Do you feel a deep connection to any of the characters in "inSyte"? If so who and why?

Hmmmm. Deep connection? Can’t say that I do.

Each of my characters is a work of fiction. Are there life experiences that worked their way into my novel? Most definitely.

At it’s core, inSyte is a character driven novel. Each character’s motivations are always clear so the plot is easy to follow without being predictable. I also strive for nicely understated humor to break up the intensity.

You always know who’s head you’re in, ie the point of view in any chapter is quickly apparent. The perceptions of the characters are different for the same circumstances, which adds depth.

And I have a lot of dialogue. Dialogue speeds up pacing and is an important element in making a book read quickly. Dialogue also helps to illustrate the characters.

My characters are multi-dimensional and interesting. Even the smaller characters are well-drawn.

My novel is a thriller and there’s plenty of action and tension. I paid a lot of attention to the dialogue to add tension by inter-cutting, avoiding having people speak in complete paragraphs and even sentences. Showing the impatience, projecting a more natural flow.

More than just dialogue, there are a number of physical conflicts. Otherwise known as fight scenes. The various fight scenes have been described by reviewers as horrifying and terrific. This is not a novel about fighting, by any stretch, but there is physical conflict. Great fun.

Anyway, back to the connection – no, I don’t feel a connection. They are all made up.

But my favorite is Cheslov. He was the most fun to write.

Do you feel your writing style differs from any other authors? Why or how?

Of course my writing style differs from many writers. Just as you can look at the top commercial novels of any decade and see differences in the writing styles.

It may be better to illustrate who my writing is similar to. Kirkus Reviews described my writing as equal parts Crichton, Clancy and King.

I could not ask for a better comparison ;). Pretty high company.

Will books become extinct?

Just a matter of time before books become obsolete. But not extinct.

Continuing from my answer above, there’s just no need for paper books. Oh sure, there will always be collectibles. It will always be fashionable and tasteful for homes to have books.

But in a decade or two, when broadband is truly ubiquitous and the computers and ipads and cell phones we use today are the size of a blood cell and you have access to every novel ever written for your virtual reading pleasure – well it becomes easy for one to imagine that physical books are obsolete.

Which do you think will gain the most profit e-books or print?

ebooks, definitely. They already have the most profit per item. Eventually they’ll overtake print books on total volume.

My mother is 80 years old and reads two or three paperbacks each week. I asked her recently if she would like to read ebooks. She could save a lot of money and I showed her how nice they look on an iPad.

Her response? No interest whatsoever. Of course she wasn’t raised on computers and displays the way people below the age of about 35 were.

Bad Reviews

Well, if you can’t handle bad reviews then you’re in the wrong business. I’ll want to understand specifics. Is this a good reviewer who has legitimate points? Or someone who, perhaps, this just is never going to be the kind of book they would like. Sort of like me reviewing a rom com –it’s just not something that’s going to really grab me, sorry.

If it’s the former, then I listen. And listen hard. Because that’s the thing about being the writer – you can never really read your book as an unbiased observer. Right? Impossible. Unless maybe you put it down for many, many years and then read it. No, probably not even then.

So I listen to ‘professionals’, what they think, and I have gone back after reviews and actually made edits based on input – particularly if I hear it from more than one reviewer.

Advice to new writers?

Don’t let ANYBODY read that initial draft. It will suck.

Oh – and don’t let ANYBODY read that initial draft. It will suck, indeed.

Also, be ready for criticism. You may think it’s the best novel, potentially, ever written. It’s not. You need direction from others to make your book be all that it can possibly be.

Finish your first draft and then refine, rewrite, make it real. Until you love it. I’d say a year or more. For me it took 3 years after the initial draft to get it where I wanted it to be.

And at least one year before it was ready for anyone else to read.

Because before that, it sucked. To be clear, I never thought it sucked when I finished writing sections. Only when I re-read them months later.

You see, here’s another bit of advice. Don’t spend too much time on the polishing when you first get the words down. You’re just building the foundation. The polishing and finishing comes later.

What's my writing style?

Real. Direct. I spent many, many hours searching and deleting ‘had’. I rewrote to put as much as I could into present tense. I read through sentences and deleted words that were unnecessary. I read all the dialogue aloud to ensure I had contractions and cuss words but not too much of either because I wanted it to be real.

Real.