The Trusted ~ The 'Nice Guy John M Green Breaks Bad' Interview ~ Part 2

Aussie writer John M Green, author of The TRUSTED, holed up in an alley behind Abbey's to give us the lowdown on his new thriller.

View Part 1 of the interview

In this final part of our interview John tells us how he developed his evil ideas…

----- Part 2 -----

Mr Green: I then approached the experts. I'd find experts on, say, hacking computers. And say my character is the Head of Development inside a clone of a software company like Adobe, a company I called Sofdox…

Abbey's: You have a lot of fun with names. I think Sofdox for the software company is excellent - it sounds real.

Mr Green: It is now. I bought the domain for it. (laughs)… And the head of development...

Abbey's: Tom Majors.

Mr Green: Exactly, but that's another story. So I told the hacking experts that this guy Tom Majors is a genius who is going to put malevolent code in the predominant PDF software and one day when you get the usual "Do you want to update?" message, it will be a siamese twin for the real code and it will blow up your computer on your desk. And the experts said, "Well, you can't do that" and they explained all this technical mumbo-jumbo which I then started to understand. So I went off and did more research and then I'd come back to them, "Well, what if Tom Majors did this?" And again they would point out why it wasn't possible so we'd go for several iterations sometimes over weeks, although the 'nuclear incident' took months, and then eventually they'd say "Holy sh*t, you can do that!"

Mr Green: And this was a very interesting revelation because it happened to me several times with the experts. The people I was dealing with in the hacking space were 'white hat' hackers - they were good guys who work with organisations to see if they can penetrate, so they can work out what to block. So I was dealing with good people, and the good people don't think like bad people. I was the 'bad person'. And I was using their knowledge to do bad things. So, I was the trusted. I was the one inside the tent, with the knowledge - I can do anything. We're all familiar with the disgruntled employee but what if they're not disgruntled? What if they pretend to be passionate about their job but they're really more passionate about some political objective?

Abbey's: Let's talk about the fun you have along the way. Let's talk about The Break. You're obviously a fan of the band.

Mr Green: Absolutely! Isn't everybody? (laughs)

Abbey's: They get a wonderful plug on a couple of occasions. Have you met them?

Mr Green: Well, Rob Hirst, who was in Midnight Oil as well, is a good friend, and I sought his permission. And in the first book I had a Midnight Oil song, a sex scene to…

Abbey's: Beds are Burning?...

Mr Green: … The Power and the Passion which I sought his permission for as well. But The Break is an astonishing band. Their new album is about to come out and they are touring with Rodriguez on his Australian tour. Similarly with The Atlantics, who I also mention in the book - a lot of people don't remember the name, but Bombora and Pipeline are two Australian, global classic hits of the 60's and they're still playing. I like portraying some sense of Australian culture within my stories…

Abbey's: And give a sense of place….

Mr Green: Yeah, I'm proudly Australian - I think this is the best country in the world to live and work in. I particularly love the Northern Beaches which I think comes through in the book.

Abbey's: Yes, I thought the Aussie 'surf chick' as the hero was an unusual choice. How did she form in your mind?

Mr Green: Well, when I was dreaming up Tori Swyft, I wanted to create a modern-day, female 'James Bond' who had brains. And she had to be sporty. All of my heroes have been female. I guess I've got a personal fixation that I like all of my heroes to be strong-willed, articulate, successful women because I think that there aren't enough female role models in the thriller genre.

Abbey's: You also have fun with conspiracies, with say, the death of Steve Jobs. And you also have fun with corporate empires, global brand marketing and ideas or solutions for countries like Greece that are in financial crisis. And although it's a bit of fun, there is an idea behind it…

Mr Green: I'm really thrilled that you found that amusing. (laughs) It's a bit cheeky - but it could happen, you know.

Abbey's: That's where a book like this gets you thinking. You're wondering, could this really happen?

Abbey's: You also have a bit of fun by introducing a few links into your previous books. Isabelle Diaz gets a mention.

Mr Green: Yes, well I needed a President in The Trusted, so she gets another guernsey.

Abbey's: The book is also populated with impossibly bright people surrounded by extreme levels of wealth.

Mr Green: I needed to have an extraordinary organisation, a secretive, well-connected one with resources such that they could jet around the world as needed.

