Among the joys of being a
writer is getting to know people like Eric Beetner. As nice a person as I know,
Eric is, in addition to being a gifted author, a musician, an artist, and a
telented video editor with seven Emmy nominations to his credit.
It’s been way too long since
he’s been here, so the occasion of hois newest book, Real Bad, Real Soon,
the sequel to last year’s outstanding The
Last Few Miles of Road.
One Bite at a Time:
Your books read as though they’re passing directly into the reader’smind with little or no authorial
intrusion. As a writer myself, I know that’s a lot harder todo than it might sound. How do you
manage it?
Eric Beetner: As much
as I love a well-crafted sentence that makes you pause and marvel over the word
choice, the simile, the metaphor I’d have never thought of – they also
risk taking a reader out of the story. The scenario I just described means I’ve
stopped reading and am now thinking of the author. I don’t want people to think
about me at all when they read my books. I should be invisible.
In a way, I think my day job
as a TV/Film editor may influence that. My craft, when done right, is invisible
to the viewer. You should never come out of a movie and think, “Man, that was
so well cut.” If you notice it, then it’s not really well cut except in
instances of music montage or specifically designed editorial moments, but even
those are there as showpieces and outliers when it comes to telling the story.
You have your moment (think of the many music montages in Goodfella, let’s say)
then the song fades, and you go back to being invisible.
approach writing the same way. My favorite
books to read are ones where the story moves along as if by an unseen hand.
There is craft in that. It’s not dumbing down language so the reader doesn’t
have to “think” about it. Rather, it’s being aware that language is there to be
understood easily and in most cases, simplicity is best to communicate your
story.
OBAAT: You always have
a unique take on hit men. First there were Lars and Shaine inthe Devil books.
Now it’s
Carter McCoy, Breanna, and a third person I won’t namebecause it will spoil the ending of The Last Few Miles Of
Road. I’m
not asking youwhere you get your ideas – well, sort of, maybe – but what
inspired these twists on agenre that has been done to death?
EB: If I’m starting to write a crime novel I assume going in there
will be death, so I think how can I make it something you might not have seen
before? I like exploring the consequences of violence. I don’t ever want to
take it lightly. I want there to be a cost to any death on the page. If I’m
thinking in those terms, then the characters have to adjust and they sort of
automatically get this extra layer on top you don’t get if someone is just a
cold-blooded killer.
If you look at the best books
and films where there is a cypher of a person whose only job is to be the best
killer out there with zero emotion, then the true center of the story is
usually someone else who the audience can connect with because there’s no
empathizing with an emotionless killing machine.
OBAAT: This is mostly
for the fledgling writers out there, but how has your experienceas an author
differed from what you expected?
EB: You are catching me on a day where my only answer is that is has
been SO MUCH HARDER than I wanted it to be. I’ve been kicked in the crotch by
this business more times than I can count and I often wonder why I persist. I
could run down the list of all the indignities and bad breaks I’ve gotten, but
we don’t have the space and nobody wants to hear me complain.
When I started publishing in
2009, I had a Freshman class of other writers who I knew and was close with and
others who I was aware of and have followed their careers. I’d say easily 75%
of them have fallen away. Cancelled contracts, dropped by agents, lost the fire
– whatever the cause, I’m still hanging around where so many have quit.
Others of the peer group are still going because they’ve achieved a measure of
success which is great to see.
I’m sure I’ve made some poor
choices, trusted some wrong people, which has contributed to my frustration and
my lack of sales. But every time I think of writing my big send-off letter on
my way out the door and detailing the crushing lows of what I’ve endured, I’m
reminded of how many kind people I’ve met, how many hands up, favors,
kindnesses small and large I’ve been on the receiving end of over my time and I
realize it’s not at all bad. Not in the least.
So yeah, I’ve never been a
best seller. Can’t seem to make a foreign sales deal, never had a movie made.
I’ve had MULTIPLE publishers go out of business while publishing my stuff. Had
books I delivered in full end up never coming out. Had to pivot and adjust and
re-think everything at every turn. But what makes it worth it are the friends
I’ve made. Many are the same names on my shelf who I love to read year after
year. And the experiences I’ve had, even in the relatively small-time world of
my publishing career.
