James Paddock, novelist, writer of
mystery and suspense
Tell us a little about yourself and your background? Where are you from?
I was born and raised in the Big Sky Country of Montana. Once
of age I joined the Navy and said goodbye to my home state, for places like Illinois,
Rhode Island, Virginia, Florida, the North Atlantic, The Mediterranean, and a
tour around South America, eventually marrying and settling in South Carolina.
In 1985 I left the Navy, built a business and raised a family. It was from the
little town of Goose Creek in the Low Country of South Carolina that I began
playing with the notion of writing. Twenty-plus years and three states later I retired
and settled in beautiful, sunny Florida, playing pool and golf, and of course, writing
the next series of great American mysteries.
So, South Carolina is where you began writing. How did it
evolve?
I think the notion of storytelling–making up stuff and sharing
it with others–started way back. I am a daydreamer and apparently, from what
I’ve been told, I was that way as a lad, running around the streets of Great
Falls, Montana, making up stories for my cousins. For the next 30 years I
continued to daydream, though as I got deeper into adulthood I stopped sharing.
I thought something was wrong with me. In '82 and '83 I had duties aboard Navy
Merchant Ships that provided me with a lot of free time, and a typewriter...
yes, the old fashion kind with ribbons and a bottle of whiteout. I started a
novel. Today I have rather foggy recollections of what it was about, not even
sure it had an identifiable plot. When I returned to the states I let someone
close to me read it, someone whose opinion I thought of highly. The facial
expressions and lack of any verbal encouragement or criticism, told me all I
needed to know. Forty or so pages of manuscript went into the trash and I
figured that writing novels was not in my skill set.
Ten years later, 1992 to be exact, the notion resurfaced. Why,
I don't remember, but I did enroll in a creative writing class at a community
college. The final for the class was to submit a short story to a publisher. An
anthology publisher shelled out $25.00 to publish my first story. It was like
I’d won the lottery. That is truly where it all began. This year, 2014, marks
my 22nd year learning the process of fiction writing. There is still a lot more
learning to be done. I hope it will never stop.
What
are your books about?
I have nine novels at this point that span a variety of plot
lines including:
· Terrorists entering the US through Canada with a
WMD (weapon of mass destruction). Elkhorn Mountain Menace - previously
titled Angels in the Mist
· The use of DNA to recreate Smilodon, the largest
of the sabre-toothed cats. They find their calling in Montana in a trilogy. Smilodon,
Sabre City, The Last Sabre
· An accidental time-travel. Imagine being
pregnant in 1987 but giving birth in 1943, and then in book two finding the
daughter 20 years later wanting to know what the hell happened. Before
Anne After, Time Will Tell
· A suspenseful, heart-pounding story of twins
separated and then looking for each other in LA 20+ years later. Lost
& Forgotten
· A heart-warming and inspirational story of a
young woman finding a new path for her life in the Nevada desert. Hot
Roast Beef with Mustard
· A Tucson, Arizona ex-cop, now private
investigator with family and relationship issues, winds up the prime suspect in
a serial killing rampage. Deserving of Death
What
inspired you to write these books?
I am inspired by my daydreams, or maybe some would call them
nightmares. They usually pop up while walking the beach, the isles of Wal-Mart
(think about the nightmares walking around Wal-Mart at night) or mountain
trails. Sometimes, as in the case of Smilodon, the idea comes up after
watching a TV program. It was a Discovery Channel special on the sabre-toothed
cat that planted the seed that eventually built the trilogy. I'm not inspired
to save the world or make a political statement. I simply want to entertain,
take one away from the problems of the world, if only for a few hours.
Who are the primary readers of your books?
I'd like to think that my readers are anyone who enjoys fiction
and a story full of suspense, edge of your seat twists and turns, with real
world characters dealing with real world and in some cases, out of this world,
challenges. Of course, real world characters are emotional, whether it be
anger, love, fear, joy, or disappointment. If you like an emotionally charged
story with lots of suspense, then you're my reader.
How did you come up with the titles?
