Ask the Author: Michael Dobbs
Answered Questions (3)
Michael Dobbs
Find a niche area of expertise that you can make your own. In my case, it was the Cold War, but it can be anything, from gardening to global warming. If you can make yourself an authority on a certain subject, you will automatically begin to build an audience. Beyond that, you have to find a way to attract and hold the interest of the reader. I am a writer of non-fiction, but I have paid a lot of attention to the writing techniques of novelists. These include memorable characters, vividly described places and scenes, the use of dialogue, and a plot that pulls readers in from the very beginning. This sounds obvious, but can be extraordinarily difficult to accomplish. Remember that the reader is under no obligation to buy your book, let alone to read it. You must give him or her a compelling reason to keep turning the pages.
Michael Dobbs
As a journalist and foreign correspondent, I witnessed one of the great stories of the 20th century: the collapse of communism. That made me interested in the great turning points of history, like the beginning and end of the Cold War, or the Cuban missile crisis. At a certain point, I discovered that I preferred to write about past events, rather than current events. Even the best reporters are unable to penetrate the corridors of power in the way a historian can, once all the historical sources become available. But the motivation is essentially the same: to take the reader with me to exotic and forbidden places. I think of myself and the reader as neighboring flies on the wall, observing history unfold beneath our astonished gaze.
Michael Dobbs
I wanted to describe U.S. immigration policy during the years leading up to the Holocaust through the eyes of refugees from Nazi Germany. I was struck by a quote from the American journalist Dorothy Thompson, in 1938, that "a piece of paper with a stamp on it," i.e. a visa, was often "the difference between life and death." I wanted to know why some people lived while others died. By focusing on a single village, on the edge of the Black Forest, I have tried to answer that question. "The Unwanted" is a German story, and a Holocaust story, obviously, but it's also an American story that will resonate with readers today.
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