The Intel: Vaughn Entwistle

The winter nights are cold and dark, the wind is howling through the trees and you’re in the mood to curl up in front of a crackling fire in a top hat – or, if you’re a lady, a pretty bonnet – to read something dark and gothic.

Vaughn Entwistle’s new novel The Angel Of Highgate takes us back to October 1859. Lord Geoffrey Thraxton is notorious in Victorian society – a Byronesque rake with a reputation. After surviving a near deadly pistol duel, boastful Thraxton finds himself on the wrong side of the attending physician Silas Garrette, a chloroform addict with a bloodlust, and when Thraxton falls in love with a mysterious woman who haunts Highgate Cemetery he unwittingly provides the murderous doctor with the perfect means to punish a man with no fear of death.

Entwistle has got form where supernatural chillers are concerned. He’s the author of two novels in The Paranormal Casebooks of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle series – of which The Angel Of Highgate is a prequel – The Revenant of Thraxton Hall and The Dead Assassin. He lives in north Somerset with his wife and cats.

Vaughn gives us the intel on his new series, Thraxton, gargoyles, and the secrets of Highgate Cemetery, and finding your killer concept.

Tell us about Lord Geoffrey Thraxton. Where did you get the inspiration to write such a deliciously wicked character?

Lord Thraxton is a bit of a naughty boy. I would describe him as “wicked” in the naughty sense of the word: wicked but not evil. He is impulsive, utterly without boundaries, and has a self-destructive streak that leads him to frequent brothels, smoke opium, womanise, fight duels and tempt fate at each and every opportunity. He’s a pastiche of several real-life characters. Like Lord Byron, he would best be described as “mad, bad, and dangerous to know.” He’s also partially based upon also the Irish nobleman, The Marquess of Waterford, known by many as the “Mad Marquess” because of his drunken revels with a group of cronies that frequently ended in vandalism and public outrage.

But deep at the centre of Thraxton is a dark streak of melancholia. He was deeply wounded in childhood by the death of his beloved mother and the subsequent indifference of his stern father. In the novel. Thraxton is a metaphor for the Victorian preoccupation (some might term it, fetishisation) of death. The Victorian era was a time when, due to the prevalence of incurable diseases such as “consumption” (tuberculosis), many people died in the bloom of youth. (The Poet Keats is a tragic example.) The Victorians made an artform of mourning right down to strict conventions regarding the mourning clothes that had to be worn for a full year after the loss of a loved one. The creation of London’s “Magnificent Seven,” elysian necropolises such as Kensal Green Cemetery, Brompton Cemetery and, of course, the crown jewel, Highgate Cemetery, were the physical manifestation of the Victorian obsession with death and mourning.

Why are we so attracted to absolute rotters like Lord Geoffrey?

I think we are fascinated and drawn to scoundrels like Lord Geoffrey Thraxton because they have the power and influence to flaunt the conventions of society, where we do not (or at least not without suffering consequences). Although we all like to live in an orderly and safe world, I think readers get a vicarious thrill reading about a protagonist who follows his or her own path without fear of the social repercussions.

Why are we so fascinated by the Victorian underworld?

I think Dickens has to take a great deal of the blame for this. The criminal underword has always held a fascination for the rest of us. The Victorian criminal, from Jack the Ripper onwards, had the unique ability to slip away into the foggy night, evading capture by the authorities. As such, they become fearful shadows. We read horror and suspense novels because we like to be scared, and the Victorian underworld is filled with bogeymen. The two that feature in The Angel of Highgate: the Mobsman Mordecai Fowler and the deranged Doctor Silas Garette, are utterly ruthless psychopaths dredged up from your worst nightmare.

Which is your favourite grave in Highgate Cemetery?

To me the most spectacular part of Highate Cemetery is the Egyptian Avenue, a dark and gloomy passageway entered by passing through a massive, pharoahnic arch (Egyptology was all the rage in Victorian England). The dark passageway is lined on either side by brass doored tombs and gradually ascends to a circle of granite tombs called The Circle of Lebanon, so named after the towering cedar at its centre. If you’re a topophile like me, there’s nothing to match it for sheer gothic atmosphere.

Will we be seeing the return of your paranormal sleuthing duo Arthur Conan Doyle and Oscar Wilde?

