Happy Pub Day, Glen Erik Hamilton!

INGRID THOFT

I'm thrilled to welcome Glen Erik Hamilton to Jungle Reds. The third book in his critically acclaimed Van Shaw series, EVERY DAY ABOVE GROUND, is out today.  Glen's debut, PAST CRIMES, won the Anthony, Macavity, and Strand Magazine Critics awards for Best First Novel and was also nominated for the Edgar, Barry, and Nero awards.  The follow-up in the series, HARD COLD WINTER, was published to rave reviews in 2016.  Glen is a native of Seattle, but currently resides in LA with his family, where we recently met up at a tiki bar for great conversation and strong zombie cocktails!  I'm so glad he's spending his pub day with us!

INGRID THOFT: Your new release EVERY DAY ABOVE GROUND is out today, and it’s fantastic. Can you tell us about it?

GLEN ERIK HAMILTON: Thank you! EVERY DAY ABOVE GROUND is the third in the Van Shaw series.  Van was raised by his grandfather, a professional thief, and escaped the criminal life in his late teens to serve in the Army Rangers.  At the start of EDAG (as the publisher and I affectionately call it), Van has been out of the military for a few months.  He’s trying, with some difficulty, to rebuild his life and home after the events of the last book.  An old partner of his grandfather’s approaches Van with the offer of a safe cracking job.  Van would normally refuse any criminal work, but he convinces himself that this score is at least semi-legal and on the side of the angels.  As is often the case in crime thrillers, the job does not go as planned.

I had a lot of fun writing EDAG:  Van is forced to contend with some wild characters, villains at both the apex and bottom rungs of the smuggling world, and no less dangerous for being at either end.  His personal relationships are also rocky.  Van has the bad habit of neglecting his emotional life for his more active one, even when he needs the people around him more than ever. He’s a family guy without a normal family. Part of EDAG is him wrestling with those friendships and those responsibilities. 


IPT: You grew up on a boat, which is a very unique setting in which to live.  Has that experience influenced your writing?

GEH: Tremendously.  Some of those inspirations are easy to spot: I have major characters living aboard and many scenes set on or around the waterways that almost completely surround Seattle. Seattle is also our largest western seaport north of Los Angeles, so the shipping business is a tremendous opportunity for crime stories.

But beyond that, people who live aboard boats make the deliberate choice to be a little removed from mainstream society. There’s an outsider mentality, which includes a distrust, if not outright rejection of the norm (whether that’s a positive or a negative, I leave for the observer).  I have at least some of that outlook, and there’s no question that Van, with his skewed upbringing, does as well.


IPT:  If writing is your dream job, what would your second dream job be?

GEH:  This is a tough one.  I love acting on stage.  Before writing, theater was my primary creative outlet; I have a degree in it and it’s how my wife and I met. I fully intend to continue acting for the fun of it when life allows. I also enjoy reading history, and teaching, and can easily imagine an alternate life path that could have lead me to becoming the world’s foremost expert on post-WWI North African territorial wars, for example, and the impoverished academic career that might result.

IPT: Ha!  I had no idea that you have an interest in post-WWI North African territorial wars!  What are you working on now, and is there a book you’re dying to write? Romance?  Sci-fi?

GEH:  I’m working on a standalone novel, more of a direct thriller than the mystery-thrillers of the Van Shaw series. What I’m most eager to try next, time allowing, are short stories. The interstitial chapters of the Van books show our hero at different ages.  I approach those as if they were independent stories, and I have a lot of fun with the flexibility and the challenge.  Seeing one of my short stories appear in "The Strand" or "Ellery Queen" someday would be a huge milestone.


IPT:  Okay, you know I have to ask: How do you come up with character names?

GEH:  [For the reader:  Ingrid is asking this because one of the major characters in EDAG is also named Ingrid.  She’s a bad bad person.  The character, that is…]

Anytime I hear a name that strikes me as unusual and evocative, I note it down in a running list.  The best names have a particular tone, a musicality.  For example, Ostrander is a town in Washington State. The name always struck me as chilly, removed, and monied. I used Ostrander for the name of a well-heeled attorney and personal fixer for a billionaire in my second book, HARD COLD WINTER.

Van Shaw has a fun genesis – Van is short for Donovan; I wanted he and his grandfather to share the name.  In the Irish way, the granddad is Dono, so the younger Donovan is Van.  Shaw comes from two places: my favorite playwright George Bernard Shaw, and the late actor Robert Shaw, who would have made a wonderful Dono. The name Shaw also has an appropriate music to it, like a sword being unsheathed.

Oh, and the character Ingrid?  “Ingrid Ekby” had a great sound, both Nordic and subtly mechanical. Ekby, by the way, is a shelf unit from IKEA…

IPT:  Now it’s Glen’s turn to shoot a question to the readers of Jungle Red!
GEH:  What’s your favorite character name, the one that best sounds like the fictional person’s personality?

I’m going to make this a little harder and say: No Harry Potter characters allowed.  J.K. Rowling is just too good at that game.  Comment, and you'll be entered to win a copy of EDAG!


EVERY DAY ABOVE GROUND
It sounds like a thief's dream to Van Shaw: A terminally-ill ex-con tells him of a fortune in gold, abandoned and nearly forgotten after the original owner died in prison. To rebuild his destroyed house and to help the dying man leave a legacy for his pre-teen daughter, Van agrees to the job. But the safe holding the fortune is a trap and Van must figure out who the hunters are really after—while being hunted himself.


