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QUESTIONS FROM READERS

Mark Gimenez answers readers' questions about developing characters, writing from a female perspective and his next book, THE PERK.

Cindy from Acton, CA: After reading THE ABDUCTION, I wanted to ask if you have a military background.
 
Mark Gimenez: No. I had met several Vietnam veterans who had been profoundly affected by their war experiences, so I began reading everything I could find about the war and the men who fought it. Ben Brice's story is the result of that research.

Julie from Mechanicsburg, PA: Was the character of Ben based on anyone you know?
 
Mark Gimenez: No. He is based entirely on my research and imagination.
 
Julie from Mechanicsburg, PA: When you started writing this book, did you know the entire plot? Or, did you start writing and then figure out the twists and turns?
 
Mark Gimenez: Writing a suspense/thriller is like taking a car trip: you'd better know where you're going. So, yes, I knew the entire plot, and I outline in detail. But that's not to say that little side trips don't arise during the writing process, because they do. Some stay in the book, some get edited out.
 
Julie from Mechanicsburg, PA: You have some very strong female characters in this book! Do you find it more difficult to write from a woman's point of view than from a male perspective?

Mark Gimenez: Yes. But my wife is always there to correct my mistakes: "Mark, a woman does not think like that!"
 
Julie from Mechanicsburg, PA: How long did it take you to write THE ABDUCTION? Do you have a set time every day to write?

Mark Gimenez: I actually wrote the first draft of THE ABDUCTION prior to THE COLOR OF LAW. I wasn't happy with it, so I set it aside and wrote THE COLOR OF LAW. Then I went back to THE ABDUCTION and reworked it until I was happy. I was also practicing law at the time, so THE ABDUCTION took probably two years to write.
 
I start writing when my sons leave for school and stop when they come home; the noise level increases dramatically. I then write again at night when they go to sleep.
 
Julie from Mechanicsburg, PA: Who was your favorite character in THE ABDUCTION?
 
Mark Gimenez: It's a tie between Ben and Gracie. After my extensive research into Vietnam, I felt deeply for our soldiers who had fought that war, so I had a real connection with Ben. And Gracie is modeled after my young son, so I was writing about him.

Peggy from Clarksville, TN: Since I know you have a background in a high-powered law practice like Elizabeth, which probably made your character easier to build as a lawyer, I'm wondering how you developed your other characters with such depth and realism.
 
Mark Gimenez: I do a character "book": every character's entire life is written out in detail, from birth until we first meet him or her in the book. By the time I write the first scene, I know everything there is to know about each character. For example, we were all bullied as kids, but what if it had been a daily part of our lives? How would that affect our adult lives? That is John Brice's past and it torments him to this day. Basically, I try to live each character's life before writing about that character, or, actually, through that character.

Rita from Coppell, TX: How long does it take to write such an intricate book? Is there another book in the works?

Mark Gimenez: THE ABDUCTION took about two years to write.
 
My third book, THE PERK, is about a high-powered Chicago trial lawyer who loses his wife to breast cancer and is left alone to raise his two young children. Their lives fall apart, so he returns to his small hometown in the Hill Country of Texas and ends up the local judge. He thinks it will be a simpler life. It's not.

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