There
are three entries in the series at the moment. The fourth book The
Artist is released on February 17th and Amazon is
taking pre-orders. Although the series is satire/humor, each entry
bends toward a sub-genre. The Model for example tilts towards
sex and horror. I’m excited for The Artist as it is a
straight-up action thriller and a real page turner! I have ten books
planned right now. If there’s appetite for more I will certainly
extend it and explore new ways to disrupt her life and put her in
danger.
What
do you think makes a great story?
Characters
that you care about and can relate to in difficult situations. It
doesn’t matter if it’s romance, western, sci-fi or a comedy –
fiction works best when real characters find themselves in unreal
situations (not silly “unreal” of course, but just ironic or
difficult situations!). The best stories show how a character
develops. An example of this is In
Their Shoes main character Joy
Attwood. At the start of The Teacher
(book 1) she’s a new, fresh-faced and eager journalist. By the time
she’s gone through The Artist
(Book 4) her whole world has changed. She’s toughening up and
getting better at handling people/ By the time the series is closed
for good, she’ll have become the Walter White of journalism.
What
inspired you when writing The
Actor?
I
am a screenwriter and filmmaker. The former is how I earn my living
at the moment, until my author career really kicks off (I’ve only
been doing this for fourth months, so early days yet!). I’ve worked
with many actors over the years and thought it would be ripe for
satire. There are so many wild and eccentric characters in an actor’s
life, from directors, writers and casting agents. Of course, there
are the sex-hungry media and swathes of fans. I wanted to accurately
portray a day in the life of a reasonably successful actor and see
how his life would change when an attractive journalist joins him for
the day. The media gets everything wrong. She inadvertently gets in
his way and both ruins and saves the day in a variety of different
scenarios.
After
The Teacher
(which is relatively relaxed in comparison to the rest of the series)
I was keen to raise the stakes. I thought of the most inappropriate,
wildest and most embarrassing situations – some gleaned from real
life stories – and blend it all together for a rollercoaster day of
shame, sex, miscommunication and farce. I also took a stab at media
and the profession while I was at it! I had a blast writing it.
What
are your ambitions for your writing career? Full time? Part time?
I
quit teaching after fifteen years to go full time writing. I didn’t
want to do it half-assed, and so got myself into a position where I
could spend a few months establishing me, my brand and my writing.
I’m always looking for the funny and irony in everything, no matter
the genre. I have ten books planned for In Their Shoes, but am going
to pause the series to focus on horror for a while, and alternate
between the two. By the end of the year I’ll have a long-running
short story horror series called Pure
Dark and another as-yet untitled
sci-fi series, too.
When
did you decide to become a writer?
Very
early on in my life. I initially wanted to shock and make people
throw up when I was about eight years-old. I took enormous pleasure
in people’s reactions to things. I still do. In school I started
writing stories for my English teacher and friends with the intention
of provoking and shocking them, and it usually worked. Some of it was
quite grizzly. As I grew older I became more and more fascinated with
the mechanics of comedy. I studied the subject intently at film
school and wrote screenplays. I started my author career in October
of 2016. All I’ve ever wanted to do is write, entertain and more
often than not provoke the reader. It’s all good fun! This is why I
LOVE it when my readers get in touch to tell me what they think!
(andrew@chromevalleybooks.com
– I always write back!)
When
writing The Actor
did anything stand out as particularly challenging?
There
were two main challenges. I used to live in London, and because Pat
and Joy run around Soho and the West End from one appointment to
another, it was very important to get street names right, observe the
rush hour and busy roads and guestimate times it would take to get
from one place to another. I actually printed out a gargantuan map of
the West End and put tacks on the different locations (e.g. Pat’s
agent’s office, shooting locations, audition offices and so on). So
my outline looked more like a map than a set of events.
The second challenge was just keeping track of the busy day in my head. I made a conscious decision whilst writing the first draft to not outline on paper. I needed chaos and disorder. Not writing the events down meant I had to keep them in my head for ten days while I wrote the first draft. In other words, my writing got better for it as I was trying to remember the busy schedule and complaining about it through Pat, and quizzing myself about it through Joy. It’s a bit schizophrenic, I guess, but it helps flavor the overall piece and accurately represent the hectic lifestyle of the actor.
The second challenge was just keeping track of the busy day in my head. I made a conscious decision whilst writing the first draft to not outline on paper. I needed chaos and disorder. Not writing the events down meant I had to keep them in my head for ten days while I wrote the first draft. In other words, my writing got better for it as I was trying to remember the busy schedule and complaining about it through Pat, and quizzing myself about it through Joy. It’s a bit schizophrenic, I guess, but it helps flavor the overall piece and accurately represent the hectic lifestyle of the actor.
How
did you come up with the story of The
Actor?
I
just asked “what if?” What if I put Joy through the most
embarrassing, shameful and graceless day I could possibly imagine. So
I did. What would you be embarrassed about? Being nude in front of
thousands of members of the public? What if the media caught it? What
if you became a sex icon by mistake? What if you had only two minutes
to prepare for a West End/Broadway stage debut in front of 1,400
audience members and theatre critics? I just thought of the
most incredibly awkward situations and shoved my main character
through it. How she responded even surprised me! There were a few
points where I just thought “Ah, fuck it, I don’t know what will
happen if I put her through this” and just let her loose. The
results were astonishing. Joy is a fictitious character – but, in
many ways, she’s very real to me. I created her and she has a life
of her own through these stories. To me, that’s an incredible
thing.
What
do you like to do when not writing?
I
am movie mad. I co-run and co-host a movie podcast called The
Smoking Lamb. We’ve had over 1.2M download since starting in
May 2016. We talk about films, review the latest movies, look at the
box office. It’s very R-rated. We’ve had a lot of terrific guests
on our show from UK filmmaker Chris Jones to 1980s horror icon Larry
Cohen. I’m heavily influenced by movies and it’s often been said
that my books read like them. I am a screenwriter too, and I think
visually, so it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise I suppose!
By
far the best way to keep abreast (hehe!) of my work and release is it
join Chrome Valley Books’s mailing list. (bit.ly/subcvb)
Follow
me at Amazon via my author profile, of course. And check my website
for my blog on how I write, and other weird stuff I think is
interesting at my website www.chromevalleybooks.com
Above
all else, please write to me at andrew@chromevalleybooks.com
– let’s chat. I love chatting to my readers! Just recently I had
an idea and out of the blue asked of my Gang Members (that’s Chrome
Valley speak for ARC reader) to suggest a name for a character. A
sudden act of philanthropy. She gave me the name, and now he’s a
character in The
Artist!
I’m spontaneous like that.