Meet BJ Condike

Thanks to Partners in Crime blog tours for the opportunity to interview author BJ Condike about his debut novel Murder is Personal. Jake Powell is perfectly happy in his adopted Texas town until an old friend shows up. And then shows up dead. Can he figure who did it and why before he ends up behind bars? You can read my review HERE. And don't forget the giveaway!

Jodi: Your author bio includes a list of past occupations/hobbies – everything from

bookkeeper to archer to furniture maker. When and how did you add mystery

writer to the list?

BJ: In 2016 my wife Mary Lou (a.k.a. “ML”) wanted to join a writing club where we lived in Granbury, Texas. She had met a lady named Sue who had been a nurse in the Pacific Theater in WWII, and ML wanted to write her story. The club meetings were in the evening, and ML asked if I would drive her, as she was having vision problems. So I went along as her chauffer and planned to just observe from a corner, but I couldn’t keep my mouth shut and got caught up in the whole process. I had always been an avid reader, and writing a novel was on my bucket list, so I took the plunge.

A year later we went to the DFWCon writing conference in Dallas, where we met an amazing

instructor name Tex Thompson. She told us about a course she taught in a program called The Writers Path at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Soon after we enrolled at SMU and graduated two-and-a-half years later. We continue to challenge ourselves to improve our writing through workshops, conferences, self-study, and critique sessions.

Jodi: I love that you and your wife joned the writing community together. Yos started with short stories. Was it difficult making the leap to a full-length novel?

BJ: No and yes. I had been writing short stories for a few years, and tended to think and write in six-to-eight-page increments. When I began the novel, I approached each chapter as a short story, wrote my six or eight pages, and voila I had a chapter. That part was relatively easy.

What was extraordinarily difficult was finding my voice, setting a tone, creating an atmosphere, and creating characters that were consistent from chapter to chapter. I was learning to write as I went, so I had to repeatedly read what I had written to maintain consistency. As I wrote more and learned more, my writing improved over the years (at least I hope it did), and I kept revisiting my previous chapters to elevate them to the level of my ever-improving writing skills. Not only writing, but storytelling.

When I started, I knew how to write a sentence and a paragraph, but knew little about story structure which is a study topic all by itself. Add in layers of style, vocabulary, figures of speech, points of view and other topics, and the craft of writing is an eternal learning process. The most difficult part is making the book appear to the reader as if you wrote it all in one sitting, instead the pieces you crafted over several years.

Jodi: Murder Is Personal includes two settings, Texas and Massachusetts, that are

significant to you personally. What about another favorite spot of yours, the

Florida Keys? Will Jake Powell be finding his way there eventually?

BJ: Jake and I are already involved in another adventure which begins in Texas, but inevitably will take us to other places. At this point we haven’t left the Lone Star State, but the door is open to where we will travel. Florida is definitely one potential destination, but there are other candidates as well.

Jodi: I have no patience. I'm just dying to know where Jake might end up next. You belong to several writing communities. What do you find the most valuable thing you’ve gained from being an active member in these groups?

BJ: In addition to creating friendships with so many talented writers, participating in critique groups is extremely valuable. When you read a piece of your writing to a group of 15-20 individuals who share your love of literature, you receive incredible insights into your writing. It’s great to hear perspectives and reactions from those who don’t write in your genre.

In our group we have such an eclectic mix of writers, including poets, screenwriters, fiction and non-fiction writers, a songwriter, and a stand-up comic. In addition to their writing backgrounds, our club members also pursued a variety of careers, including judge, attorney, airline pilot, radio announcer, psychologist, professor, teacher, psychoanalyst, financier, programmer, advertising exec, jeweler—the list goes on (not including where they’re from, like Great Britain, Australia, Canada, and Costa Rica). When you present a piece to this group, it’s like a microcosm of the world at large, and you hear how a global audience might respond to your writing.

Jodi: Tell us a little about your writing routine? Do you write every day? Are you an

office writer, coffee shop writer, or maybe even (and I love the idea of this) a boat

writer?

BJ: I’m an in-the-zone writer, meaning if I can clear my mind and my inbox, I can write

anywhere—airport lounge, spare bedroom, living room, family room, office, even on a plane. I haven’t tried writing on a boat, and can’t conceive it ever happening (close work in a rocking

boat is a straight line to motion sickness). Background noise doesn’t bother me, but loud music or TV sounds do. My ideal situation is complete silence, although a ticking clock is fine.

I sometimes write in the morning and edit in the afternoon, but for some reason I don’t reach my full speed until around 3:00 p.m., which is unfortunate, because ML writes more in the morning, and tends to break off around 4:00 p.m. when I’m still cruising. I’ll often keep going until 5:00 p.m. or so, and frequently start again around 8:00 p.m. for a couple of hours.

Speed is another factor. On a good day I might write one page (250 words) in an hour, although the rate is highly variable. In those rare occasions when I’m at a writing retreat and can focus, it’s much faster. My record on one retreat was 13,000 words in two-and-a-half days, roughly 2 pages (~500 words) per hour. That was an unusual situation, as I was writing missing chapters, filling in blanks between A and B, so I already knew what I needed to say. If I could sustain that pace, I could write a book in less than three weeks (not possible—that’s just putting words on the page without all the forethought that goes into it).

Jodi: Do you only write in the mystery genre?

BJ: No, I dabble in other genres as well. It’s great to exercise your writing muscles by writing in different genres and points of view. My first reading love was science fiction, so I write some short stories there, with fantasy a close second. I’ve experimented with action, drama, and memoirs, but have no interest in (and therefore no talent in) horror, romance, historical fiction, women’s fiction, and a host of others I can’t even imagine.

I tend to write in first person, but that can be limiting, because you can only write about what the main character experiences. Third person writing, on the other hand, is more flexible both plot- and character-wise. I’ve written some in that point-of-view, but not much.

Jodi: Is there an author that you would love to meet? Or who is one author you think

everyone should read (in addition to you, of course)?

BJ: I would love to meet Janet Evanovitch, as I adore Stephanie Plum. Other authors who have influenced my mystery writing include Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammet, Ross MacDonald, Gregory McDonald, John D. MacDonald, Rex Stout, and Dick Francis.

Jodi: When I learned that you were married to another writer I initially thought, “Great, he

has someone who understands the craziness of a writer’s life.” But then I thought, “If

both my husband and I were writers nothing – except writing – would ever get done.” So,

is it helpful sharing your life with another writer?

BJ: Oh, absolutely. We have endless writing topics we can discuss, like plot and characters, the nuances of the English language, our writing club activities, and the never-ending vicissitudes of publishing and marketing (and now the impacts of AI). It’s great because we have more to talk about beyond family, Sophie (resident Corgi and Queen of the Realm), the house, neighbors, and world events. It’s not that we do nothing but writing, but more how we squeeze writing in amongst all our other activities and responsibilities.

Jodi: What do you do when you aren’t writing?

BJ: Home improvement projects, writing club activities, selling books at the Artisans Market, walking the dog, yard work (always something to do with 70+ palm trees on the property), and fishing and boating on our boat Sea-Quel, which recently replaced our old vessel Plot Twist.

Jodi: 70+ palm trees! I'm green with envy. My office is now in the office/greenhouse time of the year as all my houseplants that spent the summer out on the patio have officially moved back inside. It's a jungle in here!

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