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Anne Perry: At Home in Victoria's England
Though best known for her two Victorian-era mystery series (both set in London), one starring superintendent Thomas Pitt and his wife Charlotte, and the other featuring private investigator William Monk and nurse Hester Latterly--whose latest adventures are chronicled in Ballantine's just-released Slaves of Obsession--Perry has also ventured into other formats. In fact, her tale "Her s" garnered her an Edgar award for best mystery short story earlier this year. "For short stories, it's a different writing process in many ways," the author tells PW. "You don't have to sustain the effort for as long a time, but just make it turn on one pivotal point. This gives you the freedom to create new characters, and if they don't work really well, you don't need to have them again. But if they do work, you can carry them further." She adds, laughing, "That's my trouble, I'm really a series writer--I get involved with my characters and want to know what happens to them after that." Perry spends roughly half a year on each series ("I'm surprised that you can't hear the clash of gears when I go from one to the other"), and says she d sn't prefer one to the other. She deliberately puts elements that she likes into each one to help keep them--and her interest in them--fresh.
"I like to stick to the legal, medical and military in the Monk books, which are quite dark, and there's always a really good trial scene," she says. "Setting them in the 1860s gives me the chance to hark back to the revolutions that swept Europe in 1848, a time of tremendous turmoil. And of course William's relationship with Hester is different than the one between Thomas and Charlotte." For the Pitt books, the emphasis is on the political and social scene, she says, particularly high society. "This is fun, because I can show a different side of life, the wonderful clothes and people like Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde and Gilbert and Sullivan. There were a lot of interesting things going on in the 1890s." As for marketability, she gives series the thumbs up. "As a reader, you get to know the characters and like them," she explains. "This is why good comedians so often have a catchphrase, because you feel comfortable with what's familiar. Each book in a good series should be partly new and partly familiar, as you take people you know and do something unexpected with them." Still, as a writer she acknowledges a certain attraction to the stand-alone. "Part of you wants to end things with a bang and have the final word beyond which there's nothing to say." --Heather Vogel Frederick Comments from the Editor: "I think of Anne as more of a novelist than a mystery writer," says Ballantine editorial director Leona Nevler. "I think the attraction people have to her books is that they learn about a time and a place, and that often the issues then are early manifestations of the issues of our own time." Interestingly, Perry's second series--the one featuring William Monk--actually came to Ballantine as a stand-alone novel. "When I read The Face of a Stranger, I said to Anne, 'You know, this would make a terrific series as well,'" recalls Nevler. "So she changed the ending in order for it to work as a series." Donald Westlake: Adept at Juggling
Westlake's Parker series (beginning with The Hunter), written under the pen name Richard Stark, started because Westlake wanted to break into the burgeoning field of paperback originals. He didn't intend there to be a second book about Parker. "He was a bad guy, and at the end he got caught by the police," he says. But then an editor at Pocket, Bucklin Moon, called. "He liked this character and asked if there was any way I could let him get away and give him more books about him." Because I didn't plan on a series, I hadn't made him reader-friendly. But that's what Bucklin Moon liked about him, so I kept doing it." Everything went smoothly until, after many Parker-starring books, Westlake "lost" the character. There was a 23-year hiatus before he put in another appearance. "I lost the voice," Westlake explains. "It had to lie fallow. Eventually it was able to come back. It was fresh again." Dortmunder, the comic thief, made his appearance somewhat by accident, too. "I began thinking of a story for Stark to write about Parker. Parker deals very badly with frustration. I thought, what if he had to steal the same thing three or four times? I realized I couldn't use Parker. When a tough guy is comic, he isn't tough any more. So I created Dortmunder. I never planned a series." The challenge of stand-alones, Westlake says, "is finding the people, the settings, the stories. It's more of a complete voyage of discovery. It's satisfying to have a character who has resolved his problem. I've put him through his paces and he can go on without me. The pleasure with Dortmunder and Parker is having done the dance again." As for selling the books to an audience, the series characters win hands down. "The first thing about Dortmunder or Parker is you can say, 'Here he is again. You like him. Here he is.' With the stand-alones, all you can say is, 'Here is a story you're going to like.'" --Suzanne Mantell Comments from the Editor: William Malloy, Westlake's longtime editor (and executive editor at Mysterious Press), says Westlake books are easy to sell--"He is, after all, a point of reference for a lot of other comic writers"--and that his foray into straight and horrifying books with The Ax and The Hook made readers and reviewers take notice of how good at plot and character he is. "As Stark he d sn't sell as well, but he's reviewed and revered, a precursor to Elmore Leonard and the neo-noir movement." Altogether, Malloy says, Westlake is one of the strongest-selling writers on the Mysterious Press list. Jonnie Jacobs: Enjoys the Best of Both Worlds
