{"id":5759,"date":"2014-04-27T21:16:03","date_gmt":"2014-04-27T21:16:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/?p=5759"},"modified":"2014-12-20T04:48:57","modified_gmt":"2014-12-20T04:48:57","slug":"a-written-interview-with-authors-in-the-spotlight-with-lucie-dunn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/a-written-interview-with-authors-in-the-spotlight-with-lucie-dunn\/","title":{"rendered":"A Written Interview with Authors in the Spotlight with Lucie Dunn"},"content":{"rendered":"

In my blog post yes\u00adter\u00adday, I men\u00adtioned my upcom\u00ading inter\u00adnet radio inter\u00adview<\/a> with Pam Stack, host of Authors on the Air, on Wed., April 30 at 8:00 p.m.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, as a corol\u00adlary to that inter\u00adview, Pam\u2019s co-host, Lucie Dunn, does a writ\u00adten inter\u00adview with authors appear\u00ading on Pam\u2019s show and pub\u00adlish\u00ades them to her Authors in the Spot\u00adlight page on Face\u00adbook. I thought Lucie asked some ter\u00adrif\u00adic ques\u00adtions, so I want\u00aded read\u00aders of this blog and the inter\u00adnet at large to have access to this inter\u00adview.<\/p>\n

Lucie\u2019s ques\u00adtions are pre\u00adsent\u00aded in the bold\u00aded text, and my answers appear below each ques\u00adtion. I hope you enjoy it.<\/p>\n

_______________<\/p>\n

\"86ca3b59-5d7d-441d-82df-56cccef2ba1b_authors_on_the_air\"<\/a>Yes\u00adter\u00adday I had the dis\u00adtinct plea\u00adsure of doing a writ\u00adten Q&A inter\u00adview with a very artic\u00adu\u00adlate and intel\u00adli\u00adgent man. His most recent nov\u00adel, One Hun\u00addred Miles from Man\u00adhat\u00adtan<\/em>, was released at the end of March, 2014. He has the first two nov\u00adels in his acclaimed Dako\u00adta Stevens Mys\u00adtery Series pub\u00adlished and I am told he has enough ideas stored for quite a few more. He comes to us from New York but is a true New Eng\u00adlan\u00adder hav\u00ading been born in Maine. I present to you Chris Orcutt!<\/strong><\/p>\n

OK, first ques\u00adtion: Were you always a read\u00ader?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Absolute\u00adly. This is going to sound apoc\u00adryphal, but I taught myself to read at age 3. The sto\u00adry is that I walked into the liv\u00ading room and start\u00aded read\u00ading out loud from Time<\/em> mag\u00ada\u00adzine. My par\u00adents were dumb\u00adfound\u00aded. So, yes, I\u2019ve always been a read\u00ader, and I enjoy read\u00ading the very best writ\u00ading. I\u2019ve also read my fair share of junk over the years, but over time I learned that life is short and you can\u2019t waste your time read\u00ading the junk when there are so many mas\u00adter\u00adpieces to read.
\nVery true! How old were you when your first man\u00adu\u00adscript idea came to you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, if by \u201cman\u00adu\u00adscript\u201d you mean sto\u00adries, then I began writ\u00ading them at about age 12 and would read them aloud to my friends on the school bus. I seri\u00adal\u00adized the sto\u00adries so every day, or every oth\u00ader day, there would be a new install\u00adment. I still remem\u00adber some of the char\u00adac\u00adters I cre\u00adat\u00aded. One was a James Bond-esque spy, anoth\u00ader was a detec\u00adtive.
\nIs this the detec\u00adtive that went on to become Dako\u00adta Stevens?<\/strong><\/p>\n

