I am in Central America at the moment, working on the
sequel to The Gray Man. The title of the next book will be “A Killer of Men” and it will be on shelves next year. Just this morning I spoke with my editor (via email… NYC seems VERY far away from me as I listen to a rooster crow and a mountain thunderstorm outside my window). I had sent him an original synopsis for the sequel which he liked when he purchased 2 more books to follow the Gray Man. And then, being a bit of a pest, I came up with an entirely different plot, locations, characters- an entirely different book than the one he bought. I wrote a synopsis for the second version, sent it to him about a week ago… and waited. Today he said go for it, so it’s full speed ahead on AKOM.
The setting of the next novel will NOT be Central America, I can say that much. Also I’ll reveal that the title of the book refers to both the Hero and the Villan of the story. I’m really really excited to focus all my attention on it now- a lot of work ahead, but it’s what I love to do.
In other news, I’m heading to NYC next week to go to Thrillerfest, a conference/convention/soiree (that’s french for “excuse to eat banquet food and drink wine from a jug). I’m actually pretty excited because I’ll have the opportunity to meet some of the best writers in the business. The convention is at the Grand Hyatt at Grand Central Station. I guess the big shot writers who already have a couple of books under their belt stay there at the hotel… but I got a decent room a few blocks up the street, and saved $500 bucks. I guess I save about $50 bucks a block. Hopefully I’ll be a swanky author someday and can drop an extra 5 benjis for 4 nights in a hotel… but I hope I never actually do it. In researching The Gray Man in Europe I slept on trains and in nasty “hourly rate” joints, I survived that unscathed, more or less, so any place with a bed and a pillow and not too many creepy crawly things should do me fine.
I feel like I’m going to Thrillerfest as more of a fan and less of a writer. Yes I’ll meet with my editor while there, and I’ll be on a panel with writers with a lot more experience. But I know I’m going to come back to Memphis with an arm load of books, hopefully all signed, and some pictures of some of my favorite scribes. (did I really just write “scribe”? yikes)
New York is always fun, so I’m looking forward to it, but I’m also looking forward to getting back home, spending my time working on my book instead of on my spanish, walking to my fridge for a turkey sandwich instead of walking 20 minutes for a burritto, frijoles, and sliced fruit of questionable origin. I plan on having BBQ my first day back– and I will appreciate it all the more having missed it for the last couple of months!
just finished reading your book. read it in two days. loved it. everything except for court pulling the pin from a grenade with his teeth. i’m in the army and can personally atest to the fact that it’s virtually impossible to do haha. even if you did manage to do it, you’d have some messed up teeth.
didn’t see vince flynn, brad thor or web griffin on your authors list. all characters very similar to court. web’s character in his presidental agent series is probably my favorite. again, thanks for the great read. can’t wait for the new book.