Former 2000AD editor and now prolific novelist David Bishop has three books - two novels and an omnibus - due for release at the time of writing. A Murder in Marienburg is his first visit to WFB and is published April 2007 (June outside the UK). Fiends of the Rising Sun is the latest instalment of David's tie-ins to the famous strip from 2000AD and is out July 2007 (worldwide). First to hit the shelves is the omnibus collection of his first three Fiends books Fiends of the Eastern Front.
There's more. He has written Judge Dredd, Dr.Who and Elm Street novels, had a radio play broadcast by the BBC last summer and still writes comic strips. Best of all, he is the author of the stirring adventures of Nikolai Dante. More about all this can be found on David's blog.
1. How on earth did you manage to write three novels so close together? Is there some breakthrough in clone technology that we should know about? How scared should we be by your super-human powers?
I'm a professional writer, so it's my job to write. Plus, I enjoy it. If a week goes by and I haven't written something worth reading, I get antsy. Most years I write half a million published words for various media - novels, non-fiction books and articles, comics, radio plays, audio dramas. In the twenty-seven months up to and including January 2006 I wrote nine novels for Black Flame. That's one novel every three months. While it takes me about four-six weeks to write the first draft of a novel [depending upon the required word count], it takes many more months of letting my subconscious think about the story. Then, I've got absolutely no more than the bare minimum possible time left in which to complete the novel, I start writing. I'm a sprint writer when it comes to novels. Because it's long-form fiction, you have time to discover things about your characters along the way. In shorter form fiction like comics, audio drama and screenplays, you have rewrites in which to discover your characters.
Superhuman powers? I wish. Dan Abnett writes novels in the morning and comics in the afternoon [or vice versa]. Me, I have to write one project at a time. If I've got a novel on the go, that's happening to the exclusion of pretty much everything else. I can break off to write an issue of The Phantom or maybe do a short gig on something else, but the novel has to take precedence. That's why I write them so quickly, otherwise I'd get nothing but novels done. I've made a bad habit of going straight from one novel to another - for example, I did my first Warhammer tome A Murder in Marienburg last autumn and went directly into my next Black Flame page-turner, Fiends of the Rising Sun. Looking back, I wish I'd been able to take a proper break between the two. Keep jamming deadlines too close together and you're pushing your luck. As a consequence, I've decided I'm not writing any new novels in the first half of 2007. I hope to write another Marienburg book later this year, and maybe about volume in the Fiends of the Rising Sun saga, but that's on a wait and see basis right now.
2. Fiends of the Eastern Front - vampires, Nazis and the epic scale of the Eastern Front - a writer's heaven. How did you get such a great gig?
Black Flame's editor at the time, Jay Slater, was a WWII nut. He discovered 2000 AD had published a comic strip serial called Fiends of the Eastern Front about Rumanian vampyr fighting alongside the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front, and asked me if I wanted to turn that into a trilogy of novels. Now, the original story is only forty-four pages long - not nearly enough upon which to base quarter of a million words over three novels. But the comic strip left plenty of gaps in its narrative, so that offered some hope it could be done.
I did a little research into the realities of the Eastern Front and discovered it was a massive conflict, with enough incident and material to feed a trilogy of trilogies. So I came up with some ideas for the first novel and suggestions of where subsequent books in the series could go. They got a thumbs up from Jay, the rest of Black Flame and from comic publisher Rebellion, who owns the rights to 2000 AD and its archives. The hardest part was choosing what to leave out. I didn't touch the battle for Stalingrad, but instead used that for a Fiends comic strip that ran in the Judge Dredd Megazine last year. Jay had wanted me to tackle the battle of Kursk, but that didn't fit in the trilogy either.
The second hardest part was all the research I had to undertake for the trilogy. It sounds perverse, trying to make novels about WWII vampyr historically accurate, but I wanted the books to read like you were really there. I wanted the little details to be accurate, to give the fantastical premise that extra verisimilitude. I'd like to think I carried it off. Certainly, I haven't heard any complaints that the characters use the wrong guns, tanks or planes. Yet.
3. Dante, Constanta, Freddy and Dredd. Who was the most enjoyable to write and who was the most difficult?
I find Dredd the least interesting to write for Black Flame. I wrote three Dredd novels published by Virgin in the 1990s, so going back to the character felt like going back over old ground. Besides, there are so many Dredd stories already out there - I couldn't get excited about adding to them. Bad Moon Rising isn't bad, but Kingdom of the Blind is merely efficient.
