Good Morning, Booklovers!
Here we are two days before Christmas! Thanks to everyone for stopping by and also to today’s guest author S. Lee Manning for taking time out of the Christmas rush to chat with us about books and what she’s got coming next for her fans.
Welcome, Sandy! How do you take your coffee?
SLM: Black. Lots and lots of black coffee. Very strong.
Ally: Coming right up. While I pour, please introduce yourself to readers.
Bio:
S. Lee Manning spent two years as managing editor of Law Enforcement Communications before realizing that lawyers make a lot more money. A subsequent career as an attorney spanned from a first-tier New York law firm, Cravath, Swaine & Moore, to working for the Office of the Attorney General, State of New Jersey, to solo practice. In 2001, Manning agreed to chair New Jerseyans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (NJADP), writing articles on the risk of wrongful execution and arguing against the death penalty on radio and television in the years leading up to its abolition in the state in 2007. An award-winning short story writer, Manning is the author of international thrillers. A life-long interest in Russia and espionage is reflected in the Kolya Petrov thrillers.
Something unique/unusual that isn’t in your regular bio: “When I was 21 and very insane, I hitchhiked from London to Edinburgh, Scotland by myself - and nothing bad happened. I still can't believe I did something that dangerous.”
Author Contacts:
https://www.sleemanning.com
@SLeeManning1952
https://www.facebook.com/sleemanning
S. Lee Manning spent two years as managing editor of Law Enforcement Communications before realizing that lawyers make a lot more money. A subsequent career as an attorney spanned from a first-tier New York law firm, Cravath, Swaine & Moore, to working for the Office of the Attorney General, State of New Jersey, to solo practice. In 2001, Manning agreed to chair New Jerseyans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (NJADP), writing articles on the risk of wrongful execution and arguing against the death penalty on radio and television in the years leading up to its abolition in the state in 2007. An award-winning short story writer, Manning is the author of international thrillers. A life-long interest in Russia and espionage is reflected in the Kolya Petrov thrillers.
Something unique/unusual that isn’t in your regular bio: “When I was 21 and very insane, I hitchhiked from London to Edinburgh, Scotland by myself - and nothing bad happened. I still can't believe I did something that dangerous.”
Author Contacts:
https://www.sleemanning.com
@SLeeManning1952
https://www.facebook.com/sleemanning
INTERVIEW:
Ally: Who or what inspired your featured book?
SLM: When I started planning my latest book, I had a dilemma. My protagonist, Kolya Petrov, had resigned from his job as an intelligence operative at the end of the previous book and was trying to build a more normal life with his fiancee. I had to figure out a way to get him back into the world - and back to doing the kind of stuff that nearly got him killed in the previous book - that would be believable and in character. There had to be a serious threat - that was no problem - and something that he and he alone could handle. If he was not essential to stopping the threat, not only would he not do it, his former boss wouldn't particularly want him back, given that he wanted to shoot her for what she did to him. So I came up with the idea of a former friend having essential knowledge who would talk only to Kolya - and everything flowed from that. Dmitri, Kolya's childhood best friend whom he'd helped put in prison, had made a few guest appearances in dreams and hallucinations in Trojan Horse - and I wound up building the plot around his and Kolya's fractured friendship. The theme of betrayed trust runs generally through Nerve Attack.
Nerve Attack, by the way, can be read without having read the previous novel.
Ally: Are you self-published or traditionally published? How did you make the decision?
SLM: Traditionally published but with a small publisher. I didn't want to deal with cover design, book layout, yada yada.
Ally: What for you is the hardest part of writing?
SLM: For me, the hardest part of writing has nothing to do with the writing. The writing is the fun part. The hard part is trying to get the word on your books out to people who've never read them and never heard of you. It has nothing to do with the quality of my books, but everything to do with the number of authors out there, the number of distractions, and the fact that I am not a celebrity. Being with a small publisher means that most of the marketing falls on me. I enjoy doing talks and meeting with book clubs, but getting the events is tough. It takes an enormous amount of time, and it has been especially hard during Covid. I spent a lot of hours making cold calls to libraries in my home state of Vermont to ask if they'd be interested in an author talk on zoom or in person - when it's safe. Even if I can get a gig, and I've done about ten so far this year, people are still reluctant to come out, and zoom doesn't have the same effect as in person events. But still, I feel like I'm slowly getting the word out.
