All Due Respect Issue #1 (14 page)

SW:
You have a number of short stories out, including two collections—
8 Pounds
and
Dead Letters
. Are there stories you’ve written that you want to revisit and rework into longer, more layered pieces?

CFH:
By and large, no. To me, a short story tends to present itself fully formed: I can see the whole picture before I sit down to write it, and once I’m finished, the idea’s all used up. A novel, on the other hand, is usually too big for me to wrap my head around at a glance—it’s only through the process of writing it that I figure out what it’s all about.

That said, there is one story that broke that rule for me. I wrote it for a buddy of mine who runs this kickass magazine called
Needle
. He wanted a longer piece for his second issue, so I wrote a story about a hitman who only hit other hitmen that clocked in at 11,000 words—more novella than short story. People seemed to dig it. My agent at the time said I should turn it into a novel. I thought she was crazy.

Then one morning, I woke up with a fresh take on it, and started writing. 90,000 words later, I had a novel. It keeps a lot of the beats from the short, but it’s got a totally different flavor, I think. Whether it’ll wind up published is anybody’s guess.

SW:
From ghost writing to fan fiction, the shelves are covered with writers toying in sandboxes of others. Would you be interested in ghost writing any novels? Would you be interested in having other people write stories based on your Collector series?

CFH:
Let me make this as clear as I can: if James Patterson is reading this and would like to offer me a steady paycheck to write crime novels under his name, I’m ready and willing. And I’m a cheap date; I could probably live for a year on the cash he’s got in his pockets.

The fact is, like most writers, I have a day job. I’d love to write full-time. If that means a portion of my writing time is dedicated to work-for-hire, then so be it. Oddly, I’d be less inclined to tackle something out of rabid fandom—say, a Sherlock Holmes or Philip Marlowe novel—than I would for a paycheck, because I’d be terrified I’d fuck it up. Sixteen-year-old-punk-me would probably call me a sellout for saying that, but that kid was an idiot, so who gives a shit what he thinks?

As for my stuff…it depends. I’m cool with people writing fanfic, because I think it stems from a genuine affection for the original work. And I’d be psyched to see a comic, movie, or TV show that expounded on the Collector universe.
Dexter, True Blood, The Walking Dead
, and
Justified
have all proven it’s possible to diverge from the source material in creatively successful ways. Ditto comic book continuations of beloved-but-cancelled TV shows like
Firefly
and
Buffy
. As far as officially sanctioned books by other authors…I’d never say never, but it would take some serious convincing for me to let someone else write a Collector novel. That’s kind of my job.

SW:
In writing, I find myself going back to certain themes, certain ways to build a story. I might use the same setup, but then alter it in some way to get to a different point with the story. I think of it like a musician building a song from the same chord progressions, then maybe mixing up the bridge or the rhythm. Have you found yourself doing that sort of thing? Using similar tools? Painting on a similar canvas?

CFH:
I never do it consciously, but as I glance down at my bibliography, patterns certainly emerge. It seems I write a lot about the tragic consequences of love. The ripples caused by sins early in life. About the secret world that lies just beneath the one we see. And a lot of my characters are myopic idiots with delusions of grandeur who’ve consumed so much schlocky pop culture they start thinking that’s how the world really works. I assume that bit’s autobiographical.

SW:
If you’re an author, is it normal to worry that your author picture makes you look fat and that your official bio makes you sound like a dick? Asking for a friend.

CFH:
God I hope so. It took like fifty shots to get a pic I didn’t hate to put inside my books. Thirty-five or so were from a camera; the rest were whiskey. And last time I updated my bio, I (er, I mean my trusted assistant, because why on earth would I write about myself in the third person?) must have gone through ten drafts before one stuck. I’m still not sure it’s any good—could be I just got sick of trying.

SW:
When people introduce a writer to prospective readers, they’ll often make comparisons. She writes like a Russian Alice Munro or he writes like a talented Emily Bronte. Have you ever read any comparisons to Chris F. Holm that seemed off? Or any that you hadn’t thought of, but really seem to nail something in your writing?

CFH:
The two I seem to get a lot are Jim Butcher and Stephen King. I assume the people doing the comparing are talking tone, not quality. Butcher I understand, because we both kinda sorta write supernatural detective novels. The King comparison, I’m wobblier on. I mean, we both live in Maine. We’re both white dudes. We both like punk rock and cheesy horror movies. But King is one of the most influential, prolific, and successful storytellers of modern times, whereas I…kinda sorta write supernatural detective novels.

You know what? On second thought, me and King are totes alike, so if you’re a fan of his go buy my stuff.

SW:
Over at The Rumpus, Erin Lyndal Martin asked a clever question of musician Eleanor Friedberger and I’d like to appropriate it for our use here: “Is there something you go to when you feel like you need more inspiration? Do you have standard go-to albums or books or anything?”

CFH:
Oh, god. I have too many to count. The Parker books by Richard Stark. Lawrence Block’s
Eight Million Ways to Die
. Donna Tartt’s
The Secret History. Twin Peaks. Sports Night
. Neko Case’s
Blacklisted
and
Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
. My Bloody Valentine’s
Loveless
. T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land.” All are works I’m drawn back to again and again, for creative sustenance as much as enjoyment.

I’m also fond of taking walks to get my gears turning, and exploring hidden places—old rail tunnels, decaying wharves, abandoned buildings. And there’s a place in town called Portland Architectural Salvage I’m nuts about. It’s three stories of reclaimed doors, fixtures, furniture, windows, statuary…you name it, all piled high with neither rhyme nor reason. Mason jars full of skeleton keys, stone lions, the front end of a ’57 Chevy—it’s like a building full of writing prompts.