Writing for Freddy Krueger was a joy, though I wished I'd done more in the way of forward planning for that. It was my first time writing a 95,000-word novel and my plot synopsis was all of three pages long. Normally I'd have a much longer and more comprehensive roadmap, so I was flying blind and vamping a lot on Suffer the Children. Despite that, I was happy with the finished book and well up for writing another. Alas, it wasn't to be, as the Elm Street books didn't sell enough to sustain the line. Such is life in publishing.
Fiends have proven to be my most successful line of novels, as is shown by the fact it's now spawned the spin-off series Fiends of the Rising Sun. Constanta appears in the first book of that, creepy and sinister as ever. What I am enjoying about the Rising Sun storyline is that it gives me a chance to introduce a new lead vampyr and show his progression from being a noble warrior for the Japanese empire into a blood-sucking monster. He does it for all the right reasons, but the cost to him is terrifying.
Writing for Nikolai Dante is the most fun I've had in novels. The character was created by Robbie Morrison for 2000 AD and I consider myself lucky to be the only other writer ever allowed to contribute to Nikolai's adventures. I had a blast writing my three Dante novels [soon to be collected in a handy omnibus edition], and would happily keep writing Dante novels for years to come. The books are rip-snortin' romps to write and read, big and bawdy and outrageous fun for all concerned. Hell, I'd probably pay money to write another Dante novel, but don't tell Black Flame I said that.
4. How does the tie-in novel market. Do you come up with the ideas? Did you get approached about writing them?
It's a mixture. Sometimes editors will approach you a specific story or idea they'd like to see developed - that was the case with Fiends of the Eastern Front. In other cases I'll pitch ideas to an editor and they'll pass them along the food chain to whoever controls the rights. I write scripts for a comic character called The Phantom, which are published in Scandinavia and Australia. For that the editors can supply me with anything from a plot synopsis to a single word title, and I have to develop that into a full script.
5. Do you still write for 2000AD? If so, what are you writing/editing for them?
I've written much more for the monthly Judge Dredd Megazine than I have for 2000 AD weekly. Ironically, the Fiends comic strip I wrote for the Megazine was originally intended for 2000 AD. A lot of readers like the story [and Colin MacNeil's stunning art, natch], but many said it would have been better published over eight weeks in 2000 AD than over eight months in the Meg. I've got ideas for more Fiends strips kicking around in my head - the concept of vampyr in the midst of wartime is so flexible, you can do almost anything with it. Several of those would make good comic strips, I think. But I've got to find time to do the historical research before I can plot those out.
6. A lot of people would assume that the editorship of 2000 AD is the perfect job. Why did you give it up?
Editing 2000 AD is a great job, but it's also exhausting. I used to stumble home creatively spent, nothing left in the brain for my own writing - I give it all away at the office, literally. After four years of that I was itching to do some writing of my own. Editing comics can be hugely rewarding, but that urge to do some writing of my own was too strong to ignore. I realised I couldn't be as good an editor if I tried to write novels and other projects of my own outside the office, but I couldn't continue being just an editor, I needed more. Plus there were all manner of frustrations with the company that owned the comic at the time. So I resigned to go freelance. Ironically, a week later it was announced a new owner was taking over the comic. I did contemplate reversing my decision to resign, but it was time to go - the call of the writer was too strong for me to ignore any longer.
7. What can we expect to see from you next?
Let's see - the Fiends of the Eastern Front trilogy is being collected into an omnibus edition, that's pretty much out now, I think. As an added bonus I've written a feature for the back of the book, exploring how the novels came to be and how they changed during the writing process.
My three Nikolai Dante novels are also getting the omnibus treatment. That's called From Russia With Lust, appropriately enough. I'd love to write more Dante so if everyone bought a copy of the omnibus, that might be enough to convince the powers that be to let me loose on the Russian rogue again.
My first Warhammer novel comes out this spring. A Murder in Marienburg is about attempts to reopen a City Watch Station on the notorious Three Penny Bridge in Marienburg. The local crime bosses are determined to drive the Black Caps out, there's a monstrous menace lurking in the catacombs beneath Suiddock about to burst out and a noble Elf is murdered on the Watch's turf, creating all sort of problems for the newcomers. It's full of blood and thunder, noble sacrifices, impossible odds and flashes of humour. I quite proud of the novel, it's one of the best things I've written. I've long harboured the urge to write for the Warhammer universe, but always held back, not sure if I could get a good grip on the world. Now I've taken the plunge, I can't wait to get back into it and my flawed hero, Captain Kurt Schnell.
