Andrea57 asked B.K. Duncan:

What is your motivation for writing and what makes you choose the particular genre?

B.K. Duncan Two wonderful questions in one – thank you. I’ll start with the genre part first as there I can trace the path of conscious decision making; analysing motivations is never as clear-cut.

For many years I wrote novels that received rave rejection from agents and publishers, except all contained the kiss of death: I was falling between genres. When I finally sat up and took notice I realised that I was writing books with lots of action; plenty of character development; and interwoven themes explored in challenging settings. But a weakness in narrative drive because plot had always been led by the fusion of the other components of fiction. So I decided to focus my attention on stories where plot formed the spine. Crime novels, in other words. There had always been dastardly goings-on in my books and all I needed (or so I thought) was to study the conventions of the genre and harden things up a little. Only it wasn’t that easy and it took me a novel or two to get it right. Well, I hope I have with Foul Trade.

My motivation to write is to make sense of this thing called life. To examine the human condition. And to do so by immersing myself in the topics that interest and excite me; creating stories that fire my imagination and allow me scope to learn things I’d never have the excuse to spend time on otherwise. I love language; the poetry of words; the fusion of memories and experience; pulling the strings of characters who can involve themselves in things I can only ever dream of. I suppose, if you add all that together, I write to discover the essence of who I am and to express that in ways I can share with others – friends and strangers alike. Not matter what a writer explores, they are always, in the end, exploring themselves.

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