Abbey's: Getting back to the real world, tell me about Misfit Aid that you're supporting with this book. This is an organisation that I hadn't heard of, and it amused me thinking about sending a bunch of surfers overseas to a country saying "Go do some good" - I mean, do those guys really exist? (laughs)

Mr Green: They do (laughs). Have a look on their website - it is really astonishing, with video clips about what they do, helping areas that have had natural disaster. How the connection came about was that all of Pantera Press books promote a charity in one of the areas that we're interested in. So that's the love of reading, the love of writing, and fostering ideas - they're the three main ideals. When we came to The Trusted, we thought how cool it would be to have a surf-based charity to match with Tori's love of surfing. So what we've done is a combination of surfing safety and promoting reading. We've had a program of surf reports on radio that in addition to the safety information, also promoted the idea of taking a book to the beach.

Abbey's: And finally, if The Trusted was to make it to screen, is there an actor you see as a good fit for Tori Swyft?

Mr Green: Scarlet Johansson - she's my choice - if I was ever so lucky for this to make it to the screen. But of course, I'd have no say in that decision. (smiles)

Abbey's: Scarlet would be an excellent Tori, though she'd need a few freckles. Thanks John, for making the time to speak with me today.

Mr Green: Thank you, I really enjoyed it.

*bullets fire and crack the rendered wall above our heads. John grabs his hat and dashes down the alley way, rounds the corner, and is gone*

John M Green chats with Abbey's about The TRUSTED - Part 1 of interview

On the eve of unleashing his new thriller, The TRUSTED, John M Green holed up in an alley behind Abbey's to tell us how his book came about.

----- Part 1-----


Mr Green: Have you read it? (laughs)

Abbey's: I have read it, yes.

Mr Green: Did you like it? (smiles)

Abbey's: Yes, I did. My wife [ed: she's a crime fiction addict] will be the next one to read it.

Mr Green: Oh good.

Abbey's: The first thing that struck me about it was that I used to read a lot of Robert Ludlum as a young man and there's some things about this -  the fast pace, the technology and the mentioning of models and makes and that sort of stuff - that brought all that back to me. So I was wondering, when you write a book like this in particular, is there a style that you have in your mind, a sound if you like, that you're writing to?

Mr Green: A sound?… That's a great way…

Abbey's: …a mood… is it a fast-action thing? Or is it something else?

Mr Green: yeah… a mood… I guess what I'm really trying to do is to create the relevant mood for the part of the book. So there are different - I hope there are different parts - different moods in different sections of the book, because overall, yes, I want to write a fast, pacey, gripping thriller, but it can't all be fast and pacey. You've got to have breathers and diversions, otherwise readers get exhausted.

Abbey's: And it does build up. It starts out slower and starts to build and by the time all the calamity is unfolding, that's when it's really bowling along.

Mr Green: Yes. Exactly. And that's what you're trying to do. You're trying to be a bit like a high performance car that is going on a long journey and it takes a little while to build up the pace. You don't want to put the pedal to the floor straight away because it's very jarring. You do want something intriguing at the beginning to suck people in to the story, which I hope I've done, and then you want to build up and create some colour around the characters so that people can start to have empathy or dislike for the character, depending on what type of character they are, and also try to create conflict around the characters. And then as the story goes on, to build up that pace until you get to the climax, when hopefully for this type of book it becomes quite scary.

So a lot of that does involve the detail that you've spoken about, because when I'm writing I try to close my eyes, figuratively speaking, so that I can actually see what the characters are seeing. I want to be able to touch it and smell it and hear it and so on, so when I'm in a particular scene, I try to imagine myself in that scene and put my head inside that character's head and try to see what they're seeing and feel what they're feeling, and then I can sort of say 'Oh… well, where would the shadow have been?' and 'There were some roses over there - could he have smelt them?' Is there any music in the background, or is it just quiet? Or is there an ambulance going past? So it is those sorts of things I try to do, but not overdo, because that can slow you down as well.

Abbey's: Yeah, and you can end up with a very different style of novel, very descriptive if you like. You mentioned Morris West before [ed: pre-interview banter], so is there an author like that who you may have read when you were younger? Do you think they influence you in your own style?

