 The dates of the original Q&A session were 7/25/06 through 8/1/06. Author David Thomas Lord recently visited the ARWZ Community Forums to answer questions from fans and ARWZ readers in an Interactive Q&A. The questions and conversations in this transcript are in no particular order, and may vary from the order in which they were originally asked.
As a little kid, around eight years old, I was a reporter for the neighborhood newspaper, which I put out with my friends. I wrote a short story in high school and my teacher praised it, but I didn't like her, so I ignored her praise. (Talk about cutting off your nose!) I didn't write another short story until many years later. What has changed most in my life after the publication of Bound in Blood is that I have writer friends now. While I was working on that first novel, I knew no other writers, so I had no one to tell me if I was screwing up or not. I had no one to tell me how to find an agent or a publisher, or what to expect when I did find one. Nowadays, yes, I do spend more time talking about the business of writing as opposed to the art or craft. And, the best part, I get to correspond with readers ( I hate and never use the word "fan") and hear what they respond to in my writing. That, truly, is the most rewarding. I have heard, twice, since the publication of Bound in Blood that I, through the book, had turned someone into a reader. I guess it doesn't sound like much, but it is by far the most rewarding thing I've heard regarding my writing. Finally, for most of my life, my friends had mostly been artists, performers and musicians. I'd not known many writers before I was published. Now, the majority of my friends are writers. Writers don't tend to talk about new projects. I don't because I feel that I'd rather expend the energy writing a story than talking about it. Other writers feel it's bad luck to talk about something that isn't published yet and still others fear that someone will overhear and steal the idea. I'll tell close friends what I'm planning, but that's it. Oftentimes, they'll have good ideas for places to go for research. Mostly, though, when writers talk about writing, they talk about the business aspect. They talk about editors and agents, new markets, magazines that have folded—things like that. Sometimes we'll talk about another writer we've read, the pros and cons. Pretty much, Mags, it's like professionals in any other business. Thanks for the questions. I hope I've answered them well enough.
Have you personally recognized that writers are different from e.g. painters? actors? Is there anything in particular that applies to writers, any certain characteristics e.g. some actors enjoy being in the spotlight, even privately, being the "talk of town" etc.? — magusachan
I know of no other artisic pursuit in which the members alert others as to new markets, sales techniques, etc. than writers. Writers are always willing to say: "Contact my agent, or my editor." They introduce you to people you should know and steer you from those you should avoid. I see little to no jealousy and a great deal of support.
I really like going to WHC. It's the only time of the year I get to see my friends, but I also enjoy doing the panels and sharing what I've learned about writing and the business. As far as doing a reading is concerned, I don't mind what size audience I'm reading to. I've read to groups as small as a half dozen and to others very large. The intimacy is something that I create, not them. In the theater, you learn to draw an audience to you, rather than reach out to them. The only hard part, oddly, is making eye contact. Even though it's something I wrote, I still read from the book. I've never memorized anything I've written. So, I have to be absolutely certain I know where I am and what comes next before I look up, away from the page. Still, I think it's important to make that personal contact with the audience, so that they feel you're reading for them, not at them.
When I was young, I read a lot of classic literature (save the "geek-calling" until later!). I read The Iliad and The Odyssey, Shakespeare, and lots of mythology, all interspersed with a lot of comic books. I graduated to Poe, Hawthorne, Stevenson, and others. But I think the writers who've most influenced my writing are J.K. Huysmans and Gabriele D'Annunzio. They both wrote prose the verged on poetry, which is something I strive towards. As I'd mentioned elsewhere on this forum, I directed for the theater, rewriting Marlowe, Shakespeare and the Greek playwrights, before writing my own. But in writing a novel, I get to be the playwright, director, set, lighting and costume designer, all the actors—everyone. I think it may have been my frustration in doing only one role in the theater at at time that lead me to writing fiction. Finally, you're very welcome. I've very much enjoyed the time I've been spending here on this forum. Thank you all so much for having me.