Jacobs believes she has the best of both worlds: "[Having two series] is a real blessing because it gives me some of the diversity that people who are just doing one series don't have." Although she's quite content juggling her two series, Jacobs tells PW, "I do have a stand-alone in the back of my mind. I would very much like to do one because you can change tone, you can bring in new characters. Characters are one of the things that really get me excited--not so much the plot but the people that I'm writing about."
Talking about keeping two series fresh, Jacobs says, "Each book is a book in and of itself--each novel is a chapter in each character's life. As long as you keep the characters consistent and believable, you can really push them in new directions. That's what I've been trying to do, because as writers we want to have new experiences both in the writing and the living. When you write a story, you live it, and that's one of the fun things about being a writer. You can be all these different people that you can't be in real life." --Hilary S. Kayle Comments from the Editor: Kensington editorial director John Scognamiglio sees different markets for Jacobs's two series: "The Kate Austen series appeals to the fans of cozies--the more traditional mystery reader. Her Kali O'Brien series is harder edged and more issue oriented. With our packaging, we aim those more at people who read legal thrillers." As for the author's future, he says, " My goal is to eventually get her to do a single title suspense thriller." Robert Crais: A Major Elvis Groupie
"I will always write about Elvis Cole and [his partner] J Pike," Crais says, "because they are part of my life. I love those guys. But with Demolition Angel I met a character [in the book] named Carol Starkey, an L.A. bomb squad tech, and fell in love with her. I wanted to go further with her and write something entirely different. I don't want to replicate over and over again the same characters. I think it's important to grow and develop as a writer and try new things. "If you write series," he continues, "you always have two totally different audiences: the old people, who have read everything that has come before, and the new people, those for whom this particular title is their first exposure to the series. The story has to be framed in such a way that both audiences get it without insulting the intelligence of the old people or confusing the new people." After finishing Demolition Angel, Crais went back to Elvis Cole for a time, before striking out again with the Carol Starkey character and the L.A. bomb squad in Hostage (due next summer from Doubleday). "I sort of bounce back and forth," he says. Crais is a longtime fan of private-eye fiction, "although I read pretty much everything. I discovered Raymond Chandler when I was 15 and I'm crazy about suspense thrillers." However, his first sales to publishers were SF tales in the '70s, when "there was a very real market for [that genre], much more so than for mystery fiction." Stand-alones provide different challenges and pleasures to an author than series titles, Crais tells PW. "A stand-alone broadens the canvas I paint on. It gives me greater freedom and allows me to develop fresh characters. And I'm a character writer primarily. Character always comes first, never a plot or a gimmick. Everything comes out of that character." --Margaret Langstaff Comments from the Editor: Shawn Coyne, Crais's editor at Doubleday, believes that "stand-alone titles give the writer an opportunity to try something new and give their series characters a break. It makes both commercial and creative sense to move to stand-alone titles after establishing a series." Addressing Crais's authorial strengths, he says, "He creates full-bodied, flawed and sympathetic characters across the board--and his plotting is amazing. Most of the thrillers and mysteries I read are a bit predictable to me. But Bob pulls the rug right out from under you." Frances Fyfield: Don't Give Away All the Details
