‘So What’s the Mystery?’
A Q & A with Sara Gran, Faber’s newest crime author, discussing her new novel City of the Dead.
Faber’s Angus Cargill does the grilling…
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Introducing the ‘world’s best private investigator’…
New Orleans, and Vic Willing, Assistant District Attorney for the prosecutor’s office, has been missing since Hurricane Katrina hit. Called in from San Francisco is Claire DeWitt, a detective whose expertise and methods derive from some unique sources.
What Claire discovers takes us into the heart of the crime-ravaged, deeply wounded city, where those who can afford it live behind fences and those who can’t are slain daily on the streets. And it’s there she discovers that the only thing worse than an unsolved case, maybe, is a solved one.
From the acclaimed author of Dope and Come Closer, City of the Dead is the first novel of a detective series unlike any you have read before, one that is sure to inspire a passionate and devoted following.
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Claire is such a great character – kind of irrepressible, brilliant and flawed at the same time. Did you have it in mind to try and do a series before you had her character, or did that idea follow once you’d got going with her and City of the Dead?
(Sarah): Thank you! I had long wanted to do a series, but it never seemed like the right time. Then after the storm, in 2005, I had a long series of literary fuck-ups: I’d spent a year working on a book set in New Orleans that I had no idea how to finish, given that it was now a different city; I put that aside, then spent a year or two writing another novel which my agent and editor rejected. Then I began a mystery novel set in post-K New Orleans, and thus came Claire: pretty quickly I knew that this character engaged me enough, and her mysteries compelled me enough, to make this the series I’d always wanted to do.
Series publishing can be looked down on, but at its best it can allow real freedom to develop and explore character, among other things. I wondered what your thoughts are, at this stage, on writing a series?
That’s exactly why I wanted to do a series – I’d published three stand-alone books, and one novel isn’t necessary enough space to really watch a character come to live with the full range of complexities that we humans have. Also, I enjoy fucking with people’s expectations, and I think many of us expect a detective series to be, maybe, a little trite or formulaic. So it’s fun for me to screw around with that expectation and instead of finding a formula and sticking with it, explore different aspects of my characters as they go through the changes and challenges we all go through in life (although theirs are more interesting than mine!).
And as a writer, it’s a real joy to know I’m in a long term, committed relationship with these people, and not just dating. Claire has a long story with a lot mysteries and I’m committed to telling it. It’s also a treat for me to get to explore these notions of ‘detection’, ‘mysteries’, ‘crime’, and so forth from a slightly different angle with each book, and hopefully my own understanding of these esoteric concepts will continue to grow and I can pass that along to the readers. It’s also a bit of an experiment here in terms of seeing what kind of a person I am four or five years from now, and how that will reflect (or not) on Claire and her world.
I was talking to someone recently, who’d just read City of the Dead, and they said, excitedly, that they had to track down a copy of Détection! Was there any inspiration or precedent for the figure of Jacques Silette, either in fiction or real life?
Not really! But I am so thrilled that someone said that to you, thanks for passing it on! That really makes my day. Someday I’ll take all the Jacques Silette scraps from the books and put them together in one volume, so we will have Détection or something like it.
I wish I knew someone as interesting as Jacques Silette. But there are books that I feel have changed me in the indirect way that I describe Détection doing so: Nelson Algren’s book about writing, Nonconformity, some of the spiritual classics like the Tao Te Ching, The Bhagavad Gita, or The Yoga Sutras, the writing I’ve read (and not really understood) by French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, the little bits of Freud and Jung I’ve read.
I think words have an overt power, when they speak to our conscious minds, but they can also have a more subversive, subtle, power, which is to speak from one subconscious or soul to another. That’s an interesting use of words to me, and a different understanding of language than the one I’d grown up with. So it’s fun for me to play around with that.
What are you reading right now?
I’m reading William T. Vollman’s The Royal Family – it’s about a thousand pages and I’m reading it slowly, so I’ll be reading it for a long time yet! But I am really mesmerized by the world he’s created, and of course I have a soft spot for detectives. He’s an amazing writer who likes to see in to the hidden corners of things, which not many people want to do.
I won’t say ‘favourite’ but can you recommend a novel you love, in one sentence (or so)?
This is an exciting season to have a book out, with so many of my favourite writers and friends publishing new titles. Megan Abbott is a good friend and one of the smartest, most interesting people on earth; her new book, The End of Everything, is one of the most exciting novels I’ve read in a long time – completely fresh, completely different, it has all the best qualities of her earlier work but jumps up to a whole new level. I practically jumped out of my skin when I read it. I read it over a year ago and I still think about it all the time.
And an album?
I bought a ‘best of’ Maria Callas a few days back and I am wholeheartedly enjoying it. Classical music and opera are very alien to me – I didn’t grow up with them around – and these unusual (for me) sounds make me see the world slightly differently. I like that. For my next long car trip I’m stocking the car with opera.
And a film?
My recent opera fetish was brought on by rewatching Diva about a week ago, which I hadn’t seen since the eighties. Fantastic movie, and so relevant and fresh today. I was very impressed at how well it’s held up.
And, finally, can you tell us anything about book two in the series? Do you have a title, where’s it going to take place, and … what’s the mystery?
I do have a title but as you haven’t approved it yet, Angus, we better hold off on sharing that! But I can tell you almost everything else, because it’s almost done: it takes place in and around San Francisco, where Claire lives. A friend (and ex-boyfriend) of Claire’s, a musician, is murdered in his home. The police are convinced it’s a simple robbery, but as Claire knows: nothing is ever simple. Meanwhile, in 1986 Brooklyn, Claire, Tracy and Kelly solve their own mysteries in the rubble of an impoverished New York City: their friend Chloe has gone missing, and no one else cares enough to find her, leaving the girls to solve the case on their own. Sounds a little dark, doesn’t it? There’s also a subplot involving miniature ponies, so it isn’t all so bleak! After that, book three will take place in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and book four will take Claire back to New York City.
June 17th, 2011 at 11:36 am
[...] Bookdagger.com » 'So What's the Mystery?' Claire has a long story with a lot mysteries and I'm committed to telling it. It's also a treat for me to get to explore these notions of 'detection' 'mysteries' 'crime' and so forth from a slightly different angle [...]