Ally: Why did you choose writing as a career? Is it your only career, or do you have a “day” job?
SLM: I've wanted to be a writer since I was five years old. I always loved books, and I loved making up stories. I majored in English, got an MA in English lit, and then wrote short stories while working various jobs in my hometown of Cincinnati. When one story won a prize from the Mercantile Library and was published in Cincinnati magazine, I decided to head for the big city and become a fulltime writer. In New York, I worked on small magazines, shared an apartment with five other people until I got tired of being poor and went to law school. Through the years of my legal employment, I tried to keep up my writing, but it wasn't easy. So, now that I've stopped practicing law, I am writing full time. I have the luxury of not worrying about supporting myself with my writing, which allows me to write what I want and as much as I want.
Ally: Do you work from an outline?
SLM: Well, kind of. I tend to write a short outline and then a longer outline. I start writing, and as I write, I realize that the outline doesn't completely work and I deviate, and then I revise the outline, and then I go back to the novel and then deviate again from the outline and revise the outline again. I play the circle game until I finish - then I do the edit and rewrites without an outline, although at that stage, I sometimes do a timeline to make sure I don't mess up any of the dates.
Ally: How many drafts (revision passes) do you do on a typical book before submission to your editor/publisher?
SLM: Too many, if you count revising chapters as I go. I revise over and over before I even get to the end and do a global edit. Then I ask my husband to read - and after his input, I do another edit and revision.
And the above is one of the reasons I write a book a year.
Ally: What is your next writing project? Anticipated release date?
SLM: My next writing project is tentatively titled Bloody Soil.
Elevator pitch: Years after the murder of her father, a young woman infiltrates a far-right group in Germany, selectively eliminating neo-Nazi killers, to exact justice for her father's death until an American joins the group and poses a different kind of challenge.
Anticipated release date: November 2022.
Ally: Which of the trivia questions did you choose?
SLM:
Ally: Who or what inspired your featured book?
SLM: When I started planning my latest book, I had a dilemma. My protagonist, Kolya Petrov, had resigned from his job as an intelligence operative at the end of the previous book and was trying to build a more normal life with his fiancee. I had to figure out a way to get him back into the world - and back to doing the kind of stuff that nearly got him killed in the previous book - that would be believable and in character. There had to be a serious threat - that was no problem - and something that he and he alone could handle. If he was not essential to stopping the threat, not only would he not do it, his former boss wouldn't particularly want him back, given that he wanted to shoot her for what she did to him. So I came up with the idea of a former friend having essential knowledge who would talk only to Kolya - and everything flowed from that. Dmitri, Kolya's childhood best friend whom he'd helped put in prison, had made a few guest appearances in dreams and hallucinations in Trojan Horse - and I wound up building the plot around his and Kolya's fractured friendship. The theme of betrayed trust runs generally through Nerve Attack.
Nerve Attack, by the way, can be read without having read the previous novel.
Ally: Are you self-published or traditionally published? How did you make the decision?
SLM: Traditionally published but with a small publisher. I didn't want to deal with cover design, book layout, yada yada.
Ally: What for you is the hardest part of writing?
SLM: For me, the hardest part of writing has nothing to do with the writing. The writing is the fun part. The hard part is trying to get the word on your books out to people who've never read them and never heard of you. It has nothing to do with the quality of my books, but everything to do with the number of authors out there, the number of distractions, and the fact that I am not a celebrity. Being with a small publisher means that most of the marketing falls on me. I enjoy doing talks and meeting with book clubs, but getting the events is tough. It takes an enormous amount of time, and it has been especially hard during Covid. I spent a lot of hours making cold calls to libraries in my home state of Vermont to ask if they'd be interested in an author talk on zoom or in person - when it's safe. Even if I can get a gig, and I've done about ten so far this year, people are still reluctant to come out, and zoom doesn't have the same effect as in person events. But still, I feel like I'm slowly getting the word out.
Ally: Why did you choose writing as a career? Is it your only career, or do you have a “day” job?