Mr Green: I think, when I started writing thrillers, I chose thrillers. I mean, I have a more eclectic reading taste than thrillers, so I read very widely, both in fiction and non-fiction, but what I found during my business career was that I particularly liked reading thrillers when I was exhausted. Or when I was really busy. They gave me an escape from reality that I needed. They forced me into a zone that was very relaxing, even though they can be quite tense. Because they just take you away from everything else that you care about. So I decided, when I was wanting to start writing, that I would try to write those books, because they're not just entertaining, they're also therapeutic.

But when I thought about who might be my model for that, I actually thought about Michael Crichton. And the reason I particularly like most of Michael Crichton, not all, is that what he did was, he didn't just write an entertainment, he picked a very important, hot issue of the day and then built a story around that. So it was entertaining, but it made you think about the issue. If you think about Jurassic Park, which I think is a sensational book - the movie was extraordinary - but the book itself, to me in a way is more extraordinary, because what I love about books as opposed to movies, is the author gives you the skeleton, and you the reader have to put in the body and the colour and the sound and the smells. When I saw the movie I thought yeah, that's the book, but a movie is passive. A book is really active for the reader because you've got to do all that work. So anyway, he did this thing with Jurassic Park where the issue was thinking about cloning before it was a big thing. And thinking about the ethics of cloning and the ethics of science. And should there be rules about this? And what if it goes wrong?

Another book he did was called Disclosure, which again was made into a great movie, but it was about sexual harassment in the workplace before it was a major issue, and he turned it on its head, which in a way made it a more provocative subject, because he made the harassment by a female boss of a male employee. And so, at the time, a lot of men in the workforce might have thought 'sexual harassment is no big deal', but then if you put the guy in the position where he is the victim, he is forced to look at it in an entirely different way, and I actually think he (Crichton) did a great service. So I try to do that.

Abbey's: This brings me to the idea of choosing the thriller format to explore big ideas. You could be writing a non-fiction book or an essay on that sort of thing. Is it about the power or the cut-through that you get with a broader audience?

Mr Green: Yes, I really wanted to write something that I wanted to read, and I thought if I wanted to know about something and it was put to me in a way that was entertaining, then I'm more likely to read it, enjoy it and learn about it without it being in any way a lecture. I certainly don't want to do that. I always start my thinking about a novel with a 'what if' question. So, pick the topic and then, what if this was pushed further than anyone would normally think? What could happen? So I did that in the first book (Nowhere Man), thinking about where the stockmarkets were at the time, which was very buoyant and bubbly and then I imagined, what if they went wrong and they had a financial crisis.

In Born to Run, I thought, you know, every American President for - quite a while - has been charismatic has been a Democrat, so what if I were to craft a really, really charismatic and popular Republican. What would she look like? What would happen and what would be the forces against her? All of that sort of stuff. And I've got a big fascination for American politics.

And so for this book, for The Trusted,… well, as Kevin Rudd once said, 'The environment is the greatest moral challenge of our time'. It's the passion that is driving public opinion on many, many things. So I said 'well, we all think that people who are pro-environment are good people.' What if they go to extreme? And how could they go to extreme? We know about all sorts of terrorists in other fields and I thought, well 'what if these guys were so radical that… and then I came up with this concept of 'what if' to save the planet, they would destroy its economic system because they're so concerned that governments are not doing anything, that business is not doing anything, and that even what they are doing is just playing at the edges - that it needs radical action - that actually what you have to do is shut off the power. You have to shut off the oil industry, you have to shut off the banks and all of this stuff. You have to stop population growth. We're at seven billion people and growing fast, all of which is plundering the planet. So how would they do that?

Well, they wouldn't do it as neo-Luddites, who go and throw bombs at factories. They'll be much smarter than that. Because we're in a time in history for the first time ever where globalisation and technology give people tools at their fingertips, that they can cause things to happen all over the world instantly. I thought these guys have to be really, really smart. They have to be brilliant, so I made them all PhDs. They have to be 'inside the tent', not 'outside the tent'. So, not people throwing bombs or hacking into organisations. And the lightbulb went off for me when I remembered the Cambridge Five. These were the Soviet sympathisers…

Abbey's: And the shock to everyone… to society…

Mr Green: Exactly. It was a huge shock. Here was a bunch of Cambridge graduates in the UK, part of the establishment, who were Soviet sympathisers who infiltrated the highest echelons of the British secret service. One of them was even the Queen's closest adviser, (Anthony) Blunt. These people were part of Britain, yet they were Soviet spies.

