KASIA RADZKA

Sunday Sessions: Interview with Author, Pat McDonald

by Kasia | Aug 16, 2015 | Interviews, Writing

Welcome to the series, Sunday Sessions, where you’ll get to meet authors from around the world, writing in different genres, sharing their writing tips, marketing adventures and much more.

Please welcome Pat McDonald, author of the ‘The Blue Woods Trilogy’.

1 – Tell us a bit about yourself

My name is Pat McDonald and I am a full time writer of fiction having spent most of my career as a Researcher, Project Manager and Programme Manager within the British National Health Service and in law enforcement and the criminal justice system. My lifelong ambition has always been to become a writer of fiction; after all fiction is a reflection of life of which I am a long time voyeur. I am a people watcher, and nothing pleases me more than sitting in a public place observing the world as it passes by – hence my penchant for writing my novels in my favourite coffee shop, where I have met some extraordinary people.

My crime trilogy (nicknamed ‘The Blue Woods Trilogy’ because of an over active imagination at disposal of bodies!) consists of Getting Even: Revenge is best served cold, Rogue Seed and finally Boxed Off.

‘The Blue Woods Trilogy’

3 – What sort of research did you do before you started writing?
I neither research my books nor do I plan them before I begin writing. I suppose seventeen years working within a police force can be described as ‘research’ though. I describe myself as a ‘free flow’ writer. I literally sit in front of a blank page or screen (I do have a preference for writing in long hand) and I just write. My stories come to me as I write, so do my characters. Planning is what I used to do as a writer when I worked in Heart Attacks, Mental Illness, Learning disability and the police force as a researcher writing reports, papers, articles and books (my work is published as Pat Mounser), now as a novelist I tell stories and I left formal planning behind me. I find this kind of writing totally inspiring although I joke about being possessed of some long dead ‘real’ writer who feeds me the plots! Plots just come into being as I write. However, I do find that the internet has most of the answers I need. For example, I know very little about drugs and the drugs world, and am currently writing a light hearted (dare I say humorous?) look at the criminal side of drugs from the view point of my hapless hero Benjamin Matthews in a book I am writing currently ‘A Penny for Them.’

I do write a lot of my real life journeys into my books. Marcia Page disappears to Dubai and her stay and the subsequent pursuit by Harry Beddoes is my own personal experience of United Arab Emirates and the hotels they stay in – every experience is research! It led me to write about what happened to her as she drops out of the plot in Getting Even: Revenge is best served cold. My soon to be published spin off ‘Breaking Free’ takes Marcia Page (real name Livia Morrison) back to the UK and finds her in North Wales where she tries to hide and blend in. It examines further my interest in stalking and the concept ‘can someone make themselves disappear’? It is a young adult paranormal novel and has a hint of historical W.W 1 drama that is surprisingly haunting! The historical aspect I researched using the internet and a trip I took to North Wales, with a visit to Caernarfon Castle where the Royal Welsh Fusiliers have their exhibition. In fact, it was where the end of the historical part of the book came to me whilst I was there.

4 – What do you love/hate the most about writing or being a writer?
This is an easy question for someone like me who loves more than anything else to write. It is my medium for expressing myself and I prefer it to explaining something verbally. I have always written, in my earlier life poems and short stories (maybe not as short as most!). My working life was a more formal version as I describe, but the freedom to write is so powerful for me I only wish I had written fiction all the way through this time. When I first published Getting Even I found the process of editing and proof reading so onerous that I wondered if I could do it again (it is 622 pages long and I had to read it eleven times). I think I felt like that because I didn’t give myself time and it coincided with other things I had to do. When you are a ‘free flow’ writer you have to continuously be aware of continuity of plot and character and apart from a spider diagram of relationships between characters I retain most of it in my head, therefore, I have to read and re-read what I have written to make sure of continuity and formatting etc. I think not being able to write is the worst thing. My recent brain tumour operation left me initially unable to write and type and I had to work long and hard for it to come back and like riding a bicycle one day you find you can do it without thinking. Not to be able to write is unthinkable.

5 – What is your typical writing day like?
I write every day. I begin my day early because I am an insomniac and need little sleep. I have always risen before 06.00 o’clock in the morning, now even earlier. I do my Twitter and Facebook tasks first, sifting new followers can be quite a task but I choose every one myself. I then move on to typing up what I write at night time, and other tasks. At the moment my days are interspersed with various hospital appointments as I am still recovering from my operation; this means I spend more time at my computer and writing. Reading formed part of my evening ritual but is slower since my recent operation left me with double vision, but I still manage to read (one eyed) and write reviews, but this is slower than before. Sometimes if unable to sleep I read or write during the night, and always have pen and paper at my bedside. I am a vivid dreamer when asleep, I will say no more!

