A Conversation with Douglas Preston

Douglas Preston is the New York Times best-selling author of BLASPHEMY, TYRANNOSAUR CANYON and THE CODEX, as well as the co-author of the deviously plotted thrillers featuring enigmatic FBI agent Aloysius X. L. Pendergast, PhD: RELIC, THE WHEEL OF DARKNESS and their latest hit, CEMETERY DANCE.

Doug’s also a magazine feature writer who contributes regularly to The New Yorker magazine; and his articles have appeared in National Geographic, Natural History, Smithsonisan, Harper’s, and Travel & Leisure, among others.

Doug is a Research Associate at the Laboratory of Anthropology in Santa Fe, a member of PEN New Mexico, and a board member of the School of American Research in Santa Fe. He counts in his ancestry the poet Emily Dickinson, the newspaperman Horace Greeley, and the infamous murderer and opium addict Amasa Greenough. Preston and his wife, Christine, have three children, Selene, Aletheia, and Isaac. They live on the coast of Maine.

JONATHAN MABERRY: You’ve written a lot of novels.  What keeps it fresh for you?

DOUGLAS PRESTON: What keeps it fresh is when I think of what else I might be doing to make a living. Digging ditches? I sit in my little 8 x 10 shack in the Maine woods and think that this isn’t a bad way to make a living. The truth is, I love writing, I love entering that mysterious quasi-universe that exists in my head and is slowly forming on my computer screen as I write a novel.

MABERRY: You seem to be something of a research junkie.  Talk about the fun of research for your books.

PRESTON: I know some writers hire researchers. I could never relinquish my own research, for the simple reason that while researching one thing, I often find something else which is totally unrelated but fabulous. The central idea for the new novel Linc and I are writing came about when I was researching a completely unconnected factoid for another novel. Research is like digging for gold—you never know when you’re going to hit pay dirt.

MABERRY: Describe the differences in the writing process between your solo work and the collaborations with Lincoln Child.

PRESTON: Writing with Lincoln is a lot more fun. We argue, we curse each other out, we struggle with the plots and characters, and then when the book is published we gripe about moronic Amazon reviews and tell each other what fine and brilliant fellows we are. Writing a solo book is a lonely enterprise. It’s just you and the glowing screen—no one to complain to, no one to bounce ideas off, no one to argue with, no one’s bad grammar to correct.

MABERRY: Your books occasionally step over the line between science and supernatural.  Why’s that fun for you as a writer?

PRESTON: We skirt the supernatural, we play with it, but we rarely step over that line. Both Linc and I are attracted by the outré, the strange, the bizarre. Much of what appears to be supernatural in our books turns out to be cutting-edge science or bizarre biology. We love to ask the question, What if…? and then play it out.

MABERRY: You have a hot new Pendergast novel out.  What’s the skinny on that?

PRESTON:  In the current book, CEMETERY DANCE, we had the idea to start with the religious practice known as Obeah.

MABERRY: Obeah…that’s like Voodoo?

PRESTON:  I had worked at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and knew an anthropologist who had done research in Haiti on Voodoo practice and Obeah (a very similar tradition). We thought it would be interesting to write a novel featuring those practices. That was the initial idea. But there is a long, long journey between idea and plot. Many inexperienced people and beginning writers don’t realize that the key is not so much in the idea, but how you turn it into a plot. I get people all the time saying, “I’ve got a great idea!” as if that’s the end point of the process. No. You’ve got to transform it into a great plot, and that can be exceedingly difficult. And then you have to write the book, and create believable characters. Great ideas are a dime a dozen. Give me a great plot, great characters, and good writing.

MABERRY: Your books often have a bit of social awareness or social commentary in them.  Is that the case with the new one?

PRESTON:  With CEMETERY DANCE, the plot involved animal rights activists, among other things. And the Voodoo and Zombii elements proved to be something else entirely…

MABERRY: Tell us about your next book.

PRESTON: It’s a Pendergast novel, called FEVER DREAM. It delves into the greatest mystery in Pendergast’s past, the one our readers have been asking us about for fifteen years. The novel opens in Africa, in the bush, many years ago… I can say no more.

MABERRY: Great…you’re going to leave us hanging.  Just like a thriller writer!

Find Douglas Preston at The Official Douglas Preston / Lincoln Child website: http://www.prestonchild.com/

- JM

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