Jenn McKinlay: One of my most favorite mystery series is the Cat in the Stacks mysteries, penned by my friend Dean James (aka Miranda James). In case you don't know, one of the lead characters is a Maine Coon cat named Diesel. Seriously, what's not to love?
With his new book CARELESS WHISKERS, the 12th book in the hugely popular series, hitting the shelves on January 21st, I thought it was a good time to have Dean pop in for a visit. We did a little Q & A about his series and his writing life, and I love it so much because he really hits some elemental truths about the writing process. Enjoy!
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Jenn: How did you come up with Charlie Harris and Diesel and the Cat in the Stacks mysteries?
Dean: After my Trailer Park Mysteries series was canceled, I was trying to come up with an idea for something new. My editor at Berkley, Michelle Vega, and her boss, Natalee Rosenstein (my editor before Michelle), suggested a series with a librarian and a cat, thanks to the popularity of the book Dewey the Library Cat. I sent them three chapters and a synopsis for the book, they liked it, and a three-book contract got me started.
Jenn: When did you decide to become a writer?
Dean: When I was old enough to figure out that people actually wrote books (and they didn't just magically appear on the shelves out of nowhere), I thought that would be a cool thing to do. Inspired at the age of eleven or twelve by my two favorite sleuths, Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden, I wrote a novella (at the time I thought it was a book) featuring a girl sleuth who was half Nancy/half Trixie. My aunt typed it up for me, and I sent to the Whitman, who was publishing the Trixie Belden books at the time. I got a form rejection letter, and that rather daunted my enthusiasm. All the other volumes in the series I planned never got written. Skip ahead to grad school days, and I started writing murder mysteries (you should not assume a direct connection between my being in a Ph.D. program and wanting to kill fictional people).
Jenn: How long does it take you to write the first draft of a mystery?
Dean: I never really have a "first draft" in the most technical sense. I have a "living draft" because I adjust and change as the story develops. I'm not one of those people who can come up with a minutely detailed outline; that would drive me nuts and I'd never write the book. I like to see what happens while I write. I always get good ideas this way for twists and for character bits. As for how long it takes, it varies. The actual time of fingers on computer keys is many hours, but the writing process also consists of letting the subconscious pull
things together, and that usually takes a few months.
Jenn: What is your work schedule like when you're writing?
Dean: Schedule? Um, no. I have a full-time day job as an electronic resources librarian in a university medical center, and I spend five days a week at a computer. Mostly I write on the weekends, but as a deadline looms I will
write before and after work as well.
Jenn: Late night writing when the house is quiet is still my favorite.
Jenn: What do you like to do when you're not writing?
Dean: Sleep. Read. Travel. Watch TV and movies. Sleep some more and read some more.
Jenn: What’s the biggest challenge to writing a long running mystery series?
Dean: Not repeating yourself. I try to keep the stories fresh with what's happening with Charlie and his family and friends, but also with the characters involved in the murder plots. There are only so many tropes you can use in a conventional cozy mystery, after all. I've read several thousand mysteries,
many from them the Golden Age of detective fiction, and I think I've absorbed most of the variations you'll find in a traditional mystery. I like to play with the conventions. I had a lot of fun with this, in particular, with my
Simon Kirby-Jones mysteries. He is a gay American vampire who resides in an
English village and comments acerbically on everything and everyone.
Jenn: As a child, what did you want to do when you grew up?
Dean: I went through various stages of career enthusiasms. I babysat younger cousins frequently, so I thought being a pediatrician might be the thing. Then I became fascinated by foreign languages in the fifth grade and decided I wanted to be a translator at the UN. I even wrote to the UN for information.
So my plan was to go to college and study several languages. Then I ended up getting a degree in history, with minors in English and Spanish. I thought being a college professor seemed like fun, so I went on to grad school and got a Ph.D. in history (specialty, medieval England), and eventually got my master's in
library science. It was far easier to find a job in a library than a teaching position in history when I finished grad school, lo these many years ago.
Reading over this, I realize that what I wanted to do all along was concerned with languages, speaking them and writing them, and the writing of them came to predominate, I suppose. Where the urge to kill serially came from, I'm not quite sure...
Jenn: LOL, Dean. Thanks so much for joining us today!
What about you, Reds and Readers, any questions for Dean? Also, since I asked Dean I'll ask you, too. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
What about you, Reds and Readers, any questions for Dean? Also, since I asked Dean I'll ask you, too. As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
Miranda James is the New York Times bestselling author of the Cat in the Stacks Mysteries, including Twelve Angry Librarians, No Cats Allowed, and Arsenic and Old Books, as well as the Southern Ladies Mysteries, including Fixing to Die, Digging Up the Dirt, and Dead with the Wind. James lives in Mississippi. Visit the author at catinthestacks.com and facebook.com/mirandajamesauthor.
