Loren Estleman Interview
October 12, 2001
http://www.lorenestleman.com/

1) You have a lot of books out. How many books do you write a year on the average?

I average two books per year. It's a metabolic condition; one would leave me with too much time on my hands and the disturbing conviction that without writing I'd be just a bum. Three, and my work would suffer from haste. I write on a manual typewriter, which allows me to work steadily, rather than fast. Unlike computers, manual typewriters never break down. My output doubled when I abandoned electrics.

2) A lot of your books take place in Detroit. And it seems as though you know enough about Detroit to be considered a historian of the city. Through out the books we get a historical look at the city. Have you thought about doing a non-fiction book of Detroit? Maybe even "Amos Walker's Detroit" ?

AMOS WALKER'S DETROIT is the very title I chose for a book coupling Walker's descriptions of various neighborhoods and landmarks with photographs. It's still just in my head, and there's been no interest. I am the author of the Detroit entry in the forthcoming ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA, but I effectively and with great relief gave up nonfiction when I left my last newspaper job. Writing from the imagination is a lot more fun.

3) I had heard rumors about the possibility of another Peter Macklin Novel. Any truth to that?

SOMETHING BORROWED, SOMETHING BLACK, the first Peter Macklin book in 15 years, will be published by Forge in April 2001. In it, Macklin has a new young wife who has no idea what he does for a living, and much of the narrative is from her point of view.

4) Earlier in your career you wrote two Holmes novels (Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Holmes was this your first foray into mystery/crime novels?

My very first novel, THE OKLAHOMA PUNK (not my title; these days I don't let publishers change them), was my first crime novel, based on the career of 1930s Public Enemy Number One Wilbur Underhill. SHERLOCK HOLMES VS. DRACULA was my first book-length mystery, following two stories I published in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine.

5) In 1980 you introduced the mystery genre to Amos Walker. And in the twenty plus years since he has come to be the definition of a hardboiled detective. How much of Amos Walker reflects you?

I'm exactly like Walker: handsome, strong, courageous, and honest. Criminals blanch at the mention of my name and I shake women off my lapels like snow.

6) The Walker books seem to have a timeless quality about them. Do you think this is part of their appeal?

Possibly. I avoid topical and political references that don't age well. Jonathan Swift, writing in the 18th century, still has something to say to modern readers, while some books published during the abysmal period of the 1960s are excruciating to read today. I don't know if I can match Swift, but I certainly want my work to outlive me by more than a few decades.

7) Do you think there are similarities between mysteries and westerns?

Definitely. Both genres deal with a frontier, someone's attempt to tame it, and someone else's efforts to keep it wild. Conflicts are between archetypes, easily recognizable regardless of setting. It's worth noting
that the only two uniquely American contributions to world literature are the western and the detective story.

8) Anyone who reads Amos Walker knows about your knowledge of cars. What kind of car do you drive, and if you could own any car from any time, what would it be?

I drive a 2000 GMC Sonoma four-wheel-drive pickup with extended cab, but in my head I'm driving a 12-cylinder Duesenberg; or for more practical parking purposes a 1949 Mercury--black, of course, with fender skirts--a marvel of aerodynamic engineering resembling Buck Rogers' spaceship.

9) What authors do you enjoy reading?

Robertson Davies, Ernest Hemingway, Edith Wharton, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Patricia Highsmith, Douglas C. Jones, Elmer Kelton, Willa Cather, Arthur Conan Doyle, Jack London, Elmore Leonard, Oscar Wilde, Raymond Chandler, Gustave Flaubert, Honore de Balzac, H. Rider Haggard, Lucia St. Clair
Robson, P.G. Wodehouse, William Manchester, Flannery O'Connor, Rudyard Kipling, W. Somerset Maugham, George Macdonald Fraser, many others. If you're curious about the fact that most of these authors seem to be dead, it's because they wrote their best work before the Beatles came to America.
This to me is the point at which western civilization began to decline.

10) Do you have a large collection of books?

By some standards; about 15,000 volumes. I collect modern first editions and research and reference books. The idea in the beginning was to cram my study with all of human knowledge, in the interest of total autonomy, but every time I begin a new project I run into an area of intelligence not to be found in my library. I understand computer technology is the closest thing to a source of universal information, but it includes the drawback of owning a computer. I'll stick with my books.

11)What other type of jobs have you had in the past?

