Ask the Author: Robert Wilson
Answered Questions (15)
Robert Wilson
Dear Ellie, Thank you for your question. I am still writing but I am no longer getting published. After the Javier Falcon books I wrote a series of 4 thrillers with a character called Charles Boxer, a kidnap consultant, as the protagonist. They were published by Orion but when the CEO changed they stopped. I have since written two books set in Occupied Paris which I hope to get published but it is not easy out there. I wish you all the very best, Rob
Robert Wilson
Sorry or being so slow in responding. All the very best, Rob
Robert Wilson
I think I intended that the Narciso in the PIDE was the father of the Narciso in the PJ. The process of arriving at a title is quite strange. I originally thought of someone telling me the world's most uninteresting headline: 'Small earthquake in Chile. Not many dead.' From there I leapt to the idea of extreme understatement. And from there I arrived at A Small Death in Lisbon. The girl's death appears to be a run of the mill killing but it opens up a massive can of worms. La Petite Mort wasn't my main intention.
Robert Wilson
There used to be an English bookshop in Almancil called The Griffin but Amazon killed it. You might be lucky and find it in The Owl as I'm sure they'll stock books on Portugal. I'm glad you've got a level in Portuguese. I haven't. Never studied it, just picked it up...and it's a tricky language to hear. First time I've found I could speak more than I understood.
Robert Wilson
Thank you Birgitt. I will let them know.
Robert Wilson
The guide book is only really available in Portugal now. There's a shop in Monsaraz called Mizette which sells the book. I could get a number for the shop and you could try to persuade them to send you a copy. I don't have any with me here in UK. Glad you're enjoying A Small Death. All the best Rob
Robert Wilson
Hello Lisa, The Seville books are as good a place to start as any although most people read A Small Death in Lisbon first. The Company of Strangers, which comes after, is a spy/love story which male readers don't always like and female readers mostly do. Then come the four Seville books. I hope you enjoy them which ever order you decide. Best wishes Rob
Robert Wilson
Hello Warren, Sorry to hear about your health and I hope you've been steadily improving since the chemo and radiation. I know how tough that treatment is having seen Jane and others on her ward go through it. So well done for toughing it out. I'm glad my books helped to divert you through those sleepless hours. I recently had an email from someone who had been in jail for three years telling me how much he'd enjoyed the Falcon books with their Spanish heat and atmosphere. We writers forget that books are read in all sorts of different locations and under very different circumstances and in each case offer a different experience. Thank you for your condolences. I would love to be able to tell you that the next Boxer book (No. 4) is due any moment but both my UK and US publishers have decided not to go ahead so unless you speak German or Norwegian you might have a long wait. I'm sorry, but the numbers just didn't stack up. Clearly Boxer didn't 'speak' to enough people. I am currently working on another book set in London, Paris and Lisbon in WW2. All the very best, Rob
Robert Wilson
Thanks for wriitng to me and for expressing your enjoyment of the books. When I wrote the Falcon novels the story arc that came to me was of Javier's psychological development from paralyzed man to one capable of falling in love. I reckoned I needed 4 books to complete the arc. The first to break him down, the second to rebuild him, the third to mature him and the fourth to make him into a lover. After seven years work I finished the books and I didn't want to do any more for several reasons. The first being that I had completed the work and didn't want to just keep telling crime stories with Javier as the protagonist but psychologically standing still. I'd also had enough of writing Spanish police procedurals and all the complexities involved. I wanted pastures new. That does not mean to say I will never write another Falcon, but it means it will have to wait for the right moment. I am contracted to write another three Charles Boxer books which will take me to 2017. Then I'll take stock. Thanks and all the very best, Rob
Robert Wilson
I'm sorry, Rick, but I have no idea. That was something that the producer introduced. It is supposed to be some sort of drug, obviously, but whether it's an upper or a downer I don't know and it's not clear from his behaviour what state it induces. My version of Javier Falcon would never have taken drugs. The drug-taking was the producer's 'shorthand' for 'psychological difficulties'. I hope this doesn't spoil your enjoyment of the books. All the very best, Rob.
Robert Wilson
I don't get inspired to write. I sit at the desk and work at it. When I'm starting a book I spend a lot of time just sitting and thinking. I hardly write a word. I might write some dialogue between two characters to see how they are together. I will think of some scenarios. But I will very gradually be plumbing the depths. It doesn't happen from one day to the next, but over a period of weeks I begin to realise that I'm starting to get hold of some interesting stuff. The sort of stuff that makes me burn with interest inside. Once I've hit that vein I know I can work and I don't like to stop. I like to work at it every day, that way I never lose the thread. If I take even a weekend off I know it will cost me days to get back down there again. So, I'm patient and I don't snatch.
Robert Wilson
I've just finished the final copy edit on the third Charles Boxer novel called 'Stealing People' which will come out in the UK in June 2015 and in the USA in 2016. This year I started writing the fourth Boxer novel, which will come out in 2016.