During the World Horror Convention last year in New York City, I had lunch with my agent. She asked me if I'd like to do a novella based on the vampire universe I'd created in the Bound series. She wanted to couple it with another novella by another of her clients, horror writer John Michael Curlovich, but she also wanted a third writer for the collection. After discussing a very short list of candidates, she agreed to the Canadian editor and writer, Michael Rowe. But, I didn't want to do a novella based on my Bound writings. Pretty much, I felt that everything I had to say about vampires would be said in the series. So, I proposed that we each do a novella using one of the Halloween icons (that is, any character commonly used for a Halloween costume) and having all of them end on Halloween night. That way, we could each be strongly independent of one another, though we had a connective link. When I asked Michael if he'd be interested and first wrote to John, I told them my idea and that I wanted to call the collection, Triptych of Terror. I asked them each for a synopsis of their novellas and a bio by a certain date, so that the agent could approach publishers with the completed package: all three synopses, bios and the proposal I wrote. Within five months, Alyson said they were interested and we began working with editor, Joseph Pittman. John Michael Curlovich has worked with Alyson before, writing for them such novels as The Blood of Kings and Blood Prophet. Michael Rowe is famed for editing such collections as: Brothers of the Night, Sons of Darkness, Queer Fear I & II, as well as his essay collections: Looking for Brothers and the soon-to-be-released, Other Men's Sons. John is using the gargoyle in his novella, "A Holy Time for All the Dead." Michael uses witches in "In October" and I'm using a fairy in "The Secrets of the Fey." Triptych of Terror is coming out October 1st and to my knowledge is the first collection of of gay-themed horror novellas. It's good to see you here, Lee. I hope to see you here more often.
Truthfully, novel writing is like super-playwriting or super-screenplaywriting. You get to create the story, create the cast, design the sets, the costumes, write the dialogue, produce, direct and act! What could be better than that? I have to say, Ian, that my biggest influences in writing aren't other novelists for the most part, but playwrights. Especially the ancient Greeks, Moliere, Racine, Marlowe and Shakespeare. The language was superb and the plots were absolutely fundamental.
With the major characters of the Bound series, I've created a notebook for each of them. I have their birth date and place, height and weight, eye and hair color. I include their likes and dislikes and add, as I go along, things I've said about them. But, I still have to go back and reread the notebook and the previous books to remember what I'd said. I like to describe my characters and locales fairly well, so that the reader can picture them as I do. But the trap there is that I always have to remember exactly what shade of blonde or what architectural design I'd used. So, I keep the notebooks and previous books on the desk's small bookshelf the whole time I'm working. It does drive me nuts when I'm reading a book and the color of a dress, or a door, changes. A broken window is magcally fixed, or it's no longer night.
I preferred to paint in acrylic on canvas, because I worked quickly. I'd love to paint again. I'd need a bigger place. Ulitmately, I'd want a house on the water with one small building (like a guest cottage) for an office and a larger second one for a painting studio. So if the "lotto gods" are listening....
Bound in Blood, because it focused on the vampire Jack Courbet, had a particular style. I wanted him to signal a return to the heartless monsters that vampires first were. I had had enough of those self-pitying, remorseful vampires. Jack was a monster and that's all I wanted him to be. Since the story centered on Jack, it was important that his self-involvement was primary. Nothing mattered to him but his survival. Mike is a strikingly different character from Jack, although they pass for twins. Mike did not want the life that the vampires wanted, but still, he is forced to go through a horrible change; one he fights. The extreme sex and violence of the first book was necessary in establishing Jack as soulless and callous. Since it was already established, I didn't feel that it was necessary to reiterate that in this book. So, I was determined to keep the sex and violence to a minimum and emphasize the supernatural element of the horror. I'm very pleased that the stylistic differences come through as well as they seem to. Oftentimes we say we want to do this or that with a book, but aren't sure the reader will see it. Thanks for putting my mind at rest.
