When Down & Out Books published Operation Snow Queen in February, we completed a questionnaire for International Thriller Writers. Unfortunately it slipped through the net, and the Q&A session missed the cut. You can read the unused interview below. Happy reading.
OPERATION SNOW QUEEN: ITW Q&A
• ITW: Which took shape first: plot, character, or setting?
“This is a kind of chicken and egg situation. Since this is a Jim Grant book, the character obviously came first. But since it’s about Grant’s formative years in the British Army, and I am drawing from real places and situations that I lived through during my army career, you could say portions of the plot were lived before they were written.
For example, I was stationed at Blackdown Barracks when a runaway suitcase broke a passenger’s leg at Waterloo Station. I was posted to Germany and promoted to Lance Corporal, serving as Company Clerk at 3BAPD. And I was assigned to a skiing exercise in Bavaria called Exercise Snow Queen. Operation sounds better, as does most of the other stuff that happens to Jim Grant in Germany. The knotted rope and the fire escape reads better than it lived.”
• ITW: What do you hope readers will take away from this book?
“I am never so pretentious to assume readers take anything away from my books apart from passing a few enjoyable hours with characters they care about. If there’s anything else, remember that soldiers put their lives on the line to protect your freedom. And cops arrest bad guys for the same reason. Cut them some slack if they occasionally make a mistake. We all do.”
• ITW: What attracts you to this book’s genre?
“As always, I like a story that moves and characters that get in too deep then dig themselves out. Those characters can either be innocent bystanders that get caught up in a crime or the professionals whose job it is to protect and serve. Either way, crime fiction lets your hero step up to the plate. Being ex-army and retired police, I do tend to gravitate toward the professionals. And they’re all better than I used to be.”
• ITW: What was the biggest challenge this book presented? What about the biggest opportunity?
“This book came together relatively easily. It didn’t present any challenges at all. Opportunity? It was a chance to drive down memory lane and relive some of my travels. With the added bonus that I could make all the right choices this time around. Funny thing about writing; since it all starts in the mind, and the mind is a very powerful tool, the stuff that pours out of my head feels like reality not fiction. As such, it feels like I’m writing a diary of events not making things up.
Oh hang on, I’ve found a challenge. The challenge is to get the reader to see, as close as possible, what I am seeing. I know that’s impossible because everyone will interpret the words differently. So that’s quite a challenge.”
• ITW: How does this book make a contribution to the genre?
“I have never felt that I belong among the great authors who define this genre. If I contribute anything, I would say that it’s the continuation of what others have done before me. Tell a good tale. Leave the reader feeling satisfied. And hopefully wanting more.”
• ITW: Without spoilers, are there any genre conventions you wanted to upend or challenge with this book?
“My main problem is, I don’t know what the genre conventions are. I know what I like when I read books of this kind but I don’t know the rules so I don’t know how to upend them. Maybe I throw in a little more dry humour, but Raymond Chandler already did that. A bit of tough as nails action? Lee Child already did that. A pair of Yorkshiremen riffing off each other? That’s my upending.”
• ITW: No spoilers, but what can you tell us about your book that we won’t find in the jacket copy or the PR material?
“When I was stationed at 3BAPD, my position as Company Clerk granted me certain privileges. Being a Lance Corporal did too. One of them was sharing a room with a fellow Corporal instead of living in a barrack room. We were allowed to rearrange the room so our wardrobes became a dividing wall, essentially giving us a single room each. It was very cosy. Until a new Sergeant Major took over and ordered us to turn the room into a barracks again. Including confiscating my writing bureau. As happened in the book.”
• ITW: Was there anything new you discovered, or surprised you, as you wrote this book?
“It continues to surprise me how everything that has gone before informs what lies ahead. Everything we have done makes us who we are today. Who we are today allows us to choose what to do tomorrow. If that sounds a bit pretentious for a Yorkshireman, try this. It’s not the shit that happens it’s how you deal with it. Jim Grant keeps finding fresh ways to deal with it.”
• ITW: What authors or books have influenced your career as a writer, and why?
“This answer will never change because my past is set in stone. As a reader I was influenced by C S Forester, Stephen King and Ian Fleming. Then I found Joseph Wambaugh and my direction was set. As a retired police office how could I not write crime fiction? My first crime books were in support of The Boys In Blue but then I slipped into thriller territory and my inspirations changed. Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Reed Farrel Coleman, Nick Petrie and Ace Atkins. Everything you read and watch influences your choices. Everywhere you go filters into your choice of location. I suppose the simple answer is, I’m influenced by everything.”
• ITW: What’s the one question you wish someone would ask you about this book, or your work in general? And please provide an answer.
“Same question I always want to be asked. When is the next one coming out? Answer? Soon.”
