Interview With Author John Pendleton
Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a former newspaper editor who enjoyed a 39-year career in journalism and public relations.
Based in the English holiday resort of Skegness in Lincolnshire, England, I edited a series of local newspapers, most recently for Johnston Press.
I have written four novels, “The Men in the Marsh”, “Hector’s Revenge”, “Ill Winds” and “All For Blood”, and “Skegness Past”, a mainly photographic record of my home town.
I am married to Wendy and have two grown-up children, Colin and Trudi, and four grandchildren. My interests include politics, reading, angling, tennis and going to the gym.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
My latest book, “The Men in the Marsh” begins with the dramatic events of October 12, 1984, when an IRA bomb exploded at the Grand Hotel, Brighton, in a bid to assassinate UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The idea of the novel came to me because of my own experience in 1984 when I left the Grand Hotel myself minutes before the bomb went off. My fictional story concerns a young entrepreneur who also left the hotel just before the explosion. It traces his life, loves and politics, leading up to dramatic events which have haunting echoes of his 1984 experience.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I do nearly all of my writing in the lounge at home with the television on in the background. Having the competition of the TV forces me to concentrate hard on the task in hand and stops my mind wandering.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Anthony Trollope, D. H. Lawrence and Evelyn Waugh have influenced me greatly.
What are you working on now?
I am concentrating at present on promoting “The Men in the Marsh”, but have a number of ideas for future novels swirling around in my head.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I have found Facebook and other social media sites to be a good way of promoting my books but am also building up an extensive network of personal contacts.
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Don’t be discouraged by rejections from agents and publishers. Be persistent but always have the consolation of the pleasure which writing brings you.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
The best way of maintaining interest in your writing is to write another book.
What are you reading now?
“A Word Child” by Iris Murdoch.
What’s next for you as a writer?
I think it will be something in the genre of mystery romance.
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?
The Complete Works of Shakespeare, “The Seven Pillars of Wisdom” by T. E. Lawrence and Homer’s “The Iliad”.
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