Bound in Hunger uses a very old literary style, but the story is very edgy, with some extreme sex and violence. Bound in Thirst combines two genre types into one. It will be very gloomy, dark and moody, with flashes of striking violence and horror. Imagine a dreary, humid, overbearing rainstorm with stunning flashes of lightning. The final book, The Vampire Maker (no, it doesn't have a Bound title), uses everything in the SF arsenal. Although I think each of the books gets wilder than its predecessor, they only barely prepare you for where I'm going and what I'm doing with this book.
When you're writing a novel, a really important thing to remember is the balance between the dialogue and the pure narrative. There isn't a formula saying you need so much of this and so much of that. It's a feel you develop by doing it. It's kind of like making a great bolognese sauce. You can watch great chefs, read great recipes, but until you do it, you won't have a clue. So, what I learned from my playwriting mistakes helped me marginally with dialogue, but not all that much. Dialogue only serves a certain purpose in fiction writing. In playwriting, it's the whole ball of wax.
Marty, I've always appreciated the great opening line, so I try to begin with a startling or intriguing snetence. In Bound in Blood, the opening sentence, "He rises." was the only thing I never changed. Very simple, but very evocative for a vampire tale. Bound in Flesh begins with "I'd taken to drink." A very revealing statement that compels the reader to find out who's saying it and why. I wanted the opening of Bound in Blood to be almost mundane. So it continues with "He pads down the hall from the den where he slept, through the recently arranged living room, to the spotless and guest-ready bathroom." Very simple statements, but they beg questions to the reader's mind. Why did he sleep in the den? Why is the living room recently arranged? What kind of man has a bathroom that's spotless and guest-ready? Then, I make him a bit more complex with " 'Happy birthday,' he says to the arrestingly handsome face in the mirror, studying it for telltale signs of change that never seem to appear. No new wrinkles; no puffiness; no scars. No fleshy road signs at all on his face, this map of his life." What kind of man am I talking about who has no flaws and doesn't seem to age? This is certainly speculative fiction! So, whereas I give you a man who presents nothing but questions in BinB, I give you the opposite in the opening of BinF—a man who is compelled to tell you this: "In my disconsolate loneliness, in my unhealable soullessness, in my intolerable soloness, I’d taken to drink. I’d taken to drink for its restorative powers. That’s what I’d told myself, and anyway, I’d taken to drink. And another day began for me, Mike O’Donald. Ex-cop, ex-lover, ex-man." Nowadays, we'd want to say, "Whoa! Too much information!" So, in essense, what I like to do is to draw the reader immediately to the character by offering an insight with no explanation. The nameless man of BinB appears to be compulsively orderly, yet, paradoxically, he slept in the den. The man of BinF seems to be wallowing in self-pity, and yet he takes the time to offer an overly poetic reason for drinking and even make a very subtle joke about the restorative powers of alcohol. I like for openings to draw the reader in to the story's style, show the quirks in the characters, and present an undercurrent of "something odd is going on here." For me, I like my opening sentence to be fairly simple in structure. Both of these examples are essentially a subject and predicate. The opening sentence (although I won't tell it here) of the next book, Bound in Hunger, is the same. Simple declarative sentences. Thanks for asking, Marty, and I hope you'll come back. These readers should know more about you.
I like to say that I don't write every day, but that's not exactly true. I don't work on the book at hand if, after staring at the screen for five minutes, nothing comes out. Then, I might play with a short story or write notes or ideas about something new. So, I do write something daily. I always have a notepad and pen with me everywhere I go. You never know when you'll get a good idea, see something you want to describe, or overhear a conversation you want to steal!
I suppose JK Rowling's Harry Potter series is fantasy and I did enjoy them. But I wonder if Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is that type of historical fiction that you consider alternative reality? If so, then include that as well as Carter Beats the Devil by Glen David Gold. But then, I must admit that one of my most favorite reads contains elements of all those genres: horror, science fiction, fantasy and historical fiction. The different books in the collection are attributed to different writers, but you can normally find it grouped under the title, "The Bible."