She had already begun another book, intended as a stand-alone (Shadows on the Mirror, starring the amoral solicitor Sarah Fortune) when Pocket Books offered to buy A Question of Guilt--if she would write another mystery featuring West and Bailey. Suddenly the idea of writing a series seemed like quite a good, if somewhat alien, idea. "There's much more emphasis on series in America than in England," notes Fyfield. "Series are a part of your culture and there's more pressure from American publishers to do them." Even now, after five Helen West mysteries and three that star Sarah Fortune, Fyfield still prefers the creative adventure of the stand-alone. "It's more of a challenge to begin with a whole new set of characters--characters about whom you have no preconceptions. It's rather like going to a party and falling into a fascinating conversation." But whichever the format, it's easy to think that Fyfield's nonwriting work life would provide inspiration for an infinite number of mysteries. A practicing criminal lawyer, she still puts in one day a week as a prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service and worked for a number of years with a special unit "that investigated homicide, rape, child abuse and mayhem. Like others who do this kind of work, I've got it in my blood. It's a chance to take the lid off and see people's lives--but I've never used a real case. I write more out of my imagination." Fyfield fights off any possible monotony of series authorship by alternating Helen West and Sarah Fortune mysteries. She also gives the two ladies walk-on parts in the other's books--to show her fans that she hasn't forgotten the characters. Fyfield believes that no writer should "ever give everything away in the first book--who the characters are, where they come from--you should always try to leave something more to pull out of the hat. The less readers know, the better." So when d s she call an end to a series? "If a level of boredom sets in--when Helen West and Geoffrey Bailey both failed to turn up for their own wedding, I knew I had closed that door." Undercurrents, the author's newest standalone, will feature her first American character--a man who comes to England looking for a long-lost love. "I've wanted for a long time," says Fyfield, "to explore Americans' attitudes toward England." Attitudes, perhaps, like why we insist on having our favorite mystery characters live on and on and on. --Lucinda Dyer Comments from the Editor: "Our aim for Frances," says Viking executive editor Pamela Dorman, "is to get to the point where people say, 'I don't read mysteries but I do read Frances Fyfield.'" To that end, Viking will bringing Fyfield to the U.S. in April for a media tour for Undercurrent and is repackaging five of her backlist titles. "Frances has always written mysteries that are novels--psychological suspense that is very astute and subtle. I put her in a category with Ruth Rendell and P.D. James. Her work as a lawyer has given her incredible insight into the best and worst of humanity." Bill Pronzini: Enjoys Standing Alone
Pronzini can produce a Nameless Detective novel in half the time it takes to write a stand-alone, completing it in two or three drafts, compared to perhaps six for a nonrelated title. Carroll & Graf publishes the series, which he refreshes by continuing to develop his protagonist. "Nameless changes and grows with the times," he says. "We all go through times of crisis, periods of change, and so d s he. I think of it as an ongoing biography of a character. The series focus is as much on the personal as on his cases." When he began writing, Pronzini, as a reader, was often drawn to series. "I learned a lot about writing from Ed McBain," he remarks. Now he finds himself reading more books that are not series connected, but he is very clear on how significant his own series has been. "I don't think I'd be a writer today if I did only stand-alones," he says. "The series has built my career for me. It's very hard to write stand-alones now and maintain a career--unless you're someone like John Grisham." Pronzini is married to mystery writer Marcia Muller, whose series sleuth is Sharon McCone. The two have combined forces on several projects. "We've had each other's characters appear in our own series," he says. "We also had a lot of people asking, Why don't you put the characters together on a common case? So we did it as a lark in Double. We had them solving a crime and told the story in alternate sections. Things like that keep us going. You want to try new things." Pronzini has had a few other series that have come and gone. "Sometimes things work and sometimes they don't," he concedes. "I never envisioned that Nameless would go on so long. If you'd asked me once if it were open-ended, I would have said yes. Now I'm beginning to think the series may be finite. Two or three more books may be the maximum." Lately Pronzini has published one book a year, alternating between series and nonseries, although next year one of each will appear. "If I were only doing a series," he says, "I would probably feel a little trapped." --Robert Dahlin Comments from the Editor: "A stand-alone novel d sn't speak to a small, discrete audience. It has a better chance of breaking out," says Walker editor Michael Sideman. "I've known Bill for years and I knew his interests went far beyond the series and the constraints it puts on a writer. Our catalogue lists Bill's books under crime fiction, not mystery, and our sales figures are suggesting that there is a growing audience for his books. Bill is a very close observer, and in a stand-alone he can deal more with the texture of humanity than many writers do." Francine Mathews: Jane Austen in the CIA?
