Three-Time Edgar Award-winner and New York Times Bestselling Author T. Jefferson Parker
T. Jefferson Parker is the New York Times bestselling author of twenty-six novels, including Silent Joe and California Girl, both of which won the Edgar Award for best mystery. His next novel, A Thousand Steps, is due out from Forge in January 2022. When not writing, Jeff likes to fish in Baja, hike in San Diego and settle in for the evening with a good book.
Your latest book, A Thousand Steps (Forge Books) is a gripping thriller, an incisive coming-of-age story, and a vivid portrait of turbulent time and place. What was it like in approaching the coming-of-age and period piece aspects (1960s) of this novel?
Most of the novel I based on memory. I was fourteen-years old in 1968 so I experienced the strange, beguiling world of Laguna Beach as a very impressionable, wide-eyed, wonder-struck boy. When it came time to create a hero/protagonist for A Thousand Steps, I just aged myself—that fourteen-year old boy—into a sixteen-year old on the cusp of getting his driver's license, and let him take off in his mother's hippie van! The writing of the novel unleashed waves of memories, sensations, and experiences in me—from personal things that happened to me and my friends and brother and sister—to the huge events of 1968, like the assassinations of Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King; the Vietnam War; Nixon's campaign. Not to mention the music, the ubiquitous dope and LSD, the daft fashions. When you're a kid, those things are unforgettable. They form you.
What’s your creative process like? Any special rituals or practices?
I hit the office around 7 AM, Monday through Friday. Check the weather forecast (rarely exciting in San Diego), read the L.A. Times, start work. Mornings are best. I read through the previous day's work, pick up the scent and start typing. It's great if I'm mid-scene or at least mid-chapter, because it's obvious what to do next. I usually don't work on holidays or weekends. I always have a notebook and pen in my pocket, so when I'm not at the keyboard I can write down things that come to mind.
A Thousand Steps by T. Jefferson Parker (Forge Books)
In addition to other major trade/big five publishing houses, you’ve published with Macmillan in the past. It must feel like something of a homecoming to be back in the company of Macmillan with the Forge Books imprint. What has it been like in working with your editor Kristin Sevick and the team there?
Kristin Sevick is a strong and terrific editor; she really shaped this novel, which was a huge sprawl when she first got it. Right from the start she loved what I loved about that sprawl. It's so good to be published by a house that loves the work. St. Martin's/Macmillan did the same thing on my first book, Laguna Heat in 1985. They turned a first-timer's sprawl into a tight police thriller. Macmillan seems more interested in publishing strong novels than strictly conforming genre books. A Thousand Steps is just that.
How did you get your start in writing books? In understanding the human condition through characters, do you feel as though your background in journalism helped in this process? What do you feel the novel-form affords writers, over other writing mediums?
I've been a story-lover my whole life. Mom used to read to me in the crib, just to focus my attention and shut off my caterwauling. And it worked. Here, sixty-plus years later, I'm still an unrepentant story addict. My greatest inspiration to write is other writers. When I read the greats I'm uplifted by the artistry and the story. How can you read, say, A Hundred Years of Solitude, and not be changed and moved? Journalism teaches you to write fast and clearly and get the big stuff up top. To make deadlines! It also teaches you to ask tough questions, often at people who don't want to answer them.
“…the power of fiction…goes back to stone-age stories. We need this stuff, whether it's scratched onto the wall of a cave or hypnotizing us from a screen.”
What has it been like to see publishing go through so many transitions in recent years?
I was really bummed when so many of the bookstores closed. I miss them. By the time Amazon re-wrote the rules on how books are published and sold, I had a solid career and was able to make adjustments, as they say in sports. Throughout all the changes in publishing, terrific American fiction just keeps showing up. That goes to the power of fiction, which goes back to stone-age stories. We need this stuff, whether it's scratched onto the wall of a cave or hypnotizing us from a screen.
You may be the only author to be a New York Times bestseller and to have won three Edgar Awards, the highest distinction given to those in mystery/crime/thriller writing. How do you view this honor? Do you feel the obligation to be a supportive thriller writing community member?
I read lots of manuscripts and try to be helpful. I offer endorsements for books I really like. I've helped a number of writers get a literary agent and find a good publishers. In my forty-something career, I have received so many endorsements from other writers and I'm grateful for every one of them. So, I try to give back. As far as the Edgard Awards go, they are an honor and a delight. What makes them so valuable is that they are given by other writers. A jury of peers. It's awesome.
How did it feel when you first became a New York Times bestseller and had your book Laguna Heat, adapted for TV by HBO, and how did you manage to keep your feet on the ground?
I was so young and naive I thought that was how things always went!
Can you tell us what you are thinking of writing next?
It's a story about a woman and a dog. The woman is a young reporter, and she falls in love with a street dog in Mexico and "rescues" him. Turns out he's not the dog she's told he is!
“Take chances. You don't need to know the whole story before you start. Hit at the plate.”
Do you have any advice you could share for hopeful writers eager to become published authors?
You should read a lot of good books to see how it's done. Read up. Read the greats then move on. Read what inspires you. If you write just one page a day, a double-spaced page at that, you'll have a 365 page manuscript at the end of a year. Write fast and edit yourself later. Take chances. You don't need to know the whole story before you start. Hit at the plate.
Can you finish this sentence? I love reading because...
…reading gives me things I can't get anywhere else. For me, reading is the most immersive of all the arts. You work the hardest but you get the most. You get a second-by-second account of life as we know it, from the beginning of the Word on. You get the greatest newspaper ever published. Still being published!