I certainly hope so. I’m currently writing the third in the series while plotting the fourth book and have ideas for dozens of future books in the series.

You’ve had your own gargoyle-sculpting business! What makes a really handsome gargoyle?

Ugly and scary is what you’re looking for in a gargoyle, which is why my best gargoyles are based on what I look like when I get up in the morning—before I’ve quaffed a big mug of strong tea and had time to pound the horns back into my head.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

A novel takes a tremendous amount of work and consumes a huge chunk of your life. And yet I have written novels that will probably never see the light of day. Not because the writing was bad, but because the concept behind it was not commercial enough. You can write about any subject you like, but to attract the attention of an agent and then a publisher, you need a killer concept (something highly original, but not too way out). But a high concept alone is not enough; you must follow through with terrific writing featuring original characters, sparkling dialogue and vivid prose that crackles on the page.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

Of course, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, because beyond providing the archetype for the detective story with Sherlock Holmes, he was also an incredible innovator who penned ghost stories, science fiction, historical fiction and adventure stories.

Neil Gaiman: the consummate professional. Although he’s been writing for years, he continues to produce fresh, original writing.

Elizabeth Hand. A terrific writer with gorgeous prose. A terrific “voice” and a good prose style are essential for me. I’ve abandoned many novels if the prose is dull and unoriginal. I’m very proud of my own prose style and many fans comment upon it.

Ramsey McDonald. Recognised by many as the master of horror. His short stories are the best in the genre.

Give me some advice about writing…

If you are not writing, you should be reading and vice versa. It takes hours and hours of writing to discover your “voice.” There is no short cut for this. You should also be well read in whatever genre you decide to write in. Not so you can copy others, but so you can avoid copying them. To stand out in today’s crowded marketplace, you must offer something utterly original.

 What’s next for you?

I am currently writing the third novel in the Paranormal Casebooks series, entitled, The Faerie Vortex. As you can guess from the title it’s about faeries. However, I always like to take an unconventional spin on whatever trope I use in my fiction. So these are not the Tinkerbell fairies of Disney, these are Faeries in the sense of The Fey: beings that are intimately linked with the Nether-realm that lies between life and death.

I’m also working on the plot of the fourth book in the Paranormal Casebooks series and when I’m not doing that I’m writing a collection of ghost stories.

***

The Angel Of Highgate is published by Titan Books on December 1st.

The Intel: Mark A. Latham

2015 Adam Shaw Photography

Mark A. Latham’s supernatural crime novel The Lazarus Gate introduces us to a new Victorian hero. Captain John Hardwick, an army veteran and opium addict, is recruited by a mysterious gentlemen’s club to combat an uncanny threat to the British Empire.

As his path crosses with that of “The Artist,” a mysterious yet brilliant painter whose medium encompasses something far more otherworldly than mere oil and acrylic paints, he soon finds himself drawn into a world just beyond our own.

The Lazarus Gate is the tale of a secret war waged between parallel universes, between reality and the supernatural. A war fought relentlessly by an elite group of agents.

Latham has got form for this kind of fantastical genre mash-up. Formerly the editor of Games Workshop’s White Dwarf magazine, Mark dabbled in tabletop games design before becoming a full-time author of strange, fantastical and macabre tales.

He gives us the intel on the first of his Hardwick series, how Victorian literature inspired him, the parallels between roleplaying games and narrative fiction and how a good editor can work wonders for any writer…

What is The Lazarus Gate?

That would be a massive spoiler… Suffice it to say, in a tale of Victorian science fiction, the central threat will come in the form of an Infernal Device ™. The Lazarus Gate is that device.

Your novel combines crime and supernatural elements in a Victorian setting – where did you get the idea for the exploits of Captain John Hardwick and The Artist?

That’s such a tough question – I think every writer dreads the ‘Where do you get your ideas’ question, because there’s rarely a single answer. I’ve lived and breathed Victorian literature since I was a kid, so I was always going to write something set in the era. Really, the books that I loved in my teens – Dracula, Allan Quatermain, The Man Who Would be King, The Time Machine, and so on – they informed the themes that I knew I had to touch on. The obsession with spiritualism, the Gothic, Victorian exoticism and Imperialism, the sins of the father being visited on the son… You’ll probably see shades of Count Dracula and even Fu-Manchu in the Artist, which is entirely intentional.

