Boyd Morrison
The Last True Templar
DOSSIER: When you wrote THE LAST TRUE TEMPLAR with your sister, Beth, what was the single most annoying thing she did that drive you crazy? Or was it something from when you two wrote the first book, THE LAWLESS LAND? You can be honest … she’ll never see this.
MORRISON: It’s really annoying how often she is right when we argue about a plot point (I’m so glad she won’t see this). Given that she is an expert medievalist and a world authority on the Middle Ages, she seems to like it when our novels that take place in the 14th century are actually historically accurate.
Sometimes that gets in the way of a cool action scene or plot twist I’d like to put in, but eventually she wears me down with her ironclad logic. I mean, would anyone really notice if our main character Sir Gerard Fox rode off on a motorcycle? According to Beth, they would.
JC: What was more dizzying for you – getting an agent, landing your first book deal, and seeing your book on the bookshelf, or flying on NASA’s Vomit Comet when you worked at the Johnson Space Center?
MORRISON: Figuratively, there’s nothing as dizzying as getting the call that your first book is going to be published after years of work writing three whole novels. I alternated between jumping up and down for joy and having to sit with my head between my knees to keep from hyperventilating. But flying on the Vomit Comet and experiencing weightlessness literally made me question which way was up (I’m proud to say I did NOT throw up on any of the three flights I made). Going up on the plane was definitely the best perk of working on the International Space Station project. And I’m probably one of very few people on the planet who has been exposed to zero gravity, Mars gravity, and lunar gravity, the last two of which when I was part of an experiment evaluating different flooring surfaces for future astronaut habitats.
DOSSIER: When and where do you write, and what kind of environment do you prefer? (Music/silence/ancient crypt?)
MORRISON: An ancient crypt would be too distracting, what with all the moaning and groaning from the mummies. I write on my laptop, either on my favorite chair at home or in a coffee shop, usually listening to movie scores by John Williams and Hans Zimmer. The dramatic music gets me in the mood to write suspenseful scenes, and there are no lyrics that might worm their way into my dialogue.
DOSSIER: You have sixteen US patents for basically being really, really smart. When are you going to surpass that number with books in the Tyler Locke series?
MORRISON: I’m at four Tyler Locke books right now, so it might be a while. I’d love to write more, but it would take finding a publisher who wanted to put out another one. The idea behind the series is that Tyler Locke is to engineers what Indiana Jones is to archaeologists (basically making them adventurous and cool). Tyler uses his brains and military experience to solve historical legends that end up having scientific explanations, such as Noah’s Ark, the Roswell incident, or the Loch Ness monster. Coming up with other mysteries for him to explore is one of the hardest aspects of future stories, but I’ve got a few in mind.
DOSSIER: I remember when you hit the Cussler compound with Chris Kuzneski and a few others. Did you have to arm wrestle to win the contest for who would write PIRANHA, and did you sneak out at night to take one of Cussler’s cars for a spin?
MORRISON: I was there with Chris and Graham Brown after I’d already been writing with Clive for a few years, so we didn’t have to see who would win that battle (although Chris used to be an offensive lineman for the University of Pittsburgh Panthers, so I would have needed a few doses of steroids to beat him). Clive was generous enough to let me drive his brand new Corvette around, but I was too worried about taking the wheel of one of his priceless classics.
He did give me, Chris, and Graham a ride in his fully-restored 1931 Ford Model A with Clive in the driver’s seat. The closest I’ve come to death in the last twenty years was when he screamed around a corner at thirty-five miles an hour and the flimsy passenger door flew open. The only thing keeping me in my non-belted bench seat was a death grip on the dashboard. The headline flashed through my mind, “Clive Cussler kills co-author”. Luckily, I survived to write six books with him.
Website: boydmorrison.com
Jeff Circle 