SW:
When you’re in the middle of grilling ribs, you’re able to tell someone what spices you used. This much chili powder. This much brown sugar. Onion powder. Maybe the next day, if you haven’t worked in a different rib rub, you can tell people. But after you’ve filled the grill each week for a year, going back and talking about what you were thinking fourteen months back when you used cayenne instead of chili powder, well, sometimes people want to know details that you might not be able to tell them.

How difficult is it for you to talk in detail about books you’ve written two years ago? On a panel at a con, have you been asked a question about a book and not known an answer that you should have known?

CFH:
Thankfully, that hasn’t happened yet, although I live in fear of it. I think the reason I’ve avoided it so far is, I think of the three books in the series so far as one arc, one story, so the details of the first two are still fresh in my head. Maybe if they were standalones, I’d have a different answer. If by the grace of God these books endure and I keep getting Collector questions for the next decade, I’ve no doubt I’ll eventually space on some detail. And I’ll consider it a first-world problem if someone cares enough to correct me.

The Collector Series,
by Chris F. Holm

Reviewed by Elizabeth A. White

Those who’ve read author Chris Holm’s accomplished work in the short story format are well-aware of how talented a writer the man is. He’s been an Anthony Award nominee, a Derringer Award finalist, and his short story collections,
8 Pounds
and
Dead Letters: Stories of Murder and Mayhem
, were met with universal praise from readers. Yet, despite all that, I was
still
completely blown away by the tour de force that is the Collector series, in which Holm takes a pinch of fantasy, a little supernatural, a dash of hardboiled crime fiction, and blends them into a pitch-perfect adventure in a way that is nothing short of authorial alchemy.

Things haven’t shaken out Sam Thornton’s way for quite some time. Driven by desperation and good intentions, Sam made a very bad decision many decades ago. And you know what they say about good intentions…yeah, the road to Hell. Thing is, Sam didn’t make it all the way down that road, but got detoured into Purgatory and shanghaied into eternal employment as a soul collector—if your time has come and the powers that be have marked you for damnation, it’s Sam’s job to remove your soul and send it on its way to hell.

In
Dead Harvest
, the first book in the series, Sam is assigned to collect Kate MacNeil’s soul. At first blush is seems like a no-brainer since the young woman was caught red-handed, literally, having just butchered her family. However, upon attempting to collect Kate’s soul, Sam is met with an outpouring of purity so overwhelming he’s convinced she didn’t commit the crime, that she’s been improperly marked for damnation. However, one does not simply refuse to collect the assigned soul. It’s never happened in the history of, well, ever. Failure to collect Kate’s soul is sure to seriously piss off the denizens of Hell who’ve claimed it. On the other hand, improperly sending a pure soul to Hell for damnation could touch off a war with Heaven.

Unwilling to concede there’s nothing that can be done about the situation, Sam takes Kate on the run until he can figure out a way to appease the demons without enraging the angels. Of course, Sam and Kate also have to stay one step ahead of the police, who are convinced Sam helped a cold-blooded murderess escape from the psychiatric until of the hospital where she was under police guard. Oh, and there’s also the little matter of a replacement collector—a sort of spiritual relief pitcher—who’s sent to get done what Sam has refused to do. To avoid spoilers for those who haven’t read the series, I won’t say how things play out, just that it’s a rollicking ride Sam does come out the other side of, if slightly worse for the wear.

Of course, having seriously overstepped his bounds as one of the “devil’s mailmen” with his actions, the start of
The Wrong Goodbye
, the second book in the series, finds Sam on a sort of supernatural double secret probation with both Heaven and Hell. One more screw up or act of insubordination and Sam will be shelved: his soul deposited into “a useless body decades from expiring,” alive and aware but unable to escape. Madness usually arrives before death. So you can understand Sam’s panic when the latest soul he’s been sent to collect goes missing before he can collect it. Sam’s pretty sure he knows who took it, a fellow Collector with whom Sam had a falling out decades ago, and he sets out to reclaim the soul before the powers that be notice he’s screwed up. What Sam doesn’t initially know is that there’s a lot more riding on him getting that soul back than just his personal well-being, and by the time he realizes it, Sam’s once again in the unenviable position of being the linchpin in the quasi-truce between Heaven and Hell…and the denizens of the In-Between.

Weaving together elements of Lovecraftian horror, the classic road trip, buddy action films and the supernatural, the action in
The Wrong Goodbye
unfolds at breakneck pace through a series of set pieces that are thrilling, hilarious, repulsive, intriguing, and thought-provoking—all carefully stitched together via Sam’s world-weary narrative. Holm’s ability to switch gears from tongue-in-cheek humor to skin crawling creepiness to theological musings on a dime is a reflection of his supreme command of his craft, and his descriptions and tone setting are nothing short of sublime. One wouldn’t have thought the stakes could get higher than they were in Sam’s first outing, but by the time
The Wrong Goodbye
comes to a close it’s apparent that, unfortunately, Sam ain’t seen nothing yet.

Which brings us, and Sam, to the (purported) final entry in the series,
The Big Reap
, in which Sam finds himself faced with a particularly odious task: collect the souls of the nine Brethren, a group of former Collectors who performed a supernatural ritual to break free of their eternal shackles, causing the Great Flood (you know, Noah and the ark) in the process. The power of their ritual granted the Brethren virtual immortality, but did bind them each forever to a single corporeal body, unlike Sam, who is able to leap in and out of people (both living and recently deceased) at will to command their bodies for his use.