April 2021 Group Read with Guest Author, Russell James

[Kenneth]

This is the thread for the April 2021 Group Read with Guest Author, Russell James, as we read his historical horror tale, Farallon Island. Russell will be here all month long to answer all of our questions and provide interesting tidbits on how his story came to be. Click on the link below to get your copy and please help me welcome to HA, Russell James!

[Amy]

Hi there Russel! The book sounds great and I am going to head over to Amazon right now!

[Terry]

Welcome Russell. I am looking forward to reading this when it’s released in a few days.

[Latasha]

Welcome Russell! This one sounds great too!

[Russell]

It's so exciting to be able to share Farallon Island with everyone. It was a thrill to write, with all the research that went into it. Conjuring up characters with such different backgrounds and see how they react to the threat on the island was a lot of fun. Can't wait to see how you all like it.

[Catherine]

Looking forward to curling up with this one, Russell :)

[Russell]

FARALLON ISLAND is set at a real place, a set of rocky islands far off the California coast near San Francisco. There's a big reef nearby, so a lighthosue was erected there in the early 1800s. A few houses were erected for the keepers who had to live there, but the rest of the place is a rocky pile populated by sea lions and sea birds. I tried to describe the main elements of the location, but I can give all of you a little more. There was a great display at the NPS Maritime Museum in San Francisco about the islands, in fact it inspired the story. First link here is to the actual Fresnel lens from the lighthouse. The ingenious design allows the light inside to be focused into a tight beam along a great distance. I thought it was also a real work of art. https://www.russellrjames.com/wp-cont...

[Catherine]

Hi Russell. Just read Farallon Island. I loved the atmosphere - the isolation and creeping dread. The whole story felt authentic, with plenty of suspense, terror and a great plot twist (actually more than one). Another winner!

[Russell]

Thanks, Cat! Your review means a lot since you are such a horror connoisseur.

[Kenneth]

Russell, was there a driving force that helped you decide to set the story in the 1930s?

[Char]

Hello, Russell! Thanks for joining us this month.
I read and enjoyed your book The Playing Card Killer .

[Russell]

I hope you have a nice fictional visit to Farallon Island.

[Russell]

Kenneth wrote: "Russell, was there a driving force that helped you decide to set the story in the 1930s?"

Once I was inspried to use the location, I read through the history to find out what years the lighthouse keepers were there alone. In the 1930s, the keepers were on the cusp of modernization, but still isolated with bi-monthly resupplies and poor communications. That time period also allowed me to get a more diverse set of characters as keepers (a bootlegger, immigants from China and Mexico) which made it more fun to write and hopefully more fun to read.

[Russell]

In the book there is a huge storm that pounds the island. In real life, that is very common. A lightning rod was set up to keep the lighthouse safe from lightning strikes. Here is a picture of the actual lightning rod tip in a museum. All the gouges aren't from someone dropping it. Those are from the lightning. https://www.russellrjames.com/wp-cont...

[Kenneth]

Russell, Farallon chocks in at 158 pages. Do you have a preference to writing novels, novellas or short story length?

[Russell]

Each story seems to determine its own length. Some ideas are clearly short stories where there come across as a critical scene in someone's life. My Grant Coleman adventure series are giant monster sci-fi stories. They are more action heavy and seem to tell themselves at about 150 pages. LAMBS AMONG WOLVES (coming in July from Silver Shamrock) follows a teen girl and an exorcist priest across Europe trying exorcising demons. This much more epic story needed the full novel-length treatment to be told.

[Terry]

I am a little late jumping into this monthly read, but just wanted to share that I really enjoyed this book. I loved the short, intense chapters and the fast-paced suspense. Russell, were any of the characters similar to people you personally know today? Also, was there any part in this book that you found difficult to write?

[Russell]

There wasn't anyone I had in mind as each character came to life, though I've seen each character's flaws and motivations in someone. As for hard to write, any scene where a child is hurt is gut-wrenching to write, so I end up having it happen off-screen. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I got completely lost in writing the scene where the captain returns to the lighthouse in the storm. I got done with that and I felt as wet and terrified as the captain did.

[Russell]

In the novella, one of characters isn't human. Well, two characters aren't human, but one of them isn't a killer. Jack the Mule is the reluctant provider of all the needed muscle to move supplies and keep the lighthouse running. The island had an actual mule onsite for many years and it ended up being a playmate for the children there. Here's a link to a picture of some of the kids on Paddy, one of the island mules. The picture is in the National Maritime Museum in San Francisco. https://www.russellrjames.com/wp-cont...