I’m also a pretty avid reader of horror stories (mostly Victorian and Edwardian ones, naturally), and so I always like to include some elements creeping dread in my stories. That doesn’t bode terribly well for John Hardwick at times, unfortunately…

Why is the Victorian era such a rich time for writers with a penchant for the fantastical?

We’re in a period of real appreciation for Victorian-era stories; while a few years ago we saw some failed attempts and false starts (The oft-maligned League of Extraordinary Gentleman movie springs to mind), we’re now entering a golden age for aficionados of the era like me. Shows like Penny Dreadful and Ripper Street, and the movie Crimson Peak, are getting the mainstream attention they deserve. The BBC’s Sherlock has reinvigorated interest in the Great Detective, and is even filming a very meta Victorian episode. The fantastical elements of many of these shows lend themselves so perfectly to the period – the Victorians were obsessed with the supernatural, the sinister, the fantastical. So many of the horror, SF and fantasy tropes we think of as clichéd today were created in the nineteenth century that it was just a really rich melting pot of ideas. Going back to the source seems entirely natural, to me at least.

I think the Victorian era has a mystique and romance about it. When people think of ghost stories, they often think of the fog-shrouded streets of Victorian London. When they think of detective fiction, they think of Sherlock Holmes. When they think of gruesome crimes, they think of Jack the Ripper. It’s such an evocative period in history, and for writers of a more macabre bent, like me, there’s a wealth of archetypal images to draw upon. More than that, I think that in an era where we’re just bombarded with technology and communications that make the world feel very small, it’s great to be able to hearken back to a time before the telephone or the aeroplane, when detective work had to be done with footslogging and deduction rather than high-speed international databases, and where help was several days’ ride away rather than at the end of a cell phone.

The Lazarus Gate would make a terrific film – who have your got your eye on for the main cast?

Very nice of you to say (if any Hollywood agents are reading this, their people can feel free to call my people, etc). It’s funny you should ask that though, as I was talking with friends about this in the pub just yesterday!

When I start writing a story, I often ‘cast’ the main roles, and sometimes even pin pictures of those actors and actresses up on a board. The reason is to help me with dialogue – ‘How would he deliver that line if this was a movie?’ Although I don’t write in anything like a ‘movie structure’, as an exercise it helps keep me consistent with characterisation.

A friend told me yesterday that she could see Johnny Depp playing John Hardwick, which really surprised me. Actually, when I was about four chapters in, he started speaking in the voice of Jonny Lee Miller from Elementary, and that kind of stuck. John Hardwick isn’t Hollywood-pretty, and he’s not really the typical action hero – he’s had a tough life, he’s not a great success, he’s wiry and scarred, struggling with addiction, but keeps it together in the face of adversity, remaining honest as the day is long in a world of deception and temptation.

As for the rest of the cast – I don’t want to influence how people see my characters in their mind’s eye, but let’s just say that there are definitely parts for Jude Law, Alan Rickman and Tuppence Middleton when the casting people come knocking.

You have been a tabletop games designer – what are the similarities between inventing games and writing novels?

I still am a [part time] tabletop games designer, for my sins. I think writing those sort of games flexes both your creative muscles and your organisational ones. Can you capture the imagination of your audience, and create a convincing world? Can you then create a framework of rules that logically fit together so that your readers/players can bring their own stories to life within that world? That’s at the heart of everything I’ve ever done.

It’s in roleplaying games, though, that I really cut my teeth as a narrative writer. When you’re the games master or storyteller for a small group, you have to balance those interactions so each of your players has their time to shine, encouraging them to stay ‘in character’, and rewarding their actions on the fly with new plot twists while gently nudging them towards an end goal in your story arc. All those years playing Dungeons & Dragons and Call of Cthulhu probably made me a better writer.

Like many writers, you’re turning your attention to a Sherlock Holmes novel – what can you tell us about that?

