News & Blog by JJ Cooper
Read the latest news and bulletins, essays, features, opinions from our bestselling authors. Find out what's being said, debated, and discussed in the world of books and ideas.
My Dilemma with Val McDermid, Michael Robotham and Garry Disher!
by JJ Cooper on 20 August 2010
What do I have in common with three great authors of Crime Fiction/Thrillers? Apart from writing the same genre, we’re coming together for a panel session at this year’s Brisbane Writers Festival. But, there’s a dilemma! With three very talented, and well known, authors on the stage beside me; how do I get some ‘air time’? First thoughts are to leave some ‘paperbacks’ in a brown paper bag under...
Last month I discovered a couple of ways to leave an impression on a ballroom full of the world’s best thriller writers, publishers, agents and fans. Fellow thriller writer Brad Parks serenaded guest speaker Brad Meltzer – that was impressive. I turned up late! Nineteen of us debut authors with International Thriller Writers (ITW) were treated to a breakfast and an opportunity to be in the spotlight...
Writers love words right? I’m a kinda concise type of writer though. I don’t go out of my way to hit the Thesaurus to make a show out of using a word that I wouldn’t normally use. But, there are some words I just love! ‘Touché’ is one and so is ‘penultimate’. These words have meaning to me in a personal, historic sense. For me writing fiction is about experience and imagination, therefore, some...
I’ve never really had trouble holding my end of a conversation, but I’d hadn’t thought of myself as a storyteller until it was pointed out to me in a simple exercise that an old Platoon Sergeant pulled on ‘us’ troops one day. As a young ‘digger’ in an Infantry Battalion, I was tasked on occasions to be the Signalman. This role meant carrying a heap of extra equipment (radio gear) and following the...
Well . . . I was once (and young). Perhaps the most frequently asked question of me after the publication of my first thriller, THE INTERROGATOR, was (and still is) ‘are you the main character?’ Good question. You be the judge. I spent 17 years in the Army, the last seven with the Army Intelligence Corps where I specialised in Human Intelligence (HUMINT). An HUMINT operator is someone who collects...
