fiction

Q&A with Lee Lamothe, author of Free Form Jazz

Tell us about your book.
People doing what people do.

How did you come up with the idea for this work?
Someone told me about cops doing surveillance on a camper van and, ahead on the road, it exploded because it was a drug lab on wheels.

How did you come up with the title?
I think most of what anyone does is free form jazz. There’s an artistic facet even to police work and interrogations. No one actually knows what they’re doing much of the time. You engage in motion and hope it becomes action. Writing a novel is like falling down a flight of stairs.

Tell us a little about the overarching theme of your work, and why you felt compelled to explore it.
Folks say I write crime stuff but I write relationship stuff. Characters just happen to be cops or crooks.

Did you have a specific readership in mind when you wrote your book?
No.

How did you research your book?
Stumbling around talking to people.

What was the creative process like for you?
There’s no creative process: you just write and let the story and characters take you where they want to go.

Describe your ideal writing environment.
My writing room, my cats, my wine, my Chicago blues and my smokes. Night-time while my wife sleeps.

What was the hardest part of writing your book?
Not starting another one in the middle of it because the characters needed their own book.

What was your first publication?
Toe poems under another name in around 1969-1970.

What inspired you to write your first book?
Needed the dough; non-fiction.

In your own work, which character are you most attached to, and why?
All, because they’re all based on folks I know and I love them all, even the minor characters.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever received as a writer?
Write out your outline in about 17 words as if it was a movie synopsis in the TV Guide. Stick to it but don’t be stupid about it.

Describe the most memorable response you’ve received from a reader.
“It hit my sweet spot.” Whatever that is.

Has a review or profile ever changed your perspective on your work?
No. Bad reviews are by goofs; good reviews are by smart, intelligent, canny experts.

Who did you read as a young adult?
Couldn’t read without moving my lips until in my teens.

What are you reading right now?
My new manuscript. I don’t read good stuff because it shows my shortcomings; I don’t read bad stuff because it frustrates me.

What is your next project?
Sequels to Free Form Jazz and The Finger’s Twist, a trilogy called Murder Town, a novel called The Act of Christian Winter, a novel called Celly’s Frame, and a novel called Flowers.

Lee Lamothe is the author of several non-fiction books, including the bestsellers The Sixth Family: The Collapse of the New York Mafia and Bloodlines: The Rise and Fall of Mafia’s Royal Family. His previous crime novel was The Last Thief. A journalist known for his investigations into the seamy underworld of organized crime, he travels widely in Asia and Europe from his base in Toronto.

© 2010 Defining Canada.