Titles are one of the smaller stress points for an author. They,
like the cover, have to be eye-catching and pertinent to the content. My first
novel was titled, Angels in the Mist (can still be obtained in paperback) but it
didn’t have anything to do with Angels. I just happened to use the phrase on
the last page and at the time thought it was catchy. Angels confused people
because it was about terrorism in Montana. One lady at a book signing went on
about how she loved to read books about angels. I actually talked her out of
purchasing Angels in the Mist. I have since republished it as Elkhorn
Mountain Menace and am still stressing a bit over that title. It may
get changed again.
Before Anne After and Time Will Tell have to do with
time-travel. The first is about Anne, before and after her travel
through time. The sequel, Time Will Tell, is about her
daughter, Annie, nearly 20 years later. Annie has some issues that may or may
not get resolved, but, of course, only Time Will Tell. Both of those titles
were my wife’s inspiration.
The trilogy of sabre-toothed cats was easy to title. Smilodon
is the big cat I brought back to life in Montana, Sabre City conjures up a
vision of a city of sabre-toothed cats, and The Last Sabre brings to
mind the possible demise of the cats.
Now, I like to think, my titles arise from the plot. With Deserving
of Death, the title might have one considering who is deserving to die.
Once you read it you'll realize how thought provoking the title is. Currently I
have six titles listed for my work-in-progress. I keep them at the top of the
first page of the Word document and periodically review them, deleting one or
two and adding one or two more.
What was the hardest part in writing your books? How did you
resolve it?
The hardest part about writing a novel is starting, except for
maybe the starting the new chapter, which ranks right up there with the ending.
After that it’s the marketing that is probably the most
challenging and the most stressful. Some would say that they hate the editing
the most, that they’d rather get branded by a hot poker. For me the editing process
is the most rewarding because I’ve already done all the hard work to get there;
it’s the equivalent of a getting a second wind on the home stretch or going
back with the touchup brush after painting the whole house. All I have to do is
smooth it out, fix the typos and the she
has red hair in chapter 6 and brown hair in chapter 18 kind of stuff.
What was the easiest part in writing your books?
See the last question. There is no easy part. Just when it
seems like it is getting easy, another wall emerges and there I am, against the
wall. There is hard and less hard. There is nothing I would call easy.
If it's not easy, why do you do it?
If we only did what was easy, we'd still be wearing tree
branches for underwear while throwing long sticks with sharpened points at
water buffalo because what they're wearing looks warmer than these dratted
leaves. I wonder when they discovered poison ivy didn't work? We do the hard
things because when we've succeeded we feel a lot more satisfaction, and pride,
and a lot warmer, than if we only do the easy things.
Did you do research for your books?
I had a reader ask me one time if there really were
sabre-toothed cats roaming the mountains of Montana. That made me feel good
because it meant that the processes I presented to recreate the big cats must
have had enough truth mixed in with my make believe world to make if feel real.
That doesn't happen with magic. It happens as the result of painstaking
research. For the time-travel series I researched Einstein, Kerr,
Schwarzschild, Minkowski, Feynman, Gödel, Lorentz, Hawking and possibly a few
more I've forgotten. Don't get the idea that I understood much of it. I only
needed to be able to glean enough of their theories so that I could make the
fiction I'm building believable, and in fiction believability is vitally
important. If the reader (or viewer) doesn't believe it, the story loses its
punch. We all know that a gigantic spaceship cannot suddenly jump to warp
speed, but the writers of Star Trek
made it sound as though it already existed and then the movie makers did it
right before our eyes on the big screen. From my research of Einstein and the
like, I created the Waring Triple Jump Deviation Theory, the Waring Four
Dimensional Tube Theory, and the Hair Nuclear Tri-Generation Theory. Let’s not
forget SMUDDWAGEN, Dr. Hair’s creation in Time Will Tell. Sorry, you’re not
going to find those in any text book. If you do, I demand credit and royalties.
I want my readers to put the book down and say, "Wow!" and then
wonder if there really are people at MIT working on time-travel, or secret
organizations in Montana growing Sabre-toothed cats in test-tubes.
Did you learn anything from writing your books and what was
it?
Other than all the tidbits of trivia gathered in research, I've
learned that persistence leads to results. Imagine getting up in the morning
and writing 600 words. That’s not all that much when you really think about it.
What if you did that every day for 6 months? That’s 108,000 words. Looks like a
novel to me.
What writers do you read and who has most influenced your
life?