Glen Erik Hamilton's debut Past Crimes won the Anthony, Macavity, and Strand Magazine Critics awards for Best First Novel, and was also nominated for the Edgar, Barry, and Nero awards. Publishers Weekly and Library Journal gave Past Crimes starred reviews, and Kirkus called the book "an exciting heir to the classic detective novel". The follow-up in the Van Shaw series, Hard Cold Winter, was published to rave reviews in March 2016 by William Morrow (US) and Faber & Faber (UK).
A native of Seattle, Glen grew up aboard a sailboat, finding trouble around the islands and marinas and commercial docks of the Pacific Northwest. He now lives in California with his family but frequently returns to his hometown to soak up the rain.

Website: www.glenerikhamilton.com
Facebook: @glenerikhamilton
Twitter: @glenerikh

To See? Or not to See?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Coming up: more reservations (from Matt Coyle)! And another giveaway.  

But first: AND THE WINNERS (from yesterday) are:

Of the Jungle Red Writers book of choice, (you name it, you get it, including (but no pressure) an ARC of Hank’s upcoming WHAT YOU SEE but really, any JRW book) is Kate  (who posted at 10:07)

And because Lucy is SO touched by all your support, she’s giving a copy of FATAL RESERVATIONS to:   Bonnie K.    (But, deep in our hearts, we hope you will all buy it. And we hope that this is Bonnie K’s second copy. )

Just send your addresses to me via my website.

SO now, for today, more reservations. Of a different kind. The talented Matt Coyle has reservations about—how his character looks.

To See or Not to See? That is Matt’s question. 

What do you think? And then tell us at the end to win Matt’s 

first book, YESTERDAY’S ECHO.

MATT COYLE: First, I want to thank Hank Phillippi Ryan for inviting me to post on Jungle Red Writers. It’s an honor. Hank has been like a Fairy Godsister in my fledgling writing career, sprinkling a little fairy dust at important times along the way.

HANK: Aw. You’re doing pretty fine, bub. Anthony Award and all.

MATT: Thanks! But I’ve been writing Rick Cahill for thirteen years. The fact that this has only produced two published novels and an, as of yet, unfinished third book could be discouraging. However, if you take into account how many times I rewrote the first book, YESTERDAY’S ECHO, it really comes in at around six or seven books. The point is I know Rick very well. By book three, he’s thirty-six years old.

He owns a home with a sliver of an ocean view.

He’s a private detective and drives a black 2006 Mustang GT.

 He’s a widow and currently single. His sidekick is his six year-old black Labrador, Midnight.

I write in first person so I’m in Rick’s head all the time. I know what he’s thinking when he doesn’t speak and I know the dreams he has but never tells anyone about. I know when he makes a tragic decision well before the tragedy happens. I know the truth about him even when he tries to fool himself.

I just don’t know what he looks like.

Well, I know in general terms. He’s around six feet tall and physically fit, but not a gym rat. Sturdy over thin. He’s of Irish descent and probably somewhat fair-skinned. 

Hair color? Not blond, black or red, so that leaves some shade of brown. Eyes? I don’t know.

Facial looks, not a clue. I’ve never seen his face. I almost saw it once in YESTERDAY’S ECHO. After surviving a home invasion, battered and beaten, Rick takes stock:

I got out of the shower and looked at myself in the mirror. Steam blotted out my reflection.

That’s as close as I’ve gotten and that’s fine with me. I don’t have to know what Rick looks like. I just have to know who he is.

I’m from the school of thought that thinks it’s best to sometimes let the reader fill in empty space with their own imagination. Not that I want to give them a complete blank canvas. Here’s a description from my second book, NIGHT TREMORS, that gives a bit of both:

Her voice sounded like pocket change rattling around in a clothes dryer. Loud. Jarring. Unexpected. She couldn’t have been taller than five feet or weighed more than ninety pounds. Brown eyes the size of coasters took up most of her face. Lips took up the rest. Auburn hair in a bob cut. Late thirties, early forties, but wearing it easy. Everything fit together. Not pretty, but attractive.

I let the readers fill in the blank spaces on Rick Cahill. He lives inside my brain 24/7 and I see his thoughts before they appear in his own head. But when it comes to his face, the steam is still covering the mirror.

A question for readers: Do you want a character’s physical characteristics all spelled out so you can see things exactly as the writer wants you to or do you like to fill in some of the empty space yourself?

For writers: How much physical detail do you give in describing your protagonist? How important is it to you to know exactly what he or she looks like?

HANK: Yeah, what do you think?  I struggle with that every day! I just wrote a new character, TV documentary producer Fiola (not Fiona!) Morello. What does she look like? I’m still working that out. What do YOU think she looks like? Or should I follow Matt’s lead? 

*******************

About NIGHT TREMORS:

Rick Cahill risks losing his home, his freedom, and even his life when he battles corrupt police, the criminal justice system, a friend turned enemy, a vicious biker gang, and a psychopathic murder as he tries to free an innocent man from prison.

Matt Coyle knew he wanted to be a crime writer as a youngster when his father gave him THE SIMPLE ART OF MURDER by Raymond Chandler. It only took him forty years to achieve his goal. His first novel, YESTERDAY’S ECHO, won the Anthony Award for Best First Novel, the San Diego Book Award for Best Mystery, and the Ben Franklin Award for Best New Voice in Fiction. His second novel, NIGHT TREMORS, came out in June.