Day Before Midnight (Stephen Hunter)
The characters in this story really come alive. Their dialogue and thoughts are brilliantly written. The action scenes, always written with a strong focus on what the participants are thinking and feeling, are vivid and tense and make this a quite excellent novel.
What is your writing process?
When the process is triggered (and it can be anything: One Man’s Empire has its origins in a tea-room menu; in the case of Linden Grove the title just popped into my head as I was working on something else) I mull over the idea, jotting down whatever thoughts come into my head, adding notes about characters, scenes, situations, always building it up into some kind of structure. Mixed with this is research into whatever I find I need more detail for. Then there will come a point when I’ve got so much material that I need to organise it into an outline.
On this point I should say that I don’t write the outline in minute detail; I’m of the Irving Wallace school, favouring the careful development of the main stories and subplots and ensuring the whole thing has the proper perspective and balance, yet sometimes sketching scenes or characters or situations in only very broad strokes, thus leaving room for invention and spontaneity in the writing.
The first draft is always the hardest part but after eight or nine thousand words a momentum develops and that carries me through the writing of the full novel. I’m quite thorough with the revision and rewriting; I like to be sure that I’ve done the best I can with each sentence, each scene, each chapter.
What books and/or authors have influenced the type of novels you write?
Specific books have been influences rather than the complete works of any particular author. For example, the novels from Alistair Maclean’s golden period (generally from Night Without End (1959) to Bear Island (1971) ) are still high examples of adventure and thriller writing. Wilbur Smith’s Hungry As The Sea, most of Desmond Bagley’s work, Stephen King’s Firestarter and the novels listed in My Five Favourite Books all colour my writing to a degree.
What is the story behind your latest work?
‘Jim Dagger’ has its roots in elements of another novel I planned (but didn’t develop further) and in discovering the surname in a list of old Cheshire names. The writing of it took me on a boat ride the length of the Manchester Ship Canal, and entailed much pleasurable research involving old maps and photographs. The names of some of the characters went through several transformations but Jim Dagger was settled from the beginning.
What is the greatest joy of writing for you?
Seeing a novel-in-progress build
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