TBR [to be read] is a new feature on my blog, a semi-regular,
invitation-only interview series with authors of newly released/forthcoming,
interesting books who will tell us about their new work as well as offer tips
on writing, stories about the publishing biz, and from time to time, a recipe!
Give us your elevator
pitch: what’s your book about in 2-3 sentences?
One day in 1956, a suitcase with a chopped-up, blood-drained
little boy is found on a street corner in Chicago. Then another is found on another street, and
then a third and a fourth and on and on.
Two Chicago Police Department detectives – guys with their own personal
traumas – are assigned to solve these crimes.
Which character did
you most enjoy creating? Why? And, which character gave you the most trouble,
and why?
The characters I enjoyed the most are the two cops: Hank
Purcell and Marvin Bondarowicz. I loved
reading gritty, noir detective novels like Mickey Spillane when I was a kid and
James Ellroy’s take on that genre when I was in my 30s and 40s, and I tried to
pack as much of that into the novel as I could with a twist. It’s no longer 1960 or 1980, so I tried to
give a 21st century spin to 50s noir. My main cop is Hank Purcell who is not only
hard-boiled to the max, he’s also a loving father, a terrific husband, and a
WWII vet walking around with all those PTSD memories. There’s an emotionality and a gloom to him
that mixes nicely, I think, with the noir world he inhabits. I also like Marvin. He’s ultimate noir. Although Jewish, he doesn’t respect Jewish
people or anybody else he runs across whether they’re black, white, Puerto
Rican, straight or gay. Mixed with this
meanness of his is a tendency to be very, very funny. The recent Kirkus review of the book
highlighted this aspect.
The most trouble? The
villain. The guy who butchers these
kids. The book is loosely based on a
series of actual murders that occurred in Chicago in 1956 and 1957. I was around 9 when these took place, and
they taught me that the world was a place to fear. Writing about the villain brought back a lot
of those memories of when I was a kid and I would be sitting on a stoop in my
old neighborhood with my pals and we would start talking about Suitcase
Charlie.
Tell us a bit about
the highs and lows of your book’s road to publication.
The low? The book was
accepted by a small publisher who at first did a great job of promoting the
book. Sales were good, reviews were
good, amazon reviews were good. Then I
gave the publisher the second Hank and Marvin mystery, Little School Boys. The
publisher was having trouble at that point with sales and eliminated
promotion. I didn’t know this when I
signed the contract. There was no
promotion of any kind. I shouldn’t tell
you this but the novel sold about a dozen copies. There were no reviews. Nothing.
When I complained, the publisher said, if you don’t like it
buy yourself out of the contract for the two novels. I did.
The happy ending to this is that I almost immediately found
another publisher, Kasva Press. The
press is very hands on, very committed to making the republishing of Suitcase
Charlie a great experience for me and my readers. Kasva has also committed itself to the
publicaiton for the next two Hank and Marvin mysteries: Little
Altar Boys and Murder Town. And they’ve also agreed to publish my novel
about two German lovers in WWII, Road of
Bones. I had this novel with another
small publisher also. The publisher kept
putting the novel off from one year to another.
Originally it was supposed to appear in 2012. And it never got published although I was
under contract. Ugh.
What’s your favorite
piece of writing advice?
I’ve got two pieces of advice:
- Always be writing.
- You don’t need any stinking writing advice.
My favorite writing
advice is “write until something surprises you.” What surprised you in the
writing of this book?
For me the novel was a fantastic time machine. Suitcase Charlie is mainly set in the
neighborhood I grew up in in Chicago, the Humboldt Park area where I lived from
1954 to 1975. Writing the novel allowed
me to go back in time and visit people I knew and loved as a kid and places
that meant so much to me, the park, the schools, the street corners where I
played.
How did you find the
title of your book?
That was the easy part.
That’s what we called the serial killer who was killing kids in Chicago
and dumping their bodies in the parks when I was a kid. We pictured him walking with a suitcase down
the street at night and just dropping it here or there. A lot of times, we’d be sitting on a stoop at
night talking or joking or singing, and one of the boys or girls would look
down the street and see somebody carrying a bag or a suitcase, and say Suitcase Charlie, and we would know
fear.
By the way, the guy who did a number of these murders was
finally captured but it wasn’t until the early 1990s.
Inquiring foodies and
hungry book clubs want to know: Any food/s associated with your book? (Any
recipes* I might share?)
There is a discussion of czarnina,
a traditional Polish duck’s blood soup in one of the early chapters. A suspect has some in his refrigerator, and
it makes him look really really suspicious to my two cops. I would give you the recipe, but the soup is
just too disgusting. It requires about 4
cups of duck’s blood.
MORE INFORMATION ABOUT
THE AUTHOR: amazon.com/author/johnguzlowski
ORDER THIS BOOK FOR
YOUR TBR PILE: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1948403048/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_DkS.BbB1ME171
READ MORE ABOUT THE
WRITING PROCESS: