William Kent Krueger interviewed by Craig Johnson

Continuing our At Home Online interviews: Author to Author to Author, Craig Johnson interviews William Kent Krueger. Next up Craig Johnson will be interviewed by an author of his choice.

William Kent Krueger is a multi award-winning American author and crime writer, best known for his Cork O'Connor series of books, mainly set in Minnesota. Krueger's stories always include an element of life in and around native American reservations. The main character, Cork O'Connor, is part Irish, part Ojibwe.

CJ: In the newest edition of your series, you spend a sizable amount of time in Wyoming rather than your own Minnesota. What effect did that have on the process of writing your new book, Heaven’s Keep?

WKK: None. But the research was a blast. I’ve spent a good deal of time in Wyoming—the state of my birth, as a matter of fact—and it was fun to look at it from a different perspective, one that required I take particular note of the physical geography. What a beautiful place that state is. And unpopulated. Which is very enticing, especially when you consider that isolating characters in the wild is a great way to create suspense.

CJ: You put your protagonist through a great deal of torture through the potential loss of his wife, Jo. Do you enjoy writing characters on their emotional frontiers?

WKK: Emotional frontiers? You must have an advanced college degree. Every story, to be compelling, demands tension. And despite the fact that we work in a genre that general gets a lot of mileage out of putting people in jeopardy, I think it’s really the emotional dynamics that drive readers’ interest. I also think that characters reveal themselves most fully and most compellingly when their nerves are frayed and their deepest fears surface. I love Walt Longmire, for example, not because he cuts a dashing, daring image (unlike his creator), but because I know him and trust him emotionally, and I care about what happens to him and to the people he loves. I hope the same is true for those readers who enjoy Cork O’Connor.

CJ: Your usual stomping grounds are among the Ojibwa, comparatively, how was it dealing with the Plains Indian tribes of the Arapaho, Cheyenne and others?
WKK: I approached the Arapaho, who play an important part in Heaven’s Keep, in the same way I’ve always approached the Ojibwe (Anishinaabeg) in my neck of the woods. That is, as human beings first, and as a culture second. What I mean is that Indians and whites are more alike than they are different. We hope and fear and love and hate and couple and fight in pretty much the same ways. We have moral compasses that guide us. And these days, we all eat at McDonalds. But each culture—Finn, Irish, Ojibwe, Arapaho—has certain cultural trappings that are unique, and a hierarchy of values that may be in a different order from the others. I did a good deal of research on the Arapaho, and talked with a lot of folks on and off the rez when I was in Wyoming. Christ, I just hope I got it right.

CJ: Do you consider yourself a regional author, or do you believe that Cork and crew are more indicative of a universality of the human condition?

WKK: I’m a regionalist first and foremost. That said, I think the best regional writers—the best writers, period—create stories of universal appeal about the universal condition.

CJ: I must say that one of my favorite authors was and is Tony Hillerman because of his innate understanding of Native Americans including pacing, in which you are the only writer currently capable of this same feat. So when were your German ancestors kidnapped by Indians?

WKK: I appreciate your estimation of my understanding of the Ojibwe culture. But I think there are a lot of writers out there who are doing a great job with other tribal groups. Margaret Coel, with the Wind River people in Wyoming, for example. Or Dana Stabenow, with the Aleut in Alaska. James Doss, the Thurlos, Jean Hager—the list is long, and all of us owe a incredible debt to Tony Hillerman. My German ancestors were bootleggers, so probably they contributed to the downfall of America’s indigenous population.

CJ: “Cork put his arms around his son and looked toward the mountains. Up there the snow was already falling heavy, burying everything more deeply. Beneath it, the grass and flowers of the meadows would lie dormant until spring, when they would rise again. Beneath it, animals lay curled in holes and in mountain caves where they would sleep through the dark, cold months ahead, and wake in the spring. And beneath it somewhere, God alone knew where, lay Jo, who would neither wake nor rise.” (P. 127) –Its passages like this in Heaven’s Keep that make other mystery authors want to plant exploding devices in your tires and sabotage your flights. Care to comment?

WKK: You do know how to sweet talk a guy. It’s passages like this—I worked on this one for a very long time—that make the writing both a marvelous challenge and an overwhelming pleasure.