Very little, if I want my editor to refrain from sending out the hitmen. I will say that it’s a bit of a genre mash-up, like many of Titan’s Sherlock Holmes titles. Naturally, as it’s me, you can expect a bit of Gothic horror and Victorian sensationalism; but I’m a stickler when it comes to Holmes. He will save the day using deduction and rationalism, no matter how esoteric the crime appears.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

I expect the really hard stuff is yet to come. But really, I think it’s that you have no one to rely on but yourself if you’re going to succeed. You can get support from all over, sure, but that’s not going to put words on the blank page that’s been staring you out for the last eight hours, or put an advance in your account. There are lots of things that no amount of writing advice and blogs can prepare you for. Those days when you think everything you’ve written is just terrible. The rejections, the really hard revisions… you have to steel yourself for that, and if you don’t think you’re up to it then you’re in the wrong business. It’s always been that way I think, but these days social media, book blogging, Amazon reviews… it’s made writers more accessible, and more vulnerable. I think writers sometimes get accused of having huge egos. Some of them do, I’m sure! But the average writer just uses the façade of an ego like a shield – it’s a pretty vital survival mechanism.

All of that makes it sound like writing is one long hardship. It isn’t, of course. It’s not as easy as I thought when I took the leap, in all honesty, but I wouldn’t change it for the world. Build up resistance to the hard times, celebrate the good, put your soul into it… you’ll be alright.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

It’s a testament to my obsession with history that most of my favourite authors are long dead. Of them, I’d say Conan Doyle, Stoker, and M R James would be my top three, with William Hope Hodgson and H G Wells completing the top five. Essentially that’s because those writers all became masters of their niche, if not the creators of it, and there’s no way The Lazarus Gate would have been written without them.

Of the writers living today, I envy Neil Gaiman’s fathomless imagination, Susan Hill’s ability to evoke atmosphere with very few words, Stephen King’s incredible plotting, Sarah Pinborough’s consistent and prolific output, and Adam Nevill’s ability to make the most mundane situations appear absolutely terrifying.

Give me some advice about writing…

I’ll give you two bits of advice, born of my own experience. As I’ve only had one book published to date, you can take this with pinch of salt/delete as applicable…

The first is to be true to yourself and your ‘vision’, for want of a better word. Write the book you’d want to read, and put all your enthusiasm into it so that other people want to read it too. Don’t sully that first draft by trying to second guess what makes a ‘marketable’ manuscript, by following formulas and ‘rules’ prescribed by the MFA lecturer who wrote that self-help book ten years ago. Make sure it excites you first and foremost, and hammer it into shape later, with help. Which brings me to my second tip, and one that’s perhaps even more important:

Listen to your editor.

Seriously, finding a good editor is the absolute key to getting a good book on the shelves, because no amount of tinkering and jealously guarding your beautiful work is going to make that book shine quite like a skilled editor. A good editor will engage you in a two-way process, and open a meaningful dialogue designed to polish your manuscript. But you’d better be prepared to meet her half way. That’s when the ego-shield I mentioned earlier has to get put in a box for a spell.

What’s next for Captain Hardwick?

Well, that’s also a bit of a secret. I will say that the series isn’t all about John, although I have some pretty severe hardships in store for him, don’t worry about that!

***

The Lazarus Gate, is published by Titan Books in paperback and ebook, priced at £7.99.

The Intel: Mason Cross Reloaded

Crime Thriller Fella is taking a much-needed summer break. But, chin up – we’re going to meet up again right here sooner than you could possibly hope. However, in the meantime, do keep coming back. Over the last year there’s been all sorts of stuff we’ve enjoyed plonking on the internet, and which you may have missed, such as this Intel interview with one of the talented new kids on the block… Mason Cross.

We love it when there’s a buzz about a new author. Thriller writer Mason Cross is picking up all sorts of great reviews for his gripping story of a FBI manhunt for a deranged sniper.

Crime Thriller Fella reviewed The Killing Season only last week and now, as promised, Cross gives us The Intel on new-hero-on-the-block Carter Blake, and on his own path to publication. If you’re a writer quietly plugging away at your craft, I strongly suggest you take a read…

Give us the lowdown on Carter Blake – he’s kind of a mysterious guy…

Ahh – that would be telling! He is indeed a mysterious guy. Suffice to say that he has a past that has furnished him with the skills and experience he now calls upon to do his job. That past occasionally comes back to haunt him, and we’ll find out a little more about it in the next book…

Blake hunts for a deranged sniper in The Killing Season – what is it about random killers that so fascinates us?