So I thought, OK, this is a great model. What I'll do is transplant the Cambridge Five, who fuelled many John Le Carré books, and I'll say I'm going to have a group like that, but they're going to be radical environmentalists because it's not capitalism versus communism, or democracy versus communism any more. It's the environment, that's the passion. I'm going to make them radical environmentalists, but brilliant, and they are going to conspire, they are going to spend 10 years to infiltrate the highest echelons of business and government all around the world so that at the relevant time they can press the button, pull the plugs, smash the economy and save the planet.

And then I thought, 'how the hell do I do that'? I have to find smart people who can help me. So I firstly conceived all the things I wanted them to do. So I thought like a bad person...

----- End of Part 1 -----

Notes from Eve Abbey ~ February 2013

 abbeys.com.au

I really enjoyed reading The Secret Rooms: A True Gothic Mystery by Catherine Bailey. It is a rather slender story of hidden family secrets made engrossing by the method of delivery!  Not vampires but stylish gothic mannerisms. Doors loom out of the darkness, footsteps echo and servants remain tight-lipped. Catherine Bailey is not only a historian and a television documentary producer but also the author of Black Diamonds: The Rise and Fall of an English Dynasty which is one of my favourite books. Black Diamonds tells the story of the Wentworth/Fitzwilliam family, owners of more than seventy coalmines and one of the richest families in England. Not any more…the family line has been extinguished along with the horrendous working conditions of the miners. I can imagine this story as a great TV serial yet to come.

 

Catherine Bailey, no doubt seeking another good story amongst the British aristocracy in the twentieth century, went to Belvoir Castle to delve in their famously well-kept archives. The residents, Duke of Rutland and family, date back to the 14th century and amazing documents from royal times are carefully kept in their castle in Leicestershire… 

What she discovered was something unexpected in such carefully kept archives… Three periods when nothing, absolutely nothing, was available. Why? Well, she set out to find out why and has come up with a very plausible answer. Finding out makes a great detective story and meanwhile you can see just how the aristocracy network operates. A guilty pleasure. And if you haven't read Black Diamonds do try to do it soon.

I was fascinated to find that the Duke of Rutland's family included Lady Diana Cooper, wife of Duff Cooper, diplomat, politician and author. Of course she was at that time Lady Diana Manners, the youngest daughter, who became the most celebrated debutante of her time, then a successful actress in America and eventually, as wife to Duff, the Ambassadress to France, shortly after the Second World War. Apart from his Diaries, Duff Cooper's most famous book is his classic biography of Talleyrand, the silver-tongued French politician who managed to serve five different regimes.

 

The family talents carry on of course. John Julius Norwich, author of so many books  is the only son of Lady Diana and Duff Cooper, while Artemis Cooper, is their grandchild. So, coincidence continued, when I found Artemis was the author of the latest fascinating biography, that of Patrick Leigh Fermor, author of the very famous travel books A Time of Gifts or Between the Woods and the Water. 

His two most famous books describe his journey on foot from The Hook of Holland to Constantinople in 1934, with a weekly allowance of one Pound. He didn't write these until more than forty years later – then with a gap of ten years between them. I've been asked why these are so famous and such best-sellers of their time. Not only is it beautiful prose (sometimes he strives too much) but also I think for the romanticism of the remote places and blend of mythology and history he recounts as well as his intense interest in languages. His journey was hardly hardwork. One of his first visits was to an aristocratic Middle-European family, who, charmed by the enthusiastic nineteen year old boy, sent him onwards with many letters of introduction, so he experienced a romantic way of life which was soon to disappear, sometimes staying at country estates for weeks at a time. In fact if you have any Hungarian connections I hope you have read A Time of Gifts or Between the Woods and the Water. 

   

I had a mistaken idea of Patrick Leigh Fermor. I had this picture in my mind of a rather scholarly, poetic writer. It turns out he was always known as Paddy (a rather different image to Patrick) or in Greece as Mihali. He was the sort of reckless schoolboy who was often expelled but who had an intense interest in poetry and history. He loved to sing and to charm and to be the life and soul of the party. Not everyone loved him. After a disastrous lunch Somerset Maugham described him as “that middle-class gigolo for upper-class women”!  He did always have an older and richer lady friend!

