Interview With Author Curt Wendelboe
Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I started writing shorts right after being discharged from Marines inn ’72 and had a bunch published before deciding I wanted to write novels. My thirteenth novel, Death Along the Spirit Road, was picked up by Berkley Prime Crime as was the two subsequent novels. Since then, I have published three more in that series along with a mystery set in the Great Depression, a contemporary mystery, and a period western set in the 1870s Dakota Territory, and two standalone novels. To date, I have published twenty novels.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
Death Under the Deluge began to form when I was an off-reservation policeman in a small town in South Dakota along the Missouri. There, old locals talked about an island that Lewis and Clark originally came across (American Island) and how the island was a vacation spot before the Corps of Engineers flooded the river to make a revivor. I combined that lore with that of the Lakota Cold Talkers in WWII and my idea for the cold case murder emerged.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Not unusual unless you think a goal of twelve hours writing a day is odd.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
On the western side, Louis L’Amour for certain as his research into locations for his books were so spot on.
For mysteries, Micky Spillane and John D. McDonald (both that I sneaked into the library ’cause good Christian boys didn’t read such things) for their grittiness, and Poe for his clues he imbedded into his stories that were so hard to pick up until once the denoumet.
What are you working on now?
I am plotting out my seventh in the Spirit Road series, a contemporary mystery set on Indian Reservations. I want to go back to the Crow Reservation in Montana with perhaps some scenes on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
My website can be reached by cmwendelboe.com or spiritroadmysteries.com. I can also be reached through my Facebook author page.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Persistence. I admit I was not the one with the most talent or the finest writing abilities, but I kept writing until people began paying me for what I had to say. Also, I have met so many authors wanting to be published who have had so many rejections with publishers and agents. Authors need to realize that, for the most part, initial cold submissions are being read by assistants and that if the actual agent or editor would actually read the submission, they might be accepted. It’s just the nature of the beast – agents and publishers want solid stories that interest readers yet often bever even see fine works sent them.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
How about the worst advice, one I heard from my ninth grade English teacher and many tines since: “Write what you know.” I did that for years, not having much fir life experiences until I realized if we only wrote what we knew, there would be no stories about the Roman Empire or the Reformation or the Civil War. We can absolutely write what we don’t know – through research.
What are you reading now?
In am re-reading the complete works of Oscar Wilde. So many things that he wrote about during the Victorian tines seems to be reemerging today.
What’s next for you as a writer?
I began writing a novel fourteen years ago set during the Civil Rights Movement of 1968, with scenes back in Nazi Germany during the war. I am actively seeking representation fir that novel as I have so much faith in it.
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
Any of Shakespeare’s plays since they take too long to decipher what the outdated language actually says. I would take Louis L’Amour’s Haunted Mesa, which I read a least once a year trying to figure out why it’s such a captivating read (but I haven’t figured it out yet.) And lastly, I would take the Holy Bible to get ne through the days and give me hope for rescue.
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