No, not at all. Dako\u00adta came much lat\u00ader. I got the first name of my detec\u00adtive, Dako\u00adta Stevens, when I learned that a girl I went to mid\u00addle school with had named her boy Dako\u00adta. I filed that away. \u201cCool,\u201d I said to myself. Then I wrote a humor\u00adous sto\u00adry with a PI named Dako\u00adta Perez\u2014a sto\u00adry that mir\u00adrors the short sto\u00adry \u201cAn Occur\u00adrence at Owl Creek Bridge.\u201d Any\u00adway, the first glim\u00admers of what would become Dako\u00adta arrived on the scene in my ear\u00adly 20s, but it was\u00adn\u2019t until I was in my ear\u00adly 30s that I decid\u00aded I want\u00aded to start a PI series. I was laid up for weeks with a back injury and did noth\u00ading but read Chan\u00addler and Park\u00ader nov\u00adels, and that\u2019s when I said, \u201cHell, Chris\u2014you can do this.\u201d
\nAnd you did!!! Are you work\u00ading on book three, assum\u00ading there will be a few more?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, I\u2019ve already writ\u00adten the first drafts of what I think will be books 3 and 4, and I\u2019ve been tak\u00ading notes for book 5. Hon\u00adest\u00adly, I have more than enough ideas for a dozen Dako\u00adta titles. To me the ideas have always been easy; it\u2019s the exe\u00adcu\u00adtion that\u2019s hard. The writ\u00ading and pol\u00adish\u00ading of the work takes the most time. If I were con\u00adtent to sim\u00adply pub\u00adlish my first drafts, I could have a dozen titles out in no time, but I\u2019m not con\u00adtent with that. I want every\u00adthing I write and pub\u00adlish to be the very best work I\u2019m capa\u00adble of.
\nThat just means you take total pride in your craft. And there is noth\u00ading bad about that.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Writ\u00ading is my life. It\u2019s ALL I do.
\nYou have a great resume though. A high school his\u00adto\u00adry teacher for instance. Are you a his\u00adto\u00adry buff?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I do enjoy U.S. his\u00adto\u00adry and am fair\u00adly knowl\u00adedge\u00adable on the Civ\u00adil War and WWII\u2014especially D\u2011Day. I\u2019ve been to Nor\u00admandy, stood on Oma\u00adha Beach, and I\u2019m in total awe of what those men did. I\u2019ve walked the long walk up to Ceme\u00adtery Ridge at Get\u00adtys\u00adburg and been in awe of both the Union and Con\u00adfed\u00ader\u00adate sol\u00addiers. I enjoyed teach\u00ading his\u00adto\u00adry for a cou\u00adple of years\u2014the stu\u00addents I had were won\u00adder\u00adful, tal\u00adent\u00aded, bright kids (and I stay in touch with some of them!)\u2014but oth\u00ader oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties came along and I pur\u00adsued them.
\nWell as a read\u00ader, I\u2019m glad you did.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thanks! I espe\u00adcial\u00adly enjoy going to his\u00adtor\u00adi\u00adcal sites, because I\u2019ve always believed that there are cer\u00adtain things you can\u2019t know about an event unless you\u2019ve been there. For exam\u00adple, when I went to Oma\u00adha Beach, I got there at low tide, just when the U.S. sol\u00addiers land\u00aded, and let me tell you, it\u2019s a LONG way from the water to any kind of shel\u00adter from the with\u00ader\u00ading fire they endured.
\nWOW!<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s at least 300\u2013400 yards. At least.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"THE<\/a>

THE GREAT GATSBY print by Litographs.<\/p><\/div>\n

So tell me about read\u00ading The Great Gats\u00adby<\/em>. You have read that sev\u00ader\u00adal dozen times. They say that you nev\u00ader real\u00adly read the same book twice. After read\u00ading The Great Gats\u00adby<\/em> that many times were you able to walk away with a dif\u00adfer\u00adent per\u00adspec\u00adtive than you came away with the pri\u00ador reads?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Great Gats\u00adby<\/em>, in my opin\u00adion, is an absolute gem. I have a framed ver\u00adsion of the book from this ter\u00adrif\u00adic lit\u00adtle com\u00adpa\u00adny Litographs<\/a>, which prints the entire text<\/em> of the nov\u00adel (and many oth\u00ader nov\u00adels) on a poster, in a nice pat\u00adtern. It hangs in the hall out\u00adside my bath\u00adroom. Let\u2019s put it this way: Every time I come out of the show\u00ader, I stop and point at a ran\u00addom place on the Gats\u00adby<\/em> print, and every time<\/em> I see some\u00adthing new: some new metaphor, some deli\u00adcious use of an adverb, some join\u00ading togeth\u00ader of words that you\u2019ve nev\u00ader seen before. Orig\u00adi\u00adnal.<\/p>\n

