John Baker again

Here is the second part of my interview with John Baker about his new book, Winged With Death.

Martin: One of the differences between us that I mentioned is your love
of dancing. Whereas I have two left feet. The tango plays an important
part in your book - was that part of your original plan for the novel,
or something that developed as you wrote?

John: I have wanted to use dance as a metaphore for some time, so it was
part of the original plan. It fitted this time because of the location
of the action. The River Plate is where the tango was born in that
critical period around the 1880s. The original maetaphore was coined by
the tanguerros; the leader was immigrant washed up on the shores of this
strange land, while the follower was the land itself. The dance was
about the settlement of the immigrant, the acceptance of the immigrant
by the land, the battle of each against the other and the knowledge that
each needed the input of the other.

For my own purposes, although this original metaphor was almways in the
background, was about communication. It was still about a fight, of
course, because that is what literature is always about, but it was about
reconcilliation as well. And it was there to temper and to modify and to
echo some of the other themes in the novel.

Martin: The book is, in part, set in Montevideo. Yet you've never been
to Uruguay. Of course, you did quite a bit of research, but what
prompted you to write about a real geographical location that you've
never visited?

John: I dreamed about Montevideo. I woke up one morning and realised
that I'd just returned from a night-long trip to Montevideo. I could
still smell it, I could see the colours and hear the sounds of a South
American city in the late sixties/early seventies. I thought I would
have to go there, to visit to make sure that I got everything right. But
then I realised that it could just as easily remain as a dreamscape. I
did the research. I spoke with others who knew the city with some
intimacy. I made sure that I got it right while all the time being aware
that in a very real sense it didn't matter. I was anyway playing with
the concepts of time, why not include those of space as well?
And now, when all that work has been done, do I want to go to Montevideo?
To have a look, to measure perhaps how right or wrong my idea of it was?
It's a place I love. I don't want to give myself an excuse to change it.

Martin: It might be said that one of the themes of the book is 'denial'.
Do you agree, and if so, what fascinates you about denial?

John: In terms of denial in the book, it is one of those themes I
mentioned earlier, which contrast with the theme of dance. Because
denial is an active emotion. It keeps you on the move, keeps you running
away. Whereas dance, in a very real sense is about the moment, and the
moment is about stillness.
What is fascinating about denial is that it represents the modern dilema.
Everyone is hurtling through time with pretensions of permanence; becoming
precious about rock climbing, the razor-edge of a blade, Jesus or
Mohammed. They believe the obsessions of those around them to be founded
on illusion.
That millions of Americans, sophisticated people in many other respects,
can block out all the evidence and assert that some simple controls over
the sales of guns will not affect the stats on the death rate from
firearms accidents, school-room killings, etc., is only one example of the
place of denial in the society in which we live.
There is also the concept of Holocaust denial which is fought against by
the Israeli's, who in turn are in denial about their own State’s murderous
policies in relationship to the Palestinians.
And on a personal level it's exactly the same. Denial is a defense
mechanism in which a person is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable
to accept and rejects it instead, insisting that it is not true despite
what may be overwhelming evidence.
A man told that his wife is dead may refuse to believe it, setting the
table for her and keeping her clothes and other belongings in the bedroom.
A woman having an affair may not think about pregnancy or sexually
transmitted diseases.
People usually take credit for their successes and find 'good reasons' for
their failures, often blaming the situation or other people.
Alcoholics and drug users often deny that they have a problem.
Optimists deny that things may go wrong. Pessimists deny they may succeed.
There have been many documented cases of people refusing treatment for a
terminal disease because they do not believe it is happening to the. They
would rather die than accept reality. And they do.

Martin: What was the starting point for your writing of this book?

John: I can't honestly say. My starting point is always thematic. I'm
not interested in plot. The themes which converged around Winged with
Death were time, tango, denial, revolution and abduction.

Martin: Your prose is extremely well-crafted. I'd like to think that
this is the product of endless painful revision, and suffering for your
art, rather than effortless, otherwise the envy wouldn't be easy to
control! Do you write many drafts, and how long did the book take to
write?

John: My first drafts are not very inspiring. Writing, for me, is about
rewriting. About revision and rewriting. I don't go through a fixed
number of drafts, but there are always more than I expected.
Winged with Death took a long time. Around two and a half to three years.
The best part of the experience was the editing. Lots of things came
together then. While I was writing it seemed as though the connections
weren't always there; only in the editing stage did everything fall into
place.

Martin: And did you enjoy the writing process?

John: Yes. Writing is the one thing in my life I always enjoy. Even when
I hate it. When it's absolutely impossible I still manage to hang on,
not go insane, kep the faith. Every time something doesn't work I know
it's only like that as a trial of strength. I only have to close my eyes
and hang in there and it'll all come together.