I think we do have a morbid fascination with serial killers. It’s probably because, while we can perhaps understand acts of violence committed in the heat of the moment, the impulse to cold-bloodedly take a human life is utterly alien to most of us. Thankfully, most of us don’t have that faulty gene. A sniper is particularly chilling, because they can strike from afar and you’ll never see them coming. It’s also the only type of cold-blooded killing that can be a legitimate profession: the military will actually train you up and pay you to do it.

How do you get inside the head of a man like that?

I suspect there may be some crossover in the psychological profiles of serial killers and crime writers; a little more overlap on the Venn diagram than is normal. Again, there’s a grim fascination for a writer in the idea of plotting and getting away with murder, although fortunately for society, we tend to keep our murders on the page.

In The Killing Season, I found that writing the villain was similar to writing the hero in a lot of ways: both are very driven, very methodical, very professional. They’re intelligent, capable men doing what they do. Blake would probably make a very good serial killer if he was that way inclined.

How did the idea of The Killing Season come about?

The initial idea was to pit two equally matched adversaries against one another. A hunter who can find anybody versus a lone wolf who’s adept at evading capture. I was interested in this idea of a very personal one-on-one contest amidst the backdrop of a massive multi-agency manhunt. The rest of the plot developed from that.

What kind of research did you have to do?

I read widely about serial killers, snipers, and police and federal manhunts. I read a book about the Washington Sniper case from 2002, and a couple of other books that dealt more with the history of snipers and the psychological warfare aspect of killing from a distance. A book I happened to read on J Edgar Hoover and the birth of the FBI turned out to be unexpectedly useful. I did a lot of local research into the locations I wanted to use. I spoke to my American friends to pick their brains and run ideas past them, and called on my own experiences visiting the States.

Perhaps as importantly as any of the direct research, I read a hell of a lot of thrillers, from the old masters to the authors who are in the bestseller charts today. I got to know the clichés to avoid, I stole some techniques I liked, and generally learned to avoid some of the common pitfalls. It’s interesting that the core elements of what makes a great thriller haven’t changed too much over the course of a century.

The Killing Season is your debut novel – what was your journey to getting published?

It involved a huge amount of luck! I’d been submitting stories to various magazines and competitions for a few years with occasional success. My story ‘A Living’ was published in the Quick Reads Sun Book of Short Stories, which encouraged me to keep at it. Some of the stories I posted on Harper Collins’s Authonomy site. A few months later, they got in touch to tell me that an agent, Luigi Bonomi, was interested in getting touch with me based one of the stories I’d posted.

I was sceptical at first, as it sounded too good to be true. But when I did a bit of Googling, I quickly realised that not only was Luigi the real deal, he was one of the top agents in the business. Luigi and his colleague Thomas Stofer were really encouraging about my writing and suggested I develop a novel. Fast forward a couple of years and we were ready to send The Killing Season out on submission.

Fortunately for me, Jemima Forrester at Orion read and loved it, and they offered me a deal. I was particularly pleased about signing with Orion because they have such a great track record on thrillers, and publish so many of my favourite authors.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I have a day job, so I normally have to fit the writing in around my other commitments. Luckily, I’m able to do that fairly easily – I’ve trained myself out of the habit of sitting around waiting for divine inspiration. I can write anywhere: planes, hotel rooms, cafés, pubs, libraries, park benches… I’d say my ideal writing environment is actually a quiet train carriage with no wifi. I would be unbelievably productive if I lived on a train.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

Too many to mention them all, but off the top of my head I’d have to include Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Raymond Chandler, Michael Chabon, Ian Rankin, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Tom Wolfe. All of the above have one thing in common – it’s a physical effort to stop reading them once I’ve started.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Sometimes you have to get rid of the bits of a book you really like, either by editorial mandate or because you know it just isn’t working. It’s tough, but often necessary. The other really difficult thing for me is, once I’ve got what I think is a reasonably finished version of the book, to let anyone else read it. That’s the most terrifying moment, because you’ve spent months flitting between thinking the book is fantastic and thinking it’s terrible, and you know you’re about to get an outside opinion on exactly where it falls on that scale.

How do you deal with feedback?

Generally pretty well, as long as it’s someone who knows what they’re talking about. I’m possibly unusual in that I quite enjoy the editing process – stepping back from the book, messing about with it, deciding what works and what doesn’t and reassembling it so that it runs as smoothly as possible.

