The Secret Of Excalibur by Andy McDermott

Andy, you burst on the thriller novel writing scene so recently that we've had little time to get to know you (yet). We hope this interview will begin to turn that around. How did it happen? How did you appear so suddenly, so meteorically, with so much story to tell?

My career so far has been one of those overnight successes... that took several years! I've been writing novels for about a decade, but it wasn't until 2006 that I made my first sale with The Hunt For Atlantis (the ninth novel I'd written) - and it wasn't published in the UK until late 2007. That gave me the time to complete the second book in the series, and start work on the third. Since then I've been writing two books a year, and because the series wasn't published in the States until late 2009, with the first four books coming out in very quick succession, it's seemed like a very rapid rise. In reality, though, it's been a long time coming.

Andy, Bantam Dell is releasing your thriller The Secret of Excalibur in March 2010. You've been a film critic and magazine editor, as well as cartoonist, graphic designer, and video game reviewer. Please describe how these (and any other significant) jobs created the ramp for your career as a novelist.

I was a journalist and magazine editor for about ten years, and I think that was terrific training for being a novelist: it taught me how to write quickly and economically. Becoming an editor taught me another skill - how to rewrite! Writing is the fun, right-brain part, but editing, while a lot less enjoyable, is equally important. Do I need this scene, this line, this word? If not, then change it, or preferably cut it. As an editor, I got pretty good at spotting and deleting padding and, if anything, I try to be even more ruthless with my own work.

In the end, though, while in my journalistic career I got to do cool things like be flown first-class to Hollywood to hang out on the set of Friends and interview celebrities (James Cameron, George Lucas, Jerry Bruckheimer and Patrick Stewart are at the top of my name-dropping list), I realised that rather than just report on other people's work, I wanted to create my own stories. I'd been writing fiction in my spare time, and found I was enjoying it vastly more than writing for my job. So in 2004, much to everyone's surprise, I quit to write novels full-time. I hadn't made a sale - I didn't even have an agent. I just had my (meagre) life savings and a load of ideas, and the plan of writing until I sold a novel... or ran out of money. As it turned out, I came very, very close to the latter - beans-on-toast for dinner four nights a week close - but then Headline (Headline Publishing Group, London, U.K.) bought The Hunt For Atlantis, and my life completely changed.

Please tell us about archaeologist Nina Wilde and her fiancé, former SAS bodyguard Eddie Chase. What are their personalities and backgrounds individually, and how did their chemistry lead them to becoming engaged?

When I created Nina and Eddie for the first book (at the time, I had no thoughts of it turning into a series), I wanted to get away from the genre cliché of the tall, square-jawed hero with multiple doctorates who can do everything from fly a helicopter to identify the vintage of a wine with a mere sniff of the cork, and 'the girl', who's there solely to be rescued and be the hero's sexual prize at the end. So I made Nina the character who drives the entire story, following in the footsteps of her parents who died while searching for Atlantis - but while she's an expert in one field, archaeology, this bookish specialisation means that she's naive and inexperienced in others. Which was where Eddie came in, to handle what she couldn't: the physical action. As a former member of the UK's Special Air Service, which is arguably the world's top special forces regiment, he's more than up to the task. (Another genre cliché is for British characters to be effete intellectuals and Americans two-fisted blue collar brawlers, so I flipped the nationalities. Although it led to an embarrassing moment when I was talking to another author at a publishing event and ridiculed the cliché, only for him to say, 'You've just described my main characters...')
But I didn't want Eddie to be a standard hero, so I made him squat, balding, not especially handsome, uncouth, and not quite as smart as he thinks he is! He tends to rush into situations acting purely on instinct. So Nina balances out that aspect of him. She's the brain, he's the brawn, and together they can achieve things neither could on their own. They make a good team - although they don't always work together smoothly.

What I've found quite surprising is that despite Eddie having been deliberately created to be unlike the usual hero type, and even though he displays several negative aspects of his personality over the series, a lot of women absolutely love him! I've received many an email from female fans saying that he's their idea of the perfect man. I think it's partly because beneath all his rough edges he's still a romantic at heart, partly because he'll go through anything to protect the people he cares about, and partly just because he's a funny guy.

When Headline bought The Hunt For Atlantis, it was as part of a two-book deal, so I jumped at the chance to bring back Nina and Eddie in The Tomb Of Hercules and build on their relationship. Yet another cliché of the genre is that the hero and 'the girl' get together at the end of one book, only for her to have vanished completely from his life by the time the next story rolls round so that he can move on to a new conquest, and I definitely wanted to avoid that. (I can't help wondering if it's vicarious wish-fulfillment on the part of male, married authors...)

What is the general story arc over your series of novels? Or is there a consistent one? Some authors have written series with the same characters, who 'go off on holiday,' to use the British expression, and are plunged into adventures in the mysterious countryside of the U.K. Their relationship may be warm and fun, but essentially static. Other authors write on a developing arc. That can play out two ways. Either the characters develop from novel to novel, or there is an overarching plot that carries on from book to book--or both. How do you see your series?

