Goodreads asked Nicolás Obregón:

What’s your advice for aspiring writers?

Nicolás Obregón 1) Assuming the writer wants to take this path, they should do extensive research on agents. This will (hopefully) be a life-long relationship and the agent will earn a cut of anything the writer earns. That cut is well worth it. The agent has the connections. The agent has the wisdom. The agent will help navigate unchartered waters. Essentially, they will be the writer's champion out there in the real world. As such, making a list of agents should be a carefully-considered process that must not be rushed. Once ready, the query letter the aspiring writer sends out should be pored over extensively. After all, this is probably the most important e-mail they will ever send. It's worth spending a fair amount of time researching query letters in general, differing styles, best practice, so on. The agent will also want to know why the writer has addressed them in particular. Luckily, agent bios will usually convey what they are looking for. If they love unexpected settings and wicked plot twists and the writer's novel has that on the page, then this should certainly be made clear in the query letter. Lastly, it's a good idea to read it out to a select few - teachers, friends, trusted colleagues. Someone who won't be a yes man, who's happy to highlight the errant comma, so on.

2) This point is probably more abstract but I think it's important. The aspiring writer will be told time and again: 'find out who you are.' Essentially, they are being asked to understand their own identity. Of course, some people will have this down already but it's no simple task.

I've always loved crime fiction. Always. But I never planned to write crime fiction for a living. So, when I heard the siren call of Blue Light Yokohama and realised I was going to be writing about a homicide inspector, I embarked on a crime fiction pilgrimage. I spent a lot of money on books. Good ones. Bad ones. Long ones. Short ones. Funny ones. Gross ones. Hardboiled ones. Magical ones. Ones close to home. Ones from further away. Icelandic, Indian, Japanese, Spanish. Classics. Unpublished titles. You name it, I probably read it. I gorged on crime and ended up learning about its historical roots and traditions - from the Chinese oral tradition magistrate stories, to One Thousand and One Nights, to the Bible. I became a fan of authors, old and new, and came to understand where my own writing might one day sit in the great genus of crime fiction.

But had I 'found out' who I was as a writer?

Not really.

However, I had found out who I wasn't. And that was valuable to me. It helped me to forget the preoccupation with some overarching search for identity as a writer while, at the same time, galvanised the drive to simply write the best novel I could.

So yeah, while a journey of self-discovery is probably worthwhile, I would say it's far more valuable to focus energy on writing the best novel possible. The rest will flow from there.

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