CJ: On page 141 Cork makes the comment that, “Some men behave differently when they’re away from their families”, and on page 184 another character says, “Hard telling how a man behaves away from home”. Umm… This begs the question, what are you like on the road, Kent ?

WKK: A hellion. I never met a roadhouse I didn’t like. Actually, I’m pretty staid. Although at conferences I love to hang out in the bar after the work of the day is done, I don’t hang out as late as I used to. Which reminds me, don’t you owe me a drink?

CJ: What do you consider your books to be, police procedurals, classical mysteries or literary whodunits for people that are so entranced by the story that by the time they get to the end don’t give a damn about whodunit?

WKK: I hope that by the time they close the book people don’t give a damn about whodunit, because honestly most readers are smart enough to have figured that part out long before the end. So I pray that I write a compelling narrative in all regards—with powerful language, intriguing characters, dynamic tension, great setting, etc. Some of my favorite writers in this genre are people whose books don’t quite fit a niche, but who write one hell of a great story. Like you, for example.

CJ? Some of my favorite descriptive passages in your novels usually have to do with water, so in what way has living in the land of ten thousand lakes affected your writing?
WKK: I’m a water sign, and I’ve always been drawn to water. I’m really grateful that I can set my stories in a place where water in so many forms—rivers, lakes, streams, rain—helps to define the landscape. I’d be screwed if I lived in Arizona.

CJ: Do you drink a Leinenkugel’s Creamy Dark beer every once in a while just for ‘sense memory’ purposes?

WKK: Honest to god, it’s my beer of choice, particularly in winter. In summer, I go with a regular Leinies.

CJ: In the opening of Heaven’s Keep Cork is no longer a standing sheriff, how has this change in context affected the novels?

WKK: Cork’s been and out of uniform a lot. I’ve finally had him put the badge away for good—although the tension between him and Jo at the beginning of Heaven’s Keep is due to the possibility that Cork might take a job as deputy. In our genre, as you well know, you have to have a believable motivation for your protagonist’s involvement. In your case, Walt is a sheriff. His interest is understandable. In order to believably involve Cork in things, I’ve made him a PI. That said, his involvement in the intrigue at the heart of Heaven’s Keep is profoundly personal. When I look at all the books in the series, that’s what I keep coming back to. Even when Cork was sheriff, his involvement was very personal because often the safety of people he cares about was at issue. So that will probably continue to be the case. Until, I guess, everyone Cork cares about is dead.

CJ: How would you say the arc of story differs in a series as opposed to a singular novel, and after this impacting episode, where does Cork O’Conner go from here?

WKK: In any series in which the characters age, there’s story arc. That’s one of the things I love about a series, watching how time and circumstance shape people I’ve come to know as well as I know my own family and friends. Cork’s story has played out over about eight years of his life now. His children have grown and are departing for their own lives Cork has to deal with his own aging and the changes in his circumstance. It’s a broad canvas we get to paint on, and in my case, I just see it extending blank into the future, waiting for me to imagine what will fill it. As for Cork, to know where he’s headed, you’ll have to read the next book in the series, Vermilion Drift, which should be out in the fall of 2010.

Hey, buddy, I just want to say thanks. These were great, thoughtful questions. But I wasn’t kidding about that drink you owe me.

Cool Canadian Crime: Rick Mofina

Today David Cole continues his Cool Canadian Crime interviews. A special thanks to David Cole for these wonderful interviews with Canadian Crime Writers. Today: Rick Mofina

Previously, David interviewed Louise Penny, Barbara Fradkin, Mary Jane Maffini, Thomas Rendell Curran, Gail Bowen, Garry Ryan, RJ Harlick, and Anthony Bidulka. This group of authors were chosen by David to represent a variety of mystery genres, styles, and historical periods. More to come.

Rick Mofina is a former journalist and an award-winning author of several acclaimed thrillers. His reporting has put him face-to-face with murderers on death row in Montana and Texas. He has covered a horrific serial killing case in California, an armored car heist in Las Vegas, flown over Los Angeles with the LAPD Air Support Division and gone on patrol with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police near the Arctic. He has reported across Canada, the USA and from the Caribbean, Africa and Kuwait’s border with Iraq. His true crime articles have appeared in the New York Times, Marie Claire, Reader’s Digest and Penthouse.

