1. After such a technical career what prompted you to write a novel?
From a very early age I was an avid reader, cutting my teeth on the likes of Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, The Three Musketeers, Enid Blyton and a variety of others, some of which are still on my bookshelf to this day. I thrived on those stories and promised myself that one day instead of just reading the words of others it would be me behind the pen. However, in a struggling borough of inner London, aspirations were low and opportunities few. As a result, in 1954 a fifteen year old lad was expected to earn a living and contribute to the family pot as soon as he was able. As I showed a sound aptitude for all things electrical I was steered firmly to a career in that direction. Military service followed and then marriage, a family and a long career in engineering. But throughout all this time writing ran in parallel with everything else. Creative writing courses encouraged the persistent thumping out of words on an old typewriter, using writing competitions, magazine articles and any other outlet I could find just to hone the skill. In 1992 at the age of 54 I took a planned early retirement and was at last able keep the promise I had made to myself so many years before.
2. Why did you choose the Action / Adventure Genre?
Thinking back, I can’t ever remember wanting to write anything else. Maybe it was because of my upbringing. As I have already said I was born and spent my informative years in a poor area of inner London where crime was part of everyday life and frequently occurred on your own doorstep. Burglaries, theft and violent crime were common place with the police ever present and always facing an uphill struggle. That period in my life has always stayed with me and as rough as it was I still look back at it with great affection, the colourful characters, good and bad, still as vivid as ever in my mind; the grandma, for instance, in ‘A Lethal Quest’, a real person, a real grandma of that time.
But then, conversely, during that same period, the movies were showing heroes; the gumshoes like Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe, who always, whatever devastation they had to paddle through, got their man. And their woman, of course.
One was real life; the way things were. The other was fantasy, but to me as captivating as anything I had ever read. I couldn’t make movies, but I could write and that’s what I wanted to write about. Since that time, though I have never been able to ignore the realities of life as I knew it, I have always strived to ensure that whatever mayhem occurs during the course of my stories, my own hero always wins through and when the reader turns that last page, he says, “Yup, just as it should be.”
You have some unique passions you share on your website http://www.awlambert.co.uk/ Can you share how your Gambia, Africa experience and your passion for jazz playing figure in your writing?
My African experience is the one thing that remains remote from all else. Five years ago my wife and I visited The Gambia for the first time. We found a country, among the poorest in the world, yet whose people were the most friendly we had ever met. Keen to see the real Gambia we hired a 4x4 and travelled far into the bush where we found a tiny, remote village that, though the villagers had virtually nothing at all to offer, still welcomed us and shared what they did have; which on that first occasion was a bowl of rice. We were so taken with those villagers that we have visited annually since and with the help of a few generous friends have personally funded the digging of wells and the supply of tools and seeds. That village, the tiny village of Nema, now has a small farm that is worked by the villagers and produces enough to sustain the whole village community. As a result Valerie and I are now considered honorary Gambians. The progress that has been made over those five years can be seen by visiting http://www.gambiafarm.com/ and is proof that it’s not only large charities that can create benefit for those in need.
However, as I have already said, this part of my life remains separate from all else. Whether, at sometime in the future, I will attempt to include it in my writing in some form or other remains to be seen.
Jazz came to me at the age of fifteen with British musicians like Ken Colyer trying to emulate the wonderful sounds of the New Orleans masters. I was smitten from the very first few bars. But as with the writing, so with the music. Just listening was not enough. I had to play and to this day, when I’m not writing I’m usually playing. And it’s a great pleasure to include that music in my stories. When Theo Stern, my own hero, climbs into his car and hits the CD player, it’s always New Orleans traditional jazz he listens to. And with the music in my head as I write, I’m right there alongside him.
3. Your novels include such specific details which add to the intensity and colour of your stories. How much research do you put into each story?
