The 7th Victim is latest from Alan Jacobson

How do you conduct your research for the books?  Do you get any help from the FBI?  Police?  Forensics experts?

 

I consult all three entities, and more. Research is very important to me--and consequently, to my novels. I learned that lesson in a college writing workshop course I took (as part of my English major) more years ago than I care to count. It wasn't until I returned to writing creatively that I understood the lesson I'd learned years earlier.

 

Here's the thing: although I write fiction, the fiction part only comprises the story that I dream up. The rest is as factual as I can make it. Those facts prop up the fictional aspects, make them real and credible.

 

There's a long story as to how I got involved with the FBI, but for purposes of brevity, I met Special Agent Mark Safarik in early 1994 at a class on blood spatter pattern analysis. Afterwards, we stayed in close contact and he was subsequently promoted to the profiling unit in Quantico. We would spend hours on end talking about profiling and serial offenders. Agent Safarik had been "bitten" by the profiling bug a dozen years earlier and it became his goal to make it to the Bureau's Behavioral Analysis Unit. Behavioral analysis (or "criminal profiling") really got his juices flowing. And after learning about profiling, I realized I'd caught that bug, too. After the initial background check, the FBI allowed me to tour the Academy, where the profiling unit was housed, for the first of many trips.

 

Did you have any trouble getting access to the inner workings of the FBI?

 

I've never had any problems getting into the Hoover Building (FBI headquarters), the Washington Metro Field Office, etc. I'm a known entity to them. As to other police departments, I simply explain who I am, that I've worked with a lot of police departments and sheriff's offices, as well as the FBI, and they're always willing to answer my questions. There's one police lieutenant in Virginia who went so far as to take photos and interview people on my behalf, after I'd returned to California, for additional information I found I needed for The 7th Victim.

 

As a result, I've received emails from readers who are cops, attorneys, chemical weapons facility lieutenants in the Army, armorers...professionals in so many fields...telling me that I got it right and that they appreciate it. In fact, Special Agent Safarik, who was so instrumental in helping me understand his world of profiling and serial offenders, told me I'd gotten The 7th Victim "spot-on." For nearly 15 years, he's signed his emails to me "Knee Deep in the Blood and Guts." He started doing it as a reminder to "get things right," because he does this stuff "for real," even though I'm writing about it fictionally. He's tracking real killers, dealing with real victims. He has to view the crime scene and autopsy photos, the videos these offenders make of their handiwork, and he has to absorb it all emotionally. So if I were to "make stuff up" or read some books and muddle through it and mangle the subject matter, I wouldn't be portraying profilers or the killers accurately. I'd be cheapening what he does--and not respecting the victims.

 

How has the reaction been from women readers?

 

Wow. It's been very strong. Here's why: Vail is doing a job that's not normally done by a woman. I've worked with the real female FBI profiler (Agent Safarik's partner, Special Agent O'Toole) to understand what issues Agent O'Toole faces, specifically what it's like being a female agent in a male dominated unit (and agency). So, again, having credibility with your readers is important. In some respects, the issues Karen Vail faces aren't unlike what women in the real world face in predominantly male business settings. While Vail's issues are dramatized (not many women would take the actions she takes), they live vicariously through her--they want to be able to do what she does on the pages. For a variety of reasons (wanting to keep your job being the first), those in the real world have to be more restrained in their response.

 

I also explore Vail's personal life during the course of the story; it's part of the plot because it's a part of Vail as an individual. She deals with an abusive ex-husband, wrestles with issues involving her teenage son, and confronts her mother, who's suffering from Alzheimer's. Oh, and has a love interest that, in a sense, is all wrong. So we see the tough side of Karen Vail, FBI agent, but we also see the personal side of her as she struggles with how to deal with all of this. It's the juggle of life--it's what we all have to deal with on some level and because of that, the reaction from female readers (and male) has been tremendous. Let's not leave the men out of that equation: Vail may be a woman, but ultimately she's a human being. And male or female, we take the ride with her, as she navigates all these problems while trying to do her job. Because if she falters, if these personal issues weigh too much on her, and she isn't sharp on her job, more women will die.

 

Your teenage years were turbulent...discuss the impact they had on the realism of your writing.

 

Hmm, well, there are many people who had much more turbulent teenage years than I did, and I wouldn't presume to compare mine to theirs. To me, as a young person in a difficult situation, what I experienced was significant. When I was attending junior high school in New York, I was part of a "forced integration" experiment in which teens from one ethnicity were bused into schools in predominantly other ethnic neighborhoods. It was a volatile situation. Police cars were often parked out front. There were riots, hallway incidents, threats, and beatings. Violence was, it seemed, a daily occurrence. So my junior high experience was not filled with youthful exuberance. Now, there are a lot of directions someone can go from this point. Fortunately, I learned a great deal from it and grew as an individual. I remember having a large group meeting with a counselor the high school brought in, a year after the fact, to talk with the student body about race relations. I remember volunteering to stand up to speak about how the experience had changed me and how I'd mentally worked through it. I think back now on what I said, and am proud of how I had processed the situation and the conclusions I drew about the good in people.