His book, Blood of Others, won the Arthur Ellis Award, and the International Thriller Writers named his book, The Dying Hour, (due for UK, Australia and New Zealand release Sept-Oct 2009) as a finalist for an inaugural Thriller Award. His short story, “Lightning Rider,” won the Arthur Ellis Award and is included in the anthology, Murder in Vegas, Edited by Michael Connelly. Six Seconds, his standalone global thriller, was released in January 2009, and by 2010 will be published in 12 countries and 7 languages. His next book, Vengeance Road, (Released Sept. 2009) has been praised as, "a thriller with no speed limit," by Michael Connelly.

DC: Canadian authors such as you, Louise Penny and Linwood Barclay are becoming a more well known internationally. Why do you think that this is the case?

RM: I think it has everything to do with being good story tellers. On a philosophical level it might be that Canadians tend to be somewhat insular in the winter and spend much of our time in deep thought during the deep freeze. I can hear Canadians laughing at that observation, but maybe there’s some truth to it. Also, a Canadian has yet to win a Nobel Prize for Literature. I’m hoping Alice Munro will be our first, although I’d say Margaret Atwood is the odds on favourite.

DC: I understand that you are due to start a third series, tell us a bit about it and why have you decided to start a new series.

RM:VENGEANCE ROAD concerns the murder of a broken-hearted woman and the chilling disappearance of her friend. Hero cop, Karl Styebeck, is beloved by his community but privately police are uneasy with the answers he gives to protect the life – and the lie – he’s lived.

The case haunts Jack Gannon a gritty, blue-collar reporter whose sister ran away from their family years ago. Gannon risks more than his job to pursue the story behind Styebeck’s dark secret, his link to the women.

DC: Tell us a bit more about yourself?

RM: I grew up in a working-class family east of Toronto, in Belleville, Ontario, Canada. I started writing fiction in grade school and never stopped. I was 15 when I sold my first short story. I was 18 when I hitchhiked to California and wrote a (dreadful still unpublished) novel about the experience. In university I studied Journalism and English Literature, including a course in American Detective Fiction.

I was a cub reporter at The Toronto Star, the same paper where Hemingway worked, before I embarked on a career in journalism that spanned three decades and several newsrooms. My reporting has put me face-to-face with murderers on death row in Montana and Texas. I covered a horrific serial killing case in California, an armoured car heist in Las Vegas, and the murders of police officers in Alberta.

DC: Your novel Six Seconds is your first standalone novel. What made you decide to write a standalone novel?

RM: I was ready for it. After producing at total of 8 books for 2 series, I was ready to take a shot at a standalone with a story that had a global canvass. It seemed the perfect way to get things rolling with MIRA Books my new publisher.

The book took shape; by refining a number of unrelated scenes, dramas and events I had observed during my time as a reporter; such as the heart-wrenching anguish of interviewing a mother whose child had vanished. Then there was the time I was on assignment in Nigeria, not long after the September 11 attacks. I was in the Abuja where I saw a boy in a slum wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with Osama bin Laden’s picture and message calling him #1 Hero. On that African trip I also visited Ethiopia where I watched old women, who lived in some of the harshest conditions on earth, weaving fabric on a loom in the slums of Addis Ababa. Prior to that, I was in the Gulf where I talked to British aid workers, and at Kuwait’s boarder with Iraq. I also talked to peacekeepers from Canada concerned about the toll land mines were taking on children who plucked them from the dunes.

What if I took these elements and twisted them into fictional threads that were all connected? What if ordinary people from different parts of the world became ensnared by extraordinary events that could alter history as a clock ticked down on them? Suppose it all came down to six seconds?

DC: You have written five books in your first series featuring Tom Reed and Walt Sydowski based in San Francisco, California. Where did you get the characteristics for the two main characters?