Last question first... everything I read influences me in some
way or another, but nothing stands out as saying, “This is the be all do all story that changed my
life.” I’ve had books make me joyful, pleased about life, such as Stephen
King’s The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.
That is one that few people have ever heard of but which I consider one of his
best. It may have been psychological horror, but I felt good about reading it. For Whom the Bell Tolls by Earnest
Hemingway (the audio version) left me angry and depressed for days. Stephen
King’s The Green Mile is one which,
after reading it, I went out and rented the movie so I could share it and
discuss it with my wife. In non-fiction I’ve Recently read Married or… merry? By Kate Papas. I found it not only entertaining
but a great trigger for some productive discussions with my wife. One that
influenced my bucket list would have to be
Dungda de Islan’ by Charles Dougherty, a true story of sailing the Eastern
Caribbean for a year. I can't help but think about that story every time I see
a map of the Caribbean.
Most of what I read is purely for entertainment, though
everything teaches me how to be a better writer. I consciously watch what
writers do right and what they do wrong and try to learn from both. Loaded in
my “Now Reading” folder on my Kindle are: Siren
Song: Book One of the Siren Song Trilogy by B.A. Blackwood, a humor-filled
fantasy involving fallen angels interacting with normal humans; Married or… merry? by Kate Papas because
I want to read it again; and Social Media
Just for Writers by Frances Caballo because I really need to learn more about
social media. Standing by in Hardback is David Baldacci's The Target. Can't wait to get into it.
What is a typical writing day for you? When are you most creative?
I am strictly a morning person when it comes to mental
creativity. Before retiring from the pesky day job, I would spend approximately
one hour each morning in my writing craft before going to work, writing, editing,
researching, daydreaming. Weekends would range from two to five hours each morning.
Of course I need to knock out vacations, mowing the lawn, the honey-do list,
napping, colds & flu, staring at the flat screen, more daydreaming, just
generally being lazy… well, you get the picture.
Are you a pantser or outliner?
I have to say I'm a pantser. I always wing the first draft,
that is I write by the seat of my pants. There is no beginning outline or
character profile, often times no more than a sketchy idea for a plot. For
example: What if the sabre-toothed cat was brought back to life and then got
loose in Montana? That was all I had when I started Smilodon. Character
profiles are buit as I go, as they tell me who they are. The only character I
create is the first one. He, or she, introduces me to the next few and then the
story goes organic, heading off in directions I never anticipated with new
characters I never saw coming. It’s kind of like life, or at least mine.
Do you have any advice you’d like to give to aspiring
authors?
The exact same advice they’ll hear from most successful
authors… WRITE. That is, write until the story is finished. Seems silly to say
it that way, however, there are many who when they see they are within 10 or
20,000 words of the end, start rushing, leaving things hanging here, dangling
there. Kind of like being served a great meal only to be presented with a dry,
stale, tasteless cookie for desert. That cookie will be the last thing I
remember and may keep me from returning to the restaurant for another meal. You
want to leave your reader wanting to come back and sample all your other great
titles; don’t leave them with the memory of a tasteless cookie ending.
The most important thing to do after finishing a story is edit
it. Whether you pay a professional, sweet talk Aunt Sally or do it yourself, it
has to be done and it has to be done correctly. If Aunt Sally’s going to hold
back because she doesn’t want to hurt your feelings, or can’t see the typos
because she hasn't cleaned her bi-focals, or simply gets lost in the story, she
is doing you no favors. Great stories with typos and inconsistencies will be
read only by relatives and friends. For everyone else it will get bad or no
reviews and fall into the digital dustbins.
So, write, edit, publish, market.
For me it goes like this:
Write…edit…edit…edit…publish…market.
Sometimes following that there is:
Unpublish…edit...edit...republish…market.
Where can the readers find your books?
The best place to find me is at Desert Bookshelf Publishing - http://www.desertbookshelf.com or simply
search for me by name at your favorite on-line eBook store.
Also, please feel free to look me up, or follow me, on:
IAN Social Network - http://iansocialnetwork.ning.com/profile/JamesPaddock
Twitter - https://twitter.com/jameswriter
*All data including images and videos for this interview was used with the permission of the author. They belong to the rightful owner and this blog claims no ownership.
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