Scott's Note: Dust Up, the new biotech thriller from Jon McGoran, comes out today. That's good news; I can vouch for the novel being fast, suspenseful, and quite entertaining. Good to know, also, that a guy who's funny in person is just as amusing in print. So....what does Jon have to say about his book?
Halfway through writing the first draft of Dust Up, I was ambushed by a Haitian gangster. Not literally, but literarily.
I am an
assiduous outliner. I like to know as much as possible about where a story is
going before I start writing. Outlining might not be for everyone, but it’s
definitely for me. If you ask me why, I’ll tell you more than you want to know
about that, but I’ll also tell you that the outline has to work for the author,
not the other way around. Two or three times per book, while writing a first
draft, I’ll go back and tweak my outline to accommodate different directions
the story has taken.
One of
the knocks against outlining is that it can steal some spontaneity from the
writing of the actual draft. I get that, and to some extent it may be true, but
even as much as I outline, I frequently experience new minor characters
unexpectedly stepping onto the page because that is what the story needs. And
sometimes minor characters become major ones, expanding to fill a void in the
narrative. But rarely does one of those characters grab hold of my affections —
and my narrative — just through the force of their own personality. That’s what
happened with a character named Toma in my latest thriller, Dust Up.
A late
addition and a very minor character, Toma is the gangster nephew of one of the
main characters.
From the
very beginning, Toma responded to the practical demands of the plot with a
backstory that gave him depth and complexity.
When I
needed him to speak English, I realized that as a child, he’d been a boat
person, brought on the dangerous journey to Miami by his mother. She died
shortly after their arrival, but not before conferring upon him a deep
understanding of Haiti and its history. Forced to make his own way, he became a
small-time criminal, until his arrest and deportation back to Haiti. He is from
both worlds and neither, but his experiences give him a broader view and
insights that none of the other characters possess.
The plot
dictated that the head of the gang had recently been killed, leaving Toma as
the leader. But I realized Toma hadn’t just lost his boss, he had lost a
friend. Being the gang leader wasn’t something he had sought or wanted. It
wasn’t an opportunity, it was a tragedy.
Toma became one of my favorites — a troubled character with a difficult past and an uncertain future, a personality of unexpected depth, intelligence, passion and remarkable complexity.
In what
has become one of my favorite scenes I have ever written, Toma lets loose with
a ranting monologue, releasing the bottled up anger and outrage and frustration
at the things that are done to his country and the things that it does to
itself.
It erupts
as Doyle and Toma are hiking through the jungle at night, as part of a broader
plan. Just before they leave, Toma is forced to kill someone — a senseless
murder that the victim brings on himself, and another tragedy in Toma’s life.
Immediately
afterward, he and Doyle set out.
There is
a lull in the narrative, and in it, unbidden, Toma starts talking.
“Fucking Haiti,” Toma said,
bitter and weary, fifteen minutes after we’d set out.
I didn’t know what to say
to that. He had a point. It was not a country without problems. But it had
upsides, as well. People like Regi and Marcel and Elena. People like Portia.
And it wasn’t my country to criticize. How many times a day did I say, “Fucking
America”— and with good reason too. But I wasn’t Haitian, so I kept my mouth
shut.
For the next two pages, Toma talks about Haiti’s history, its place in the world, the heartbreaking unfairness that seems to haunt it, and that it sometimes brings upon itself.
I’m not a
big fan of long monologues. I take very seriously my role as a storyteller, and
while the books I write often have topical themes, I feel very strongly that
those ideas should add to the story, not interfere with it. Whenever the two
compete, story wins. Every time. Just the whiff of exposition makes me jittery
and depressed.
In the
scene, Doyle doesn't know what to make of it at first. Writing it, I didn’t
either. I had no idea where this was coming from, but every time I tried to
reign Toma in, to cut him off, he told me, ‘No, I’m not done yet.’ And he was
right.
Looking
back after writing it, I realized Toma had just been through this traumatic
event. He barely knew Doyle and didn’t care what he would think. And in the
darkness, like a confessional, Toma might feel more freer to speak his mind.
It made
perfect sense. The crazy thing was, Toma realized it long before I did.
Jon McGoran
is the author of the Doyle Carrick biotech thrillers Drift, Deadout,
and the newest releases, Dust Up, as well as the novella Down to
Zero, from Tor/Forge Books. Writing as D. H. Dublin, he is the author of the
forensic thrillers Body
Trace, Blood
Poison and Freezer
Burn.
