Interview With Author Gary Blackwood
Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
After decades of bouncing about the U.S., I’ve settled down on the beautiful North Shore of Nova Scotia, where I find I’m more prolific than ever–which is saying something. I’ve published 36 novels and nonfiction books (so far) for middle grade, YA, and adults. I’m also a widely produced playwright, and I’m slowly starting to get a foothold in screenplay territory.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest published book (I have a couple that are still orphans) is The Devil to Pay (Black Rose Writing). I’m a pacifist, and I’d been wanting for a long while to write a novel that deals with how pacifists can make their way in a world that seems rife with violence. Devil is loosely based on my years at university in the late 60s, when the spectre of the Vietnam War was hanging over every male student’s head. It also draws on my fascination with codes and ciphers (which also led me to write Mysterious Messages: A History of Codes and Ciphers).
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
Not unless you count sitting myself down in front of the computer every day for several hours. (It’s the main reason I manage to be so productive).
What authors, or books have influenced you?
Mostly the classics. I love the elegant prose of Dickens and Hardy and Robertson Davies. But my most recent was inspired by Steinbeck’s The Winter of Our Discontent, which deals with ordinary people with ordinary problems in a very straightforward way.
What are you working on now?
Nothing, as far as actual writing; I have three books and a whack of screenplays that I need to find homes for, so I’m taking a sabbatical and concentrating on querying and submitting, which can get to be a full-time job.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I can’t really say. I’ve tried various methods, but I totally suck at promotion.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Yep, but it’s advice that very few want to hear: Spend a lot of time, before you begin writing, on planning (not the same as outlining) and researching and writing bios of your main characters. It gives you a solid idea of where you’re going and how to get there, so you don’t go astray or come up against a roadblock somewhere in the middle.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
How to structure a story (novel, stage play, screenplay) as explained in Syd Field’s excellent book Screenplay. I use his method continually, and teach it when I do writing seminars.
What are you reading now?
I just finished John Grisham’s The Innocent Man (my first dive into Grisham), and am now starting on The Epic of Gilgamesh. Talk about eclectic.
What’s next for you as a writer?
No idea. I don’t mean that I have no ideas–my head and my clipboard are swimming with those. I just haven’t settled on one yet. But I am doing quite a bit of planning (see above advice) and note-taking.
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?
How to Survive on a Desert Island (actually, one of the ideas I’m considering has to do with just that); The Complete Works of Shakespeare; The Complete Works of Thomas Hardy; The Complete Works of P. G. Wodehouse;
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