Mayra Calvani's Blog - Posts Tagged "crime-fiction"

John H. Byk (pen name, Conrad Johnson) was born and raised on the gritty streets of Detroit, Michigan.  After surviving high school, he joined the Coast Guard and then went back to school to earn his Masters of Art in English.  Still aching to see more of the world, he worked as a Merchant Seaman and then taught English in Japan and Thailand before returning to Detroit to teach high school.  Having had enough, he retired early and now spends his time writing and interviewing contemporary authors on his podcast blog, 2012writersALIVE, from his home in Michigan's beautiful Upper Peninsula.  When not chained to the computer, he spends his free time hunting, fishing, hiking, sailing and enjoying nature with his best friend Judy and his adoring canine, Sarah.

To promote his trilogy, the John Oxman Vogages, the author is offering the prequel, Detroit Daze free on Smashwords and Barnes and Noble.

About the book:

Detroit Daze is a novel about guts, glory and gangs set in the Mad Motor City of Detroit, Michigan.  Not for the faint of heart. Not for the nostalgic minded reader.  Not for suckers but for survivors only.

Interview:

What was your inspiration for Detroit Daze?

I wrote my first novel, Till the Moon Falls, in 2010.  When I finished it, a sequel came to mind so I went right to work on that. It's called, Xe-Nophobia. After finding an old high school friend on Facebook, he suggested that I should write a novel about those wild and crazy days so I did, figuring that a trilogy was better than a duology.  The book is a prequel that completes The John Oxman Voyages series.

How long did it take you to complete Detroit Daze?

Once I finished my first novel I couldn't stop writing.  I finished all three books in a year and then a fourth one and now I'm working on my fifth. I've also written non fiction, chapbooks along the way.  If there's a day that goes by that I'm not writing, then I'm thinking about writing.

What do you find most challenging about writing crime fiction?

Avoiding sensationalism.  Blood and violence for its own sake does not a good story make.  There has to be a compelling narrative to justify it all.

 What is your favorite scene in the book?

To be honest, I hated the entire manuscript when I was done with it.  But then I shared it with Rebecca Forster, indie author of the best selling Witness Series and she nearly flipped out because she loved it so much.  She answers this question best when she posted a review on Amazon that says, "Every word, every plot turn, every scene was so graphically presented that the reader prays the main character will be able to escape his circumstances. You will never forget Heavy, Berwyn and the rich cast of characters portrayed in this novel."

What do you love most about being an author?

The freedom to dream, explore, create, share and to have an excuse for eating fudge brownies for a sugar buzz while working.

What does an author need to do to be a guest on your radio show, 2012writersALIVE? 

First of all, they have to have a book that's on the market and ready to be purchased with a click. Secondly, I prefer authors that have experience related to the work they are promoting and/or credentials more substantial than just being a blogger.  I screen potential guests carefully to keep my show classy and relevant (I hope!).  Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, they need a telephone or Skype connection, especially if they live outside of the USA.

What’s on the near horizon?

Warmer weather and lots of fishing trips.  Seriously. I can hardly believe how much I've written in the past two years and all the interviews that I've done.  I feel it's time to slow down a bit, catch my breath and cast a few flies for trout as I still continue working on my next project and soliciting guests for my podcast blog at a much more relaxed pace than before.

Is there anything else you’d like to tell my readers?

If you're a writer, write from your own social milieu. If you're a reader (as all good writers should be), always have at least two books on your nightstand (or on your electronic device) that you're working your way through.  Scan and sift through everything that you come across in print.  Also, watch a goofy comedy film every now and then.  Besides that, make sure you wear sunscreen on the beach.

Connect with John H. Byk:

Twitter: johnhbyk

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/john.h.byk

Link to excerpt: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/79687

Link to purchase page: http://johnbyk.blogspot.com

Link to book trailer: http://youtu.be/pPV9ID3QAHE

Don’t forget to download your free copy of Detroit Daze from Smashwords or Barnes and Noble:

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/79687

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/detroit-daze-john-conrad-johnson-byk/1110197586?ean=2940011537363

R. Barri Flowers is an award winning criminologist and internationally bestselling author of more than sixty books–including thriller and suspense fiction, relationship fiction, young adult mysteries, true crime, and criminology titles.

