Today, I had the privilege of interviewing author Stephen V. Masse, whose current book is A Jolly Good Fellow. As you may know from reading my blog, I'm a huge fan of mysteries and thrillers, and this book is a fun adventurous thriller featuring a beat-down Santa, a kidnapped preteen, and a happy ending. I used my interview to get to know the man behind the book.
Great question – when I’m writing! In a perfect world, I start after breakfast, then break for lunch or when I’m hungry, and then write until I reach a natural stopping point. Back when I lived in Amherst and had hallucinations of making a living by writing, I used to write every morning until I ran out of ideas, and I would either take a bus or walk up to the coffee shop and join a fascinating group of friends for discussions of every kind amid the aromas of cigarette smoke (this was pre-prohibition), clove smoke, and coffee. I was most productive in these years, writing seven novel manuscripts in about ten years.
It’s become a privilege for me to find enough time to do any serious writing. I’ve been hoping to finish a book this season, but running a business by day and marketing a novel at night and weekends has put that in the background. If work is slow, sometimes I will buckle down and write through a day and night.
2. As a mother of a teen and preteen, I think you gave Gabriel such an authentic preteen voice. Do you have preteens of your own? What drew you to that age for your character, as opposed to a more worldly teenager?
Well thank you kindly, I rather enjoy Gabriel and wish I had a son just like him. But alas, I have no children. At the time I wrote the first draft of this book, I had no outline or plot plan, I just spent six straight weeks pounding out the story as it came to me. Gabriel is a composite of many boys I knew when I was a camp counselor and a Big Brother, with a pinch or two of myself thrown in for flavor.
Gabriel materialized as an eleven year old, and I suppose I never really questioned his age. I think he needs to be young enough to still need the fatherly relationship he extracts from Duncan Wagner, while at the same time old enough to understand certain worldly things.
3. What inspired you to write a Christmas themed book, as opposed to a non-holiday book?
Perhaps the timing of my first draft had something to do with the Christmas themes, as I began the book in late fall and worked straight through six weeks around Christmas. This was to be Reality Fiction, and I put myself into it completely without plan or outline. I had a habit of writing first and asking questions later, and discovered through the course of many rewrites and many years that the Christmas theme is vital to the story. Duncan Wagner is starving for salvation, and Gabriel comes as the innocent child full of light and possibility into Duncan’s darkness. Wagner says he wants something green for Christmas, of course meaning ransom money, but the green is in the Christmas tree that Gabriel coaxes him to buy, as well as being in Gabriel himself.
4. Most novels are written in third person. Why did you choose to write in 1st person?
Again, this was pretty much the way the novel came to me. I remember at the time I wrote the first draft, I was acutely aware of the conventional wisdom in publishing that novels in the first person were very hard to sell – but I trusted my instincts and decided to let Duncan Wagner tell his own story in his own Boston lingo.
5. Who are your own favorite authors? Do you reread books?
By far my favorite is Mark Twain, even though I haven’t had time to read his work in over a year. I do reread books, and find myself fascinated by the surprises I find in books I thought I remembered so well.
Hope you enjoyed reading Stephen's answers. I'm always so interested in the process behind creativity, and I loved this chance to talk to him. Have a happy Monday all! Back with more photos tomorrow. ;)