My question is how would a writer, like yourself, write a story that has a similar theme to other books and keep it original. — Aquaryan
If horror is your chosen genre, it's best to have read the greats in the field and then the best of the contemporary writers to get an idea of what's been done and how. You can't just change lore that's been used for decades on a whim, or worse, because you don't know about it. Once you've read through the genre, you play the "what if" game. Every novel begins with "what if." You begin with the basis of the icon you're exploring, let's say a vampire, since it's the most common of the horror icons. Then you think, "What if I make a vampire who isn't bothered by the sun, isn't a nightwalker?" Then, you work out the details of how that could happen, the difficulties it might engender, etc. Mostly what you'd want to do is reject certain aspects of the established lore to write new lore and a creature who is controlled by those laws.
It's funny, when I wrote Bound in Blood, I had no writer friends. Now it seems that most of my firends are writers. Of all of them, I discuss the art and craft of writing most often with Canadian writer and editor, Michael Rowe, although it's not what we talk about mostly. The writer friends with whom I talk about writing—and you will find many of them listed on page 124 of Bound in Flesh—usually talk about the business of writing rather than the art and craft. There's and old joke that goes something like, "If you want to know about Art, talk to a businessman. If you want to know about business, talk to an artist." It's usually people who don't write who want to talk to me about it.
In Bound in Blood, there are a couple of characters I based upon people I know. They aren't named for them, but I still sent them the scenes and asked if it would bother them to have that printed. I'd like to say that everyone says "yes," but I wrote a scene in Bound in Flesh and named the character after someone I know. I sent him the scene and he wrote back to say he did not want to see his name used that way, even though the character could not possibly be him. He asked me to remove the scene. Sorry, the scene was too good, so I just changed the name. He's not spoken to me since. Immortality just ain't what it used to be! When I do use people I know, I usually blend a few into a single character. I might take one person's hair, another's frame, a third's personality or interests. The overwhelming majority of my characters are totally fictional and about 10% are a blend of people I know. I also might use people's names or nicknames for fictitious characters. I have asked people I know if I could borrow their names, because the thing I hate most is making up character names. (The other thing I do is go through the obituaries and death notices for names.) In my next Bound book, Bound in Hunger, I'll be using quite a few of the names from a group I belong to. All of the characteristics of those characters will be invented; everything but the name. One of the members of the group even allowed me to use her real name for a major character. I wrote to her a number of times to explain what I'd be doing with the character I'd invented who bore her name. I wanted her to be sure that she wouldn't be bothered by some of the more "extreme" activities her namesake would be doing. As for how closely the characters come to the real-life model, I've received some interesting reactions. All the real-life friends of one of those characters contacted me to say it's a spot-on description. However, when I based another character upon a friend of mine, she said, "I'd never wear that dress!" Go figure. I'd have to say that the character enters my mind partially formed. If that partial formation reminds me of someone, I might deliberately go partially, or fully, in that direction. If the character shows up strongly independent, they don't get the characteristics of anyone I know. Strangers and their traits show up in more subtle ways. As I've said, I carry a notebook whereever I go. So, I oftentimes write down a description of the way someone walks, what they're wearing, etc. I rarely create a character just to use the description I took down, but sometimes I'll use the note for a character who already exists. By the way, "Queen of the Abyss" is a great name for a character! Hint, hint!
Not only are all the characters, events and locations imaginary, but no animals are harmed in the writing of my novels. (Please insert the appropriate emoticon here.)
When I was about eight, the kids on my block started a newspaper. We'd spend the morning hunting down stories, meet at lunch, and write in the afternoon, printing and delivering the paper before dinnertime. I wrote for both my high school newspaper and literary magazine. But, I never thought about writing professionally through those years; it was something I did for fun. Even playwriting was more of an extension of directing than a career choice. It truly wasn't until I began Bound in Blood that I took it seriously.
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