Bestselling mystery and thriller fiction, including SEDUCED TO KILL IN KAUAI, MURDER IN MAUI, MURDER IN HONOLULU, KILLER IN THE WOODS, DARK STREETS OF WHITECHAPEL, STATE’S EVIDENCE, PERSUASIVE EVIDENCE, and JUSTICE SERVED.

Other novels by the author include the bestselling relationship novel, FOREVER SWEETHEARTS, and young adult novels, COUNT DRACULA’S TEENAGE DAUGHTER, GHOST GIRL IN SHADOW BAY, and DANGER IN TIME.

Flowers has also written a number of bestselling true crime books, including THE SEX SLAVE MURDERS, THE PICKAXE KILLERS, SERIAL KILLER COUPLES and MASS MURDER IN THE SKY. He was editor as well of the bestselling anthology, MASTERS OF TRUE CRIME.

The author has been interviewed on the Biography Channel and Investigation Discovery.

Official Website: http://www.rbarriflowers.com/

Q: Tell us why readers should buy BEFORE HE KILLS AGAIN: A Veronica Vasquez Thriller.

A: BEFORE HE KILLS AGAIN is a crime thriller written by an award winning criminologist and bestselling author of such true crime books as THE SEX SLAVE MURDERS and thriller fiction, including MURDER IN MAUI and DARK STREETS OF WHITECHAPEL.

This book is about an FBI profiler and criminal psychologist who returns to her hometown of Portland, Oregon, to assist the police in tracking down a serial killer, who murders beautiful women in pairs.

As someone who has written extensively about real life serial killers, BEFORE HE KILLS AGAIN brings verisimilitude to the perpetrator and his psyche as he pushes the boundaries in handpicking his victims.

For readers who love thriller fiction where the villain is a frightening serial killer who matches wits with the beautiful protagonist and homicide detectives on the case—or are fans of TV series such as Criminal Minds, Dexter, and Hannibal-- this is a novel you are sure to enjoy.

Q: What makes a good thriller novel?

A: A good thriller novel is one in which there is a constant sense of danger and a suspenseful whodunit, with three dimensional characters who bring you along for the ride as they converge for a heart pounding conclusion.

Within this regard, the thriller should also convey a strong plot with smart twists and turns and deft pacing that will allow the story to play itself out while keeping the reader thoroughly engaged.

Some great thrillers that come to mind include Robert Ludlum’s The Aquitaine Progression and John Grisham’s The Pelican Brief. I believe that BEFORE HE STRIKES AGAIN also fits in this category.

Q: What is a regular writing day like for you?

A: A regular writing day for me involves getting up at 6 a.m. and heading to my computer at 7 a.m. (after an hour of working out and having breakfast)—where I spend the next five hours writing and rewriting my latest book.

After a noontime lunch and chores, I am back at it by 1 p.m., where I go at it on computer till 5 p.m. (sometimes 6 p.m., if really on a roll), typing away in faithfully sticking to the plot in my head.

I call it quits for the night after that and am back in the grind the next day.

This is a routine I follow seven days a week. I am the type of writer who is not easily distracted by other things—understanding that I get out as much as I put in as an author.

Q: What do you find most rewarding about being an author?

A:  What is most rewarding to me as an author is being able to successfully write in multiple genres (thriller, true crime, young adult mysteries, and criminology). As such, I have fans in these different genes, giving me a good reason to try and keep up with them in bringing out fresh material they can take pleasure in reading.

Aside from that, I enjoy the camaraderie with other authors, having found some great friends over the years to seek advice and words of wisdom from while returning in kind.

Q: What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received that you’d like to pass to other authors?

A: That’s a great question. Hmm… I’d have to say that the best writing advice I’ve ever received and have passed along to other authors came from a bestselling crime writer who told me when I first got started: “The thing that separates serious writers from those who aren’t in it for the long haul is the ability to shake off rejections and look at as constructive criticism rather than personal attacks—making yourself a better writer in the process with each rejection letter.”

Definitely words to live by for any writer willing to work at it to hone your craft till you get where you’re going in finding success in the business.

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Book Description:

From R. Barri Flowers, award winning crime writer and international bestselling author of Dark Streets of Whitechapel and Killer in The Woods, comes a gripping new psychological thriller, Before He Kills Again: A Veronica Vasquez Thriller.