Editing, reporting, and writing for newspapers. No honest jobs.

12) Do your books require a lot of research?

Yes. I'd estimate a year's research goes into each book, concurrent with what I'm writing at present. I'm blessed with a nearly photographic long-term memory, so the amount of cramming I have to do on each project diminishes in direct ratio to the amount of material I've written pertaining to that area. Once you know that Doc Holliday preferred colored dress shirts and that latent fingerprints evaporate with time, you're saved the trouble of looking up those details.

13) Writing as much as you do would take a lot of discipline I would imagine. Do you have a regular schedule you follow?

I'm not a born self-starter, a condition I share with most writers. Therefore I sentence myself to six hours per day at the typewriter, or however long it takes to reach my goal of five clean pages.

14) A nice selection of your earlier books are being re-released in trade paperbacks. With beautiful artwork I might add. Have you noticed a renewed interest in the earlier work?

Yes, particularly as regards my various series. When people discover one, they naturally want to read the earlier entries. At the moment I'm in the happy position of having all my published work back in print or about to be, so it's easier than ever for the diehards to track down my ouvre. I agree with you about the artwork. By and large I've been fortunate in the artists and designers who have collaborated on my covers. Some of these people have gone on to brilliant success in the world of art collecting.

15) Do you think the internet helps with sales? Do more people know about your books because of it and does it give people easier access to them?

It's advertising, a global billboard. It can't hurt, and it has made it easier for some readers to track down my harder-to-find work. My website (www.lorenestleman.com ; shameless plug) has increased my profile
significantly.

16) Have you had any interest from Hollywood for any of your books? I think Billy Gashade would make a great miniseries.

Occasionally something is optioned, covering my mortgage for one month. If they ever get around to filming, I'll be able to pay it off. A producer of feature films flipped over BILLY GASHADE, but said it could only be done as a TV miniseries, and passed it along to a contact in television. I didn't expect to hear anything about it after that, and I wasn't disappointed. Two years ago, my agent in Hollywood congratulated me, saying EDSEL was "on the front burner" at Warner Brothers. Since then the option has run out and he's retired. As far as Hollywood goes, I'm the anti-Elmore Leonard.

17) How would you describe a perfect weekend?

No work to do and a pile of good books within arm's reach.

18) Do you enjoy the public part of being a writer? Going to conventions, signings?

Some parts of it. Meeting readers and booksellers and getting together with other writers is a nice break from the solitary life. However, it exhausts me, whereas writing energizes me. No contest, if I were forced to choose. My worst day writing is still better than my best day on the job.

19) Is your taste in movies similar to your taste in books?

Yes, in that it's all over the map; although film noir is no. 1. I pioneered the concept of the home theater 15 years ago, building a movie room into my basement with a fifty-inch screen TV and a collection of movies on tape that runs around 1,300 titles at present. Now I've started on DVD. This access to film has been of enormous assistance with such books as THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN MOVING PICTURE ASSOCIATION, about early Hollywood, and the Valentino series, about a film archivist who keeps getting mixed up in murder. I've also installed a VCR with a four-inch screen on my desk to monitor specific details. I broke it in while writing NEVER STREET.

20) Your books have wonderful titles. Does a lot of thought go into the title of a book?

A great deal. I always start with the title, although it may take several years before I think up a book to stick on the end of it. For me, the best titles evoke shadows and echoes, and I try very hard never to use one that someone has used before. In that, I've failed a couple of times, but not knowingly. I hold writers who pilfer other writers' titles in the same contempt I reserve for plagiarists. If they can't come up with one of their own, I suspect the sources of their characters and plots as well.

21) Writers spend a lot of time by themselves writing. How important is the support of your family?

They're sounding boards, marketing geniuses, and head-holders when nothing's going well. Deborah Morgan, my publicist (and wife; she's also an extremely accomplished writer), designed my website, concocts, arranges, and sends promotional items to thousands of readers and booksellers on an ever-expanding list, and has even been known to carry one of my books through airports with the cover exposed, to gather attention. If I weren't sleeping with her, I couldn't afford her.

22) Do you take inspiration from real life for any of your books?

Where else would I go?

23) If you were able to speak with a young Loren, what would you have said to him?

Avoid polyester.

24) What's the one thing that is always in your refrigerator?

Coke and/or Pepsi, preferably in glass bottles, otherwise in cans. I slam them the way Dylan Thomas slammed Irish whiskies.