After he reached Constantinople he travelled to Greece where he fell in love not only with the country but also with an older, richer Countess from one of the Balkan countries. His other books Mani and Roumeli, which he used as excuses for not continuing the travel story, are essays of love to those Greek areas.

 

His other claim to fame, and where I was totally wrong in my image of Patrick Leigh Fermor, were his activities on Crete as a Special Operations Officer during the Second World War. Along with another adventurer, and disguised as a German Corporal, he kidnapped a German General and spirited him off the island. I'm afraid I regard this as yet another schoolboy prank! Local villagers were punished terribly and it turned out not to be the wicked General after all, but his more acceptable replacement.

No doubt because of family connections, Artemis Cooper did know Patrick Leigh Fermor and acknowledges that not everyone loved him. But most did. A terrific biography of a life lived well and not to be repeated these days. It is said that Artemis Cooper will edit the unfinished manuscript left by Patrick describing the third part of his journey to Constantinople, perhaps to be called The Broken Road.

Her other books are Writing At the Kitchen Table: The Authorized Biography of Elizabeth David and Paris After the Liberation 1944-49 written with her husband, military historian Antony Beevor. She has also edited many books, including the Letters of Evelyn Waugh (Ed: The version edited by Artemis Cooper is unavailable) and Diana Cooper. One book I especially liked was Cairo in the War which now seems to be out of print. Keep an eye out for it.

   

Just for fun I'm going to list a few of the books of John Julius Norwich, the third Viscount, (whose children called him Lord Know-It-All). His most recent publication is The Popes: A History but he is most known for his histories of Byzantium and the Normans in Sicily. The titles are Byzantium: The Early Centuries; Byzantium: The Apogee;  Byzantium: The Decline and Fall and A Short History of Byzantium. Normans in the South 1016-1130 and The Kingdom in the Sun 1130-1194. The Middle Sea: A History of the Mediterranean and A History of Venice. A nice little extra, especially for travellers, is A History of England in 100 Places: From Stonehenge to the Gherkin which describes some historically important places you can still visit today. Of course you can always find these books on Abbey's famous History shelves.

     

Here's another nostalgic suggestion for you. An author who also left home in 1934 to walk into his future, just as Patrick Leigh Fermor did, is Laurie Lee, author of As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning. He also took more than thirty years to write his story of walking from London through Spain, making his way by playing his violin in cafes and streets. His other book, Cider with Rosie is available in Vintage Classics and is a delightful account of his childhood in the Cotswolds in the 1920's. Lovely writing. He is the author of several other books but these two are regarded as classics.

Keep well, Eve

 

Notes from Eve Abbey ~ January 2013

 abbeys.com.au

I had to be very strong to read an amazing book written by a Sudanese refugee. It is called Beneath the Darkening Sky by Majok Tulba, who was unable to read or write, even in his own language, when he arrived in Australia as a teenage refugee. He has said that the story of the African child soldiers needs to be told, and it is a horrifying story, but added to this is the description of the lawless, violent rebel soldiers. Not good news. His description of the treatment of child soldiers (who were taken so long as they were as tall as an AK47 rifle) breaks your heart, but you must admire his clear, simple, effective prose. It is worth the stress to read this book. Tulba has also made films and is writing another book. Congratulations to him.

     

I read and enjoyed another book about African refugees - Alek: The Extraordinary Life of a Sudanese Refugee by Alek Wek, who was born in a village in South Sudan, yet became a famous supermodel. She tells the story of her childhood in a most unaffected, simple way, describing their small comforts and daily ritual with some pride, despite their poor circumstances. Her account of her family’s first flight across the arid countryside away from Wau, the small township where they lived, when rebel soldiers attacked, is most moving and a real eye-opener. She describes how her mother always boiled any water they were able to find before letting the children drink. Such discipline! No wonder they survived. Alek eventually managed to get on a flight to London, where her sister was already living, and her good life story eventually begins. Nothing was easy and, although she had modelling jobs, she still cleaned toilets at the BBC and worked in a salon washing old ladies’ hair. Her description of the ins and outs of modelling could be salutary for teenaged dreamers. This is an inspirational story and would be a good gift to young people – in fact it should be in every school library. Firstly to explain the story of refugees, and secondly to illustrate how beneficial hard work, discipline and tolerance can be. An intelligent, confident, strong voice comes through. Alek also mentions the very popular 1998 book Desert Flower by Ethiopian refugee Waris Dirie, another beautiful young woman with a different story to tell about escaping a forced marriage. You’ll find them both in biography.