RM: Tom Reed is a compilation. I think he embodies the sins and virtues of every hard-driving new reporter I’ve ever known. He works well with Walt Sydowski. He represents every grizzled detective I’ve ever met, including one or two with the SFPD Homicide Detail and some Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigators. And he stands as a foil and father-figure to Reed. I’ve used some of my father’s actual biography in shaping Sydowski, in that my dad is Polish. He was a child when the Nazis invaded Poland.

DC: You only wrote 3 books in your second series featuring Jason Wade, a rookie crime reporter, which is set in Seattle, Washington. Was he by any chance based on you?

RM: I did draw upon my time as a rookie reporter at The Toronto Star. At the Star, I learned the news business by reporting craft working in the suburban bureaus and the metro news desk at One Yonge Street. I covered a range of stories, including a murder trial, and a takedown by the SWAT team looking for an escaped killer. I also did time in the "torture chamber," the cell-like room housing banks of chattering police scanners where you kept your ears pricked for the first hint of a story that could stop the heart of the city. Or break it. But it was in writing The Dying Hour, with rookie Jason Wade, pursuing the first big story of his news career, that I looked back on mine. Through Jason, it was easy to re-live the thrill of landing a scoop and the adrenaline-fuelled days of my summer at The Toronto Star.

DC: Will you go back to either series?

RM: In September 2009, the Jason Wade Series will be launched with release of THE DYING HOUR (Selected finalist by The International Thriller Writers, for a Thriller Award) in the UK by MIRA who will give it a big push. Approximately six months later, the second book EVERY FEAR will be released in the UK and six months after that, the third, A PERFECT GRAVE.

DC: In 2003 Blood of Others, which was is the third book in the Reed and Sydowski series won the Arthur Ellis Award as Best Novel. You have also won another award for your short story Lighting Rider in 2006. Has wining these awards had an effect on your writing?

RM: No. They are terrific validations, but they don’t erase self doubt.


DC: Are you going to continue to write standalone novels are you going to go back to writing a series?

RM: Yes to both.

DC: Was it a long journey in between your work as a journalist and you starting to write crime fiction? If so why the long journey?
RM: I was always writing since I was maybe seven years old. It is an affliction. My first novel was written when I was 18. Others followed. It wasn’t until some 20 years later that I became a published novelist. For me, as a reporter by day, novelist by night, a light had been switched on. Covering human tragedies and dramas up close was overwhelming. But on another level, having a university degree in English Literature, Journalism, and having studied religious responses to death and American Detective Fiction, I felt I was equipped to try to make sense of what I was experiencing.

DC: What has been your most rewarding experience as a journalist and what was your most scary?

RM: There was a little girl who had a terminal brain condition and her dream was to meet a certain music star. When her family’s situation was made known to my news organization, we wrote about it and her dream came true. The family invited me back stage for the meeting, there was not a dry eye there.

The most scary, there were many, let’s see . . One quiet night I was working alone in the newsroom on the cop beat when a call came in for me. It was a convicted murderer who was calling from prison. From the psych ward. I didn’t know him, but I had written about him. That night he confessed to me how he tricked his way to get access to a telephone because he needed to talk to somebody outside of the institution. So, I said, talk. He then went into to every detail, every vile, disgusting detail, of how he abducted two young women then held them hostage in a suburban home. Then he told me exactly how he murdered one but decided to let the other live. He was not remorseful, or even emotional. He just wanted me to have a clear accounting. Then he hung up. My spine rattled for hours after. I had trouble sleeping that night. That’s only one strange experience from the beat.

DC: What was the biggest challenge you faced when you first moved from the world of Journalism to writing Fiction? And did you always intend to write Crime as opposed to literary fiction?

RM: I was writing fiction long before I became a journalist, so the shift was not really a challenge. I saw journalism as a passport to experiences that would strengthen my lifelong pursuit of writing the best fiction I could. When I found myself on the crime desk of the Calgary Herald, I thought, this is it, this is the palate from which I can draw.

DC: Are you passionate about the genre and what do you think of the current trends today?

RM: I think crime fiction is in its golden period. I don’t reflect much on trends. A good story is a good story.

DC: Some do not consider the genre to be "literary" enough and at times it does not get the accolade it deserves. Do you believe that this is the case, and if so have you any views on how people’s views might be changed?

