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Crime writer Bill Cameron’s fans cheered the release of his new novel at Murder by the Book Thursday night. Day One (Tyrus Books) is the third in Cameron’s series set in Portland, featuring (now retired) police detective Skin Kadash.
According to Cameron, “One of the main themes of the book is the idea of reinvention of self, sometimes willingly and sometimes as result of desperate need.”
Cameron read an excerpt from Day One and shared his writing process with the crowd at MbtB. He said whenever he starts a new project, he needs to do something he’s never done before. His prior books –Lost Dog and Chasing Smoke—were more tightly focused and took place over a period of two or three days. This time he experimented with sprawl: more characters, a longer time frame, and a nonlinear chronology. The story is told from five different points of view.
Unlike some authors, Cameron doesn’t begin his books with a detailed outline. In fact, he wrote his first paragraph of Day One without knowing who was telling the story, who the characters were, or even whether it would be part of the series.
Cameron uses settings that will be familiar to Oregonians. “One of my habits is to take places I really love and commit atrocities there,” he said. “If something horrible happens in my stories in a place that’s real, it’s out of affection.”
While Cameron gets away with mistreating places, he said it angers his wife when he makes bad things happen to his characters. Jill passionately corroborated this fact from the audience.
Cameron’s next novel is about 85 percent done. His recurring character Ruby Jane stars in this one. Much of the story hearkens back to Ruby Jane’s high school years, requiring Cameron to crawl into the head of a teenage girl. He researched teenagers by reading lots of young adult fiction, and emailing with his daughter to see if his ideas would fly.
One audience member asked about the role of social media in an author’s life. Cameron replied that while a web presence is important for an author, “its need is grossly inflated. The online world is very saturated,” he said. “It’s easy to be a big fish in a small pond and feel like you’re making a big impact when really it’s only you and a couple of people who happened to notice you.” He also admitted to occasionally oversharing online, and tweeting too much. He blogs twice a month for Criminal Minds.
Murder by the Book is very supportive of crime writers and readers, and always puts on nice events, with such classy touches as fresh grapes and Dove chocolates. Portland is lucky to have its own mystery bookstore, and to count Bill Cameron among its local authors.
Image credits Bill Cameron Mysteries.
