Guest Blogger: Thomas Kaufman

Last year Thomas Kaufman made his crime fiction debut with the book that won PWA/St. Martin's Best First Private Eye Award, DRINK THE TEA. This summer he is following up with his second Willis Gidney novel, STEAL THE SHOW. The jazz-loving PI is desperate for money...desperate enough to commit a crime?

Thomas Kaufman is here today as part of his blog tour to talk about one of those famous questions all writers encounter: "where do you get your ideas." Tom says it's about more than the ideas, but I'll let him tell you. Please help me welcome, Thomas Kaufman!

When I did my DRINK THE TEA book tour, I drank a lot of tea. I also answered a lot of questions about writing, and by far the most-asked question was, where do you get your ideas? I usually say I have a service in Duluth that emails me ideas once a month.

You'd be amazed at how many people come up afterwards and ask for the name of that company.

But having an idea is not the same thing as writing a book. I can say I have this great idea -- doing ROMEO AND JULIETTE as New York gangs in the 1950's. Nice idea, but it's a long stretch from there to WEST SIDE STORY, right?

Similarly, the newspaper is filled with story ideas. But unless the story grabs you, as a writer, unless it makes you think, then it's just an idea.

The genesis of DRINK THE TEA was an incident that happened in a restaurant. I was with some friends, and one of the young professionals at the table, who was a Mexican-American woman, spoke in a cruel and nasty way to the Mexican-American waitress, who had done nothing wrong.

Later, I thought a lot about this. I mean, why would someone act that way? Not only that, but feel they were completely right and justified in doing so? My guess is that, for some reason, things felt wrong to the young professional, out of balance somehow. By trashing the waitress, the other woman was trying to restore balance in her world.

My new book is STEAL THE SHOW, and what got me interested in writing it was something a friend told me – he was working for a company that designs and manufactures a piece of consumer electronics gear. Three people owned the company: a young man who was the designer, his father, and another man.

My friend told me the son got squeezed out of the company – by his father! This intrigued me. Then my friend said that the son –who had designed the gear in the first place -- had signed a non-compete clause. So for the next three years (the duration of his non-compete), the son was making his own version of that same piece of electronics gear. The son was going to use it to drive his father out of business.

Interesting family dynamic, right?

It was for me, and that's how STEAL THE SHOW got started. Now, I had never met any of the people involved, but I didn't have to. All I had to do was create the characters I needed. Also, I try to keep the reader guessing as to the son's true intentions.

Another idea in STEAL THE SHOW is the use of encrypted digital satellites to distribute motion pictures. About 25% of US movie theaters now use digital projection (and have discarded their 35mm projectors). For a long time, Hollywood studios have looked for a different way of getting their movies into theaters. Because I work in the film business, I found this was interesting. So it became part of my story, the technology that the son was so good at.

Okay, now it's my turn to ask a question: Have you ever read a book, and couldn't get into it because the characters left you flat?

I've started more books than I've finished for that very reason. And one of the things people told me about DRINK THE TEA was that they loved the private eye, Willis Gidney. So I wanted to make sure the Gidney fans got their money's worth with STEAL THE SHOW. But how to do that?

The answer was about two feet tall and twenty months old – Sarah, the African American baby that Willis Gidney saves in DRINK THE TEA. At the end of that book, the cops take her away from Gidney.

While I was writing DRINK THE TEA, the Washington Post ran a series of articles about DC and its system of juvenile justice. So I interviewed the two reporters who had written the articles.

In other words, I found an idea that was too interesting to let go of. So I didn't. In the new book, Gidney is looking to adopt this child. But DC Adoptive Services, in the form of case worker from hell Florence Walters, doesn't see an unmarried PI as ideal parent material.

So Gidney has to hire lawyers, commit felonies, lie, cheat, and generally hang himself out to dry, all to help this girl. And I can hear you ask, why does Gidney do all of this?

Because he went through DC foster care himself. He barely survived it. So when he looks at Sarah, he can't quite bring himself to walk away from her. Plus, DC is overrun with kids needing homes. If he doesn't try to get Sarah out of there, no one else will.

I liked this because it dovetailed with what I knew about Gidney. This kind of story also provided multiple level of conflict. And conflict, as we know, is the medium through which story is told.

So while ideas are important, just about anything can serve as the jumping off point for a book.

Even if you're from Duluth.

Thomas Kaufman is an Emmy-winning director/cameraman who also writes mysteries. His first book, DRINK THE TEA, won the PWA/St Martin's Press Competition for Best First Novel. His second book, STEAL THE SHOW, released this month. His blog tour will continue at The Rap Sheet and Writers Read.

Caught! - A Double Dose

I have a double dose of authors for you again this Saturday. There's just so much reading going on, and that's a great thing!

First we found Martina Cole reacting to David Morrell's appropriately named CREEPERS. In the U.S. Martina's FACES was released in mass market paperback this past March from Grand Central Publishing. In the U.K. her HARD GIRLS was released in paperback from Headline Book Publishing.

And the other half of our double dose is debut author Thomas Kaufman who is taking a break from filming and writing to read Sandra Ruttan's LULLABY FOR THE NAMELESS. I think this looks like a perfect place to be caught reading!

Tom Kaufman is the author of DRINK THE TEA, which was published this year in March and won the St. Martin/PWA's Best First P.I. Novel Award.

