David’s Comments (group member since Dec 29, 2007)

David’s comments from the Q&A with David Liss group.

Oh, I do that all the time. Book people can't help themselves.

By the way, of all the people I've checked, you and I have the most books in common.

I also like Paul Auster, which is somethign I see we have in common. Plus that's a very handsome cat on your profile photo. Like many writers, I'm a crazy cat person.

I'm not really sure why I don't read a whole lot of historical fiction. I love reading good historical fiction that strikes me the right way, but I find most books too leaden and ponderous. Only a minority of writers know who to keep the research from overwhelming the characters, and in the end, I read fiction for characters and narrative tension, not for historical data. If I want that, I read history.

Kirk,

Thanks for the question. I love writing historical fiction, but I mostly read contemporary stuff. I’d always wanted to write a contemporary novel, and after writing three historical books, I figured it was time or it would, in some sense, be too late. And for years I’d been thinking of doing something with animal rights, and so it all came together.

When I started writing Ethical Assassin I thought – Wow, this is so much fun. I’m never writing historical fiction again – but then when I finished, I couldn’t wait to get back to the historical stuff. The two books I’ve completed since are both historical, though I’m working on another contemporary book right now.

I guess the bottom line is that I want to write the book I want to write, and so far I’ve been lucky enough to have a publisher who will let me do that.

You can look through my list on this site, of course, to get a sense of what I like. My policy, by the way, is to only rate books I like. I don’t want to be knocking down anyone else’s work.

In general I favor contemporary novels with some kind of comic bite and an engaging narrator.
My favorite writers of this kind of book are people like Tom Perrotta, Jonathan Tropper, Nick Hornby, etc.

Even though I write mostly historical fiction, I tend not to read a lot of it. I tend to be very wide ranging in my reading, and I’m not at all a genre snob. If I have reason to believe I’ll like it, I’ll read mainstream fiction, horror, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, thriller, you name it. I even once read a romance novel because a friend of mine swore it was really good. Ultimately, on this matter, we did not agree.

I'm largely pasting this in from a similar question in the other thread. Please forgive me.

Here is the pub date info, however.

The Whiskey Rebels (September '08)
The Devil's Company (sometime in '09)

And one more thing -- this late in the game they are thinking of changing the title of The Whiskey Rebels. The publisher thinks the bool will appeal to both men and women readers, but the title might drive off the women. I'll update the world if we come up with something new.

Here is a basic description of each:

The Whiskey Rebels is a historic thriller set against the backdrop of the Panic of 1792, the first financial crisis in the United States. The novel follows two principal characters: Ethan Saunders is a former Revolutionary War spy, now disgraced and living on the fringes of society, but when he learns of a possible danger to his long-lost love, he is drawn into a plot that may undermine the new and fragile nation; Joan Maycott and her husband are tricked by unscrupulous speculators into settling on the barbaric western frontier, but when her life is shattered she vows revenge on the men she holds responsible, including Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton. This was easily the most challenging novel I’ve ever written, but it was also exciting for me for a whole bunch of reasons – grappling with some of the history of my own country, writing two distinct narrators, and, of course, learning lots about early whiskey making.

The Devil’s Company, which is the third (and maybe final) Benjamin Weaver novel is set shortly after A Spectacle of Corruption and attempts to examine the 18th century origins of the modern corporation. In this novel Weaver, against his will, is made to take on the British East India Company, and so learns about the uneasy nexus of power that exists between the Company and the British government, the ways in which the Company produces and manipulates the markets for its goods, and all kinds of juicy things. As the third novel with a continuing protagonist, I wanted to mix things up a little, so in this book there are plenty of characters from the previous two who don’t appear, there is one fairly major character who dies, and Weaver meets the woman who, if the books continue, he will likely marry. Of the three Weaver novels, it is probably my favorite.

For some reason, I thought it would post my responses after the original questions, so I’m responding to questions as they come. It might be easier to post questions in separate threads. I’ll try from now on, though, to include the question in my response so people know what I am talking about.


"Hello, Mr. Liss, Your novel "A Spectacle of Corruption" begins, nicely, in the first person, from a character in the 1700s. How does one from the present time learn to speak as someone in another century? How did you concoct the words "fickle gaze" and "scribbler's perdition", which sound so foreign to our ears?

Also, I'm interested to know what kind of research one does to breathe life into another century. Thanks for any time. Tom"

The short answer is by reading tons of 18th century writing. In my work as a graduate student, I spent countless hours reading 18th century novels, plays, poems, political tracts, letters, newspaper articles, and just about anything else you can think of. It was actually a lot of fun to attempt to reproduce something like real 18th century diction in these books.

As far as the research goes, I did lots of research before I even knew I was going to write a novel set in this period – it was for my graduate work. But once I started the novel, I realized there were lots of things a novelist needs to know that an academic might not – what people ate, what they wore, where they might have lived, etc. There are so many sources for this stuff, both contemporary and from the period, that it’s just a matter of finding them and sorting through them.

The Whiskey Rebels is a historic thriller set against the backdrop of the Panic of 1792, the first financial crisis in the United States. The novel follows two principal characters: Ethan Saunders is a former Revolutionary War spy, now disgraced and living on the fringes of society, but when he learns of a possible danger to his long-lost love, he is drawn into a plot that may undermine the new and fragile nation; Joan Maycott and her husband are tricked by unscrupulous speculators into settling on the barbaric western frontier, but when her life is shattered she vows revenge on the men she holds responsible, including Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton. This was easily the most challenging novel I’ve ever written, but it was also exciting for me for a whole bunch of reasons – grappling with some of the history of my own country, writing two distinct narrators, and, of course, learning lots about early whiskey making.

The Devil’s Company, which is the third (and maybe final) Benjamin Weaver novel is set shortly after A Spectacle of Corruption and attempts to examine the 18th century origins of the modern corporation. In this novel Weaver, against his will, is made to take on the British East India Company, and so learns about the uneasy nexus of power that exists between the Company and the British government, the ways in which the Company produces and manipulates the markets for its goods, and all kinds of juicy things. As the third novel with a continuing protagonist, I wanted to mix things up a little, so in this book there are plenty of characters from the previous two who don’t appear, there is one fairly major character who dies, and Weaver meets the woman who, if the books continue, he will likely marry. Of the three Weaver novels, it is probably my favorite.

I decided to write a novel about the early stock market because I was doing my dissertation on finance in 18th century British novel, and the stock market shows up over and over again. I was never interested in finance until my research backed me into it, and once I realized how insanely obsessed people were with it, I became fascinated. As far as parallels go, I think there are more than I would have guessed. The modern world with all our communications technology should preclude 18th century style corruption, but its amazing to me how many scandals emerge the old fashioned way – a small group of people making secret deals while the rest of the world looks on without noticing how obviously dodgy it all is.

Many thanks to those who have decided to take part in this discussion. As a reading addict, I’m always happy to talk about books, mine or anyone else’s, and I genuinely enjoy making contact with my readers.

I’m open to discussing anything in these forums: my own reading habits, any of my published novels, my two completed forthcoming novels, the book I’m working on currently – you name it.

I recently finished teaching a course in conjunction with National Novel Writing Month in which I, along with a small group of dedicated students, hammered out rough drafts of books between November 1st and 30th. I’d also love to use this forum to talk about issues of craft.

I look forward to what I hope is an enjoyable and lively exchange.

David