After that Fiends of the Rising Sun is due out in the summer. That pitches American soldiers, sailors, pilots and marines against Japanese vampyr in the battle for the Pacific. I'm still tweaking that one, but it's a real epic. Originally the story was going to stretch from Pearl Harbour to Guadalcanal, but when I started writing the Pearl Harbour just grew and grew and grew. I wrote thirty thousand words set around the fall of the Philippines in April 1942 and it looks like that's going to be held back for the next book in the series. I guess that gives me a head start on volume two, when and if it happens!
8. Is it an ambition of yours to write any 40K fiction?
I have flirted with the idea of writing for the 40K universe but I find the vast depth of continuity rather daunting. The joy of Warhammer for a relative newcomer to the universe is you can find a corner of the Empire and tell your own kind of stories within it. Creating and telling tales about life in the Marienburg City Watch suits me well; it's relatively uncharted territory and that offers me plenty of elbow room. I get the impression - and I may be utterly, utterly wrong about this - that the 40K world is more bound by its history.
I would like to have a crack at 40K in the future, but I'd need to find my niche within those many, many worlds. In the meantime, I'm having a great time with Warhammer. I'm told Warhammer doesn't have as strong a following as 40K. If nobody's looking, that'll give me a chance to run amok and cause my own particular kind of Chaos. Tee hee.
9. Could you give us a couple of examples of how the ideas for books came about?
A Murder in Marienburg sprung from discussions with Black Library editor Lindsey Priestly. She enjoyed my Nikolai Dante novels and wanted to lure over into her area of Games Workshop's publishing empire. We batted various ideas back and forth about what I could write before deciding on a police procedural set in the Warhammer universe. A Murder in Marienburg is not unlike the US ensemble cop show Hill Street Blues, but with elves, halflings and all manner of fantasy phenomena. Originally it was going to be set in Altdorf and was even known as Altdorf Blues for a while, before Lindsey suggested relocating the action to Marienburg. I'm glad that happened, as Marienburg has got its own distinctive flavour, apart from the empire - that's added a lot of juice to the characters and their personal stories.
Fiends of the Rising Sun came from the success of the Eastern Front trilogy. That sold like gangbusters in America, despite not having any Americans as characters in the book. Somebody across the Atlantic wondered if there was any way of transplanting the Fiends concept to a theatre of war where US troops were more active in WWII. The Pacific was an obvious choice, especially as I was born and raised in New Zealand, a small nation in the South Pacific . From that simple notion Fiends of the Rising Sun was born.
10. How many words a day do you write and how do you structure your day? Do you set yourself targets?
When I'm working on a novel, I aim to write a minimum of 4000 words a day. I used to be a morning writer, able to get my word count done by lunchtime. Lately I seem to have become an afternoon writer, so I devote the morning to other tasks. I trained and worked as a daily newspaper journalist, so I find it much easier working to taut deadlines. Give me all the time in the world to write something and I'll simply never get started. I need the discipline of a deadline, otherwise I tend to fritter my time away.
11. Have you always been a writer? How did it all come about? How much of a struggle was it for you to become one?
I write for fun when I was growing up and always enjoying inventing stories, often inspired by other people's characters. My James Bond 003 and a Half tales were much admired by, well, me mainly. When I finished high school I decided to turn my extrovert personality and way with words into a career, so I became a journalist. When I emigrated to the UK in 1990 I fell into a job as a comics editor. When Virgin came to us looking for potential Dredd authors, I volunteered my services. I'd always wanted to get a novel published and this seemed a safe bet. Those early books for Virgin taunt me how to write long form fiction, experience that's proved invaluable since.
My first book was a dreadful mishmash, but the publishers needed another novel quick and I was quick, if nothing else. My second Dredd novel, Cursed Earth Asylum, was where I started to think I could make a decent writer. Stuff came out of my imagination that amazed and - sometimes - frightened me. I learned to trust that instinct and give it flight. I'm an instinctive writer by nature, but that doesn't mean you ever stop learning how to write better.
12. What do you think is the most common misconception of a writer's life?
Firstly, that we either make lots of money or none at all. It's somewhere in between for most of us. Secondly, that we go on book signing tours and have people queuing up for hours to meet us. That happens to a select few, most of who have worked damn hard to achieve that acclaim. There are more than one hundred thousand new books published every year in the UK alone. That's how fierce the competition is to get noticed. Think how many books don't get published - millions, probably. Perhaps the biggest misconception is that writing is easy. Yes, anyone can write if they're literate, but good writing isn't easy. Having a great idea, that's easy. Good ideas are commonplace. Great writing isn't.
