Her unquiet brain requested a shift from
fact to fiction about ten years ago, when she started madly writing mystery
novels based in Saskatchewan. Five of those have been independently published:
Adam’s Witness, Broken Through, Fire Lake, Griffin’s Cure and a novella, Two
Hundred Bones. The final book in the mystery series, The Maddox
Verdict, is about to launch (exciting!) and we'll chat about that shortly, but she's also working on a romantic thriller, a standalone novel with
different main characters, but within the Adam and Grace universe.
And, as if that wasn't enough, she's also the author of a traditionally-published historical fiction/western entitled Blood and Dust, and a children’s book, Magic Mack and The Mischief-Makers - what a woman! She currently lives in a rambling bungalow in Saskatoon with her husband, goldsmith Ken Paulson, a human mine of useful plot ideas. So let's meet her!
Hi Jo, thanks so much for chatting with me and I'd love to start with your new novel, as it's just launched, so what can you tell me about it?
'The Maddox Verdict' is the sixth book in my mystery (plus love) Adam and Grace series, and completes the arc — so the series is now, finally complete. There may well be more books in the universe, but this is it.
It took me a very long time to write this book, partly due to life challenges, but also because it was extremely important to get the title character, Virgil Maddox, as perfect and as real as possible. Virgil is a Black American military veteran who lands in my city for various reasons. He is based on two men: a dear friend, who indeed is an American Vietnam veteran and an immigrant to Canada, and a client of my father’s from years ago. My father was a lawyer who defended teachers around the province.
I am neither Black nor American, nor if it comes to it, a man. So, trying to get his personality and his voice just right was extremely important to me.
Oh wow, that does sound quite a challenge. So what's it about?
It's about a teacher falsely accused of sexually assaulting three of his female students. Virgil happens to be a university friend of my main male character, Inspector (by now) Adam Davis. It turns out that there is a cabal behind these accusations — a cabal that has also perpetrated many heinous crimes. Adam is incandescent over the trumped-up charges, but is in conflict because of his relationship with the accused. He’s also supposed to be getting married to Grace Rampling, but the timing . . .
Oh my goodness, this sounds amazing (and yet another book for my TBR pile - I really need to build an extension to house all my books, lol!). Do you have a link?
Of course! (press here)
The first book idea chose me. I had just
gone through a very difficult time, both personally and professionally, and
found myself bouncing off the walls or curled in the foetal position, drinking
too much and not sleeping enough. I knew this manic phase of misery had to end,
but how?
Subconscious to the rescue. After
approximately three months of this, I woke up at 3 a.m. (as usual) with a story
rolling through my head instead of the usual anxieties. It was inspired by a
local event from years earlier, about which I wrote a nasty newspaper column (I
worked at the daily at that time.) One of the two local cathedrals, which
rented its sanctuary to performing groups — many churches here do this, to
raise renovation funds and so on — cancelled the local gay men’s choir concert.
I was livid and said so in print. It was
one of two columns I wrote over several years that received the most reaction,
most of it pro-choir.
So that dark night, I suddenly had built a
plot around this event, including a murder (that did not happen in real life,
ha!), a red-haired and passionate reporter (my female main character), and a
very handsome (I couldn’t resist) detective sergeant who takes the case, solves
the crime, and falls madly in love at first sight with the journalist.
I wrote it in about a year, not having clue
one what I was doing. I had basic English skills, of course, after years of being
a journalist. But a novel!? I read those things. I didn’t write them. Yet there
I was.
There is usually a germ of real life
underlying my mystery stories, with the exception of Griffin’s Cure which was almost
entirely made up of whole cloth. But my primary passion and motivation is
creating books that address social issues: homophobia, misogyny, racism.
And yes, before you ask, I have indeed been
called a woke libtard and much worse. Will I stop? No.
Good for you! I'm sure I'm not the only person standing up and applauding you right now! But sorry, please carry on.
Next I veered over into historical
fiction with my western, Blood and Dust, which is traditionally published. The
book emerged from a nightmare of my husband’s. Within a week, I had decided to
write a first chapter which naturally placed itself in 1880s Canada. I showed
it to him, his jaw dropped, and off I went.