There is a definite arc to Nina and Eddie's relationship, which I've planned out up to Book #8. Actually, it's shaped less like an arc than a roller coaster! The seventh and eighth books in particular are going to put them through some very tough times, but they have clashes throughout the series.

It would have been very easy just to have got Nina and Eddie together at the end of The Hunt For Atlantis and have their relationship from then on remain perfect and unchanging as they went on other adventures around the world, but to be honest having all the conflict be external would have been pretty boring to write. Even the closest couples fight in times of stress, and considering what Nina and Eddie endure it would be unrealistic for them to remain understanding and lovey-dovey all the time!

In terms of plot, the individual stories - each of which revolves around finding some great archaeological or mythological treasure - all stand alone, but there are various threads that run through them. Book #8 will pull together some elements that have been around since as long ago as the first novel. I've had the subject of that story in mind for a couple of years now, and it's big: the stakes will be so huge that I couldn't use it any earlier, as it would have been a case of 'Well, how do I follow that?' (Mind you, I thought the same after writing the fourth book, The Covenant Of Genesis, and the series is still going...)

Can you tell us a little more about the storyline of your upcoming third novel, The Secret Of Excalibur, and how it affects the lives of your heroes?

As the title suggests, the third book in the series has a background of Arthurian mythology, with the murder of a family friend leading Nina into a search across the world for the tomb of King Arthur and his legendary sword Excalibur, as well as trying to figure out why a Russian billionaire is willing to kill to obtain it. But I also wanted to open up the characters and show new sides of them as the series goes on, so in The Tomb Of Hercules we met Eddie's ex-wife Sophia, and in this book we meet his family, with whom he has a rather fractious relationship for reasons that are revealed over the course of the story.

As with all my books, though, there's an enormous amount of action, which gets bigger and faster and crazier as it goes on. I had particular fun writing The Secret Of Excalibur, because I set part of it in the town where I live! The idea of running a massive Hollywood-style car chase with lots of chaos and destruction through the prim seaside surrounds of Bournemouth was absolutely irresistible. But the story takes Nina and Eddie to plenty of rather more exotic locations, everywhere from the Syrian desert to an Alpine castle to an old Soviet submarine base in the Arctic Circle. And, of course, the tomb of King Arthur himself.

How have you developed as a writer from one book to the next? Have your characters and your story or stories grown with you?

From a technical perspective, I think I've developed a leaner, faster writing style, and can fit more action into fewer words than when I began. I've also become more merciless in the editing stage, slicing out anything that doesn't drive the story forward. (Except for the jokes and awful puns.)

Nina's probably grown more than Eddie over the course of the series; to begin with, she was introverted, fixated on her work to the exclusion of everyday social life, uptight, and while not lacking in self-confidence was decidedly passive-aggressive about it! Over time, she's become much more open and personable... although her obsessive nature is still there. The difference now is that Eddie won't hesitate to call her on it.

Eddie hasn't changed as much, but he's still developed as a character with Nina's help... however reluctantly! Some of his more abrasive edges have been smoothed off, and as he's got older he's realised that he isn't as perfect and invincible as his ego would like to believe. At heart, though, he's still the same: a mouthy knight in slightly battered armour.

Overall, my storytelling's become bigger and more confident as I've gone on. I would never have been able to write something as epic as The Covenant Of Genesis when I started out, or the relationship of the two villainous brothers in The Cult Of Osiris. Writing a series also makes things easier, as the cast become familiar old friends; not just Eddie and Nina, but recurring characters like Mac and Matt Trulli and Sophia. Once I get them together, they almost write themselves.

Any sign of movie adaptations? Will you write the screenplay? Given your long-term interest in film, you probably have more than once thought about this.

There's been some interest from Hollywood, but nobody's bought the movie rights yet - I suspect because filming the books as written would be enormously expensive! Having been peripherally involved in the film business as a journalist and critic, I'm under no illusions that 'the movie' I see in my head when I write a book would even remotely resemble what might end up on screen, but I'd still love it to happen. People keep suggesting Jason Statham to play Eddie; he's not a Yorkshireman, but he certainly looks the part, so I could go for that!

The British may be accused of inventing the modern thriller, whose beginnings as such I associate with Eric Ambler. Before that, John Buchan's 1915 The 39 Steps, made into a 1935 Alfred Hitchcock movie by the same name. And of course Ian Fleming's James Bond series, and so on. How do you see yourself fitting into that tradition?

One of my biggest early influences was Alistair MacLean - I love Where Eagles Dare (as does Eddie, funnily enough...) and I still have the battered paperback copy that I first read in my early teens! I also rediscovered Fleming fairly recently and thoroughly enjoyed his Bond novels, even while having to accept the casual racism and misogyny as a byproduct of their time.

