An Interview with Jeffrey Deaver

Jeffery Deaver, an international number-one bestselling author, is known for his murder mysteries and crime fiction novels. Worldwide, he has sold 50 million books in 150 countries, including “The Bone Collector” that was turned into a film starring Angelina Jolie and Denzel Washington. Also, he is only the second American author to write a James Bond book. In addition to writing novels, Deaver writes short stories.

Deaver, a close family friend, spent a few days over Thanksgiving break with my family. Before cramming final Thanksgiving preparations into just over an hour, we took a leisurely walk on Cardiff State Beach. Being the youngest in my family and the only teenager, it is rare to be engaged in lengthy conversations with adult guests. Both on the beach walk and throughout his stay, however, Deaver spoke to me and asked me about things that are pertinent in my life. He also shared an array of stories about his career and personal experiences, most of which were augmented by his sense of humor.

His career began telling real world stories though his work as a high school journalist. Deaver graduated from the University of Missouri with a bachelor’s degree in journalism, which he explains is integral to his novel writing now. He later went onto to practice law in New York City.

Eventually becoming a prize-winning novelist, Deaver has written 38 thrillers, with his 39th, “The Burial Hour,” coming out in April 2017.

In an interview, accompanied by clattering sounds from the kitchen on Thanksgiving Day, Deaver spoke about many topics including what led him to novel writing, his work writing a Bond book and his involvement in the filmmaking process.

What led you to writing novels?
“When I was about 10 or 11, I didn’t have any interest in sports. I wasn’t very talented in sports and I was kind of reclusive. So, I spent a lot of time by myself reading, and I read books from authors like Agatha Christie, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, and I liked them. But I thought, ‘I think I can tell stories, too.’ So, when I was 11, I wrote my first book. It was actually just a short story, but I divided it into two chapters, and I did the cover art myself. And, even though it was a terrible story, I felt ‘I wrote a book. I can do it.’ I knew then, at age 11, I was going to be a writer, a novelist.”

How does your journalistic background inform your novel writing?
“Journalism has been very, very helpful for me in two ways. First of all, writing fiction is clear communication. The idea in your mind, that could be a very good story, is going to be useless if you can’t tell it in a clear, concise way. And journalism… really taught me how to put together sentences not in a very fancy way, but in a way… [that] it can be most clearly communicated…. Good writing is important and journalism is really nuts and bolts….The second thing about journalism is….that it taught me how to interview people. Part of the fun of writing fiction is going out in the field, talking to people….So if I hadn’t been a journalist…, I’m not sure I could be a novelist today.”

How do current events inform your story ideas?
“I absolutely look at current events. My goal in writing fiction is to create an emotional response…. I don’t want a reader to say ‘Oh, That’s an interesting book.’ I want them to say ‘Oh my gosh! I survived this book because it was so exciting. It made my palms sweat, it made my heart race.’ And one of the ways to do that is to find topics that resonate with current readers”

How important is it to create a relatable character?
“You really have to tell a story about living, breathing people, characters we care about, like Harry Potter or Hermione. Of course we care about whether Voldemort is going to take over the world, but mostly, we care about what’s going to happen to [Harry], Ron and the individual characters.”

What kinds of characters do you write about and do you ever interject yourself into your books?
“The characters I create and whose point of view I write from include a 16 year old African-American girl in New York, an elderly Chinese illegal immigrant, a Mexican detective, a quadriplegic, women characters of all ages and it isn’t really that difficult for me to step into the minds of people, with a little research…. I do not let any of myself into the book. I try to become the character. And I think that makes the book a more intimate experience for my readers because they, too, step into the mind of that asian-american character, or the 16-year-old girl who’s living in Harlem…. But writing about these characters, I step into their shoes and forget myself completely.”

Do you base characters off of people you know?
“I rarely do that. For one thing, I want to have the freedom to tell whatever story I can. If the novel is based on a character that I know, I’m subconsciously going to want to kind of make that character….somebody different….And the other thing is that I kill a lot of people in my books, and I wouldn’t want to have a good friend of mine get murdered in my books. So, I have to make sure I don’t include them.”