Technorati Tags: Martina Cole, David Morrell, Thomas Kaufman, Sandra Ruttan, Crime Writers Caught Reading Crime

Debut Author Thomas Kaufman

On Sunday I had the good fortune to be able to meet debut author Thomas Kaufman. He held a book event in Cleveland at Appletree Books in Cleveland.

Well, actually the event was down the street at this cool little restaurant called Nighttown. It was a very classy set-up. Tom joked that when he first came in there was a piano in the area where he would be speaking. He thought he would be able to stretch out on the piano (ala Michelle Pheiffer in the Fabulous Baker Boys) and present that way. No such luck. That would have made a great picture don't you think?

Anyway, as you'll remember since he was my guest blogger just last week, Thomas Kaufman just released DRINK THE TEA, which won the PWA/St. Martin's Best First Private Eye Novel contest (the same award presented to Les Roberts for PEPPER PIKE and Michael Koryta for TONIGHT I SAID GOODBYE).

Tom has a wonderful sense of humor and after starting to read the first few pages of the book while I was there at the restaurant, I could see that his humor translates into his writing as well. He started writing DRINK THE TEA when his first child was born. It took him about two years to write the original version. He put it away and worked on some other things for awhile and then picked it back up. While working in a writer's group, someone suggested that he should submit his book to the PWA/St. Martin's Press contest, so he did and promptly forgot about it. He forgot about it until he received a call informing him that he had won the contest.

DRINK THE TEA involves the juvenile correction system and Tom explained that a lot of that was inspired by a colleague of his. His protagonist is a fan of jazz, and you can tell he shares that characteristic with Tom himself.

The first round of edits on DRINK THE TEA required Tom to cut nearly 50 pages from his manuscript because the book was too long, but he believes that made the book better ultimately. There is a sequel to DRINK THE TEA that Minotaur likes. Publication of the sequel will be determined based on sales of DRINK THE TEA. So, in other words, go out and get your copy quickly so we can ensure more to come from Tom Kaufman.

Tom spends a lot of time behind the lens of a camera. His day job is as a cinematographer. He's been very successful there as well, racking up several awards for his work. But in either realm he's telling stories. Tom said he first started writing at the age of twelve.

Tom Kaufman is a very animated, witty, inspiring presenter and I encourage you to meet him if you get the chance. I know he's in the New York area right now, will hit my friends at Mystery Lovers on Thursday then will make his way out west to L.A. and Arizona. You can see his list of events here. Definitely go if you have the chance!

May I Introduce Thomas Kaufman?

Late last week I was reading this great review over at Pop Culture Nerd's blog and wondering why I had not heard of this book. I figure it's because my head has been stuck in other books, but that's still no excuse. Anyway, the name of the book is DRINK THE TEA and it is the winner of PWA's Best New Private Eye Novel Competition. This always raises my eyebrows since former winners include Steve Hamilton, Michael Koryta and Les Roberts. So, I'm thinking, "I have to get this book." Even though, in my mother's words I have "50 million books" around my house, I need to get THIS one. And low and behold, I kid you not, the next day there's an email in my inbox from the author, Thomas Kaufman.

Thomas Kaufman is an Emmy-award winning director and cameraman (gosh, he's going to need a bigger house for all these different awards). He's worked on many documentaries with cops and FBI agents. Now he's writing about those subjects.

Thomas graciously agreed to take over the reigns of the blog today, the release date of his debut novel DRINK THE TEA. Please help me welcome Mr. Thomas Kaufman:

Some people write to escape their days jobs. I write because of my day job. This job often forces me to take long airplane rides, and spend lots of evenings in hotel rooms.

I work as a cinematographer. I shoot TV shows for people like Barbara Kopple & Michael Moore. And I've filmed too-many-to-count programs for Discovery and National Geographic, BBC, WGBH, WNET…you get the idea.

The other thing about my day job is the kind of films I do – lots of commercial and some dramatic films, but more on the documentary side of things. And a lot of shows with cops, DEA agents, FBI agents. I have a great time with these men and women, and a lot of them are born story-tellers. Over the years I've written down some of these stories, and tried to use them in DRINK THE TEA.

My work lets me see life unfold through the viewfinder of a camera. So when I wrote the different scenes in DRINK THE TEA, I was doing my best to visualize them – how the people moved, their body language, what they were saying, what they weren't saying.

Last week my wife took me and the kids to an art gallery. We saw Renoir and Monet paintings. The impressionists believed in studying gestures, that certain poses and body language conveyed emotions and attitudes that were universal. I think about that kind of language when I visualize the scenes I'm writing.

Another type of language is spoken. I like to play music with my friends. So I think I have a pretty good ear. When I hear dialogue, I listen for the rhythms. Then I try to write that way. Folks don't speak in grammatical constructions. They talk in fragments. All the time. So I try to engage that part of me when I write dialogue. I try to hear it.

The last thing I'll tell you is where I write: anywhere but home.

Maybe it's all those years on the road, but I find it hard to do a first draft at home – too many distractions. But a coffee shop, sure. A doctor's waiting room? You bet. A Chuck E Cheese for a 9-year-old's birthday party? Even that is better than being in my own house, thanks just the same.

Oh, and pass the pepperoni.

So hopefully that birthday party turned out to be very productive for Thomas. The other great news Thomas shared with me is that he is going to be in my neck of the woods next weekend, so I'm headed off to see him on Sunday...and get my hands on that book...so I'll have 50 million and ONE books in my house!

You can find out more about Thomas Kaufman and his debut novel, DRINK THE TEA, at his website. And you can also check out his tour schedule to see if he will be in your neck of the woods!