I’m lucky to have an agent and an editor who both have excellent instincts about what makes a thriller work. It’s rare that what I’ve written can’t be improved by listening to some knowledgeable advice and having another go at it – it’s always better after a rewrite. I also like to get reviews from readers – a book either works or doesn’t for someone, and it’s useful to know why in either case.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

Friends, family, work, travel, death, love, children, good experiences, crappy experiences – it all feeds in. Another writer told me it’s essential to have spent some time doing a regular job and having a life before you can be a writer, and I’d definitely agree with that. It all comes down to writing convincingly about people and places, and to do that you need experience of as many different kinds of people and places as possible.

Give me some advice about writing…

Keep going. Try to write every day, even if it’s only 500 words. Finish things. Invest some time in plotting, but be open to change – it’s important to have a path from which to wander. The internet should be avoided during writing and embraced during research.

And read a lot! Everybody says that, but that’s because it’s true – not just to learn from the best, but to learn why some things don’t work so well so you can try to avoid making the same mistakes.

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace?

Be lucky! I’d definitely recommend trying to get an agent, as mine has helped me so much beyond the usual business of dealing with the publisher; giving me support and encouragement and invaluable feedback on early drafts. Think about the market, but try not to over-think: don’t write something you don’t like just because you think it will be marketable, because it probably won’t end up being very good. Play to your strengths. Try to be pleasant to work with and professional – it only started to happen for me when I began treating writing as a job. Read a lot.

What’s next for you?

Right now, I’m really looking forward to launching The Killing Season at Waterstones in Glasgow and doing the whole reading and signing thing. The next Blake book – called The Samaritan – is just about done (there’s an excerpt in the back of the first book) and I’m thinking a lot about book three, where we’ll learn more still about his shadowy past.

Aside from that, I’m really excited that one of my stories is going to be published in a forthcoming issue of Ellery Queen, which was one of my long-standing ambitions. I’m going to be on three panels at Crimefest in Bristol, and I have a couple of other festival appearances later in the year that I’m not allowed to talk about yet. When I get the okay, I’ll be sure to let people know at my blog.

 

The Intel: Mason Cross

We love it when there’s a buzz about a new author. Thriller writer Mason Cross is picking up all sorts of great reviews for his gripping story of a FBI manhunt for a deranged sniper.

Crime Thriller Fella reviewed The Killing Season only last week and now, as promised, Cross gives us The Intel on new-hero-on-the-block Carter Blake, and on his own path to publication. If you’re a writer quietly plugging away at your craft, I strongly suggest you take a read…

Give us the lowdown on Carter Blake – he’s kind of a mysterious guy…

Ahh – that would be telling! He is indeed a mysterious guy. Suffice to say that he has a past that has furnished him with the skills and experience he now calls upon to do his job. That past occasionally comes back to haunt him, and we’ll find out a little more about it in the next book…

Blake hunts for a deranged sniper in The Killing Season – what is it about random killers that so fascinates us?

I think we do have a morbid fascination with serial killers. It’s probably because, while we can perhaps understand acts of violence committed in the heat of the moment, the impulse to cold-bloodedly take a human life is utterly alien to most of us. Thankfully, most of us don’t have that faulty gene. A sniper is particularly chilling, because they can strike from afar and you’ll never see them coming. It’s also the only type of cold-blooded killing that can be a legitimate profession: the military will actually train you up and pay you to do it.

How do you get inside the head of a man like that?

I suspect there may be some crossover in the psychological profiles of serial killers and crime writers; a little more overlap on the Venn diagram than is normal. Again, there’s a grim fascination for a writer in the idea of plotting and getting away with murder, although fortunately for society, we tend to keep our murders on the page.

In The Killing Season, I found that writing the villain was similar to writing the hero in a lot of ways: both are very driven, very methodical, very professional. They’re intelligent, capable men doing what they do. Blake would probably make a very good serial killer if he was that way inclined.

How did the idea of The Killing Season come about?

The initial idea was to pit two equally matched adversaries against one another. A hunter who can find anybody versus a lone wolf who’s adept at evading capture. I was interested in this idea of a very personal one-on-one contest amidst the backdrop of a massive multi-agency manhunt. The rest of the plot developed from that.

What kind of research did you have to do?

