My Tour Buddy, Nick Petrie

INGRID THOFT

I had lots of fun on my "Duplicity" tour in January, largely because of my tour buddy, Nick Petrie.  Some of you may be familiar with Nick from his debut novel "The Drifter," which is nominated for the Edgar and Barry Awards for Best First Novel and the Hammett Prize for Best Novel.  The second book in the series, "Burning Bright" was released in January, hence the shared tour dates.  Nick's main character, Peter Ash, has been likened to Jack Reacher, by Lee Child himself!  His books are critically acclaimed, thought-provoking thrillers, and I have nothing but acclaim for Nick as a travel companion and friend.  He was recently in Seattle, and we caught up,

INGRID: Tell me about your main character, Peter Ash?  What inspired you to write a character who is a veteran?

NICK: Peter Ash is a highly-trained Marine Corps veteran who signed up to help his country and make a difference.  After eight years of war, he returned home with an unwanted souvenir, what he calls the White Static – an intense claustrophobia caused by post-traumatic stress that makes it hard for him to be indoors for more than a few minutes.  Like many veterans I’ve met, Peter has a deep need to be useful and a profound sense of right and wrong, which combine into a powerful drive to help others out of trouble.

I’m not a veteran myself, and for many years I didn’t think I knew many people who’d served in the military.  But in my day job as a home inspector – I’m that guy you hire to tell you (hopefully) everything wrong with your dream house – I realized during the early stages of the Great Recession that many of my inspection clients were veterans just coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan.  I’m a pretty curious guy, and I found myself having some truly fascinating conversations with my clients.  They really opened my eyes to the challenges our veterans face coming home from war.  I didn’t know I was researching a novel, but as it turned out, I’d already started writing “The Drifter” somewhere in the back of my mind.  Funny how that works.

Anyway, Peter is a lot of fun to write – he gets himself into some fairly crazy situations – and he’s a great excuse to keep learning more about the evolving lives of veterans and anything else that my oddball brain finds interesting.

INGRID: “The Drifter” takes place in Milwaukee, and “Burning Bright” is set on the West Coast, including some heart stopping scenes in a forest of giant redwoods.  Why did you change locations, and can you tell us where the third book is set? 

I love writing about place – I think of the setting of a novel almost as another character – and certain stories lend themselves to certain settings.  Milwaukee, a rust-belt city suffering hard in the Great Recession, was the perfect place for "The Drifter."  With "Burning Bright," I wanted to write about technology, and the west coast was the logical setting for that.  I also lived in Seattle for ten years, have travelled all over the west, and wanted to write about some of the places I truly love.

Another answer, to be completely honest, is that I’m deeply afraid of getting bored, and changing settings feels like a great way to keep a series fresh and evolving.  I can change the subject matter and the scale of the story easily just by dropping Peter in a new town with new characters.  Plus each new setting suggests a new plot – so the truest answer, I suppose, is that I’m kinda lazy.

My third Peter Ash book is called “Light It Up” and is set in Colorado.  Peter gets involved in the new cannabis industry – drugs, guns, and big money.  It was big fun to write, plus it gave me a great reason to go explore Denver and Boulder and spend a few days backpacking in the Rockies.  

INGRID: That's the first I've heard of the title!  Very apropos!  So what do readers think about Peter?  What kind of feedback do you get from them?

NICK: I was really nervous, writing about a veteran when I’m not a veteran myself.  This is a subject I’ve grown to care deeply about, and it was important to me to get things right.  Since “The Drifter” came out, I’ve had many conversations, both in-person and online, with veterans and their family members, telling me how much they appreciate the care I took with the emotional details.  One of my favorite conversations was at a library event.  Two sisters, whose husbands both served in Vietnam, told me the book helped them understand their husbands better.  Honestly, I can’t think of a higher compliment. 

INGRID: What has surprised you most about becoming a published author? 

Frankly, I was surprised I’d ever become a published author to begin with!  I’d written three books I couldn’t get published, and I’d given up on ever publishing anything.  I wrote “The Drifter” just for myself, writing the book I most wanted to read.  To discover not only that a major publisher wanted the book, but that so many people would actually read it and enjoy it and tell their friends about it?  Pretty much blows my mind on a daily basis.   

Another great surprise is how welcoming the crime fiction community has been.  Who’d have thought that people who write about death and dismemberment would be so nice?  (I’m from Wisconsin, so I’m required to be nice.  Otherwise the authorities make you move to Illinois.) 

INGRID: It is an amazingly supportive community.  Is there a wannabe book lurking in the back of your brain, something you would write if you didn’t have to consider agents, editors, and fans?  A romance?  Sci-fi?

Oh, I have a few ticklers in the dark recesses of my demented brain.  I’d like to write about Milwaukee again – it’s a fascinating place, with a lot of layers.  The book would be something gritty and weird and maybe internet-y.  I’d like to try my hand at writing for young adults – maybe Peter Ash’s teenage years?  I’m so impressed by good YA writers.  Those books have to be extremely tight, and I think it must be really difficult to make them look so damn easy.  But those two ideas actually seem fairly reasonable.  The true leap would be some science fiction space opera – I’m a sci-fi geek from waaaay back, so that would be loads of fun.  If I could pull it off. 

If you haven't read "The Drifter" or "Burning Bright," you're missing out on a terrific series.  Nick will be here today to answer your questions, and he's giving away a signed copy of "Burning Bright."  Be sure to include your email in your comment!

BURNING BRIGHT

In the new novel featuring war veteran Peter Ash, “an action hero of the likes of Jack Reacher or Jason Bourne” (Lincoln Journal-Star), Ash has a woman’s life in his hands—and her mystery is stranger than he could ever imagine.

War veteran Peter Ash sought peace and quiet among the towering redwoods of northern California, but the trip isn’t quite the balm he’d hoped for. The dense forest and close fog cause his claustrophobia to buzz and spark, and then he stumbles upon a grizzly, long thought to have vanished from this part of the country. In a fight of man against bear, Peter doesn’t favor his odds, so he makes a strategic retreat up a nearby sapling.

There, he finds something strange: a climbing rope, affixed to a distant branch above. It leads to another, and another, up through the giant tree canopy, and ending at a hanging platform. On the platform is a woman on the run. From below them come the sounds of men and gunshots.

Just days ago, investigative journalist June Cassidy escaped a kidnapping by the men who are still on her trail. She suspects they’re after something belonging to her mother, a prominent software designer who recently died in an accident. June needs time to figure out what’s going on, and help from someone with Peter’s particular set of skills.

Only one step ahead of their pursuers, Peter and June must race to unravel this peculiar mystery. What they find leads them to an eccentric recluse, a shadowy pseudo-military organization, and an extraordinary tool that may change the modern world forever.

 

Nick Petrie received his MFA in fiction from the University of Washington and won a Hopwood Award for short fiction while an undergraduate at the University of Michigan.  His story “At the Laundromat” won the 2006 Short Story Contest in The Seattle Review, a national literary journal.  His first novel, "The Drifter," was nominated for 2016 Edgar and Barry awards for Best First Novel, and the 2016 Hammett Prize for Best Novel. A husband and father, he has worked as a carpenter, remodeling contractor, and building inspector.  He lives in Milwaukee.  "Burning Bright" is his second novel, and the sequel to "The Drifter."