I also interviewed Adrian on Allan Guthrie's Noir Originals
Adrian McKinty was born and grew up in Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland at the height of the Troubles. He studied politics at Oxford University and after a failed legal career he moved to the US in the early 1990s. He found work as a security guard, postman, construction worker, barman, rugby coach and bookstore clerk before becoming a school teacher in Denver, where he now lives.Q1. What are you writing at the minute?
A novel called Fifty Grand about a cop from Havana who comes to America to investigate a suspected murder.
Q2. Can you give us an idea of Adrian McKinty’s typical up-to-the-armpits-in-ideas-and-time writing day?
I’m not one of those up at six and write 1000 words before breakfast types. For me its more like an hour here and an hour there in between dealing with the kids and school (I’m a teacher).
Q3. What do you do when you’re not writing?
I play rugby when I get the chance and lately I’ve been doing a bit of skiing here in Colorado.
Q4. Any advice for a greenhorn trying to break into the crime fiction scene?
Read tons and not just in the genre.
Q5. Which crime writer(s) have impressed you this year?
I’ve discovered James Ellroy’s later fictions The Cold Six Thousand and American Tabloid and they’re both fantastic.
Q6. What are you reading right now?
Take a Girl Like You by Kingsley Amis
Q7. Plans for the future?
I’d like to write a book about the year I spent in Jerusalem but what exactly I don’t know.
Q8. With regards to your writing career to date, would you do anything differently?
I’d do everything differently. If I’d known how important promotion was going to be I’d have gone mad promoting Dead I Well May Be. The book got starred reviews in all the trades but Simon and Schuster didn’t spend a dime on advertising so the starred reviews meant nothing. I should have stopped everything and gone around the country promoting the book on my own dollar and really tried to make a big splash. The lesson is you can't rely on the publisher, you have to work all the angles. Writing the book is only half the story, you have to go out there and sell the bloody thing with or without the help of your publisher.
Q9. Anything you want to say that I haven’t asked you about?
Nope, not really. When you read Dead I Well May Be you’ll have some questions about knee capping, but until that happy time…ciao…
A novel called Fifty Grand about a cop from Havana who comes to America to investigate a suspected murder.
Q2. Can you give us an idea of Adrian McKinty’s typical up-to-the-armpits-in-ideas-and-time writing day?
I’m not one of those up at six and write 1000 words before breakfast types. For me its more like an hour here and an hour there in between dealing with the kids and school (I’m a teacher).
Q3. What do you do when you’re not writing?
I play rugby when I get the chance and lately I’ve been doing a bit of skiing here in Colorado.
Q4. Any advice for a greenhorn trying to break into the crime fiction scene?
Read tons and not just in the genre.
Q5. Which crime writer(s) have impressed you this year?
I’ve discovered James Ellroy’s later fictions The Cold Six Thousand and American Tabloid and they’re both fantastic.
Q6. What are you reading right now?
Take a Girl Like You by Kingsley Amis
Q7. Plans for the future?
I’d like to write a book about the year I spent in Jerusalem but what exactly I don’t know.
Q8. With regards to your writing career to date, would you do anything differently?
I’d do everything differently. If I’d known how important promotion was going to be I’d have gone mad promoting Dead I Well May Be. The book got starred reviews in all the trades but Simon and Schuster didn’t spend a dime on advertising so the starred reviews meant nothing. I should have stopped everything and gone around the country promoting the book on my own dollar and really tried to make a big splash. The lesson is you can't rely on the publisher, you have to work all the angles. Writing the book is only half the story, you have to go out there and sell the bloody thing with or without the help of your publisher.
Q9. Anything you want to say that I haven’t asked you about?
Nope, not really. When you read Dead I Well May Be you’ll have some questions about knee capping, but until that happy time…ciao…
Thank you, Adrian McKinty!
1 comment:
80% of the way through Adrian McKinty's Fifty Grand and very much enjoying it. I bought it after hearing about it on this site. So thanks for that.
I was a bit dubious before I began it, wondering how it would compare to Jose Latour's Outcast. I had the great pleasure of having dealings with him in Havana years ago.
But good news. Fifty Grand holds its own. It's a great read. I'm zipping through it much faster than I expected because it's shouldering t of the way other things I should be doing instead.
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