SLM: I've wanted to be a writer since I was five years old. I always loved books, and I loved making up stories. I majored in English, got an MA in English lit, and then wrote short stories while working various jobs in my hometown of Cincinnati. When one story won a prize from the Mercantile Library and was published in Cincinnati magazine, I decided to head for the big city and become a fulltime writer. In New York, I worked on small magazines, shared an apartment with five other people until I got tired of being poor and went to law school. Through the years of my legal employment, I tried to keep up my writing, but it wasn't easy. So, now that I've stopped practicing law, I am writing full time. I have the luxury of not worrying about supporting myself with my writing, which allows me to write what I want and as much as I want.
Ally: Do you work from an outline?
SLM: Well, kind of. I tend to write a short outline and then a longer outline. I start writing, and as I write, I realize that the outline doesn't completely work and I deviate, and then I revise the outline, and then I go back to the novel and then deviate again from the outline and revise the outline again. I play the circle game until I finish - then I do the edit and rewrites without an outline, although at that stage, I sometimes do a timeline to make sure I don't mess up any of the dates.
Ally: How many drafts (revision passes) do you do on a typical book before submission to your editor/publisher?
SLM: Too many, if you count revising chapters as I go. I revise over and over before I even get to the end and do a global edit. Then I ask my husband to read - and after his input, I do another edit and revision.
And the above is one of the reasons I write a book a year.
Ally: What is your next writing project? Anticipated release date?
SLM: My next writing project is tentatively titled Bloody Soil.
Elevator pitch: Years after the murder of her father, a young woman infiltrates a far-right group in Germany, selectively eliminating neo-Nazi killers, to exact justice for her father's death until an American joins the group and poses a different kind of challenge.
Anticipated release date: November 2022.
Ally: Which of the trivia questions did you choose?
SLM:
- a movie you’ll always remember: Princess Bride. Some of the most quotable lines in all of moviedom. My go to response when being called by a live telephone scammer who asks my name is a quote from the movie: "Hallo. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."
- favorite comfort food: Pizza. Don't eat it much anymore, but I do love it.
- If you were a color, what would it be? Purple. (What can I say - I'm a child of the 60s.)
- something unique in your handbag: A beautiful pocketknife, green handle, that I bought at a street fair in Beaune, a gorgeous little town in France. I usually remember to remove it from my purse and leave it somewhere else when I have to go through security checks. Forgot a few times and got the knife through which, as a thriller writer, makes me nervous.
- pie or cake? Cake. Chocolate with amoretto icing.
- Your hobbies? Stand-up (comedy). When I have time - guitar and photography.
- If you couldn't write anymore, what would you want to do? Stand-up. And yes I do it now.
- How long does it take you to write a book? From idea to final draft - six months to a year.
Nerve Attack (A Kolya Petrov Thriller)
Genre: international thriller/romantic suspense
Rating: PG-16
Former American intelligence operative Kolya Petrov, struggling with the physical and psychological aftereffects of kidnapping and torture, is drawn back into the game when Dmitri, his childhood best friend, holds the key to stopping an attack by terrorists armed with a deadly nerve agent. Working with Dmitri, however, is complicated. While their friendship had been forged during their years in an abusive Russian boys' home, the two men's lives took very different paths. Dmitri had headed the North American branch of a Russian gang until Kolya, working undercover, put him in prison. Ten years later, Dmitri's cooperation is essential to finding the smuggler of the nerve agent, and he refuses to work with anyone but Kolya. Kolya, trying to build a normal life with Alex, the woman he loves, reluctantly agrees to undertake one more mission. But while Kolya must trust Dmitri not to take revenge for the betrayal of their friendship while seeking information in Russia where Kolya would face torture and execution if caught, Alex must evade would-be kidnappers and killers in Vermont. To end an elaborate plot that threatens both their lives as well as the lives of hundreds of innocent people requires Kolya and Alex to use all their abilities and intelligence and to trust in unlikely allies. But can Kolya, fighting through PTSD and physical injuries, trust his own judgment?
Buy Link:
https://www.amazon.com/Nerve-Attack-Kolya-Petrov-Thriller-ebook/dp/B0971255GC/
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