Rodger Carlyle
The Shadow Game
DOSSIER: When the Alaskan weather trapped you and group of five other men in an Alaskan hunting cabin, you had twelve books among you representing only three authors: Tom Clancy, Lee Child, and Clive Cussler. What do you think would have happened if someone had pulled out a Harlequin?
CARLYLE: Our remote log cabin has been in use by the family for decades, so when we found a limited number of books represented on that trip, it forced us to dig into the cabin’s small library. I saw books about around the world sailing, classics like THE SEVEN HABITS, even how to identify mushrooms and wild berries in grown men’s hands. We’re a group, aged from our thirties to seventies, and most of us have hunted together for years, so someone with a Harlequin in their hand, probably wouldn’t have elicited any response right away, but the reader might well have been designated the waitress for the evening when drinks were mixed.
DOSSIER: Attending law school for you was so boring you left. But it wasn’t the material as much as it was your “attack life” nature that sent you to Alaska. If you hadn’t ended up in Alaska to satisfy that inner drive, where else would you have gone? Wherever that place is, would you have still ended up writing books?
CARLYLE: My father was an executive with PepsiCo and commuted into Manhattan for years. I’m originally from the Pacific Northwest and grew up with a fishing rod, shotgun and rifle in my hands, so New York, NY was never my cup of tea. It was and still is one of my favorite places to visit, but for ten days or less. I ended up in Alaska because one of my favorite childhood authors was Robert Service. I would thumb through each new issue of outdoor magazines looking for stories on Alaska. So, I jumped at the opportunity to go to Alaska for a short assignment. I fully expected it to be a two-year jaunt, but this place becomes part of you, (or you hate it). My attack life nature never left me, and Alaska is just part of it. I’ve fished in Russia, hunted and fished in Mexico, hiked in the Black Forest, (from beer stuba to beer stuba), fished and traveled in Latin America and one of my favorite people in the world was the guide who introduced me to Brown Trout in New Zealand. I ended up with a pacemaker after getting nailed by a stingray while snorkeling. All the time I wrote, first for business, then politicians, and at the same time wrote full novels for myself without ever thinking about publishing.
DOSSIER: When and where do you write, and what kind of environment do you prefer? (Music/silence/the Alaskan wilderness during that one month when you can go outside?)
CARLYLE: I write in a large loft in my home in Anchorage, a place I love because it is so close to Alaska. I have literally boxes of research from decades of travel and subscribe to a host of research sites. My initial drafts are almost always from my office loft, (and I actually select a music playlist for each book), but then as you know, comes the tough part, polishing and rewriting. That I do on the screened porch of our remote cabin where the music is rain on a metal roof, wind in the trees, eagles screeching, loons calling, and the occasional sound of bears fighting over fishing holes. (The weather allows us to fly there from mid-May through early October.) We spend most of the year outside, flying hiking, running rivers and hiking in the summer. In the winter we cross-country ski. But, when it’s blowing over ninety and the rain or snow is horizontal to the ground, then a warm fire with a cold Jack and water is our recreation of choice.
DOSSIER: Was it really your wife who suggested you should start writing books? If so, you’re pretty much following all of her advice these days, right?
CARLYLE: I was a single dad for a long time. When I met Carmen, she was a recent widow who chose to come to Alaska and teach in a remote Alaska Native village. She was just looking for someone to share a pizza with when she flew into Anchorage, and I was a happy bachelor who was a bit of a puzzle in that I was somewhat a recluse who loved to entertain. As we grew closer, I shared my writing with someone who has a master’s degree in language arts and was a fellow in a writing program at the University of Washington. She began reading my fiction. She watched my frustration with helping politicians create biographies and political position papers, only to watch many of them walk away from their written commitments. So, then came her famous advice, “you write fiction anyway, why not focus on writing your own?” Yes, I listen to her advice, but as I did while running companies reserve the right to do something different. (This seldom happens.)
DOSSIER: With your knowledge of global political affairs and personal experience working overseas in places like the pre-Putin era of Russia, how much does your latest book, THE SHADOW GAME, pull from your past to influence your writing?
CARLYLE: My past, education and travels drive my writing. I’m a political scientist by education and deeply concerned by how little Americans really study our history, our successes and our failures. Much of today’s “knowledge” is really just someone else’s opinion on social media or the meanderings of commentators, both right and left. Two things, especially the young people of today have never experienced, is true poverty and spending time in an autocratic nation. (It shocks me how places like Russia and Iran, places where the USA helped to push aside autocratic rulers replaced them with worse.) In those two countries, places where I have developed friendships with current citizens and expats, many of the people dream of rekindling rule of the people. So yes, my books pull from my past and unlike so many thrillers written by friends, where the goal is to entertain by moving from almost impossible situation to the next, I like to do something similar but against a background of national and international problems.
With that said, that format has been a mixed blessing. Amazon, which dominates the book sales market today has a group who review every book. Part of their “mission” is to halt the publication of books that “take advantage of current crisis.” Somehow, I have a finger loosely on the pulse of what is going on in the world. When THE OPPOSITE OF TRUST, came out, a 1950’s Cold War story where America was recovering from the McCarthy witch hunts and Russia was trying to implement the Khrushchev reforms against the entrenched Stalinists, and a not so cold actual war was raging, the release date coincided with the war in Ukraine. Amazon refused to publish for months. THE EEL AND THE ANGEL focuses on conflict between China and the US. Thank God it came out just before the open conflict over Taiwan took a turn for the worse. Again, Amazon wanted to shelve the book, but it was already out. THE SHADOW GAME is rooted in two conflicts; one between the regime in Iran and the American government and the other between Iran and their own expat community.
The release date is November 14, and with the current Middle East conflict slowly heating up, I am concerned about how Amazon may respond. It’s almost like they think a book that took two years to write can somehow be created in days. Jeff, people like you with your five author questions in the Dossier can really help alleviate this nonsense. I write to entertain, to keep peoples pulse building. My style is similar to Vincent van Gogh’s painting style, to exaggerate the essential…and leave the obvious vague. And if I am successful over the years, perhaps I can educate a bit and open some eyes and hearts, if only one degree.
Website: Rodger Carlyle | Amazon author page
Jeff Circle 