That said, again, lol, there are also social issues at play in that book! Even my wee children’s book has a social issue at its root, so I guess I do not veer far from the core passion.
I love how you're true to your passions, as I'm sure that energy will come across in your writing, but what about novel outlining - are you a plotter or pantser?
I am largely a pantser, but the basic plot and definitely the first few chapters and the ending are clear in my head before I begin. I don’t know how people can write fiction without knowing the ending. How on earth do you get there? I outline in my head and never use any aids.
I agree about not knowing the ending, but I plan a lot - I don't know what I'd do without my trusty spreadsheet! How about deciding on a point of view (POV)?
POV, for some reason, is an easy decision
for me. It’s just what the book calls for. In the case of the western, it’s the
story of this young man’s journey from eastern to western Canada and it’s
written entirely from his POV. It felt right.
I'm loving the naughty! Talking of characters, do you create full profiles before you start, or as you go along?
I don't create profiles.
Whaaat? How do you do that?
If I can’t “see”
my characters, they don’t belong in my book. If they are not in my brain or my
heart or both, I can’t write them. So they just live with me. This makes their
characteristics generally quite easy to write as well.
Oh, I wish I was like that! How about naming characters?
Names are a bit of a different story,
particularly for tertiary characters. I google the hell out of them. I don’t want
them, particularly the villains, to have the same names as local people; my
books are largely based in my own home city and other parts of the province.
I blew it spectacularly once. Sgt. Joan
Karpinski is one of my favourite secondary characters. She has indeed had a few
POV chapters. As always, I searched the name and found nothing. It turns out
that an acquaintance’s relative has, indeed, that name. Thank goodness the
relative was chuffed instead of upset and occasionally calls herself “Sergeant
Joan.” I love that.
Thank goodness she saw it that way! What about some of the technicalities, like picking tenses, choosing language styles, etc?
I am most comfortable in basic past tense
and therefore always “write there.” I find present tense hard to read,
personally, so there’s that too.
There is a fat lot of swearing in my
novels, but I hope I don’t take it too far; at least, not so far that it gets
either boring or too offensive. I mean, these are cops, right. And bad guys.
They swear.
True, and your genre does call for realism, so it's a good choice. But what about purple prose? Is that ever a problem?
I am not a fan of a lot of description and
certainly not of purple prose. It’s not (I hope and think) a big problem,
because I write action-based novels with a lot of (too much?) dialogue. Scaling
back the dialogue is a bigger issue for me.
I'm the same - I love writing dialogue! But as you're so experienced, do you have any tips for newbie or aspiring writers?
I have SO many tips! I
do some content and line editing and I’m constantly adding tips to my list. It’s
hard to know where to begin, really. Here are a few fundamentals.
If you write, you had better also read. It
is amazing how much brains can glean about word usage, style, grammar and
character development without the prefrontal cortex even noticing.
Be sure to read a good book on
novel-writing basics. It’s stunning how many people cannot properly write and
punctuate dialogue tags, for example. Also, sentence fragments. (Ha). Sometimes,
they work for emphasis. Too many of them and your reader will be flinging the
book across the room.
Avoid overusing words. Avoid overusing
words. Just already seriously suddenly avoid overusing the same dang words.
🤣🤣 Oh, I love this! I think I'm getting the message...!
Okay, let's switch to the publishing side of things now. You mentioned you've been both traditionally and self-published - can you tell me more?
When I wrote the first book, Adam’s Witness, I decided I was too old to be pitching a murder mystery to agents or publishers. That was almost 10 years ago, so apparently I have survived and maybe didn’t make the best decision. I did get some agent interest afterward, but it was too late for my series. I was told that it would be next to impossible finding a publisher for an already-published work.
When I wrote the western, however, I
thought well, it’s now or never. So I pitched it to two publishing houses (to
begin with) and one took it.
Oh wow, congratulations! That's quite some feat.
For me, editing seems key in producing quality work, it's made such a difference to my work, but what about you? What's your process and do you use professional editors?
I wish I could answer that first question.
I edit it until I feel it’s finished. I expect it’s at least a dozen full
passes, with much intermittent peering at single chapters. I don’t read it out
loud, but I know this works for a lot of authors.