It is NOT for the weak or the
thin skinned. It’s a brutal, heartbreaking, commerce-driven business that will
chew you up and spit you out. But if you need to tell stories, if you love
other book people, if you want to meet your heroes up close and see how
down-to-earth they really are, then come on in. Even if you only last a short
time, once you write and publish a book, it’s something nobody can take away
from you and something relatively few people actually do (though on most days
it feels like everyone and their mother has written a book)
OBAAT: When we chatted
in 2017, you said, “I’m always fighting my instinct to write acharacter who
is fifty as the ‘older’ guy.” Carter McCoy is well past
fifty, so you clearlygot over it. What changed in your outlook, and not just
that you got older. A lot of writersget older and never get past that hurdle.
EB: I like writing characters with a history and some life experience.
For Carter, I needed someone with nothing to lose. Literally. You can’t take
his life from him because he’s only got weeks, maybe months to live. I could
have given a young guy his disease, but I also liked the idea of a man who has
reached his 70s and lived a good life and now has to struggle with himself to
see if he can become someone else, and if killing someone who he thinks
deserves it will fundamentally change who he is. These were all interesting
ideas to me that carried more weight when he had a few more years in him.
Everyone changes in their 20s in a thousand different ways. Far fewer people
reinvent themselves in their 70s.
But hey, I’m smart enough to
give him a younger person to interact with and readers to react to. The Carter
McCoy books aren’t written for a geriatric crowd, even as I quickly approach
that stage myself.
OBAAT: When you were
here in 2015 I asked, “If you could have
written any book of thepast hundred years, what would it be, and what is it
about that book you admire most?”Your reply: “I’ll say Wild
at Heart. I’m
a huge Barry Gifford fan and this is ground zero formost people on his work and
the start of his most famous creation, the Sailor and Lulabooks.”
It’s been ten years. Would your answer
be the same?
EB: I’m not sure. Maybe the cynical answer would be to pick something
that has sold much better. I honestly think that the satisfaction for me lies
in the fact that I have written books and created now a body of work of which I
am enormously proud. I’d hate to think of writing someone else’s book. That’s
their story to tell just as I think my books could only have been written by
me. When I think about quitting or the inevitable day when I’ll be done by
choice or by circumstance, I know that I did what I set out to do creatively.
Commercially, there are many goals still left to attain. I have ambitions and
goals both big and small. But I can rest easy knowing I have created more in
the fiction world than I ever thought possible. I’ve told stories that are different
and while I know I’ve recycled themes that are interesting to me, I’ve written
mostly vastly different books. I’ve taken chances, experimented, stretched
beyond my comfort zone. I have books I’d put up against most of my favorite
authors and can think, “Yeah, that belongs on the same shelf.”
It’s gratifying to think that
and it took a while, but I’m at a sort of peace with what I’ve done for myself,
even if I haven’t cracked a wide readership. Knowing I connected at all with
even a small audience is amazing and beyond my expectations when I began.
OBAAT: You are a master
of the short series, two or three books. Have you ever been tempted to go back
and revisit an old series, say, for instance, Lars and Shaine, or the McGraws
from the Rumrunners books?
EB: Three seems right to me. I don’t know that I
could write a ten- or twenty-book series. Hats off to those who do. It’s a
challenge.
When Wolfpack picked up the
Rumrunners books there were only two. A trilogy seems better, especially in a
book bundle the way they are packaged now, so I wrote a third book many years
after the last stab at that series. It’s called Sideswipe and it’s only
in that ebook bundle and because of that it may be my least read novel, but I
still like it.
Going back after so long was
easier than I expected.
I co-wrote a trilogy with
Frank Zafiro, The ‘List’ Series (The
Backlist, The
Short List, The
Getaway List) and he floated the idea that we revisit that one. I
hesitated, then he suggested two novellas we could pair into one volume and
that sparked an idea (because the end of Book Three felt fairly final). So I
did write that and Frank is going to write his half when he has time in his
very busy writing schedule. That’ll technically be four books in that series,
which will make it the longest I’ve done.
Lars and Shaine for sure is
done. I can’t see another story with them. The McGraws as well. After Carter I
may be done with series entirely, even trilogies. But I know myself enough to
know that if an idea comes or if someone wants more books with characters I
created in any of the unsold books I’ve written, then I doubt I’d say no. If
someone challenged me (and gave me contracts) for a ten-book series, I’d take
the challenge and try to push myself because that’s just what I do, ill-advised
or not.
