I’ve been fortunate enough to
receive wide acclaim already for my Sundown Press novel THE PEACEMAKER, including 5 star reviews from 2 of the most
successful western authors in the business. Spur award-winning and Pulitzer
Prize-nominated author ROBERT VAUGHAN describes it as ‘a great book’. Meanwhile
RALPH COTTON (also a Pulitzer-prize nominated novelist) writes: ‘For pure writing style, McBride’s
gritty prose nails the time and place of his story with bold authority. …this
relatively new author has thoroughly, and rightly so, claimed his place among
the top Old West storytellers.’ I’m very grateful to both Robert & Ralph
for their fantastic support.
I discuss THE
PEACEMAKER, westerns and my writing in the interview I did with THOMAS RIZZO. A writer of fine westerns himself, Tom also keeps a wonderful blog which
is an absolute treasure trove of stories from the real Wild West – great source
material for us western fiction writers. Find it here. http://tomrizzo.com/storyteller-7-mc-bride/
Tom’s
very kindly let me reproduce the interview here today.
THE PEACEMAKER is Andrew McBride’s sixth Western. All of them
feature Calvin Taylor—Choctaw—in the role of the main character.
In addition to his latest novel, he has
written Death Song, The Arizona Kid, Shadow Man, Canyon of the Death,
and Death Wears a Star.
Andrew, who lives in Brighton, England, says
watching a particular television in his pre-teens triggered his desire to start
writing. He wrote a few adventure stories before immersing himself in novels by
various authors to study how others approached the craft.
Each of Andrew’s novels has earned a broad
range of acclaim. One reader describes The Peacemaker as “gritty,
utterly authentic, and…gripping in emotion and atmosphere.”
After reading The Arizona Kid, one
reader remarked, “If McBride’s stories can’t bring the western back to life
then someone better call an undertaker.”
1.
TELL US A BIT ABOUT YOUR LATEST NOVEL, THE
PEACEMAKER, AND HOW YOU CAME TO WRITE IT.
It’s set in Arizona in 1871. The hero is an 18 year
old, Calvin Taylor, who is nicknamed ‘Choctaw;’ he’s not an Indian but was born
on the Choctaw Reservation in Oklahoma where his dad was an army contractor.
Choctaw bumps into 2 government representatives – Sean Brennan and his adopted
Apache daughter, Nahlin. They’re on a mission to talk peace to the Apaches,
then at war with the white man. Choctaw is persuaded to guide this duo to the
stronghold of the great chief Cochise, and along the way falls in love with
Nahlin. Aficionados of the TV series ‘The
High Chaparral’ will recognize that the story so far is loosely based on an
episode of the HC, but the second half of the novel goes somewhere else
entirely. I felt the original episode was a springboard for what could be a
tremendous adventure story.
2.
CALVIN TAYLOR, THE MAIN CHARACTER, APPEARS IN ALL SIX OF YOUR WESTERNS. AND HE
IS A YOUNG PROTAGONIST. WHAT DREW YOU TO CREATE HIM?
I had the idea of a character who serves as a scout
against the Apaches, then goes on to use the same skills – e.g. how to track,
fight, hunt men down - as a Range Detective, lawman, Wells Fargo agent etc. I
suppose the historical model is Tom Horn.
TOM HORN
Then having created a character who I
could use in lots of ways, I couldn’t see the point in having a variation on
him in different westerns, so he became the central character in all of them. A
key fact about him is he’s a misfit – his sympathy with Native Americans makes
him an outsider in his own society; they use him when they need him, but they
don’t really accept him. In that regard he’s a bit like the Tom Jeffords character
in Elliot Arnold’s great novel BLOOD BROTHER, or John Wayne in THE SEARCHERS.
John Wayne in THE SEARCHERS
I
read somewhere that it’s a good writing tack to have your hero/heroine as
‘someone stuck up a tree while people throw stones at them.’ In other words
having a central character who is also an underdog helps the audience empathise
with them. And he is a young man who has seen probably too much, in terms of
violence etc., for his age. Indeed in THE
PEACEMAKER, which is the first of my 6 westerns in chronological order,
he’s only 18. He does a lot of growing up in that novel!
3.
WHY WAS IT IMPORTANT FOR YOU TO WRITE WESTERNS? WHAT DRIVES THAT AMBITION?
To most people under, say 45, westerns are largely
irrelevant (I know that’s a sweeping generalization) but when I was a kid in
England in the 60s and 70s, they were a huge part of the cultural landscape. I
got my first taste of westerns via the movies (particularly those starring John
Wayne and/or directed by John Ford.) and TV westerns. For me westerns ticked
every box – they told tales that had strong dramatic tension, because they’re
essentially morality plays about the conflict between right and wrong. They deal with a wide range of moral dilemmas
that the settlement of the west threw up: How do you tame a wilderness without
destroying it? How much violence is necessary (and how much is excessive) in
creating a law-abiding society? How can very different cultures (for example
the white man and the Native Americans) co-exist? All painted on a canvas of
great physical beauty and diversity. As I got into young manhood I became
interested in the history of the real west, and also Native American culture. I
started reading westerns - the likes of Matt Chisolm, Lewis B. Patten, Fred
Grove, Gordon D. Shirreffs, Robert MacLeod etc. - which I enjoyed for their
entertainment value. But a key western I read early on was THE BUFFALO SOLDIERS.