"I've wanted to write this book since 1993," Mathews tells PW. "The idea occurred to me while I was working on the Pan Am Flight 103 Lockerbie investigation for the CIA. But I put if off because, as an employee, I would have had to have the manuscript reviewed and approved by the agency. I just didn't want to deal with the process." Mathews has a lot to say about the different reading and writing experiences offered by series versus stand-alone titles. "Stand-alones provide much more latitude for character development," she says. "You can move back and forth between characters, pick one up and leave another behind. Series work best for readers who prefer to live the lives of the main character. The reader checks into a character's life at different points and grows with them. Series gain a quiet following of loyal readers, while stand-alone titles potentially can reach a broader audience, and a cross-gender audience, larger and more diverse than the more literary crowd that follows series." Mathews notes that she grew up with a strong interest in espionage fiction. "I loved John le Carré and the James Bond series. But women were just sex toys in the genre. This treatment of women was at odds with what I found in my own career. The CIA workforce is heavily female and it was the first government agency to have day care. My entire chain of command at the agency was female; it was a wonderful experience. I wanted to take the espionage genre and put real women in the books." Although she felt it was time to do something different and try her hand with the Lockerbie-inspired situation in a stand-alone, Mathews has enjoyed her series work. "I gave a speech at the annual meeting of the Jane Austen Society last year," she says, "and the response was wonderful. I had been prepared for the worst, because I am a member myself and aware of the protectiveness and jealously, almost, with which the group guards the author's reputation. But they couldn't have been nicer to me." Evidently no prejudice, only pride. --Margaret Langstaff Comments from the Editor: Bantam senior editor Kate Miciak calls Mathews "absolutely ideal as an author from a publisher's standpoint. She never misses a deadline, and she makes changes without a whimper." Miciak adds that Mathews "is extraordinary with character development and has a profound ability to create atmosphere that crackles off the page." The thriller market, she notes, "has been dominated by men for 15 years. Kate brings women to the fore. Cutout is all about women on a stage dominated by men. She shows how women are now everywhere in espionage. I think Francine honed her writing skills by writing series. She's ready for this now; she's had the plot for this book for nearly 10 years." Michael Connelly: Likes to Bosch Things Up
The bestselling author of seven titles featuring L.A. homicide detective Harry Bosch (which flew out of the starting gate in 1992 with The Black Echo, winning the Edgar for best first mystery), Connelly has been equally successful with such edgy thrillers as The P t, which garnered him Bouchercon's Anthony award in 1997, and Blood Work, which won not only France's Grand Prix, but also a second Anthony and a Macavity award. His forthcoming book, A Darkness More Than Night (Little Brown, Jan.), seems to have one foot in each format, as the hero of Blood Work, former FBI agent Terry McCaleb, investigates Harry Bosch as a murder suspect. "I don't really have a preference," says Connelly, musing on the differences in the writing process between the two. "Whichever one I'm doing, I really enjoy. They feed off each other." He's written a book a year for the past decade, and says that one of the reasons he's been able to maintain that pace is by alternating formats. "For the last six books I've gone from a Bosch to a non-Bosch," he says. While the stand-alones are written faster, he notes, "when I'm done with them I'm really ready for Bosch--I find I've missed him. It's become a cycle I've dropped into without really planning it." He finds, however, that writing a series is more difficult: "When you do a stand-alone, you have a completely blank canvas to start with. I feel more willing to take risks or try new things--a female protagonist, perhaps, or writing in the first person--and that always makes the process invigorating and fun." A series book, on the other hand, "g s to the heart of my philosophy about series--that it's not about the case, it's about the person." In order to pull readers along, the character can't be the same from book to book, he says. "As you