Interview with thriller author Peter Eliott

Today’s special guest is thriller author Peter Eliott to chat about his novel, A Dream of Shadows.

Bio:
Peter Eliott is a lyrically gifted author and winner of over ten literary awards. He combines his passion for poetic literature, grim humor, and suspenseful adventure in the critically acclaimed Shadow Bidder series. He currently lives with his wife in Amagansett, NY, where he devours literary fiction to grow his ever-expanding arsenal of creative ideas.

Welcome, Peter. Please tell us about your current release.
A Dream of Shadows is something of a genre mashup, in that I combine Fantasy with Mystery/Thriller and finally round it out with elements of Literary Fiction. It’s a fast-paced story that thrusts the reader into a sense of conflict from the very first scene. Most fantasy novels that I have read tend to span relatively long periods of time and cover large geographical areas, whereas A Dream of Shadows is set in a single urban setting (a city known as Hell’s Labyrinth) and is compressed into a very intense 48 hours. My world is a world of criminals—those who dwell at the edges of light and dark, and morality itself. However, even in this world, things are relative, so our main character, Vazeer, who is a smuggler by trade, is a man of significantly better moral caliber than many of the others around him.

At the start of the story, Vazeer and five others are hired to assassinate another criminal, Count Ulan Gueritus, who is as bad as they come in Hell’s Labyrinth. Things move quickly from there, and the story focuses, first, on the tense preparations for this assassination contract, and then the mission itself, which becomes ever more frightening through a series of unexpected twists. There is also a romance that runs through the heart of the tale, and a few larger, societal themes that I have interspersed here and there.

What inspired you to write this book?
Ever since I was a kid I have been fascinated by urban worlds of skullduggery and criminality, so when I chose to write this book, I knew I wanted it to feature a place like that. I did briefly flirt with the idea of setting it in a historical period on Earth (I’m a history buff), however, the political and religious details I wanted in my world were only going to work if I created them myself. So, I built a unique place, though it’s definitely inspired by the Byzantine Empire, as well as several of the great city states of Medieval Italy. Additionally, I have always believed that a high-adrenaline action story could be written in a literary style, even though you rarely see those things combined. That was one of the main challenges I wanted to take on in doing this.

Excerpt from A Dream of Shadows:
The single most chilling name in all of Hell’s Labyrinth: Gueritus. Now I had really gone and done it.

In actuality, it was Gueritus’s other name—the one often rasped in a queer, inebriated cross-resonance between fear, admiration, and loathing in the taverns of Sullward and several other North Derjian cities as well—that had carried his infamy far and wide: the Raving Blade of Hell’s Labyrinth. Never had an alias been so thoroughly deserved.

I cannot take the time now, nor the considerable mental and emotional energy necessary, to relay the stories, the many stories, which circulated like the flu through the serpentine alleys, dank cellars, and curtained tavern booths of the nefarious underworld capital known as Hell’s Labyrinth, the ones which at once depicted a man of mad, unbridled genius and terrifying sadism—that unique fusion of character traits that appears once or twice in a generation and breeds human wickedness that leaves the rest of us petty villains looking like justices of the peace. I simply cannot bear the recounting.

What I can and must do is explain why I, Vazeer, criminal though I am by my own admission, am suddenly mentioning the name of this cold-blooded demon named Gueritus. The answer is simple. On the 26th day of the autumn month known as Dekharven, in the 213th year of the new Sullward calendar, I was offered a colossal sum of money to kill him.

I and five others. Six Shadow Bidders sent out into the autumn night, sent out to murder the darkness itself.

What exciting project are you working on next?
A Dream of Shadows is part of a larger series called The Shadow Bidder Series, and I am coming out with Book Two in the series at the start of the summer. I’m very excited about it, and I think readers who enjoyed Book One will be even happier with the second installment.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?
I wrote a lot of stories when I was in grade school, just for fun, but the seminal event came when I was thirteen. I grew up in NYC, and I entered a city-wide short story contest that had thousands of submissions in my age group. The only requirement for the story was that it involve NYC in some way, so I decided to set it in the future, after the city had gone into an intractable state of decline. It was titled “Ruins” and, ironically, it contained many of the features that are dominant in A Dream of Shadows – an urban setting, pervasive criminality, a populace living in the shadows of a former greatness. Anyway, I won First Place in that contest, and Isaac Asimov handed me the certificate and the $75 prize, which was actually a lot back in those days, at least for a kid. Needless to say, that experience made an impression on me, and I vowed to pursue it when I became an adult.

Do you write full-time? If so, what’s your workday like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?
Yes, I do write full time. I actually had a whole career in architecture and design prior to this, which took care of most of my financial needs, and also gave me a lot of grounding in the visual elements of my story. Since Hell’s Labyrinth is an urban setting, and the narrator is obsessed with architecture and home furnishings – a fun juxtaposition for a violent criminal – my former career really laid the groundwork for what I’m doing now. On every level.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?
Ah, so this gets back to the workday question. Often, I’m so excited about some upcoming scene in a book that I wake up in the middle of the night—we’re talking one in the morning-ish—and I always leave the coffee maker prepped, just in case. I creep out of the bedroom where my wife is still sleeping like a normal person and I go hit the little switch that starts the glorious gurgling. After that, it’s 3-4 straight hours of caffein-fueled bliss. It’s pitch-black outside, nobody is writing, calling, texting…or even thinking about me, so I literally feel like I’m in my own creative cocoon, a little universe separate from everybody else’s’

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
Please refer back to that handshake with Isaac Asimov! LOL. After I was done playing with army men…Writer writer writer, with maybe a small desire to be an architect.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?
Yes. I think there’s a standard misnomer that novels need to be either genre-based or literary. For those seeking genre fare, they’re usually looking for strong plotting, a fast pace, a degree of escapism, but not much emphasis on the writing. In literary fiction one expects beautiful prose, symbolism, deeper human concerns, but not much in the way of excitement. I really don’t think the two things have to be mutually exclusive. In fact, if I have a single mission as a writer, it’s probably that: joining the literary with the thrilling. Readers will ultimately decide if I’ve been successful in doing that, but I won’t lie, I’m definitely trying.

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