6 – What are you currently reading?
I am sorry to say I have a few books I am reading and depending on my mood and how tired I am dip into them. Susan Wuthrich Portrait of Stella,  Melissa Saari The Curse of the Lion People  and for fun because I admire their writing and is an absolute pleasure an Ian Hutson  or an Aaron David  they make me laugh so much! The pile of ‘to read’ books gets longer, but suffice to say I always review the books I read out of respect for the people who write them.

7 – What’s your view of social media marketing for authors?
I think that it is primarily essential for any author, even those with a publisher, as we are competing in the same market. Actually, to be honest as a newbie in this area I find it a great experience and have learnt so much about different genre and ways of writing. I had not heard of micro fiction or flash fiction before social media and found that practicing other ways of writing has helped me with my particular problems – a tendency to write long books and an inability to end a story. This has helped me. I have endeavoured to put together a community of artistic people, not just writers and authors but artists, sculptors, photographers, graphic designers, book cover artists etc. Of course I have met (virtually) so many talented people I am in awe of them and their work and I have gained so many friends and a few very dear people have helped me through my recent, most difficult times and got me back to where I am now. I thank them all from the bottom of my heart!

8 – Do you have any marketing or writing tips for new authors?
I advise all new writers just to write. Sounds simple but most writers have a need to write and become side-tracked by the belief that they have to learn the skill. I know I did. Learning which words you shouldn’t use, how to construct your sentences, what the taboos are only stifles the imagination – the world is waiting for your words. The best piece of advice anyone gave me recently was for me to feel comfortable with my own style. Aspiring to write like someone else is a trip to nowhere. They are who they are and you are a completely different person, writer, and thinker – just be who you are. Once that is accomplished you will find writing a lot easier. Of course the problem with marketing once you have written something is letting someone else read your work. Having a critical friend to proof read gives you a level of confidence you never had before because a) someone read it and b) they can see the things you miss that may be wrong with it. The only book on writing I have ever read was Stephen King: On Writing  it says it all and entertains at the same time. I had it on my Stephen King book shelves for 13 years before I read it. I find writing the easy part; marketing is hard and takes a lot of time and effort and never forget, we are all in it together, so help someone along the way!

9 – If your book was turned into a film, who would you like to play your main characters? The villain?
I see my crime books as a drama series, but have given little thought to who might play my characters. There would always be a part for David Tennant, but that’s a fantasy not a reality. It becomes difficult because my American publisher made a You Tube trailer for the first book Getting Even and the characters were Americanised which conflicted a little with it being a British Police force and how I visualised them. Harry Beddoes my villain was harder than they portrayed. I think most readers would see the characters as totally different; after all reading is about losing oneself in the plot, just like a writer really. I can hear my characters rather than see them. Yes, I think David Tennant is more suited to Alan ap Pritchard in book 2 and book 3.

10 – Do you ever get writer’s block? How do you overcome it?
I have only had writer’s block once and that was part way through Getting Even. I took myself away from my desk, sat having coffee in my local Garden Centre coffee shop and thought what a great place for three of my characters to meet away from the MCU and I sat and wrote a chapter on a tiny notebook I found in my handbag. After that I went there two or three times a week to drink copious amounts of coffee have lunch and finish my Blue Woods Trilogy. It taught me how to write anywhere even on an aeroplane going out to Dubai! I now recommend to anyone to overcome writers block by changing writing locations.

12 – Where is your favourite place to write? Why?
I can write anywhere and everywhere I go, but my absolute favourite place is in my local coffee shop. I am a great voyeur of people and love to watch the world go by. Occasionally I have met people who have inspired parts of my books or characters and who have given me ideas for actual scenes to include. But I have written in all places I visit even the Bedouin tent at the Fujairah hotel on the Indian Ocean and would get up at five o’clock in the morning and sit in the heat of early morning on the terrace to write. When I am fully recovered from my operation and I can drive again I will be going back to my coffee shop just to see what inspiration comes.

13 – What’s next for you?
I await the print set for my Welsh book ‘Breaking Free’ and am halfway through a new genre for me with ‘A Penny for them’ which is a humorous view of crime from the other side. My hapless villain is a charming thirty something Benjamin Matthews who has the worst luck in the job market, but the most innocent of faces. It has amused me during the past few months at any rate. I do have an idea for writing about an old Mental Asylum nudging away at my conscious though.

Please share your social media links:
Website: http://t.co/ImQ9ZT2ZbZ
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Pat-Mcdonald/502374626484358?ref=bookmarks
Twitter: @issyblack
Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pat-McDonald/e/B00R372WK4/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1439116435&sr=1-2-ent

The Blue Woods Trilogy
The Blue Woods Trilogy is set in a typical Police Force Major Crime Unit and follows the lives of Luc Wariner and Aidey Carter. It explores the typical crimes that Major Crime has to deal with, whilst not forgetting that police officers have lives outside of their work. I would hope that it shows reality even the darkest parts and that police officers can be tempted just like any other person. I do not have many happy endings; life isn’t like that is it?