When I was first pub\u00adlish\u00ading the Dako\u00adta books on Kin\u00addle, I weighed epub\u00adlish\u00ading vs. tra\u00addi\u00adtion\u00adal pub\u00adlish\u00ading, and the touch\u00adstone I used was Gats\u00adby<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The ques\u00adtion I asked myself was this: Are the words of The Great Gats\u00adby<\/em> any less poet\u00adic and utter\u00adly per\u00adfect pre\u00adsent\u00aded in e\u2011ink than they are in print? No. In fact, I sub\u00admit that you could paint those words on a dark cave wall and they would still be as great. Great writ\u00ading is great writ\u00ading, regard\u00adless of the medi\u00adum in which it\u2019s pub\u00adlished or who decid\u00aded to pub\u00adlish it.<\/p>\n

One point to add to that: Each time you reread a book (and we writ\u00aders do a lot of re-read\u00ading), you see dif\u00adfer\u00adent things\u2014and you espe\u00adcial\u00adly begin to under\u00adstand how<\/em> the writer does what he does. I wrote a [lov\u00ading] spoof of Gats\u00adby<\/em> titled \u201cThe Mag\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcent Mur\u00adphy,\u201d which I\u2019m very proud of. It\u2019s in my [short  sto\u00adry] col\u00adlec\u00adtion The Man, The Myth, The Leg\u00adend<\/em>.
\nHow did you come up with the ten men and their pro\u00adfes\u00adsions for The Man, The Myth, The Leg\u00adend<\/em>? I par\u00adtic\u00adu\u00adlar\u00adly enjoyed the homi\u00adci\u00addal vio\u00adlin\u00adist.<\/strong><\/p>\n

What can I say? I did\u00adn\u2019t come up with them. These char\u00adac\u00adters just arrive on the doorstep of your brain and insist that you write about them. They start talk\u00ading to you. You ask \u201cWhat if this? What if that?\u201d a lot.<\/p>\n

The African big-game hunter, Buck Rem\u00ading\u00adton came from read\u00ading some arm\u00adchair safari books. The road sign engi\u00adneer came from spec\u00adu\u00adlat\u00ading about what such a man (and woman) would be like. As for the homi\u00adci\u00addal vio\u00adlin\u00adist, that came out of a sum\u00admer when I had been fan\u00adta\u00adsiz\u00ading a lot about find\u00ading a bul\u00adly from my past and con\u00adfronting him. Not killing him, obvi\u00adous\u00adly, but con\u00adfronting him. Instead I saved that ener\u00adgy for the sto\u00adry. I had been lis\u00adten\u00ading to Beethoven\u2019s \u201cKreutzer Sonata\u201d over and over all sum\u00admer long, along with eat\u00ading a water\u00admel\u00adon a day and hack\u00ading into the water\u00admel\u00adon with a big Henck\u00adel\u2019s chef\u2019s knife. It\u2019s the \u201cbits of string\u201d idea that Nabokov talks about\u2014these sto\u00adries and nov\u00adels come from the col\u00adlect\u00ading of these lit\u00adtle bits of string and fluff.
\nI loved Buck Rem\u00ading\u00adton\u2019s name, being a hunter and hav\u00ading Rem\u00ading\u00adton as your last name is just so apro\u00adpos for a hunter.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That was exact\u00adly why I gave him that name.
\nIt was a great read and I am not gen\u00ader\u00adal\u00adly one for short sto\u00adries.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thanks! One of the things I try to do in my short sto\u00adries is to actu\u00adal\u00adly give the read\u00ader what I call a \u201cdis\u00adtilled nov\u00adel\u201d expe\u00adri\u00adence. Fin\u00adish the thing and feel like you\u2019ve expe\u00adri\u00adenced a nov\u00adel, but it did\u00adn\u2019t take you days to read.
\nI like that, \u201cdis\u00adtilled nov\u00adel.\u201d Tell me about your first two books, Nick Chase\u2019s Great Escape<\/em> and I Hope You Boys Know What You\u2019re Doing<\/em>. I am think\u00ading I would def\u00adi\u00adnite\u00adly love to read the lat\u00adter.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wrote Nick Chase<\/em> and I Hope You Boys<\/em> back in my mid\u2013late 20s, and they were the best I was capa\u00adble of at the time. They\u2019re well-writ\u00adten, humor\u00adous sto\u00adries\u2014Nick Chase<\/em> is a com\u00adic nov\u00adel; I Hope You Boys<\/em> is a col\u00adlec\u00adtion of main\u00adly humor\u00adous stories\u2014but not only has my writ\u00ading advanced pro\u00adfound\u00adly since then, I<\/em><\/span> as a per\u00adson have evolved and deep\u00adened. When you\u2019re young, Life has\u00adn\u2019t beat\u00aden you down very much, but as you get old\u00ader and have some bad things hap\u00adpen to you (and some good things), you gain per\u00adspec\u00adtive.<\/p>\n

What I would say about those first two books is that I\u2019m glad they\u2019re out there in lim\u00adit\u00aded quan\u00adti\u00adties (they\u2019re no longer pub\u00adlished) as a record of my ear\u00adly work, but if read\u00aders want to read ful\u00adly matured work, read my lat\u00adest four books.
\nI think the I Hope You Boys<\/em> appealed to me because I am a Mom, and I could just pic\u00adture say\u00ading that to my old\u00ader son and his friends\u2026MANY TIMES!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let me tell you where that title came from\u2026<\/p>\n

My friend Carl and I were \u201cland\u00adscap\u00ading\u201d for a very old woman (her son hired us), and our idea of land\u00adscap\u00ading was this: When in doubt, cut it out.<\/em> Every so often the old woman would come out on the porch and yell at us, \u201cI HOPE YOU BOYS KNOW WHAT YOU\u2019RE DOIN\u2019!\u201d
\nOk, last ques\u00adtion. I think I know what one part of the answer will be, let\u2019s see if I\u2019m right. Every writer has a \u201ctool\u00adbox.\u201d You know, things that you must have or must do when you sit down to do some writ\u00ading on your work in progress. What is in your tool\u00adbox?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Think\u00ading\u2026<\/p>\n

For me, it\u2019s a thor\u00adough knowl\u00adedge of gram\u00admar, punc\u00adtu\u00ada\u00adtion, syn\u00adtax, and sto\u00adry\u00adtelling prin\u00adci\u00adples. Because you don\u2019t want a lack of knowl\u00adedge of these things to slow you down. And when you know them, when you know the rules, you know when you can break the rules.<\/p>\n

Also in my tool\u00adbox is desire. Desire not mere\u00adly to become a good writer. There are plen\u00adty of good writ\u00aders. I want to become a great<\/em> writer. My heroes are Chekhov, and Fitzger\u00adald, and Cheev\u00ader, and Hem\u00ading\u00adway, and Chan\u00addler, and Flem\u00ading, and Nabokov. The desire is a major tool because it gives me some\u00adthing to strive for. Sure, I\u2019d love to be sell\u00ading my books by the bushel, but it\u2019s more impor\u00adtant to me to write work that will last.
\nVery nice.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Oh, and COFFEE and REALLY GOOD PENCILS!
\nI would like to thank Chris Orcutt for his gen\u00aderos\u00adi\u00adty and time! It was def\u00adi\u00adnite\u00adly a tremen\u00addous plea\u00adsure chat\u00adting with him! I invite you all to go and check out his web\u00adsite at www.orcutt.net<\/a> and if you would like to pick up any of his awe\u00adsome books you can find the links on his web\u00adsite. If you would like to pick up his lat\u00adest nov\u00adel, One Hun\u00addred Miles from Man\u00adhat\u00adtan<\/em>, here is a direct link to the Kin\u00addle book: http:\/\/amzn.to\/1fo9hdY<\/a>, or if you pre\u00adfer a paper\u00adback: http:\/\/goo.gl\/RqQkxy<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

_______________<\/p>\n

Thank you, Lucie! It was a plea\u00adsure.<\/p>\n

\u2014Chris<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my blog post yes\u00adter\u00adday, I men\u00adtioned my upcom\u00ading inter\u00adnet radio inter\u00adview with Pam Stack, host of Authors on the Air, on Wed., April 30\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,30,3,4,6,77,78,76,88,39,11,43,12,87],"tags":[90,89,94,97,98,99,91,96,95,92,93],"class_list":["post-5759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-real-piece-of-work","category-chris-orcutt-books","category-craft","category-favebooks","category-interview","category-novels","category-one-hundred-miles-from-manhattan","category-process","category-radio-interview","category-short-stories","category-dakota-stevens-mysteries-series","category-the-man-the-myth-the-legend","category-the-rich-are-different","category-written-interview","tag-authors-in-the-spotlight","tag-authors-on-the-air","tag-chris-orcutt","tag-craft-2","tag-dakota-stevens","tag-dakota-stevens-mystery-series","tag-interview-2","tag-novelist","tag-novels-2","tag-writers-2","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5759"}],"version-history":[{"count":43,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6352,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5759\/revisions\/6352"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orcutt.net\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}