FBI psychologist and criminal profiler Veronica Vasquez returns to her hometown of Portland, Oregon to assist police in apprehending a ruthless serial killer dubbed “The Rose Killer,” who kills beautiful women in pairs, leaving a rose on top of each corpse.

Heading the investigation is homicide Detective Sergeant Bryan Waldicott. Veronica must win him over, along with the entire task force, and prove herself worthy of the job. Since losing her husband three years ago, Veronica had been focused on her work to escape the pain of loneliness and separation. A romance with Waldicott, who has issues of his own, complicates things for them both as they try to stop a serial murderer before he kills again.

When she begins to suspect that the new husband of her estranged sister Alexandra could be the killer, Veronica pursues that delicate angle and, in the process, becomes a target herself.

Before He Kills Again is tense thriller that will keep readers on edge till the very end.

 Purchase:

Amazon Trade Paperback / Kindle /Kindle UK / Kindle CA / Barnes and Noble Nook eBook / Smashwords / Kobo

Joseph B. Atkins is a native North Carolinian who worked on tobacco farms and in textile mills in his youth, served with the U.S. Army in Vietnam, and studied philosophy in Munich, Germany. A veteran journalist, he worked at several newspapers in the South and as a congressional correspondent in Washington, D.C., before becoming a professor of journalism at the University of Mississippi. Atkins is author of Covering for the Bosses, a book about the Southern labor movement and journalists’ failure to tell its story. His fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine and Hardboiled, and his novella, Crossed Roads, was a finalist in the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Awards in New Orleans.

Q: Congratulations on the release of your latest book, Casey’s Last Chance. To begin with, can you gives us a brief summary of what the story is about and what compelled you to write it?   

A: It’s 1960 in the South, when the region is about to bust wide open with the struggle over civil rights. Casey Eubanks is a small-time hustler in North Carolina on the run after a fight with his girlfriend Orella leaves his cousin dead. A crony sets him up with a big operator in Memphis, Max Duren, a well-heeled, politically connected former Nazi who needs a hit done on labor organizer Ala Gadomska for stirring up workers at a Duren garment factory in Mississippi. Casey’s hired, but things go wrong, and he’s on the run again—from Duren’s goons as well as the cops. Enter Martin Wolfe, an alcoholic journalist who tries to recruit Casey to join him and rogue FBI agent Hardy Beecher in a plan to bring Duren down. Casey steals Wolfe’s car and returns home to Orella, where a bloody shootout with a Duren goon convinces him to join Wolfe and Beecher. It’s Casey’s last chance, a wild plan that might work but could also blow up in their faces.

Several of the major characters in Casey’s Last Chance also appeared in an earlier, unpublished novel of mine, and I wanted to see what the future had in store for them. Also, on a trip to North Carolina a few years ago, a 90-year-old cousin of mine told me a story about the black sheep of the Atkins family, a man who’d been in and out of trouble and prison most of his life. After many dissolute years, the black sheep tried to return home but was turned out by relatives, who bought him a bus ticket to Charlotte and told him not to come back. Soon afterward, he’s walking down a city street, has a heart attack, and dies. The relatives pooled resources to pay for a headstone and grave. This inverse version of the prodigal son’s story helped inspire Casey’s journey.

Q: What do you think makes a good hardboiled crime novel? Could you narrow it down to the three most important elements? Is it even possible to narrow it down?

A: It’s tempting to resist labeling, but it is what it is. I wrote for many years in a kind of Southern gothic mode, still do, but then I discovered Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, James Cain, Cornel Woolrich, that rich and very American school of hardboiled crime writing, where the writer, as Chandler once said, gives “murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons.” I thought to myself about these writers, “These are my people!” Much maligned by the literati in their day, they’re viewed as classics today. Lots of imitators are around, but the real deal can be found in the following: (1) A lean, honest, cut-to-the-chase writing style; (2) A storyline that deals with real people in real situations, even though it’s fiction, and written with authenticity; (3) A sense of the bigger picture, that underlying the actions and behavior of the characters are things in American society that help prompt them. I think my writing today is a combination of Southern gothic and hardboiled. I believe the South is every bit as noir as San Francisco or New York.

Q: How did you go about plotting your story? Or did you discover it as you worked on the book?