RM: Of course it is true, and I don’t give it much thought. It’s wasted energy to debate it. As mentioned, a good story is a good story. The job of any author is to keep the reader engaged. If the reader is struggling to find the point of the book, or the story between the covers, then the author has failed. And authors have succeeded and failed in all genres. Just take a look at best seller lists around the world, crime fiction stands well.

DC: Which part of the fiction-writing process do you find most gratifying?

RM: Well there’ve been a lot of nice comments, like ‘you kept me up all night,’ and ‘you need to write more books faster’. But one that stands out came from a lovely handwritten letter from a woman in Indiana. Seems she was on vacation in the west and bought my first book, If Angels Fall, in a used book bin for 25 cents. After reading it, she liked it so much, she cut me a personal check for the full cover price, $7.00, which she’d attached to her letter. She told me I’d earned it. I was blown away. I thanked her. And yes, I cashed the check, but I’ve kept a photocopy that I intend to frame some day.

Linwood Barclay August 14 in Berkeley

Linwood Barclay, winner of the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel for Too Close to Home, will be the Guest of Mystery Readers Int'l at a Literary Salon on August 14 in Berkeley, CA. 2 p.m. The Arthur Ellis Award given by the Crime Writers of Canada is Canada's top prize for crime fiction. His latest novel is Fear the Worst.

Barclay says about Fear the Worst, "I think Fear the Worst is my best book yet. On the surface, it seems simple enough. It's the tale of a missing child. Suppose you've gone to pick up your daughter at her summer job -- a place where she's only been working a couple of weeks -- and learn that no one there has ever seen her? So where has she been going for two weeks? And where is she now? As the father in this story starts searching for his daughter, he discovers he's not the only one trying to track her down. And he better be the one to find her first.

Join MRI NorCal for an afternoon with this amazing author.

Read Ali Karin's Lunching with Linwood in The Rap Sheet.
Watch Linwood Barclay on YouTube talking about No Time For Goodbye.

Crimespree Awards

Crimespree Magazine asked readers to select the winners in five categories for this year’s Crimespree Awards, presented by Crimespree Magazine. Here are the winners.
Hat Tip to The Rap Sheet for Quick Reporting

Favorite Book of 2008: Trigger City, by Sean Chercover (Morrow)

Also nominated: Yellow Medicine, by Anthony Neil Smith (Bleak House); Envy the Night, by Michael Koryta (Minotaur); Chasing Darkness, by Robert Crais (Simon & Schuster); and Toros & Torsos, by Craig McDonald (Bleak House)

Best Book in an Ongoing Series: Chasing Darkness, by Robert Crais (Simon & Schuster)

Also nominated: Trigger City, by Sean Chercover (Morrow); Toros & Torsos, by Craig McDonald (Bleak House); Another Thing to Fall, by Laura Lippman (Morrow); and the Duffy Dombrowski Mystery Series, by Tom Schreck (Midnight Ink)

Favorite Comics Writer: Brian Azzarello

Also nominated: Tim Broderick; B. Clay Moore; Ed Brubaker;
and Jason Aaron

Favorite Original Paperback: Money Shot, by Christa Faust (Hard Case Crime)

Also nominated: Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse, by Victor Gischler (Touchstone); Severance Package, by Duane Swierczynski (St. Martin’s Minotaur); The Stolen, by Jason Pinter (Mira); and The Evil That Men Do, by Dave White (Three Rivers Press)

Favorite Mystery Bookstore: Once Upon a Crime, Minneapolis

Also nominated: The Mystery Bookstore, Los Angeles; Murder by the Book, Houston; Centuries & Sleuths, Forest Park, Illinois; and M Is for Mystery, San Mateo, California

A Steelworks: Michael Stanley's Drink recipe

Mystery Readers Int'l's NorCal Chapter was lucky enough to have Stan Trollip the other night. Stan is one half of the writing team of Michael Stanley, the author of the Detective Kubu mystery series set in Botswana (A Carrion Death, The Second Death of Goodluck Tinubu). Stanley's Botswana is very different from that of the 'other' mystery writer of Botswana. Stanley's Botswana involves the harsh realities of life-- the animals and the people. Detective Kubu seems slow and gentle, but like his namesake the Hippo (Kubu is Hippo in Setswana), he can be ferocious. Not unlike Stan Trollip and Michael Sears, the writing team, Detective Kubu enjoys good food, music and drink.

