Ask Nick Harkaway - November 12 discussion

If you have a question for Nick Harkaway, here is the place to ask it. Please have your questions in by November 12. Nick will post his video answers (which will appear in the space above the discussion section) on November 19.

Hello! What good books are you reading right now? Or some of your all time favorites? I always want to ask writers that.. writers would know the good stuff!

Hi Nick,

In Anglemaker, Joe Spork is living in the shadow of his father, a famous gangster. To fulfill his potential, Joe has to embrace his heritage and become a true gangster in his own right.

How much of a shadow did your own father cast, and when you made the decision to strike out as a writer in your own right, did you feel at all like Crazy Joe?

I read both The Gone-Away World and Angelmaker this year; loved 'em, finding them both hilarious, touching and fascinating.

One small element I found really entertaining was your representation of some sounds; seemed like a super-highly developed onomatopoeia. Do you recall thinking a lot about how to portray sound with letters, or did they just spell themselves out?

Hey Nick.
I just read 2 of your books-The Gone away world & Angelmaker and became an instant fan of your writing style and the humor.
Just wanted to know how you can think so vast a story and still insert some humor into the tale? And what is your inspiration?

Hello Nick,
Just wanted to know what some of your favorite authors and works were. And do you see yourself influenced by any of them?

You write strong female characters very well. A little larger than life, and I think that exaggerated personality makes them even more real, and I do love how well you do that.

However, they're still just support characters. And it seems to be that way with more popular literature these days. Female characters with strength and personality, but still always second to the Male lead. There seem to be lacking *lead* roles for women. But I fully accept that it could just be me. Maybe it's a problem of the fantasy/sci-fi genre, maybe I've buried my head in the sand a bit. Probably a bit of both.

Do you find it to still be an issue being more intimate with the industry? And would you consider writing your next book with a female protagonist?

Both your novels feature martial arts in some way, and the philosophy of self defence. You've clearly researched the field heavily, and so I'm wondering how you might block this attack:

HIYAA!!!

The Gone-Away World and Angelmaker each take place in a very rich, well-developed world. Do you have any plans to revisit these worlds in future works?

I found The Gone-Away world to be among the best recent works that craft a post-apocalyptic world. There seems to be a resurgence of this genre in the last 10 years or so, books like Whitehead's Zone One or McCarthy's The Road, and ample films and TV shows from 28 Days Later to Revolution or the Walking Dead.

Did you craft your book to be in dialog with this genre? And/or do you feel that you are trying to speak to something about current social and political relations through positing the dystopia you craft as the Gone-Away World?

I was really uplifted and pleasantly surprised by stumbling on to The Gone-Away world. I have not read Angelmaker (yet). At least in the former it seemed as you had to juggle a lot of different elements as well as the dystopian world itself. That it actually was tied together in a cohesive and fulfilling manner in the end was really great. After my initial doubt upon reading the description on the cover no less.
How do/did you manage? Creative chaos? Close attention to detail? Extensive mind-mapping?
Where did you start in the narrative?

What are you working on now? When can we expect your next novel?

In other words, GIVE US MORE!

What was your inspiration for the angelmaker (and its effect on people) and, particularly, in making clockwork bees the critical component? Is there a literary, mythological, or religious precedent for this strikingly beautiful, unique concept?

Angelmaker was absolutely fantastic. Just curioius if you put any "easter eggs" in there? (Name of a character is your Mother's name...a location is an actual place you frequent...you're actually a bee keeper in your spare time) Anything like that?

Sorry to be boring, but just seconding a request for more book recommendations. I've followed some previously from your blog and they were awesome (I think monsters of Templeton and Sharp teeth come to mind).

I am always really interested about people's writing habits and how a book actually gets written, where the ideas come from, how you actually get them onto a page. This is mainly because I can't.

Some really fun questions above.

The Gone-Away World is one of my all time favourite books. And where I'd very rarely want a sequel to anything, it was just packed so full of cool ideas and characters that I just need to know more about their stories. Would you ever consider returning to that world?

When writing a novel, how much consideration do you put into word choice, sentence structure, punctuation, etc., and how much do you put into content, dialogue, etc.?

Or more simply put, what is your writing process?

I ask because your writing has a strong balance and I'm curious to learn if you scrutinize it or if you just focus on one aspect and let the chips fall where they may on the others.

Thank you.

Angelmaker seems to draw for some of its strength and depth from several popular British traditions: the real and fictional histories of daring crimes like train and bank robberies; the fantastical villains of Ian Fleming’s Bond novels; many of Hitchcock’s plots, in which the hero is pursued by both the bad guys and the police. Does this seem a fair characterization of the book to you, and in what other ways do see your work (and yourself) in the context of modern British culture?

First off, I've read Angelmaker and The Gone Away World and absolutely loved both novels. I have great respect for a writer who can be both funny and compassionate towards this his characters while managing complex well-paced and well-plotted storylines. In short, I love your work.

My question is this: I noticed similarities in the realities of The Gone Away World and Angelmaker. You mentioned the same fictional Southeast Asian country in both novels and in The Gone Away World your protaganist has an internal monologue referencing 'Crazy Joe Spork.' Should the reader assume that these novels take place in the same fictional world (Angelmaker coming first in the timeline, of course)? Could you talk about what you were hoping to get across with these allusions and can we expect to see more of them in future works?

Hi Nick!
I would love to hear you talk about what influenced you when writing about the bond between Gonzo and the protagonist. Specifically, the betrayal when Gonzo shoots the protagonist, and the acceptance and forgiveness that follows.

For me, this is the heart and soul of the book, and it would be great to learn how you relate these ideas to your life.

Why'd you go with present tense in Angelmaker? Outside of scripts, everything I try to write in present tense just comes off as overly portentous, but you weaved this crazy web of feeling with it that I couldn't imagine working any other way.

Also, you have this really great way of taking radical leftist ideologies and boiling them down into beautiful, elegant statements (the Sekunis, for example). People don't seem to mention this aspect of your writing much but I fucking love it, so thank you.

Hi Nick,

I loved both The Gone-Away World and Angelmaker.

With such large books, both cris-crossing a variety of themes - particularly Angelmaker, I'm fascinated to know what is the 'trigger point' that inspires you? Is it the actual storyline - or a character - or a theme that you want to nail, in some way?