I’m ashamed to admit that I research only as much as I have to. I like to think of myself simply as an instinctive story teller whose writing is heavily influenced by his past. Each of my novels starts with the remotest of ideas and a first sentence. Advance research is something I just do not do. The ideas come and the story progresses only when I am actually sitting at the keyboard, each sentence, each paragraph prompting me into the next. So the truth is that only when the story suddenly turns that fateful corner and I find my fingers hovering helplessly because I’ve simply stumbled into the unknown, I’ve actually written myself into an area that I know nothing about, do I think about research. But then, before hitting another key, I dig deep and use every facility available to ensure that the facts are as they should be. However, it has to be said that every tiny piece of information I collect is faithfully recorded and squirreled away for future reference.
4. How has your family helped or hindered your writing?
This is the most simple of your questions. My two sons having flown the coop long since, my wife and I now live together in a tiny hamlet on the north Norfolk coast of England. As well as being my wife of forty five years, Valerie is also my best friend, my most fervent fan and my most ferocious critic. She is also the most diligent of proof readers. Without her encouragement and understanding I doubt that things would have happened as they have.
5. What is your biggest writing challenge?
I think the whole of the creative writing process is one big challenge. For me, as I’m sure with other writers, some aspects come much easier than others; for instance I particularly enjoy writing dialogue, but find descriptive prose takes much more time and concentration. However, as an instinctive writer who finds it as difficult to pre-plan the story as he does advance research facts, I will inevitably at some time during every story write myself into an unforeseen corner. Then it’s like the gauntlet had been thrown down - now get out of that - and it can take hours, sometimes even days of thought to solve the problem and move on. For me, that without doubt is the most difficult of challenges. Yet for some perverse reason, however long it takes, it is one of the challenges I enjoy the most.
6. What are your future writing plans?
As a Brit writing through a US e-publisher I do have an ambition to see my work, in paperback form, displayed on the shelves of UK book stores, something I have yet to achieve. However, this year I will be 72 years of age and with the urge to write as strong as ever the only firm plan I have is to continue doing the thing I love most for as long as I am able.
From a very early age I was an avid reader, cutting my teeth on the likes of Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, The Three Musketeers, Enid Blyton and a variety of others, some of which are still on my bookshelf to this day. I thrived on those stories and promised myself that one day instead of just reading the words of others it would be me behind the pen. However, in a struggling borough of inner London, aspirations were low and opportunities few. As a result, in 1954 a fifteen year old lad was expected to earn a living and contribute to the family pot as soon as he was able. As I showed a sound aptitude for all things electrical I was steered firmly to a career in that direction. Military service followed and then marriage, a family and a long career in engineering. But throughout all this time writing ran in parallel with everything else. Creative writing courses encouraged the persistent thumping out of words on an old typewriter, using writing competitions, magazine articles and any other outlet I could find just to hone the skill. In 1992 at the age of 54 I took a planned early retirement and was at last able keep the promise I had made to myself so many years before.
2. Why did you choose the Action / Adventure Genre?
Thinking back, I can’t ever remember wanting to write anything else. Maybe it was because of my upbringing. As I have already said I was born and spent my informative years in a poor area of inner London where crime was part of everyday life and frequently occurred on your own doorstep. Burglaries, theft and violent crime were common place with the police ever present and always facing an uphill struggle. That period in my life has always stayed with me and as rough as it was I still look back at it with great affection, the colourful characters, good and bad, still as vivid as ever in my mind; the grandma, for instance, in ‘A Lethal Quest’, a real person, a real grandma of that time.
But then, conversely, during that same period, the movies were showing heroes; the gumshoes like Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe, who always, whatever devastation they had to paddle through, got their man. And their woman, of course.
One was real life; the way things were. The other was fantasy, but to me as captivating as anything I had ever read. I couldn’t make movies, but I could write and that’s what I wanted to write about. Since that time, though I have never been able to ignore the realities of life as I knew it, I have always strived to ensure that whatever mayhem occurs during the course of my stories, my own hero always wins through and when the reader turns that last page, he says, “Yup, just as it should be.”