add more books it's more difficult to dig further and find something new about the character. It also makes it more fulfilling when you accomplish this or at least come close to the goal." One way to keep things fresh "is to go back to a previous book and dig out a character from the past." The book he's writing now, for instance--the eighth Harry Bosch tale--will feature a character from the fourth book. "When these kinds of things are unveiled to the reader, it really pleases them, especially if they've been along for the whole ride," he notes. "It gives them almost a proprietary feel toward the whole work." As to whether readers prefer one format over another, Connelly cites a possible "reluctance" to jumping into a series late. "When a book comes out and it's the sixth in a series, some people might shy away. I know that my three stand-alone novels have bumped my sales each time, and I think they've really served me well in bringing people to Harry Bosch who might otherwise have missed him." --Heather Vogel Frederick Comments from the Editor: "Michael writes straight into the heart of the investigative traditional mystery," says LB editor-in-chief Michael Pietsch. "Harry Bosch is a police detective, and working L.A., he's coming out of an incredibly rich tradition of novels that explore that setting." Calling Connelly's plots "as fast-paced and surprising as anyone writing today," Pietsch also notes that he writes "with a profound emotional reality, something often sacrificed in the genre, where in the pursuit of plot you lose track of the reality of violence." Peter Lovesey: A Diamond in Bath
Lovesey's acclaimed Peter Diamond series is set in the noted English city, and although Lovesey has moved from the area, he returns regularly in search of "places a body could be discovered or a suspect could live. I have the plot sorted out in my mind, but to make it live it helps to find an exact place where an element of the story could happen." He takes along a pad and makes sketches and notes and often brings a camera to record images he wants to remember. "Bath has been a very fertile field for ideas. I've found that research is a confidence bringer; I want to make my stories real and solid for the reader." Lovesey has now been making crime "real" for 30 years. In 1970, he won a new crime writers competition with what would become Wobble to Death, the first of the Sergeant Cribb mysteries. The series went on to become a hit on both British TV and PBS-TV's Mystery but with unexpected consequences. "When the books were adapted for TV, the character of Cribb seemed to get away from me," recalls the author. "The actor who played him was great but eventually he supplanted my image of Cribb and I couldn't get back to the original concept." Lovesey kept his creative fires ablaze with stand-alones before deciding it was time to get back to a series. "If you're building a career," says Lovesey, "it's good to have a series or two going." After three books featuring King Edward VII as an rather inept amateur detective, Lovesey was again looking to shake things up creatively. This time he decided to take the literary plunge into contemporary times. "I had thought about it but hadn't plucked up the courage. Being in touch with one's own scene is a bit of a challenge." But writing Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond as a contemporary character was not the only challenge Lovesey encountered. In the first book of the series, The Last Detective, Diamond lost his job. "It's important that characters should develop their own lives, but I hadn't expected he would leave the police," says Lovesey. "That left me with a bit of a problem in book two." Thankfully, Diamond returned to the force in book three. Lovesey sees Peter Diamond "continuing for a bit. I'll know when he's gone far enough. Every writer should know when a character has come to the end--not because you're bored with them but because you've explored a person's character to the full." The sixth Peter Diamond, The Vault, is due this month from Soho Press; a starred PW review called it a "stunning tale of the macabre and the mundane." And while Lovesey is scouring the streets of Bath for just the right locales for the next Peter Diamond opus, he may not be alone. In partnership with some local tour operations, the author sometimes takes fans of the series to visit scenes from his books. Sign up now and you may be lucky enough to discover "where they'll do it" in book number seven. --Lucinda Dyer Comments from the Editor: "We feel that Peter is one of the outstanding authors in the field," says Soho associate publisher Laura Hruska. "He has a delightful, literate style with incredible plotting skill." Lovesey's new hardcovers and a number of his classic titles will soon be part of the Soho Crime trade paperback series. The Reaper, Lovesey's newest stand-alone, will be out in April, along with a reprint of Rough Cider. S.J. Rozan: Plots Don't Come Easily