I cannot stress this enough. Every book —
EVERY SINGLE BOOK EVER — needs at least one editor. I usually have a content
editor, a sensitivity editor, a legal editor (not for fear of being sued, but
because there is so much law and police procedure in my books), and a
proofreader. I’m lucky that my legal editor is also a genius proofreader. That
doesn’t include betas.
That's sound advice, and seeing as you've just mentioned them, tell me about your betas. And do you send out ARCs (Advance Reader Copies)?
I always have at least five beta readers. In the past, I have not employed ARCs, although that may change. I have
not independently published in a few years, and in that time the universe has
exploded with change. I have to say I’m not sure what to recommend now.
Previously, I have always lined up press
interviews, done a book launch/signing, posted an incredible amount on social
media, done the pre-order thing and at least one promo site sale, usually about
three or four weeks after launch.
Aww, marketing – it's such a divisive subject within the writing world. What works well for you?
I’ve tried it all, apart from book tours and blog tours. Some things have worked once or twice; others have not; some things stop working. The one thing that will generally work is showing up in BookBub deals, if you can get them.
Social media, once upon a time, did help generate visibility and sometimes sales, but that does not seem to be the case today, at least in my experience . . . which admittedly, is not as vast as it once was. I am feeling quite burned out on social and trying to generate the energy for my next two adventures.
I did one successful advertising campaign on Twitter/X. The downside of that were the legions of horrible, homophobic, misogynist and filthy comments that ended up attached to the ad. I couldn’t bring myself to do it again, although I will probably give it another shot for The Maddox Verdict. We’ll see.
It’s a minefield. Tread very, very carefully.
Yikes, I can't believe your adverts attracted that type of hatred. That's quite saddening, but it'll be interesting to see how your new novel goes.
Can I ask about your cover art – is that your work or do you employ others?
Oh maaaaan, this is the tough one. I have tried many cover designers, I’m afraid, and it has never worked out. One made Adam’s Witness look like a work of religious fiction (I get it, but still) and it just isn’t. One day, I will find the right person and redo all my covers. Because yes, I’ve unfortunately done them myself.
I am testing yet another book cover production company right now. It is time to update my covers. Here’s the thing about that: times and trends change, and covers probably should also change along with them.
I'll admit, I was surprised at how much cover trends affect sales, it's a bit of a minefield! And talking of which, do you have any tips for the more technical side of writing?
I am generally unimpressed with writing
software programs, none of which I will mention by name. A couple have been
useful in finding repetitive words and so on, but they were not worth the
effort overall, in my opinion.
I will not use AI for writing in any way
ever. I don’t even use it for research. I don’t find it reliable enough.
Luckily for Canadians, our ISBNs are free!
I always get my own ISBNs (not everyone does if they are exclusive to Amazon)
because I want to OWN that number. Also, copyright is automatic. I declare it
anyway on the title page.
Ooh, you lucky Canadians! I had to buy my ISBNs - yet another expense but, as you say, at least you own them so that's better for control.
I'd love to end by asking your opinion on common writing mistakes – do you have any pet hates?
Due to my history, I tend to notice basic language
use and grammar errors. This is not to say I am remotely perfect. At all.
I see comma splices, lack of subject-verb
agreement, possessives used as plurals and poor dialogue tag use — especially
when they aren’t tags at all, but physical actions. “That was so funny,” he
chuckled. Or obvious bits of dialogue that should be shown, not told, adding
insult to injury with a tag that means the same thing: “I was so angry,” he fumed.
I got that the first time, lol.
Repetition, along with not knowing the
precise meaning of a word you’re using, also makes me kind of crazy. “You’re
completely devoid of humour,” for example. Devoid actually means “completely
empty.”
Well, Jo, you have been an utter delight! Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me, and if you'd like to find out more about this wonderful author, please visit her website here or you can find her links below.
Substack: https://joannepaulson.substack.com/
X: https://x.com/joanne_paulson
IG: https://www.instagram.com/paulson.joanne/
Book One of the Adam and Grace Mystery Series: mybook.to/AdamsWitness
Amazon author page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/J.C.-Paulson/author/B071GVF9N4
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