Can you talk about your writing process?
“I come up with an idea for a book…. [and] I spend the next 8 months doing an outline of that book…. I am a very plot driven author. Many authors are character driven authors. They create an interesting character and then just put them in a situation and write the book from there. Stephen King does that. I don’t work that way. I am much more comfortable crafting the plot first and then adding the characters.”

How important is it to keep your readers in mind when writing a novel?
“I believe that in an author, or frankly any creative person, should keep the audience in mind. I have never written experimental fiction. I’ve never written an idea that I thought was absolutely brilliant, but that my readers would not like…. I [once] had an idea for a book…. [where] in the end, it turned out that the hero was really the serial killer, who was murdering people. I thought it was a very clever idea, [but] what that meant was that my readers would become very fallen in love with this character, who was very human, but at the end, it turns out that he’s just really a vicious, sadistic, killer who enjoys hurting people. And I thought…. it’s a very clever idea. I’ll bet the critics might have liked it, but my readers would have said ‘Eww. I don’t care for this.’ So, every time I sit down and come up with an idea for a book, I think ‘will my readers like this?’ I don’t want it to be good for them, in the sense that you take medicine that’s good for you, but I want it to be like ice cream….that you enjoy the book.”

Working on a Bond novel/film, how does one maintain a balance between being new and innovative while staying true to the original ideals?
“‘Carte Blanche’ was based on the James Bond character that not only Ian Fleming had created and written about, but [also] about four other authors.When I was asked to write the book, I said [to the people who have the rights to James Bond] ‘Well, I am very honored. Thank you so much. I will be happy to do it, but I have to write a Jeffery Deaver book…’ My books are very, very fast paced. They have a lot of reversal. I also said that I want the book to be set in the present day, because the original Bond books were set in the 1950s and 60s. And I thought that was too far removed. I wanted the Bond books to be in the forefront of today’s current events. But the one thing I was very aware of was that many of James Bond fans are very devoted to the character. And so, I was not going to do anything that made Bond different. It’s set in the present day, but he’s still a tough guy, he’s courageous, he’s very smart.”

How did you deal with the fact that the Bond films are known for portraying women in a sexist/objectified way?
“Absolutely true. I have been very conscious in all of my [novels] of equality on all fronts: ethnicity, gender, race, nationality. And, I tend to have villains who do not have that approach. In the Bond book for example, there are actually three very strong women characters…. I’ve been to South Africa where the book is set, and there has always been a history of racial discrimination, of course, with apartheid, but also of gender bias and discrimination. And so, in my Bond book, I was very clear to make sure that [the women in my book] were very strong. Bond could not have been successful in the book without the partnership of actually two women involved in the case.”

What is it like to see your novels adapted to the screen? How involved are you in that process?
“When I write, I try to tell my stories on the written page in a very short period of time, in a very graphic and visual way. So, therefore, you would think that I would like to be involved in making of movies. No. I don’t want to go through the trouble of coming up with an idea that I know is going to be good for my viewers, and then not see it or have it appear differently. So, I am not involved at all in the making of films. I am not involved in the translation of my things to the movies. But, having said that, I will add that I am delighted that I am able to see it up on a screen. I don’t care if it’s similar or different. I have nothing to do with the movie, and I love seeing characters say lines that I’ve written, but movies and books are two entirely different things….I would love a TV show…. [a 6-10] episode series is really the way to go.”

Are there other types of writing you enjoy doing besides novel writing?
“I did a book a couple of years ago that included an album of country western songs. That’s my book called ‘XO’ and the character is a young country western singer who’s being stalked by a crazy fan…. I thought because I used to be a singer songwriter a long time ago, that this would be a good chance to incorporate some music into the book…. So, I wrote an album and we recorded it in Nashville…. I [also] write poetry. Some poetry has appeared in [my] books, and I [sometimes also] write critical articles.”