Kylie Bryant has lived all her life in Iowa and says she spent so much of her waking life imagining stories and plots that she thought this was normal - that is, until she started asking other people about it and they looked at her funny. With a creative mind like that, and a voracious appetite for reading, it was bound to happen that she stepped over into writing. It wasn't long until she cut her teeth at romance novels. And now, some twenty-five published novels later, and three more lined up all the way to 2011, she's firmly rooting herself in the suspense genre with her new Mindhunter series. Waking Nightmare is published this month.Can you tell us a little more about the series?
Waking Nightmare is the first book, and The Mindhunters is a nickname given to Raiker Forensics, a private agency consisting of some of the best criminologists in the country. Headed by the legendary Adam Raiker, a former profiler for the FBI, they consult with law enforcement on particularly puzzling or high profile crimes. Each book deals with a different forensic specialist from the agency, although Raiker also makes a cameo appearance in each book.
The name Mindhunters most assuredly comes from John H. Douglas's classic autobiography: Mindhunter. Can you tell us a little more about the research that went into your books, especially Waking Nightmare?
I've read everything by Douglas, Ressler and Hazlewood over the years. Their books remain on my research shelves. Though I haven't been to Quantico, I have a friend who's been an FBI agent for nearly twenty years whom I pump mercilessly.
Each of the books required extensive research, which always includes reading several books on the topics covered, and talking to experts in the field. Over the course of my career I've spoken with many police personnel, a couple ex-CIA agents, ATF and DEA agents, a SWAT commander, hostage negotiators...usually different people for each book. For Waking The Dead, the third book in the series, a couple forensic anthropologists assisted me with details for my heroine who has the same occupation. I also crawled through several caves and hiked through the Willamette forest looking for the perfect place to hide bodies when I was researching that book!
I had a couple expert contacts for Waking Nightmare too. I spoke several times to a detective for the Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police Department to help with the procedural questions. He also gave me great descriptors of the historic police headquarters in that city. The forensic end was handled by a contact in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's Regional Crime lab. He answered all my questions about toxicology and transferring evidence.
Books provide background information, but I've found expert contacts are vital in order to ask the questions specific to my plots.
The novel is set in Savannah. It's a city I've always wanted to see for myself ever since I read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. What was it about the setting that got you thinking about placing your story there?
Savannah has always been on my places-to-see list because of its historic significance, architecture and eerie past. When I was researching possible settings for the book, I learned that the police headquarters there is the longest continually active police headquarters in the nation. Built in 1870, one exterior side remains true to its original form. Not to mention that it's located next to one of Savannah's reputedly haunted cemeteries! I didn't look any further; I knew I'd found the home for my story.
Do you want to give us a brief description of Waking Nightmare, in your own words?
Forensic profiler Abbie Phillips has more experience than she'd like getting into the heads of offenders similar to the one they're trailing. And she's equally adept at dealing with territorial cops like Ryne Robel. But this job comes with a couple complications: the unexpected appearance of her emotionally unstable sister and a totally inappropriate attraction to the lead detective on the task force.
What is it about this book that stands out from the other serial killer stories that line our bookshelves these days?
It's the villain and his motivation that sets this book apart. He's not a serial killer - he's a sadistic serial rapist and there's a great deal of psychological suspense to the story.
This villain doesn't seek the victims' deaths because he's decided that killing the victims lets them off too easy. He wants them to suffer by living a nightmare for the rest of their years. He's creepy enough to have given me a few bad nights while writing the book!
If you could have any two movie stars acting out the parts of Abbie, Ryne and the bad guy, who would they be and why?
Clive Owen would be perfect for Ryne - sort of damaged but with an unshakable integrity. Emma Watson captures Abbie's waifish qualities and Phillip Seymour Hoffman plays a terrifying villain.
And what's on the horizon?
Books 2 and 3 in the trilogy, Waking Evil and Waking The Dead, will be released in October and November. And I've just agreed to three more books in the series to be released in 2010 and 2011.
With all this writing, it's amazing that Kylie Bryant still gets time to teach special ed. She says writing during the school year is a bit difficult. When her kids were young she was out every night, going to their events and had time to write on the weekends. But it's flipped: now that they're all grown up, Kylie is home most weeknights and gone on the weekends which is the time she most likes to write. "I just have to make difficult choices sometimes," she says. "I usually try to get a chapter and a half done a week when I'm working. Even then I have to push it as deadline looms!"
Richard Kunzmann is the author of the acclaimed Harry Mason-Jacob Tshabalala detective series, set in South Africa. BLOODY HARVESTS, his first novel, was shortlisted for the CWA's J.W Creasy Award for best new novel.