I read widely about serial killers, snipers, and police and federal manhunts. I read a book about the Washington Sniper case from 2002, and a couple of other books that dealt more with the history of snipers and the psychological warfare aspect of killing from a distance. A book I happened to read on J Edgar Hoover and the birth of the FBI turned out to be unexpectedly useful. I did a lot of local research into the locations I wanted to use. I spoke to my American friends to pick their brains and run ideas past them, and called on my own experiences visiting the States.

Perhaps as importantly as any of the direct research, I read a hell of a lot of thrillers, from the old masters to the authors who are in the bestseller charts today. I got to know the clichés to avoid, I stole some techniques I liked, and generally learned to avoid some of the common pitfalls. It’s interesting that the core elements of what makes a great thriller haven’t changed too much over the course of a century.

The Killing Season is your debut novel – what was your journey to getting published?

It involved a huge amount of luck! I’d been submitting stories to various magazines and competitions for a few years with occasional success. My story ‘A Living’ was published in the Quick Reads Sun Book of Short Stories, which encouraged me to keep at it. Some of the stories I posted on Harper Collins’s Authonomy site. A few months later, they got in touch to tell me that an agent, Luigi Bonomi, was interested in getting touch with me based one of the stories I’d posted.

I was sceptical at first, as it sounded too good to be true. But when I did a bit of Googling, I quickly realised that not only was Luigi the real deal, he was one of the top agents in the business. Luigi and his colleague Thomas Stofer were really encouraging about my writing and suggested I develop a novel. Fast forward a couple of years and we were ready to send The Killing Season out on submission.

Fortunately for me, Jemima Forrester at Orion read and loved it, and they offered me a deal. I was particularly pleased about signing with Orion because they have such a great track record on thrillers, and publish so many of my favourite authors.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I have a day job, so I normally have to fit the writing in around my other commitments. Luckily, I’m able to do that fairly easily – I’ve trained myself out of the habit of sitting around waiting for divine inspiration. I can write anywhere: planes, hotel rooms, cafés, pubs, libraries, park benches… I’d say my ideal writing environment is actually a quiet train carriage with no wifi. I would be unbelievably productive if I lived on a train.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

Too many to mention them all, but off the top of my head I’d have to include Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Raymond Chandler, Michael Chabon, Ian Rankin, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Tom Wolfe. All of the above have one thing in common – it’s a physical effort to stop reading them once I’ve started.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Sometimes you have to get rid of the bits of a book you really like, either by editorial mandate or because you know it just isn’t working. It’s tough, but often necessary. The other really difficult thing for me is, once I’ve got what I think is a reasonably finished version of the book, to let anyone else read it. That’s the most terrifying moment, because you’ve spent months flitting between thinking the book is fantastic and thinking it’s terrible, and you know you’re about to get an outside opinion on exactly where it falls on that scale.

How do you deal with feedback?

Generally pretty well, as long as it’s someone who knows what they’re talking about. I’m possibly unusual in that I quite enjoy the editing process – stepping back from the book, messing about with it, deciding what works and what doesn’t and reassembling it so that it runs as smoothly as possible.

I’m lucky to have an agent and an editor who both have excellent instincts about what makes a thriller work. It’s rare that what I’ve written can’t be improved by listening to some knowledgeable advice and having another go at it – it’s always better after a rewrite. I also like to get reviews from readers – a book either works or doesn’t for someone, and it’s useful to know why in either case.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

Friends, family, work, travel, death, love, children, good experiences, crappy experiences – it all feeds in. Another writer told me it’s essential to have spent some time doing a regular job and having a life before you can be a writer, and I’d definitely agree with that. It all comes down to writing convincingly about people and places, and to do that you need experience of as many different kinds of people and places as possible.

Give me some advice about writing…

Keep going. Try to write every day, even if it’s only 500 words. Finish things. Invest some time in plotting, but be open to change – it’s important to have a path from which to wander. The internet should be avoided during writing and embraced during research.

And read a lot! Everybody says that, but that’s because it’s true – not just to learn from the best, but to learn why some things don’t work so well so you can try to avoid making the same mistakes.

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace?