But I don't know how well my books fit into the current archetype of the 'British thriller', which mostly seems to involve alcoholic policemen with terrible personal lives! I actually wrote a couple of novels along those lines; my agent said he thought they were good, but - in his words - 'a bit small-scale and parochial'. So I looked shamelessly towards Hollywood as inspiration for my next story... which was The Hunt For Atlantis. I suppose the Wilde/Chase series could be considered something of an homage to the globetrotting adventurism of MacLean and Fleming, but with 21st century sensibilities.

Name your favorite three (or pick a number) novels and tell us what has grabbed you about them over a long period. What genres do you read most?

I'll probably be accused of philistinism by admitting this, but since I started writing full-time I haven't read nearly as many novels as I used to. When I'm working on the first draft of a story, which can take anything up to two months, I don't read fiction at all because I don't want to be influenced by other authors' styles, even subconsciously. Then for the next two months, while I'm in 'edit mode', I find myself spending more time picking faults in whatever I'm reading than enjoying it! So that only gives me a fairly short window to catch up on my reading before the cycle starts again. I've got a stack of hardbacks that's been building up like geological strata - I bought the one at the bottom over a year ago, and I still haven't got round to reading it!

My favourite novel is undoubtedly Joseph Heller's Catch-22, which I do find the time to re-read every couple of years, and I always find something new in it. It's an amazing book. The genre that I read the most at the moment, though, is perhaps predictably the one in which I write: the adventure thriller. A certain amount of it could be described as 'checking on the competition', to make sure I'm not covering the same ground in overall themes or specific ideas - a friend of mine is another British thriller author, Scott Mariani, who recently jokingly complained that I'd beaten him to the punch of using a Winnebago as an unlikely getaway vehicle in a car chase! But I also enjoy the genre, obviously, and always pick up the latest James Rollins and Matthew Reilly novels.

Name your favorite three (or pick a number) films and tell us what has grabbed you about them over a long period. Do you have any particular genre you like best?

My DVD collection is dominated by action and thriller movies, which considering the kind of novels I write probably isn't surprising! Picking three favourites is tough, so I'll have to cheat and make it four...

1: Aliens (James Cameron, 1986) - as a complete package of sustained tension, fear and sheer adrenalin and exhilaration, I think it'll be tough for anything ever to top this in my estimation.

2: Raiders Of The Lost Ark (Steven Spielberg, 1981) - a masterclass in pure escapist entertainment. The truck chase is, in my opinion, the single finest action sequence ever filmed, and when I'm writing my own action scenes I'm always thinking, 'What can I do to make this as exciting as the Raiders truck chase?'

3=: North By Northwest (Alfred Hitchcock, 1959) - brilliant, even after half a century. Its tone is something I've aimed for with my own stories - it isn't quite tongue-in-cheek or actively winking at the audience, but it still has a knowing lightness that lets it get away with the progressively more outrageous incidents and twists.

3=: Die Hard (John McTiernan, 1988) - the action thriller as precision instrument. There isn't a single wasted moment; everything fits together as perfectly as a Swiss watch to propel you to the climax.

According to your website, you've so far written six novels in the series. The first was published in 2007 (The Hunt for Atlantis) and became a New York Times bestseller in 2009. It was followed by The Tomb of Hercules (U.S. publication 2009), and The Covenant of Genesis (U.K. publication 2009). This year you are releasing the U.S. publications of The Secret of Excalibur, The Covenant of Genesis and The Pyramid of Doom (U.K.'s The Cult of Osiris). Perhaps next year, we'll see the U.S. publication of The Sacred Vault. Do you plan to keep up this intense rate of production? What are your plans for the coming year? For the next few years? For your future career?

I'd like to keep doing two books a year, but it's likely that the schedule will slip a bit in 2010; work on the sixth book, which I only recently delivered, was delayed for over two months for reasons beyond my control, obviously having a knock-on effect on everything following it. But I'll be working on another two Wilde/Chase novels this year, bringing the total to eight. After that, if my UK publishers, Headline, want more Nina and Eddie adventures, I'll be happy to do them - they're great fun! But I also have ideas for new characters and stories that I'd like to try, so we'll see.

Born in Halifax, U.K., and a graduate of Keele University, Andy now lives in Bournemouth, where he works as a full-time writer. Previously, he was a journalist and editor of such magazines as DVD Review and the iconoclastic film publication Hotdog, where he says his lifelong love of movies (and vast knowledge of movie trivia) finally became a useful job skill. He has also worked as a cartoonist, graphic designer, and videogame reviewer, and has written for the award-winning British sci-fi comic 2000AD.

When not writing, Andy enjoys watching movies (no surprise there) and Formula 1, and relaxing in the evenings with one more glass of wine than is probably good for him.

John T. Cullen writes fiction and nonfiction. He is the author of A WALK IN ANCIENT ROME, Revised Second Edition (Sep 2009; nonfiction/ancient history); LETHAL JOURNEY (Sep 2009, dark thriller based on a true 1892 crime/ghost story); UMNITSA (WW2 espionage thriller); THE GENERALS OF OCTOBER (suspense: what if we had a Second Constitutional Convention?); and nearly two dozen other books. Visit http://www.johntcullen.com/.