A: A writer friend of mine gave me great advice along the way. In an earlier version of my book, I ended the story long before the final end that was published. “You’re just half way there,” he told me. “Now take it all the way.” And I did. That same writer gave me good advice again as I neared the final version of my novel. This time, he said, you’re taking too long to get to what this story’s about. I sliced the first three chapters to start where the published version now starts. That was hard! I had then to go back and work key elements from those three chapters back into the book in ways that would fit and be natural, but I did it. Keep the reader in mind as you work your way through the story. You want to keep that reader hanging on to the strap, gasping for air half the time and not daring to let go! End each chapter on a note of suspense so that reader just absolutely has to go to the next page, the next chapter.

Q: Tell us something interesting about your protagonist and how you developed him or her. Did you do any character interviews or sketches prior to the actual writing?

A: Casey Eubanks is a guy haunted by his late mother’s sexual promiscuity, his family’s rejection of him, the lack of respect he gets from others. His girlfriend Orella is the only one who ever gave him that respect, but he has a hard time taking a chance on a woman, and he’s quick to see betrayal in them. He’s an angry man who blames others for his problems but deep down knows he’s at the bottom of most of them.

I have a book of extensive notes and character bios, clipped photographs (of real people past and present who I think looked like my characters), hand-drawn maps of rooms, buildings, and alleyways, pages of historical facts and other jottings, all of which helped me keep track of the tiniest details. If a character has dark brown eyes on page 30, he better still have dark brown eyes on page 230! Casey is loosely based on the earlier mentioned black sheep of the Atkins family, something that I’m sure has my father turning over in his grave! Still, I never got to know that black sheep like I know Casey.

Q: In the same light, how did you create your antagonist or villain? What steps did you take to make him or her realistic?

A: I’ve always been fascinated by old Nazis who escaped the hangman and are living out their lives in some remote backwater. I’ll never forget the great Jewish actor Nehemiah Persoff’s brilliant performance of one once on Twilight Zone. My German mother actually spent months in a Gestapo prison for a minor offense during World War II. A bit of anger can be a great motivator in writing. Don’t ever let it blind you, but I tell my students anger and especially righteous indignation helped spur a lot of the great writing and reporting in our country. My villain, Max Duren, is not only an old Nazi but he also looks suspiciously like a really bad boss I once had! Of course, that boss didn’t commit murder and mayhem, but I sometimes evoked him in the wee hours as I imagined Max the Big Mahah moving about his suite in the Peabody Hotel in Memphis.

Q: How did you keep your narrative exciting throughout the novel? Could you offer some practical, specific tips?

A: Yes, as I said earlier, end each chapter on a note of suspense. Write in a fluid way that also makes that happen from sentence to sentence. Don’t get bogged down trying to tell too much at one time. Learn to sprinkle telling details and important information through your novel like so much stardust. Tantalize the reader, give him or her just enough to make them want to know more, and be cruel enough to make them wait a bit. Writing is an amazing exercise in honesty, truth, integrity. Keeping that reader in mind helps keep your ego at bay. You’re not writing to impress your readers with how smart and clever you are. You’re writing because you have a great story to tell. George Orwell said, “Be a windowpane.” He means don’t stand between your reader and the story. Make the reader even forget he’s reading a story. Make him live it!

Q: Setting is also quite important and in many cases it becomes like a character itself. What tools of the trade did you use in your writing to bring the setting to life?

A: I made the South my “beat”—both as a journalist and fiction writer—a long time ago. It was my great dream once to leave this damned frustrating region, and I did. A year in Vietnam, four in Germany, and eight in D.C. made me see the South in a whole different way. I returned a student wanting desperately to understand the forces that have made it what it is. Casey goes from one end of the South to the other, and this setting is a character in the book, just as Balzac’s Paris or Algren’s Chicago are to their books. Yet the setting ultimately is a metaphor. What you’re really probing is the human condition, yes, in a particular place and time, but still the human condition that transcends place and time.

Q: Did you know the theme(s) of your novel from the start or is this something you discovered after completing the first draft? Is this theme(s) recurrent in your other work?

A: I see a consistency in my work as a journalist and as a fiction writer. I may be a professor and writer today but I’m also still a working-class guy. My father was a tool & die maker, my mother a seamstress for many years, and I did blue-collar work into my late 20s. Most of the people who populate this novel are working-class folks, doing what they can to survive. Big forces are at play that affect their lives in significant ways and make it hard for them to see their way out. Not letting them off the hook, but it’s true. That was a theme of my book on the Southern labor movement, Covering for the Bosses, and it underlies the predicaments my characters in the novel find themselves in. The people running the South in both books have certain fascist characteristics that cannot be denied. It’s no accident Max Duren got himself a nice little setup down in Dixie.