Beneath the Darkening Sky brings to mind another book by a so-called uneducated person, A B Facey’s A Fortunate Life. Facey was born in 1894 and left school at eight, yet he produced an Australian classic, describing his working childhood on sheep farms, his experiences at Gallipoli and later raising a family during the Great Depression. I remember Nancy Keesing, who saw the original manuscript, telling me there was hardly an alteration made. There are Puffin editions of this book for younger readers and I believe an audio book will soon be available. Everyone should read this book!

This is a good moment to remind you we have a most interesting African History section, ranging from Nelson Mandela’s famous autobiography Long Walk to Freedom to Libya: The Rise and Fall of Qaddafi by Alison Pargeter or Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa by Jason Stearns, a long-time worker and researcher on Africa and a member of the UN Panel investigating Congolese rebel groups, which is a very topical subject. The New York Times recently described a leaderless group of mercenaries who were left behind in Somalia with plenty of weapons, but no purpose.

     

It was more fun to read the latest book by Emily Maguire, who turns out to be a writer worth following. I haven’t read any of her earlier books, but will make sure to read some now. The new book is called Fishing for Tigers and is set in the beautiful city of Hanoi. It seems there is something special about Hanoi. Many books have been set there and many writers seem to return there. In this novel, a thirtyish young woman - an Australian who left home as a teenager to marry an American (who turned out to be abusive) - is living alone and safe in Hanoi. Her friends are a group of hard-drinking expatriates. She finds herself sexually attracted to the half-Australian half-Vietnamese son of one of her friends who has come to visit his dad, and the young man admires her cool detachment. This is a good story, contrasting the young man’s idealism with her attempts to find peace and reason in a war-torn country. The denouement is quite satisfactory. I wondered about this. If you are suffering withdrawal from the erotic fiction of Fifty Shades of Grey, you may prefer to read this, which is so much better written!

Emily Maguire’s other books are Taming the Beast, in which the heroine is seduced by her English teacher, The Gospel According to Luke, which is about the conflicts between a religious sect and a sexual health counsellor among Sydney’s rebellious youth, and Smoke in the Room, about three idealistic activists holed up in a room in Newtown pondering life’s questions. She has also written two non-fiction books, Your Skirt’s Too Short: Sex, Power and Choice and Princesses and Pornstars. Here’s an intelligent writer with plenty to say and the ability to say it well. Seek out her books.

    

 

J K Rowling's latest book, the one that is not about Harry Potter, and is deemed by some people not to be suitable for children, is called The Casual Vacancy and is indeed a dark book following the lives of many people in a ‘typical’ English village, complete with run-down housing for the poor on the outskirts. There are many characters jostling for position on the Parish Council and none of them are especially likeable. The adolescents are most successfully depicted, unhappy lot that they are, and although there is a rape and a suicide, I don’t think reading about them would harm any contemporary reader. A very young reader would not bother. A long story, all neatly tied up at the end by a good story-teller.

 

Salman Rushdie’s autobiography Joseph Anton, dealing mostly with his life during the time of the fatwa that was placed upon him by Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini, is a very readable account. He has written it in the third person, which was an excellent idea. We would have got tired of I, I and I again! But as he refers to himself as “he”, he is able to express much more of his feelings and actions. Abbey’s gets a mention on page 170 as one of the bookshops throughout the world that was firebombed for continuing to sell The Satanic Verses, which I guess is one of those books, like A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, which many people bought, but did not finish! The name Joseph Anton is derived from the first names of two of Rushdie’s favourite authors – Joseph Conrad and Anton Chekhov – and of course you can buy all of their books here at Abbey’s, usually in the various classics series.

Keep well, Eve

L.A. Larkin quenches our thirst for knowledge about THIRST

I read L A Larkin's new novel, THIRST, whilst on holiday in the snow, which was the perfect place to read a novel set in Antarctica. But if you're buying this for that lazy summer read by the pool, just throw a few more ice cubes into your drink!