For Rozan, the change in voices from book to book helps keep the series fresh. "I'm now working on my eighth book," she says, "but it's only my fourth book with Bill Smith. By the time I finish a book, I can't wait to get ready with the next. I love doing research." For example, to write Reflecting the Sky (St. Martin's, Feb.)--her seventh novel and fourth Chin book--Rozan returned to Hong Kong, which she had visited twice before. There she was struck by a sense of duality: "Hong Kong used to belong to the British, but not really. Now it belongs to China, but not really." So she took the idea of a child being kidnapped in Hong Kong and built a dual plot around it. Ever flexible in her approach--the sixth book in the series, Stone Quarry (due in paperback in January), was actually her first--Rozan admits, "I don't even outline my books, much less have a plan for the series. I hate plots. Plotting is the worst. To me, it's very chessboard." Plots may not come easily to this author, but ideas do. "I keep notebooks with the ideas for the books and short stories," she tells PW. "I have a file for each one on the computer. I also clip things from the newspapers and keep them in files. They really work for me." Although, Rozan admits, "I like series, because it gives you a chance to come back to characters and watch them change," she's not averse to trying her hand at stand-alones. "It's not that I have an objection to it. I've written three stand-alone short stories. But everything I want to say, I can say within the series." A maverick when it comes to pleasing crowds, Rozan acknowledges, "I love to have readers, but I don't write for the market. I write the books the way I like things. I don't know enough about readers except me. I have occasionally resisted doing something in a book, if it's too similar to the last book. I think it's too formulaic." --Judith Rosen Comments from the Editor: Kahla is hoping that seven will be Rozan's lucky number. "We moved Reflecting the Sky from fall to winter," he says, "to buy us some more time to have with the galleys. Her books have built over time, and it's hard to make a leap in sales in the fall. Publishers bring out their big guns." To get booksellers excited about the new book, St. Martin's mailed galleys to every Book Sense store. Closer to publication, Rozan will embark on a 10-city tour. Dennis Lehane: Venturing into New Territory
Reflecting on the difference between writing series and stand-alones, Lehane says, "There's certainly greater freedom in the stand-alone--if you want to kill everyone off at the end of the book, you can. The only rules you have to follow are the basic rules of a novel. With series books, there are certain rules and expectations. You become more constricted with each book because your character has been defined. When I look at my books, I say, 'My God, of all the series that I know of, I certainly have two of the more screwed-up main characters!' But even they are limited by certain heroic conventions. There are some things they just can't do. I can push them as close to that line as possible, but I have to pull back. You don't have those expectations in a stand-alone." Writing Mystic River was such a good experience for Lehane that he has not yet decided which genre he'll choose for his next book. "When you do one, you want to kind of go and switch gears and do something else. Each type is an intellectual challenge." Readers have not heard the last word about Patrick and Angie, however, and the author isn't concerned about getting in a rut with his returning characters or their scenarios. "I keep the series fresh by having Patrick and Angie constantly evolving. They're not the same people in book three as book one. If I keep them fresh, it's because they're still fresh to me. "Another thing is that all five books are actually very different in mood--and that was conscious. The voice would stay the same, but the mood was different. Some of them are very dark and noir, some of them are very light and 'caper-y.' That's just because that's me. "I think a series should end when you have nothing more to learn about the characters. That's when you should pull the plug and that's exactly when I'll do it--I'm just not there yet." --Hilary S. Kayle Comments from the Editor: Though at first concerned with Lehane's decision to write a stand-alone, Morrow executive editor Claire Wachtel couldn't be more thrilled with Mystic River. "One my of sales reps said that this book reminded him of Crime and Punishment in its epic scope. The intricacies of the plot are extraordinary." She calls the novel "more than a mystery; it's a morality play. With Dennis, it's not just whodunit, it's why they 'dunit'--what's in their character that made them do it." Nancy Taylor Rosenberg: A Fresh Start Each Time
