First off, congratulations on the book. I remember when you first told me about the
concept for Clawback, in the midst of the banking crisis and fears of general
financial meltdown, it felt like you had the right idea at exactly the right
time. With any work that feels timely
when you’re writing it, there’s the danger that when the book finally comes
out, the moment will have passed. Do
you feel like the world and economy are continuing to cooperate for your book right
now?
CLAWBACK is sort of like a GOP presidential
hopeful: the more the economy improves, the worse it is for the book’s chances. Only kidding! The novel’s premise is that an
assassin has begun shooting the rottenest, worst-performing financiers on Wall
Street. Given how persistent greed and
corruption there seem to be, themes of bankster retribution are always going to
resonate.
You spent some time working in the financial sector. Does Clawback draw on people that you knew
back then, or are you more influenced by the characters that we see in the
daily news? Or are they all just
conjured from your imagination?
So far as I know, I’ve only ever worked with
one guy who’s actually killed people – and he’d done so in the service, in
Vietnam. So that’s all made up.
And
in fact, just about everyone I’ve known in the finance sector has been
hard-working and honest. Part of the problem is that the system is rigged to
elicit behavior damaging to society at large – as anyone paying attention the
last few years will have noticed. Of
course it’s not deliberate, but once short-term financial gain is everyone’s
primary motivation, and the government has been fully captured, the results we
see are inevitable.
So
in that sense I haven’t really had to draw on my own experience to find
villains – they’re well reported in the press.
On the other hand, however, we’ve all had difficult people in our lives.
Inspiration is everywhere!
You’ve written a lot of stories, another
novel, and you’re writing the sequel to Clawback, plus trying to get the word
out about this book. You also have two
kids. How do you balance the demands of
parenting with the demands of writing?
When our daughter was born, and we decided
I’d be the stay-at-home parent, it was easy.
Two naps a day – during the morning nap I’d sleep an hour too, and then
I had time to write during the second, not to mention after she went into the
crib at night. When it got challenging
was after the second child’s arrival.
Man, those first six months with a toddler and a baby were hard.
I need my sleep – I started dozing off all over the place, like on the
floor of the pre-school or slumped in a kitchen chair.
I
lost a year or two of writing in there.
Now
they’re older, though, and I have a few hours to work every day while they’re
at school. The usual rule, so familiar
to parents, does apply – sloth expands to fill the time available. The real problem is not the daily hours as
the constant siren song of procrastination. I really wish I were more driven,
or compulsive, or goal-oriented. I try
to make up for it by asking for lots of deadlines, but that only works to a
point.
You write for adults—thrillers and mysteries. Do you find that your work is influenced by
your experience as a parent? Or is it a
chance to completely escape from your role as “Dad” for a few hours every day?
One result of becoming a parent, probably
common to all, was that I totally lost interest in reading about violence
against children. In fact, noir
generally became less appealing to me, as both reader and writer. My first short stories were all fedoras and
rain and semi-automatics. Nowadays, although there’s plenty of over-the-top
action in my writing, it tends to be cartoonish, even silly.
I’d
like to think that parenting experience has made me more sympathetic to the
world’s wide range of personalities, emotions and inter-personal
difficulties. (My children suggest that
it’s merely made me even more rigid and set in my opinions, but what do they
know?) If some of that broadened
perspective informs the writing, I’m happy.
Your daughter is an avid reader. Has she read any of your stuff yet? If so, what did she think? (I find my kids are pretty hard to impress
with my work.)
Ha, they sure are! Our daughter has read a few of my
stories. I’ve told her she’s welcome to
try the novels, but that she might find them difficult – because they assume a
familiarity with the adult world that she doesn’t have (and because the jokes
are probably right over her head), not because of the sex and violence.
We’ve
always had a no-censorship policy in the house: they can read whatever they
want. This has worked out fine, for the
most part; both will stop reading a particular book if the themes become
challenging, or if they simply dislike it.
As usual, trusting them to make their own decisions seems to be for the
best.
That
said, I do wish our son would move on from Calvin
and Hobbes – I swear I’ve read every strip Bill Watterson wrote at least
ten times.
I hope we both find readers that will read our
books ten times! Thanks for taking the
time for this interview.
No, thank you! It’s always a pleasure to talk about writing
– lots more fun than actually doing it.
“Don’t bail them
out, take them out!” – is a good
tagline for CLAWBACK, and Mike rather hopes it remains fiction. You can learn more about his work at www.mikecooper.com.
Next Wednesday, I'll talk to Jeni Mahoney, fellow playwright, mom, playwriting teacher, and artistic director.
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