Be lucky! I’d definitely recommend trying to get an agent, as mine has helped me so much beyond the usual business of dealing with the publisher; giving me support and encouragement and invaluable feedback on early drafts. Think about the market, but try not to over-think: don’t write something you don’t like just because you think it will be marketable, because it probably won’t end up being very good. Play to your strengths. Try to be pleasant to work with and professional – it only started to happen for me when I began treating writing as a job. Read a lot.

What’s next for you?

Right now, I’m really looking forward to launching The Killing Season at Waterstones in Glasgow and doing the whole reading and signing thing. The next Blake book – called The Samaritan – is just about done (there’s an excerpt in the back of the first book) and I’m thinking a lot about book three, where we’ll learn more still about his shadowy past.

Aside from that, I’m really excited that one of my stories is going to be published in a forthcoming issue of Ellery Queen, which was one of my long-standing ambitions. I’m going to be on three panels at Crimefest in Bristol, and I have a couple of other festival appearances later in the year that I’m not allowed to talk about yet. When I get the okay, I’ll be sure to let people know at my blog.

 

The Intel: Anne Zouroudi

We like writers here, and we’re keen to learn from them. Crime Thriller Fella reviewed Anne Zouroudi‘s new Hermes Diaktoros mystery The Feast Of Artemis on Friday, and Anne kindly agreed to answer some questions about the critical business of getting words on a page.

What’s your writing process? What comes first, plot or character?

Usually I have a year to write a book, and I tend to spend the first three months of that time mulling it over – making a few notes, gathering ideas, playing with plot-lines. By the time I sit down to write, I’ll have the germ of an idea I think will work, and a couple of characters will already be in my head. Other players in the drama will introduce themselves as the book progresses, and hopefully by the time I’m about two-thirds of the way through and eight months in, I’ll know whodunit. It’s always a great moment when I finish the first draft – by which I mean a great relief. Then I go back to the beginning, and do my next draft, and then the next one, polishing and polishing until it’s of a standard to go to my editor.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I would so like to claim to be an organised, sit-down-at-nine-on-the-dot kind of a writer, but I’m not. I usually start work very early – as early as 5am. But sometimes I’ll wake at 2am bursting with words, write for three or four hours and then sleep late. So the hours of my writing day are not cast in stone, but I do write every day, otherwise I can’t live with the feelings of guilt.

Who are the authors you love, and why?

I love Denis Lehane and Don Winslow and Michael Connelly – those guys know how to tell a story, and for me it’s all about story. I recently discovered Neil Gaiman – strange it took me so long, since he and I seem to share the same world view. I love how he combines the real world with fantasy, creating urban fairy stories for adults. But I’ll read just about anything, if the writing’s of decent quality, though I don’t read stuff with cutting and slashing in it. Gore makes me feel ill.

What’s the hardest lesson you’ve ever had to learn about writing?

That the market, on the whole, is conservative, and if you want to be published, you have to write commercial fiction. It’s OK to write quirky stuff, but you have to write it for yourself.

How do you deal with feedback?

Depends who it’s from, but broadly speaking, in the fiction game there’s no room for ego. If it’s feedback from my agent or editor, I pay close attention, and act on it. If it’s from my readers, face to face, I act on it. If it’s a review on Amazon, I don’t read it. Reading your own reviews on Amazon – that way madness lies…

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

I set my books in Greece because I lived there for a number of years, otherwise I would never have thought of the islands as settings for novels. I think I’m old enough now and  have enough of life’s experiences under my belt – happiness and heartbreak – to write convincing fiction, and I’ve always believed it’s important to put myself into what I write, heart and soul. For example, I wrote The Whispers of Nemesis as my mother was dying, and it shows: the book’s all cemeteries and funerals. But readers have commented how moving that is, so using that experience within the book really connects people with the story.

Give me some advice about writing…

Writing is a craft, a skill to be worked at like carpentry, or playing the guitar, so don’t expect your first efforts to be greeted with cheers and accolades from the publishing industry. Keep writing until the rewards come. When you’re good enough, you’ll know, because people will want to talk to you.

And what’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace…

If you’re doing it for money, forget it, spend your time on something where the odds are better you’ll make a living. If you’re doing it for love, be aware it may break your heart, but do it anyway.

What’s next for you?

Good question. I’m working on some short stories, and I have an idea for a TV drama. But it won’t be long before I bring back with Hermes. His fans are already demanding the next installment…