Although Rosenberg's pleased with the way the book turned out, she has no plans to resurrect district attorney Lily Forresteror any of the other characters in Buried Evidence any time soon. "I like to start out fresh," she explains. "For me, it defines a clearer meaning of a novelist than to create continuing characters." Rosenberg d sn't even like to rewrite; she prefers to start over again. "To publish seven novels, I've written at least seven more," she remarks. "I write as many books as I throw away." In writing her legal thrillers, Rosenberg draws on her 14 years in the criminal justice system. But the connections between the characters and her life run even deeper. "The male characters, the female characters, even the children, they're all about yourself," she says. As for plot, Rosenberg gives all the credit to her characters. "We all start out with a concept of what we think will be the plot of the story," she says. "But if we breathe life into the characters, the characters dictate the story to you and then you find out that they're not going to do that." It's true, she acknowledges, "when I was first trying to get published, I'd research the books that were selling. But you can only write what you can write. We'd all like to write the book we feel like writing--a mystery one day, an inspiration book or a romance the next. That's not necessarily what our readers want." --Judith Rosen Comments from the Editor: Hyperion senior editor Maureen O'Brien is pleased to have Rosenberg on her list for the first of a two-book deal. "We're planning big things," she says. "The real thrust of the campaign was to have fabulous advance reading copies at sales conference and BEA and to get the buzz going that Nancy Taylor Rosenberg is back in a big way." Although, O'Brien says, "we hesitated to even bill Buried Evidence as a sequel, because it is such a stand-alone piece of work," the company had no trouble getting the message across through marketing. In an unusual cross-promotion, Hyperion and Signet cooperated on floor displays that promote both books. Thomas Perry: Created a Not-So-Plain Jane
He never intended to build a series around Jane Whitefield, either, but beginning with her appearance in Vanishing Act in 1995 and ending with Blood Money in 1999, he devoted himself to his Seneca Indian sleuth. "The first novel was intended to be a stand-alone, about a woman who saved people from terrible dangers and took terrible risks," he says. But he was very fond of the character, and so was Random House. "My editor at the time, J Fox, called and asked if I wanted to do five books about her. I agreed. Jane was a lot of fun, and it gave me experience doing a series." At the urging of his current editor, Kate Medina, he resisted the desire to have Jane--and her husband--die when he ended the series, but he had always planned to. "It seems like a cheat to the reader to put the characters in danger and not kill them off," he says.
In the end, Perry says, doing a series is like having a job. "It's comforting. With a stand-alone you're starting from scratch with each one. It's like any freelance project. The good news is you can earn a living with a blank page and a pencil. The bad news is the same: All you have is a blank page and a pencil. You never know whether you will go anywhere or reach a dead end. It's more exciting, but riskier to start fresh every time." --Suzanne Mantell Comments from the Editor: "It's Thomas Perry's name that sells his books, not a particular one of his characters," says Medina. "There is a cut to the edge of his work that is exciting. He's really inventive in cooking up fabulous plot twists, characters and situations. I'm always surprised by him and never know where he's going."
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What's Your Motive?
Oct 23, 2000
A version of this article appeared in the 10/23/2000 issue of Publishers Weekly under the headline:
