ReadersRoom: William, thank you for agreeing to chat with us, and welcome to ReadersRoom.com's Coffee with Kate.
William: Delighted to be here.
ReadersRoom: And we're delighted to have you. Let's start out exploring the protagonist in your three books. Victor Carl is an opportunistic lawyer with very human flaws. Can you tell us how you came about creating Victor?
William: It was during a dark time, when I hadn't gotten anything published and I was on the edge of getting a real job and I was feeling very bitter and left out of the publishing world. So I decided to write a book about a lawyer similarly embittered, and I came up with Victor. He was bitter and funny and desperate for a chance.
ReadersRoom: Were you practicing law at the time?
William: Part time, with my father. I had gone away to writing school in Iowa and decided to try to write full time, but it's hard to do without any income. So of course I bought a house and got a mortgage and loaded myself with all kinds of debt before starting what would become Hostile Witness. My father always used to say nothing focuses the mind like a mortgage and I suppose he was right.
ReadersRoom: So you had always planned to be a writer? And law school was a sideline?
William: I always wanted to write, yes. But I also figured, in my heart of hearts, that I'd never make any money at it, thus law school.
ReadersRoom: Do you consider Victor Carl a reluctant hero? It seems that he doesn't really want to be the good guy.
William: Victor is absolutely a reluctant hero. He imagines himself as the hard bitten type who will take the money and run at the first opportunity, but his heart always fails him. I would say if there is a trait that surprises him the most, and that is key to both his failures and his successes, it is his empathy. It stops him from from taking advantage like a good opportunist will, but at the same time it allows him to see stuff that helps solve his cases.
ReadersRoom: I found his metamorphosis throughout the three novels interesting. He is very different in each novel, yet still we recognize him. How do you show his growth so realistically, without losing sight of the original character?
William: You can't go through the things Victor goes through without changing, and as a writer I've changed with him. So the changes aren't that hard to chart, the hard thing is for him not to change too much. But some things are constant, he will always lust for money, sad eyed women, and seabreezes.
ReadersRoom: Do you feel close to Victor as a character, and does he ever seem real to you? I know many writers lose themselves in their characters.
William: I don't feel as close to Victor as I used to. I've been married for fifteen years, I've got three kids, a mortgage. Victor still just hangs out and gets drunk with beautiful women. He was what I wanted to be when I was still single. But his voice feels real to me. I sort of just shake my head a bit and there it is. He's so much funnier than I am it's a joy when he shows up.
ReadersRoom: Do you suppose at any point you will want to leave Victor behind, or mature him?
William: I don't know if I'll ever leave Victor. He connects to a part of myself I don't want to lose. I'll write other things, I'm sure, but I won't abandon him. He'd be too lonely, sitting in his office, waiting for me to send a case his way. And I don't want him to get too mature. Where would be the fun in that? Victor Carl as a paragon of virtue, lecturing young lawyers on the precepts of the bar association. Yikes!
ReadersRoom: You use Philadelphia as a setting. Is this where you live, and do you still practice law there?
William: I grew up and still live in the Philadelphia area. In fact I grab most of my stories from the papers. The gunfight on the expressway in Bitter Truth? That happened. The councilman extorting the developer? That happened. Luckily, I don't have to practice law any more.
ReadersRoom: What type of law did you practice, and do your personal experiences show up in the cases Carl gets?
William: I practiced a lot of different types of law, but the part that shows up the most is the criminal prosecution work I did in D.C. We used to get a stack of files that we'd wheel down to court in a pushcart. We'd go through them with the judge, trying to see which case was ready, and then when we all agreed on one, he would call for a jury. In the time it took for the jury pool to get up to the courtroom, I'd run around like a madman interviewing the cops and the witnesses. Bam, just like that we'd do jury selection and then openings and then the first witness. When one case was handed off to the jury, we'd start on the next.
ReadersRoom: Sounds chaotic!