Robert Wilson
Being a writer is not about being inspired. Not all the time. You will get inspiration, the flash, but then it's all about the hard work of getting it down right. My best advice to aspiring writers is to make a commitment to the desk. Say to yourself that come what may you are going to sit there for a minimum of four hours a day….come hangover or broken arm as Raymond Chandler would have it. Because that is the only way you are going to get the work done. The writer who only writes when they're truly inspired is the writer who never writes.
Robert Wilson
The best thing about the profession of writing is that you do your own thing in your own time. Nobody tells you when you have to be in the office. You work when you want to work and take time off when it suits you. It doesn't mean total freedom. That doesn't exist. But in the kingdom of your mind you are the boss.
The best thing about doing the actual work are those days when it really clicks. You're barely aware of thinking, it just comes streaming out with no obstacles. My longest period of sustained creativity was the three months it took me to write the Francisco Falcon diaries for The Blind Man of Seville. I loved writing them and I wrote over 100,000 words and used a third of it.
The best thing about doing the actual work are those days when it really clicks. You're barely aware of thinking, it just comes streaming out with no obstacles. My longest period of sustained creativity was the three months it took me to write the Francisco Falcon diaries for The Blind Man of Seville. I loved writing them and I wrote over 100,000 words and used a third of it.
Robert Wilson
There's writer's block and then there's real writer's block. I've had both. The first is when you're stuck. The writing has been going fine but then for no reason at all you find you don't know where to take the story next. This is quite common.
I usually find that I can unlock this kind of temporary block by reading through the story so far and reminding myself of the potential lurking within certain characters or their storylines. Some detail or other will normally ignite a whole bushfire of ideas. Failing that I've been known to enjoy a good meal with plenty of wine and to present myself the following day to the desk and it's amazing how in that grizzly state the mind relaxes and the ideas and words start coming.
The second sort of writer's block is a very different beast. I've never found myself in the actual state of being unable to write, but I realised I'd lost my instinct for what was good. Normally the words travel from my mind through my gut and something in there tells me whether they're any good or not. In 2010 I lost it. The words came out but I had no idea whether they worked or not. I met another writer suffering the same thing at the same time. We named the affliction 'Writer's doubt'.
How did I get out of it? I just kept going, reasoning to myself that I had to do something because that was better than doing nothing. It was the most painful eight months of my writing life. In fact I was writhing rather than writing. Every day. The hope was the most dispiriting thing. The hope that I would turn up the next day and it would all be over and I would suddenly have the instinct for it again. It never came.
I 'finished' the book. Finally. And only then did something that felt a little bit like confidence come into play. I managed to congratulate myself for having stuck it out for eight long, horrible months.
I took a break while my wife read the book. She was kind to me saying that the last third of the book needed to be totally rewritten. I presented myself to the desk and knew instantly that it was back. I was like a dog that had recovered his sense of smell. I was alive again. I rewrote everything from top to bottom. And it was done with total joy.
There are all sorts of reason why something like that happens. In my case I think it was a combination of reasons: emotional trauma, nervous exhaustion and starting a new series having lived with a previous protagonist for seven years.
Someone once said that going through profound change on a personal and professional level often resulted in writer's block and that, rather than disaster, it heralded a new era with an added dimension to the work.
I hope he's right.
I usually find that I can unlock this kind of temporary block by reading through the story so far and reminding myself of the potential lurking within certain characters or their storylines. Some detail or other will normally ignite a whole bushfire of ideas. Failing that I've been known to enjoy a good meal with plenty of wine and to present myself the following day to the desk and it's amazing how in that grizzly state the mind relaxes and the ideas and words start coming.
The second sort of writer's block is a very different beast. I've never found myself in the actual state of being unable to write, but I realised I'd lost my instinct for what was good. Normally the words travel from my mind through my gut and something in there tells me whether they're any good or not. In 2010 I lost it. The words came out but I had no idea whether they worked or not. I met another writer suffering the same thing at the same time. We named the affliction 'Writer's doubt'.
How did I get out of it? I just kept going, reasoning to myself that I had to do something because that was better than doing nothing. It was the most painful eight months of my writing life. In fact I was writhing rather than writing. Every day. The hope was the most dispiriting thing. The hope that I would turn up the next day and it would all be over and I would suddenly have the instinct for it again. It never came.
I 'finished' the book. Finally. And only then did something that felt a little bit like confidence come into play. I managed to congratulate myself for having stuck it out for eight long, horrible months.
I took a break while my wife read the book. She was kind to me saying that the last third of the book needed to be totally rewritten. I presented myself to the desk and knew instantly that it was back. I was like a dog that had recovered his sense of smell. I was alive again. I rewrote everything from top to bottom. And it was done with total joy.
There are all sorts of reason why something like that happens. In my case I think it was a combination of reasons: emotional trauma, nervous exhaustion and starting a new series having lived with a previous protagonist for seven years.
Someone once said that going through profound change on a personal and professional level often resulted in writer's block and that, rather than disaster, it heralded a new era with an added dimension to the work.
I hope he's right.
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