You have some unique passions you share on your website http://www.awlambert.co.uk/ Can you share how your Gambia, Africa experience and your passion for jazz playing figure in your writing?
My African experience is the one thing that remains remote from all else. Five years ago my wife and I visited The Gambia for the first time. We found a country, among the poorest in the world, yet whose people were the most friendly we had ever met. Keen to see the real Gambia we hired a 4x4 and travelled far into the bush where we found a tiny, remote village that, though the villagers had virtually nothing at all to offer, still welcomed us and shared what they did have; which on that first occasion was a bowl of rice. We were so taken with those villagers that we have visited annually since and with the help of a few generous friends have personally funded the digging of wells and the supply of tools and seeds. That village, the tiny village of Nema, now has a small farm that is worked by the villagers and produces enough to sustain the whole village community. As a result Valerie and I are now considered honorary Gambians. The progress that has been made over those five years can be seen by visiting http://www.gambiafarm.com/ and is proof that it’s not only large charities that can create benefit for those in need.
However, as I have already said, this part of my life remains separate from all else. Whether, at sometime in the future, I will attempt to include it in my writing in some form or other remains to be seen.
Jazz came to me at the age of fifteen with British musicians like Ken Colyer trying to emulate the wonderful sounds of the New Orleans masters. I was smitten from the very first few bars. But as with the writing, so with the music. Just listening was not enough. I had to play and to this day, when I’m not writing I’m usually playing. And it’s a great pleasure to include that music in my stories. When Theo Stern, my own hero, climbs into his car and hits the CD player, it’s always New Orleans traditional jazz he listens to. And with the music in my head as I write, I’m right there alongside him.
3. Your novels include such specific details which add to the intensity and colour of your stories. How much research do you put into each story?
I’m ashamed to admit that I research only as much as I have to. I like to think of myself simply as an instinctive story teller whose writing is heavily influenced by his past. Each of my novels starts with the remotest of ideas and a first sentence. Advance research is something I just do not do. The ideas come and the story progresses only when I am actually sitting at the keyboard, each sentence, each paragraph prompting me into the next. So the truth is that only when the story suddenly turns that fateful corner and I find my fingers hovering helplessly because I’ve simply stumbled into the unknown, I’ve actually written myself into an area that I know nothing about, do I think about research. But then, before hitting another key, I dig deep and use every facility available to ensure that the facts are as they should be. However, it has to be said that every tiny piece of information I collect is faithfully recorded and squirreled away for future reference.
4. How has your family helped or hindered your writing?
This is the most simple of your questions. My two sons having flown the coop long since, my wife and I now live together in a tiny hamlet on the north Norfolk coast of England. As well as being my wife of forty five years, Valerie is also my best friend, my most fervent fan and my most ferocious critic. She is also the most diligent of proof readers. Without her encouragement and understanding I doubt that things would have happened as they have.
5. What is your biggest writing challenge?
I think the whole of the creative writing process is one big challenge. For me, as I’m sure with other writers, some aspects come much easier than others; for instance I particularly enjoy writing dialogue, but find descriptive prose takes much more time and concentration. However, as an instinctive writer who finds it as difficult to pre-plan the story as he does advance research facts, I will inevitably at some time during every story write myself into an unforeseen corner. Then it’s like the gauntlet had been thrown down - now get out of that - and it can take hours, sometimes even days of thought to solve the problem and move on. For me, that without doubt is the most difficult of challenges. Yet for some perverse reason, however long it takes, it is one of the challenges I enjoy the most.
6. What are your future writing plans?
As a Brit writing through a US e-publisher I do have an ambition to see my work, in paperback form, displayed on the shelves of UK book stores, something I have yet to achieve. However, this year I will be 72 years of age and with the urge to write as strong as ever the only firm plan I have is to continue doing the thing I love most for as long as I am able.
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