Ultimately, I saw a realism in the world that a lot of people never get to experience. They read about it, but it's not the same as living through it, the day-to-day fear, of not knowing what's going to happen next, all while struggling to process why it's happening. I learned not to judge masses of people based on the actions of a small population, and I learned how to deal with adversity. I'm sure that experience shaped my general approach to confronting problems as an adult--dealing with them rather than running from them.

 

All experiences an author has shapes his writing, whether he's aware of it or not. These happenings shape us as individuals, they add to the collective database we all store in our brains of what we've observed and lived through. We learn how to process these experiences, and we learn how to respond. Some of it is conscious. A lot is subconscious. But they shape who we are as people, and it's the same brain that writes the books.

 

On your website you mention that you're most proud of The 7th Victim.  Why?

 

I love the novel, I love the story, I love the characters. As a writer, it's dangerous to fall in love with your work, because when it comes time to cut (always necessary at some point), it can be tough to edit out things you like. But I'm able to put on my "distance cap" and step away and look at it objectively.

But I think that because I found the profiling and serial offender material so fascinating, and because I have this innate connection with Karen Vail, I was able to sink my teeth into the story. I've also spent so many years researching the material and working with the profilers, that it's become a part of my life. It doesn't always happen that way--when you're on deadline, you just can't spend this time with a project. The experiences I've had while doing the research, the things I've seen and learned, have shaped me in ways I was totally unprepared for. All this translated into a novel I can't wait for my readers to experience. And based on the response thus far, which has been fantastic, I was successful.     

 

There are rumors that The 7^th Victim has been shopped around in Hollywood.  Any news?

 

Yes, it's sold....and it's also the first thing I've sold to Hollywood, so that's pretty special, too. Thus far, that's been a very positive and exciting experience. Because it's Hollywood, you never know if the movie will be made, but it's been a fun ride.

 

You've racked up some hefty quotes from top bestsellers, many of whom are ITW members. 

 

One thing about those quotes: I never ask for a quote unless the author is going to write the truth. I wouldn't want to be put in a position to blurb a book that doesn't resonate with me--I don't want to write something with my name on it that I don't truly believe. So I'd never ask someone to do that for me. I happen to know that those who endorsed The 7th Victim truly felt what they wrote, based on what they said in letters or emails that weren't part of the blurbs.

 

ITW members are known for being very supportive.  Have you found that to be the case?

 

I think the ITW is a fantastic support network--and a quality organization. Though it's young, it's accomplished a tremendous amount for its members, and that's a testament to the leadership. I've served on boards, some good and some not so good, and what gets accomplished in an organization is a direct result of the leadership and its vision. So the success of ITW did not happen by accident. I don't know if a lot of people truly understand that.

 

You've put Karen Vail into some pretty tough spots.  What's your process for creating and sustaining tension?

 

First, I think tension has to be real, not forced. If it's not plausible, the reader rolls her eyes rather than going along and feeling what your character feels. That, to me, is the key: engaging the reader emotionally. If you don't create a character that the reader identifies with on some level, if they don't care what happens to the character, then I haven't done my job as an author. I need to bring the reader along with me on the character's journey. If I do that, and if I put my characters in appropriate predicaments and circumstances, the reader will feel the tension the character feels.

 

In terms of sustaining tension, it's all in the pacing. You can't stay at the top of a rollercoaster for more than a few seconds because it gets boring after the initial rush of the climb. So you have to descend, which then puts you in a valley preparing for the next rise, the next rush. Tension, suspense is like that: you need the lulls to make the highs that much more interesting. If you try to keep the tension high for too long, the reader burns out and the suspense is no longer effective.

 

So...what's next for Alan Jacobson?

 

My grandmother has always said: 'We plan and God laughs'. Not to imply that the publisher and booksellers are godlike (though some authors may agree with that simile)--but they do, in a sense, guide what you write. That means that if you have a character that resonates with readers, the booksellers are going to see sales figures from that character's novels. Thus they want another novel with that character, figuring they're going to get similar sales figures (with growth) from further installments in that "series."

Due to the tremendous response we've had to Karen Vail, the plan, at present, is to write another Karen Vail novel. Originally, I figured my next novel would be Hard Target, a thriller that's ready to go and which has also been sold for film to an A-list Hollywood producer. They've lined up an A-list screenwriter and the process is moving forward. So this is the part where God laughs. "Not so fast," the all-knowing book industry said. "This Karen Vail dudette is pretty compelling, so we want another adventure with Vail first."

So I think we're going to see the return of Karen Vail.

 

Followed by Hard Target?

 

Yes; and Hard Target is another novel I'm excited about because of a new character I developed who, like Vail, has his share of problems.

 

Where can readers get up to the minute new on Karen Vail and Alan Jacobson?

 

You can always find out by checking my website (www.AlanJacobson.com). Simply put: more novels, of course. More adventures that take the reader to a place she'll enjoy visiting, to a point where she'll close my latest book, slam her hand down on the table and say, "That was great! When's Jacobson's next novel coming out?"

 

Jonathan Maberry is the multiple Bram Stoker Award-winning author of ZOMBIE CSU: The Forensics of the Living Dead (Citadel Press) and the forthcoming PATIENT ZERO (St. Martins Press, March 2009).  He's the co-creator/consulting producer of ON THE SLAB, a genre entertainment news show in development at ABC Disney.  His author website is www.jonathanmaberry.com