L A Larkin came into Abbey's looking resplendent in a smart red jacket and whilst she worked her way through signing a pile of her book, I asked her a few questions about it.


Can you tell me how you'd describe the story of THIRST?

Well, it's a fast-paced thriller set in Antarctica, with a maverick glaciologist hunted by killers who must survive long enough to stop a global catastrophe.

How did you settle on Antarctica as the place where your thriller would play out?

Antarctica is a great location for a thriller because it is so isolated. It’s easy to ramp up the pressure on the hero. Because the climate is so severe, simply staying alive is a challenge. Antarctica also has positive associations with heroism and courage. But most important of all, the disaster that Luke Searle - the hero - must prevent could only happen in Antarctica.

Yes and you're dealing with some pretty big environmental and political themes here and it's obvious that there has been a large amount of research underlying the story. How did you go about that?

I went to Antarctica on a former Russian oceanographic research vessel to be awoken every morning by the Russian captain barking instructions to his crew through the PA system. It was like waking to find myself in a James Bond story: turbulent seas, glaciers the size of small countries, and abandoned stations eerily left as if the inhabitants would return at any moment. Spending time in Antarctica helped me understand the isolation, the extreme cold and the dangers, such as hidden crevasses and blizzards, and enabled me to describe with authenticity the beautiful and terrifying world that Luke inhabits. I interviewed many people at the Australian Antarctic Division and learned about crevasse rescue, polar survival and polar medicine and also flew to the UK to interview scientists at the British Antarctic Survey who have been to the real Pine Island Glacier.

Your work actually sounds like fantastic fun, although very challenging too. Now, were your characters inspired by anyone in particular?

I wanted my characters to be well-rounded and complex. The hero is far from perfect and I hope that by the end of THIRST the reader at least understands why the adversary does such terrible things. Luke Searle is a reluctant hero who ultimately becomes Antarctica’s champion and his passion for Antarctica was inspired by an Australian I met in Antarctica. To create the Maddie Wildman character, I interviewed one of Australia’s first female station leaders.

I found the villain quite repugnant, all the same. Will there be another Antarctic thriller by L.A. Larkin?

Oh yes. I am working on a second Antarctic thriller and have planned the third.

And how do you feel about THIRST being described by James Phelan as ‘The best Antarctic thriller since Ice Station’?

Thrilled!

Thanks for coming in to Abbey's to sign some of the first copies and tell us about THIRST.

My pleasure.

(smiles and group hugs)

Craig Kirchner


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Abbey's Bookseller Review

THIRST is the perfect book for those wet days when you don't want to go outside; or for when you don't want to talk to the stranger beside you on your long distance flight; or just any occasion when you want to immerse yourself in something slightly implausible but nonetheless guiltily enjoyable!

Luke Searle is a glaciologist overwintering again on the Australian Antarctic base at Hope Station. Two team members die in what seems a tragic accident, until the base is deliberately sabotaged and Luke and his station leader, Maddie Wildman, are the only survivors. Meanwhile, a corrupt Chinese general and his son are about to blow up one of the glaciers in order to transport ice to China, where fresh water is in desperately short supply. 

And a Chinese tailor is murdered in Sydney: how does this all tie in? Alternating points of view give the narrative a great deal of pace, as the clock ticks down to the crucial time, and the goodies race the baddies to the end - as does the reader! Does have a bit of an environmental message, but that takes a distant second place to the entertainment factor, so give THIRST to any reader who just wants to lose themselves in an exciting but undemanding read!

Lindy Jones

You can find THIRST by L A Larkin at abbeys.com.au or at 131 York Street Sydney.

Notes from Eve Abbey ~ October 2012

 ABBEYS.com.au

I've rediscovered a famous book. What is it? None other than the 43rd edition of Yates Garden Guide, celebrating 124 years in Australia. And what a splendid edition it is! Over 500 pages including index. The usual information is supplemented by a pictorial history of the Yates company and a resume history of Australian gardening. Did you know Yates began in Manchester in 1826, but in 1879 one of the sons went to New Zealand for his health? Arthur began the first Yates store in Auckland in 1883. He appointed an agent in Australia in 1886, and by 1887 had leased premises in Sussex Street. Another brother later moved to New Zealand to take over, so Arthur moved to Sydney to continue their progress as one of the most well-known companies in the Pacific. This book would make a good Christmas present, even to someone who already has a copy. It would be fun to compare the changes over the years.