William: Walking into the courthouse was like sticking your finger in an electrical socket, it was like a Ramones concert, it was insane. And then you'd go to sleep and do it all again the next day. But I saw everything, tried everything. There is nothing like cross-examining prostitutes one after the other to develop technique.
ReadersRoom: Not much time to write, I imagine.
William: No, not much time to sleep either. I found I couldn't really practice law and write at the same time.
ReadersRoom: Tell us about your newest book, Fatal Flaw. You have said that in this book the ideas that were fighting it out through the book involved love, and whether love alone can save your life. I find that fascinating. Can you tell us more about the plot of Fatal Flaw?
William: Exactly. Love. We all want it, we all say we'll do anything to get it, but when we cross the line we always pay for it. Fatal Flaw is all about a woman, Hailey Prouix, and the swirl of
deceit, betrayal, and murder that seems to follow in her wake. When the novel starts, she is dead, murdered, and the book is all about unlocking her mystery.
ReadersRoom: Which of your books is your favorite?
William: My kids always ask that same question and my answer here is the same. I like you all the same, now turn off the damn Gameboy and go to bed. Hostile Witness is all about Victor and was the first, so it has a place in my heart. Fatal Flaw came out really cool, I think, and Hailey Prouix is really haunting. But Bitter Truth, with all its stories and the Gothic atmosphere and the sort of new age religious stuff that is woven through it, is one that I particularly like.
ReadersRoom: In your books you use private investigators that are very colorful and almost take over the scenes. Have you considered writing a series based around one of your private eyes?
William: No, actually. Lawyers need a P.I. to work the case with them, which gives me a chance to create fun characters, but Victor is the main guy. I always think I'm writing in the tradition of Raymond Chandler and Victor is my Marlowe, so doing a P.I. novel would be a bit redundant.
ReadersRoom: I read that you don't really sit down to write the novel until you have a beginning and an ending. Since this is not the traditional way to write a synopsis, would you care to expound on this?
William: I'm not sure what the traditional way is, but the one thing I know about writing novels is that there ain't no rules. I would break them assiduously if there were.
ReadersRoom: Do you follow an outline?
William: I won't start a book until I have a set-up, a way to get into the story, and I won't start until I have, in my mind at least, an ending that works. Endings are real important. Sometimes you get so involved in the set-up and the second act that you forget that you need to end the thing and you end up in a mess. But the ending really holds the meaning of the story and without a good one the whole thing will be flat. How many times have you read a great book that just dies at the end? It's because the writer started and hoped the ending would come and it didn't.
ReadersRoom: What is your writing schedule?
William: I write a lawyer's schedule, five days a week, all day. I try to get four pages a day, that's my number, and usually it takes all day. Less than four it's not going anywhere, more than four and it ends up being flabby.
ReadersRoom: What are you future plans? Do they include more of Victor Carl?
William: I have a new Victor Carl novel coming out next spring, a book called Past Due. This book is pretty cool because Victor's father appears, very ill now, and from his hospital bed he begins to tell Victor a story of his youth, a story that explains much about Victor's own life.
ReadersRoom: That sounds fascinating.
William: There is a mystery involved also, of course, and a court case, and a renegade Supreme Court Justice, but the story Victor's father tells is what shakes up Victor the most.
ReadersRoom: Who are your greatest influences and favorite authors?
William: I remember reading the complete Sherlock Holmes when I was a kid, and The Count of Monte Cristo, and tons of comic books, and all that has played a part in my writing, especially the comic books. I think All The King's Men had a big influence on me, and the Henry IV plays by Shakespeare, and Martin Amis's humor always sends me to the floor.
ReadersRoom: William, before we leave, is there anything you would like to say to your many fans?
William: Just that I appreciate the support I've had for my books and the generous reception given to Victor Carl. I would have thought he'd be shunned by polite society, but you
all have seemed to taken him to your hearts and that is amazingly gratifying. Thank you.
ReadersRoom: Wonderful. Thank you, William, for taking the time to chat with ReadersRoom.com. Best of luck for your writing future.
William: Thank you.
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