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Index of Authors interviewed in the Usual Questions and in featured interviews

Fabulous Phyrne Jazz Age 'tec

Wealthy Phyrne Fisher grew up poor and hungry, drove ambulances through the mud of WWI and turned to crime to cure her ennui. photo, Kerry Greenwood; 82x117

Kerry Greenwood
2013 Interview
1998 Interview
The Usual Questions
Her series in reading order

Jeffrey J. Mariotte

answers the Usual Questions

Jeffrey J. Mariotte

American author, editor, and writer and purveyor of comic books says he is, "... passionate about-among other things-reading, the deserts and mountains and forests of the American West, modern and historical, politics, photography, independent bookstores, and whatever else strikes his fancy at any given moment."

Has your interaction with fans, for example, at conventions, affected your work?

I've worked at cons for more than 40 years (a frightening thought). I started selling books at the San Diego Comic-Con in 1983, and have only missed two since.

Working in comics publishing in San Diego, it was by far the biggest event of the year. As an author and a comic book writer, it was also crucial to my career. Many of my novels are based on popular properties that come with a built-in fan base-Buffy, Angel, Supernatural, CSI, Star Trek, etc., so meeting the fans is a key part of the trade. Basically, without my decades of fan interaction, I'm not sure where my career would be now, or what I'd be writing.

Is there any particular incident (a letter, a meeting, a comment that stands out?

There have been so many, over the years. One of my favorites was a young lady at a comic convention who said, of my Dark Vengeance books (a teen horror quartet originally published as Witch Season, then retitled), "I wore these out reading them. They got me through high school when nothing else could."

Do you have a favourite author or book (or writer or film or series) that has influenced you or that you return to?

Again, so many. As a big reader and a bookseller, I like to read widely, but I do have the ones I go back to, book after book. James Lee Burke, Stephen King, T. Jefferson Parker, Don Winslow, George Pelecanos, my writing partner Marsheila Rockwell, who's a brilliant writer... It's a very long list.

Who is the person you would most like to be trapped in a lift with? or a spaceship?

I assume you mean of people who I wouldn't ordinarily be sharing a lift with. Maybe William Goldman, a longtime favorite novelist and screenwriter who's one of the few writers I admire a lot but have never managed to meet.

Who is the person you would most DISlike to be trapped in a lift with? Or a spaceship?

Ted Nugent. He's loud, obnoxious, and he looks like he smells bad.

What would you pack for space? (Is there a food, beverage, book, teddy bear, etc that you couldn't do without?)

Can I take a live bear, for company? And a lot of bear food, so it doesn't get hungry? I'd have to take Wallace Stegner's The Sound of Mountain Water, to remind me of the planet I'd left behind. And maybe the classic Green Lantern/Green Arrow run Hard-Traveling Heroes by Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams.

What is the most important thing you would like to get/achieve from your work?

I want to entertain readers, but I don't want to stop there. I would like my books to make people think about the world they live in and their place in it. I'd like them to help people cope with some of life's hardships, even if it's only by living in someone else's skin for a while, or understanding that whatever they're going through, they're not alone.

What is the special satisfaction of your work?

Writing can be a lonely business, and I'm a bit of a loner anyway, so I like it when a book or a story inspires a reader to reach out to me - through a letter or email, at a con, or however - to tell me what he or she thought of the book. Good or bad (though I prefer good). Knowing that someone was willing to part with some hard-earned cash to buy something I wrote, and then was moved enough by it to tell me, is a joy that can't be beat.

submitted by Jeffrey J. Mariotte

30 July 2014

For other answers to The Usual Questions Click here

Just the facts:
Born: Park Forest, IL, USA, a very long time ago.
Resides: The middle of nowhere in the high desert of southeastern Arizona.
Bibliography/Awards:
I've published more than 50 novels, a few nonfiction books, around 140 comic books and graphic novels, maybe 20 short stories...so I won't list them all. Interested parties can see them all on my website. I've won two Scribe Awards from the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers and an Inkpot Award from the San Diego Comic-Con, and been nominated for multiple Bram Stoker Awards and a few others.

Web site:
My website is http://jeffmariotte.com and my Facebook author page is JeffreyJMariotte.

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