I have been a long-time fan of Irish writer John Banville, well before he won the Man Booker Prize for The Sea, but I was disappointed with his latest novel, Ancient Light. The opening line is: "Billy Gray was my best friend and I fell in love with his mother." I think this could be a contender for most memorable opening line, don't you? The blurb says "dazzling and funny", but I didn't appreciate the joke, well, not until the denouement. Yes, it was about a love affair between a fifteen-year-old boy and a mid-thirties woman in a small Irish town. The story is recollected in later years by the boy, who has since become a famous actor. Too many complications and sidetracks for me, although a number of other people at Abbey's enjoyed it and I admit it is lovely writing. See what you think.

Good news that Gabrielle Lord won the Ned Kelly Lifetime Achievement Award for her crime thrillers. She has a long series of thrillers for young adults under the title Conspiracy: followed by a month of the year. Look for her books in Australian crime and the children's section.

I was watching an Agatha Christie story on TV the other night and really felt it had departed from the original story quite a lot. Have you ever felt the same? Abbey's always has the complete range of Agatha Christie in stock so you can always compare if you feel so inclined.

I have read a biography of the famous Polish reporter Ryszard Kapuscinski (when I was working in the shop I always had to ask Lindy how to spell his name!) called Ryszard Kapuscinski: A Life by Artur Domoslawski who, you can see, is yet another Polish reporter. This was not an entirely successful thing to do. At first it seemed the author didn't approve of Kapuscinski. He spent an awful lot of time showing that Kapuscinski had actually elaborated some of his stories. Heaven forbid! It wasn't until almost the end that he conceded that the material Kapuscinski produced was literature, rather than reportage. The best parts in the book are quotations from Kapuscinski. A lot of time is also spent on the ins and outs of Kapuscinski's membership of Communist committees. However, I guess this is relevant as, unless he was ‘in favour' with the government', he would not have been allowed to travel so often, and for so long, to Africa and South America and elsewhere.

It was not until The Emperor: Downfall of an Autocrat was published in America that Kapuscinski's international fame began. I read The Emperor as a fable about the fall of Haile Selassi of Ethiopia, whereas the biographer shows this to be a veiled critique of the Polish government. In his last book, Travels with Herodotus, Kapuscinski recollects his many voyages, when he always carried Herodotus with him. This time, Herodotus is definitely part of the action as Kapuscinski interprets the Herodotus stories for us and often quotes him in full. I like this quote from the cover: "Few have written more beautifully of unspeakable things. Few have his courage, almost none have his talent", which is from Tom Bissell of The Scotsman. I do think his translators deserve recognition for the gorgeous prose they deliver up.

Some of Kapuscinski's other books are The Soccer War, which is not only about soccer but about revolutions and the tiresome practicalities endured to get there; Shah of Shahs depicts the final years of the Shah of Iran and analyses the effects of revolution and fear in that country; Imperium is about Russia, Big Russia, until its breakdown after Perestroika; The Shadow of the Sun in Popular Penguins is a selection of his journalism between 1945 and 2000; Another Day of Life is about his travels in Angola just after independence when the whole country was collapsing into civil war. Students of journalism will be interested in Domoslawski's own comments on journalism.

Coincidentally, there is another book called The Man Who Invented History: Travels with Herodotus by Justin Marozzi. This is rather apt as the blurb calls Herodotus a mix of learned professor and tabloid journalist, which can just as easily be applied to the inimitable Kapuscinski... Another journalist whose work is something more than reportage is Australian reporter Alan Moorehead. We have three of his books in stock: The Blue Nile, The White Nile and The Villa Diana: Travels in post-war Italy. Recommended.

Remember that Abbey's stocks all the Penguin Black Classics, so you can buy your own copy of Herodotus: The Histories and maybe also Plautus, who has been quoted lately by Professor Mary Beard as she enthuses about ancient Rome on SBS TV. The Rope and Other Plays is in the Penguin Classics, while The Little Carthaginian, Pseudolos and The Rope is in the Loeb Classic Library dual-language edition.

For more information about any of the titles I’ve mentioned here, remember to just click on the title!

Keep well, Eve