The author, John Prebble, audaciously tackled some of the most familiar aspects
of the western – the U.S. cavalry versus the Indians, the Texas Rangers etc. –
but approached them with a fresh eye, dispensing with clichés and humanizing
his characters. So I became aware you could get into greater depth in the
western. When I found out Prebble – and also Matt Chisolm – were English, that
encouraged me to have the confidence to give it a go too!
4.
WHAT MADE YOU WANT TO BECOME A WRITER IN THE FIRST PLACE?
I think I always wanted to write. When I was only 7
there was a TV show called ‘Sir Lancelot’
I used to watch avidly.
'The Adventures of Sir Lancelot'
Pretty soon I got hold of a notebook and started
writing my own stories about Arthurian knights, until I got that little bump of
hard skin on your finger you get from holding a pen a lot. After that I just
wrote as a hobby all the time – adventure stories of various kinds. Then I
started reading. For the authors I liked I used to think: ‘I want to be like
them.’ For those I didn’t I thought: ‘I can do better than that!’ When I
realized no one was writing exactly the kind of books I wanted to read, I
thought I might as well write them myself. I started reading out my stuff at
writing groups. This was in England in the 1980s. At one of them, a guy called
Philip Caveney suggested I seriously consider writing for a living. That impressed
me because he was the first person to take me seriously as a writer, and I
valued his opinion because he was also the first published author I’d met –
he’s been successful writing thrillers and now children’s fiction – so I
reckoned he knew what he was talking about! A bit later, in the early 90s, I
had to choose between working full time or working in a more irregular way,
which would give me less money, but more time to write. I chose the latter. I
don’t regret it, although the finances have certainly been precarious at times.
I guess I just love the writer’s life!
5.
TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOUR WORK HABITS. DO YOU HAVE GOALS OF A CERTAIN NUMBER
OF WORDS A WEEK, OR DO YOU JUST AS WRITE WHEN INSPIRATION STRIKES?
The writer who waits for inspiration will wait for
ever. As I say, Phil Caveney was the
first published novelist I’d met, so I asked him what he was doing right that
other writers weren’t doing. He basically told me that he treated being a
writer as a day job, and you had to work at it regularly, on a daily basis if
possible. So I do my best to follow that. If you’re planning to write a novel
of, say 80,000 words, first you need to give yourself a DEADLINE. If you decide
you’re going to write it in 2 years, that’s 110 words a day. The thing is to
keep to that deadline and write those 110 words a day, or, if it’s easier, 770
words a week. In my present circumstances, rather than writing daily, I can set
aside 2 days a week for writing. The thing is to hit your word count and
deadlines. If you let that slip, you’ll join the ranks of would-be authors who
spend 7 or 10 years or more writing one novel, in a vain quest for perfection.
6.
IF YOU COULD HAVE ANY WRITER – LIVING OR DEAD – STOP BY YOUR HOME, WHO WOULD IT
BE AND WHAT WOULD YOU ASK HIM OR HER?
How about J.K. Rowling? I’d ask her: “How come you
managed to make so much money?”
Seriously, I couldn’t pick just one: there’s so many I’ve learned from,
from Dickens to John Prebble to Chandler, Rosemary Sutcliff, Elmore Leonard…
I’d ask them: “How do I get as good as you?”
7.
WHEN YOU’RE NOT WRITING, HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR LEISURE TIME?
Listening to music – I’ve got fairly wide tastes here.
I like watching live music too, in small venues like pubs, watching movies
(mostly on Youtube these days.) I’m keen on good conversation. I love reading,
but I’m struggling right now to find enough time for it. Country walking - I’m
lucky enough to live in East Sussex, which is one of the most beautiful parts
of England. It has a great coastline, with cliffs and everything, and rolling
hills called the South Downs that I like to explore.
The South Downs, Sussex, England
Coast of East Sussex, England
BLURB for THE PEACEMAKER:
Eighteen-year-old scout Calvin
'Choctaw' Taylor believes he can handle whatever life throws his way. He’s been
on his own for several years, and he only wants to make his mark in the world.
When he is asked to guide peace emissary Sean Brennan and his adopted Apache
daughter, Nahlin, into a Chiricahua Apache stronghold, he agrees—but then has
second thoughts. He’s heard plenty about the many ways the Apache can kill a
man. But Mr. Brennan sways him, and they begin the long journey to find
Cochise—and to try to forge a peace and an end to the Indian Wars that have
raged for so long. During the journey, Choctaw begins to understand that there
are some things about himself he doesn’t like—but he’s not sure what to do
about it. Falling in love with Nahlin is something he never expected—and finds
hard to live with. The death and violence, love for Nahlin and respect for both
Cochise and Mr. Brennan, have a gradual effect on Choctaw that change him. But
is that change for the better? Can he live with the things he’s done to survive
in the name of peace?
Apaches
EXTRACT:
Choctaw blinked sweat and sunspots out of his eyes and began to lower the field
glasses; then he glimpsed movement.
He used the glasses again, scanning nearer ground, the white sands. He saw
nothing.
And then two black specks were there suddenly, framed against the dazzling
white. They might have dropped from the sky.
They grew bigger. Two horsebackers coming this way, walking their mounts. As he
watched they spurted into rapid movement, whipping their ponies into a hard run
towards him.
The specks swelled to the size of horses and men. Men in faded smocks maybe
once of bright colour, their long hair bound by rags at the temple. They had
rifles in their hands.
Breath caught in Choctaw’s throat. Fear made him dizzy. His arms started to
tremble. He knew who was coming at him so fast.
Apaches.
And you killed them or they killed you.
****
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