Q: Where does craft end and art begin? Do you think editing can destroy the initial creative thrust of an author?

A: Over-editing can definitely drain the juice out of a piece of writing. The writer can do this himself, and I may have done this with my first and still-unpublished novel. I kept taking it out of the oven and tampering with it, adding a bit of spice here, a squeeze of lemon there, then putting it back in till I burned the damned thing! Know when to let go. Eudora Welty once said a writer should quit on the third draft. Hemingway used to tease F. Scott Fitzgerald about excessive rewriting, yet Hemingway could be guilty of this too. It’s like everything. Every writer needs an editor, and it’s the rare early draft that doesn’t require a bucket-full of red ink, yet that can be overdone, too. Both the writer and the editor have to know when things are just right. I’m not sure there’s a demarcation line between craft and art, but you’ve reached the summit when you’ve created something that somehow just needed to be created. Writer-artist Chuck Trapkus told me that once, and he was quoting stonecutter Eric Gill.

Q: What three things, in your opinion, make a successful novelist?

A: You’ve got to strive for honesty in your writing. It takes a certain amount of integrity to avoid the shortcuts--the tired cliché, the borrowed phrase, the hackneyed description--and carve out a language that’s uniquely your own. Of course, we all start out borrowing, like I did in the 8th grade when I fell in love with Edgar Allan Poe and began churning out imitations so poor that Poe turned over in his Baltimore grave. You’ve got to work hard to find your own voice, of course, and not let every gust of wind throw you off course. If it knocks you down, pick yourself back up, and go at it again! Finally, you’ve got to define what success means to you. If it means a mansion on the hill and late-model sports car with a buxom blonde in the front seat, then you’re shooting for a different kind of success than I am. Not that I’m eschewing the fun money brings! Success for me is connecting with readers in a real and important way, where something I’ve written affected them and maybe, just maybe enriched or simply made their lives better in some way. The writer who achieves this has a deep empathy for people and the human condition. The ancient philosopher Philo of Alexandria once said, “Be kind to others for everyone is fighting a great battle.” The writer who’s successful in my book is the one who has a real and motivating sense of the truth of those words.

Q: A famous writer once wrote that being an author is like having to do homework for the rest of your life. What do you think about that?

A: You can say the same thing about a reporter, a journalist. You’re always taking notes of observations you make going through life. You never know when you might need them. I’ve kept a journal since I was maybe 14 years old, and I’ve gone back to them many times to refresh my memory about certain experiences or events. The writer of fiction should do this as well. Here I go quoting other people again, but a late good friend of mine, Marty Fishgold, once told me, you spend the first half of your life going to the carnival, and the last half telling people what the carnival was like. Well, I would amend that to say, you’re still going to the carnival the last half of your life, too!

Q: Are there any resources, books, workshops or sites about craft that you’ve found helpful during your writing career?

A: I got inspired early in life reading great writers like Edgar Allan Poe, Jack London, and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Later I discovered Dorothy Day, Raymond Chandler, and modern writers like William Kennedy and Andre Dubus. Reading about their lives as well as reading their work inspired and encouraged me. Books and essays on writing like Nelson Algren’s Conformity, Hemingway’s On Writing, and Jon Winokur’s compendium, Advice to Writers are rich in wisdom about this craft. Get to know some writers. I treasure the many hours I’ve spent with my good friends, novelists Ace Atkins (no relation) and Jere Hoar, talking about not only writing but also horses, dogs, guns, crime, film noir, women, and bourbon while we shared a few glasses of the latter!

Q:  Is there anything else you’d like to share with my readers about the craft of writing?

A: Only to say that beginning or struggling writers should go about discovering the passions that drive or motivate them, the ur-sources of what fire may be in their bellies. Maybe it’s an anger or righteous indignation about certain injustices out there. Maybe it’s an intense desire to understand why people are the way they are, what connects them or separates them. Maybe it’s a desire to come to terms with certain unresolved things within one’s own life, a desperate need for answers that may or may not exist. Find those driving forces, set out to get to the truth that underlies them, and do it in a way that’s honest and not afraid of hard work. If you do this, I know I’d like to read your book when you’re finished!