Martin: You have been blogging for some years, and to much acclaim.
What, for you, is the appeal of blogging? And does it get in the way of
your other writing?

John: Blogging does get in the way of my other writing. But it's part of
my day now. It's a way of communicating with my readers, and with other
writers; it's a way of publishing stray thoughts and irritations and
freeing myself up for the main job of writing another novel. If I didn't
blog I'd have to invent some other way of avoiding the beginning of
another novel.
Blogging is my way of sharpening my pencils, of getting ready to do
something else.

Martin: And finally, what next for John Baker the writer?

John: I'm writing a novel set among the people who left Europe for
America during the middle part of the 19th century. I suppose it's a
kind of quest novel. America is the grail; and the question, or one of
the questions, might be: when you find the grail, what then? When you
find it and collect it up and it ceases to be a quest and becomes
instead a possession, are we actually better off?


So there you have it. I'm not sure I agree with John that it's not a crime novel - in fact, one aspect of the story has a faint echo of a famous Christie mystery. But what can be said for sure is that it's an intensely readable and very rewarding piece of work from a polished writer with a worldview that I find fascinating, even though (or maybe because) it is very different from my own. Recommended.

Winged With Death

I first met John Baker through the Northern Chapter of the Crime
Writers' Association, and he and I were later invited by Margaret Murphy
to form the seven-strong collective of northern crime writers called
Murder Squad. I was in on John's crime writing career
from the outset, when I read and enjoyed his first book, Poet in the Gutter, introducing Sam Turner

John has become a noted blogger, but it's been some time since he last published a novel. Now, he's back with something rather different, a notable novel published by
Flambard Press and called Winged with Death. We talked though cyberspace: here's the conversation - which continues tomorow.

Martin: I'm not sure you would describe Winged with Death as a crime
novel, though I tend to think the genre is elastic enough to accommodate
it. Not that it matters - the important point is that it's a really good
book. And very different from those of your other books that I've read.
Was it a deliberate choice to write 'something completely different'?


John: I don't think Winged with Death is a crime novel. There is a crime
in it, probably several, but it isn't a crime novel because it makes no
nods to the conventions of the genre. One of the inspirations for the
novel came from looking at the works of people like JB Priestley and HG
Wells, Orwell as well, those writers who were concerned with the nature
of time. The initial idea was to write a novel about time and it was
that that gave me the impetus to internalise the process, to take it to
bed with me and to begin mulling over the ways that I might approach it,
consciously and sub consciously. Many of the elements of the novel first
came to me in dreams, the location for instance, and the idea of using
the narrative like a dance, moving the reader this way and that, setting
her spinning for a while and then bringing her to a kind of stasis. I
use the word dance with some insight, meaning its ability to communicate
rather than manipulate.

I was also determined to write a novel in the first-person. All of my
previous novels were written in the third person (one partially in the
second-person) and, as a writer, I needed to come to grips with a
first-person narrative for my own satisfaction.
So the answer to your question is yes. Winged with Death is something
completely different to anything I have attempted before, and it was
always going to be that.

Martin; You'd probably agree that we are very different writers (in
fact, you may be very glad about that!) Yet I like to think that there
are some points of similarity between us. One is that our latest books
represent a significant departure from our previous work - although
writing up the life of Dr Crippen is a temporary departure from
contemporary crime in my case. Winged with Death, like Dancing for the
Hangman, is published by Flambard. How did you find the experience of
working with a smaller publisher after years with Orion?


John: I only ever had one good editor at Orion, and that was Mike Petty,
so it was good to work again with someone who actually liked my work. My
later editors at Orion were people who inherited me and we didn't work
together over a project for which we shared a passion. We worked around
something which actually divided us rather than united us, and I was
asked more than once if I could write like (this months popular author)
or (the current projection for next year's breakthrough darling).
I suppose there must be people who are prepared to prostitute themselves
in this way; but it was never going to be a possibility for me.
Working with Flambard was good because the general attitude was 'how can
we make a good manuscript better', and that is something I've always been
happy to go along with.

Continues tomorrow....

Flambard News

My Murder Squad colleague John Baker wrote a number of warmly reviewed crime novels in the 90s, but in recent years he has become well-known as a leading blogger. I'm glad to say, though, that he's returned to novel-writing, and his new book, Winged with Death, is due to be published in March. More about this in due course.

John's book is published by Flambard Press, as is my latest, Dancing for the Hangman. Flambard have an interesting and eclectic list; they publish poetry, but also, on occasion, such prominent names in the crime fiction world as Val McDermid and H.R.F. Keating, and they are great to work with. I'm glad to say, too, that they have just let me know that Dancing for the Hangman is going into a reprint. Good news, which I find rather encouraging.