Inspector Kubu's favorite drink when he's on duty and can't drink alcoholic beverages (wine and beer) is a Steelworks. Kubu drinks them ice cold and often two at a time. Stan Trollip brought all the fixing and mixed drinks for the group at our Literary Salon Sunday night. I found the drink incredibly refreshing, and I think you will, too. Here's the recipe direct from Michael Stanley. Thanks, Stan.

Steelworks

1 shot of Rose's Kola Tonic (available at African Hut)
A splash of Angostura Bitters to taste (available at any liquor store)
Top up with ginger BEER (not ALE)
Always add ice at the end-- not before adding ingredients

Variations: You can also use half ginger beer, half soda water. You can also add a shot of Rose's Lime Juice.

George Dawes Green

Ravens by George Dawes Green is one of my favorite books this year. It's been 14 years since Dawes, the author of The Caveman's Valentine and The Juror, has published a book. Although, way, too long, it has been worth the wait. His writing is intense, his plotting perfect, and his pacing non-stop. I had the opportunity to interview him recently.

JR: For you, what can the crime novel form accomplish that other types of literature cannot? Perhaps, I should have started with, do you think of yourself as writing crime fiction?

GDG: I like effrontery of being a 'thriller writer'. I like braiding together skeins of contingency, conjuring up atmospheres of peril and shadow and passion. Thomas DeQuincey talks about the Literature of Power -- which moves you -- as opposed to the Literature of Knowledge -- which teaches you. Sails rather than rudders. Most American fiction leans toward the latter form, and has limited interest for me. But the urgency of any thrilling novel cleans out our minds, rinses out the nonsense and allows God's grace to come pouring in.

JR: What have you been doing in the 14 years since the publication of your last book?

GDG: One night I remember vividly. It was already July in NYC and the fireflies had not shown up in any strength, and we thought maybe they weren't coming this year at all -- and then suddenly one evening there they were. Millions of them flashing in ragged unison in Tompkins Square Park. Their own city of lights, with the East Village neighborhood folks crowding against the fences to watch the silent concert.
Some of the other evenings are hazier in my memory.

JR: What do you do when you're not writing?

GDG: I love playing tennis with my friend Ariel Janzen, watching the yellow ball arc up against the perfect blue. The two of us cackling merrily as we watch it go sailing over the fence.

JR: What do you like best about the actual writing? Not publishing, just writing.

GDG: Well, there are moments of great incandescence. But I really don't like sitting indoors when everyone else is outside watching the flight of the yellow ball. You may begin to suspect, by the tenor of these answers, that I have a streak of laziness.

JR: Do you have any quirks when writing?

GDG: I write in bed. Often I write all night and into the next day.

JR: Do you finish every novel you begin? If not, how many unfinished manuscripts do you have on hand? Any unpublished novels that might get dusted off and sent around?

GDG: I've put aside a couple of books. I'd like to finish them all some day. It's easy to imagine myself as just that sort of industrious writer. Meanwhile I lie in bed and gaze outside at tennis balls in flight, and then fireflies in flight, and the time just slips away ...

JR: What is The Moth? And how did you get involved?

GDG: The Moth is an astonishment. I started it some twelve years ago -- after the success of the Juror. Famous people and people you've never heard of tell stories around a given theme. The stories are unscripted, personal, kitchen stories. Utterly absorbing evenings. If you're tired of the manipulations of Hollywood executives you're never heard of, if you'd like to experience the great simple elemental one-to-one power of the raconteur, come join us!

I had more questions, and as in most interviews they went from general to more personal and specific: questions about his life, movies, actors and evil. I always feel the interviewee has the option of answering any or all.

My final question was "Have you ever bought a lottery ticket?" He didn't answer that one, but I think we all won the lottery with Ravens.

To watch a video interview with author George Dawes Green, go here.

Sarah Weinman has an excellent review of Ravens in the L.A. Times.