13. Who are or were the biggest influences on your writing?
Terrance Dicks wrote dozens and dozens of novels that adapted old Doctor Who TV adventures into books. His prose was lean and pithy, getting the hell on with the story. I devoured those books and I suspect they were a massive influence. My other big influence was training and working as a daily newspaper journalist. That thrashed any stylistic quirks out of my system pretty thoroughly. As a consequence, you won't find a lot of purple prose or lilting poetry in my writing. My goal is to entertain - tell a good story as efficiently as possible and get out.
14. What genre would you say you work in? And do you plan to step out of it and into mainstream hard SF or horror?
I've written novels that involved at least one (if not more than one) of these genres - science fiction, crime, fantasy, horror, comedy, espionage and war. I'm quite happy writing for any of these, but seem happy writing books that blend multiple genres. I've got an historical crime story I'd like to write one day, but need to find the time to indulge that tale.
15. I noticed from your blog that you are putting a lot of effort into screen-writing. Is that the direction you want to go in, or are you aiming for a balanced mix of the different disciplines?
I'm completing an MA in screenwriting at Screen Academy Scotland at the moment. I've also been involved with workshops and writing labs for radio drama and TV script editing. All of these are areas I'm looking to develop further, particularly TV drama, but it takes years to make your mark in them - just as it does in novels. For now I'll keep mixing the variety of work that I do: novels, comics, radio and audio drama, non-fiction, whatever else comes along. Bills need paying and I need to keep writing. I'd go barmy if I didn't.
16. What other work do you have underway?
Besides all the other things I've already mentioned, I'm being mentored for nine months by a professional TV writer. Working with him, I'm developing the pilot script for a returning TV drama series of my own creation. I don't expect the series will ever get commissioned, but the experience of developing and writing the scripts will stand me in good stead for future opportunities. The hope is that by the end of the mentoring period, I'll have a calling card script of which I can be proud. I can then use that to try and secure the services of an agent who specialises in film and TV.
17. Books. Who is your favourite author?
I read little that isn't for research, sadly. The only time I get to read for fun is on holiday, when I'll tear through a novel a day, if not two. I enjoy Donna Leon, who writes murder mysteries set in contemporary Venice, but her descriptions of food and meals always make me hungry. The novels of John Irving rarely disappoint, though I've only read a few. I'm hoping to read more pre-20th Century novels one day, but I'm not sure when I'll have the time.
18. What books are you reading at the moment?
I just finished a book about the lives of Watergate journalists Woodward and Bernstein. Most of my other reading is to go with screenwriting, such as Writing for TV Drama Series by Pamela Douglas and Writing for Soaps by Chris Curry. I've been dipping in and out of Brian Sibley's rather good authorised biography of Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson. Oh, and The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks was fun - but that was research.
19. Any practical advice for aspiring BL writers?
Writers write. People who sit round talking about writing [or doing the same online] would be better off actually doing some writing. Join a writers' group, either in person or online. Push yourself to write more. Write everyday, eve if it's only a few hundred words. Ban all games consoles from the house, you'll get more done. Most important of all? Take a touch typing course. [When I first typed that last sentence, it read 'take a tough typing course' - I can just imagine it: Get typing, you worms! Hit that letter Q, show it who's the boss!] Being able to type with all ten fingers is invaluable for any modern writer. There's a lot of typing in a novel, and you'll finish much faster if you can type using all ten fingers not just two. Anybody who says otherwise is a fool.
20. Do you have an agent?
Nope. To be honest, it hasn't been necessary yet - and I've had 16 novels published, with two more coming out this year. But if I do get a toe in the door of TV, getting an agent will become considerably more essential. Hopefully that will be sooner, rather than later.
21. When you become Evil Overlord for the day, what rule would you impose on the genre or on publishing in general?
I was Evil Overload at 2000 AD for the best part of five years - Dark Bishop, they called me - so I think my time as evil overlord has already passed. But thanks for the offer. Now, get back to work, lowly publishing minion, or else you'll feel the back of my wrath across your terminal! Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!
OK, now for the usual disclaimers. Any and all errors are solely due to my poor proof-reading skills (yes, still). If anyone wants to post questions for David, feel free to do so. However, there is no guarantee that he will answer them.
- Martin Belderson
