Steve Womack: Nashville Noir
If the only Nashville residents you can name are Garth Brooks and Minnie Pearl, you need to meet Harry James Denton and his friends. Well, maybe not all his friends, unless your idea of fun includes hanging out with repo men, bouncers, strippers, arsonists, pornographers, and assorted ladies and gentlemen with homicide on their minds.
Maybe you’d better settle for reading about Harry. Author Steve Womack chronicles the ex-reporter’s new career as low-rent private eye with a blend of action, humor and local color that has won him an Edgar and a growing band of dedicated readers. And trust me, Womack will show you a side of Music City you’ll never see on the Nashville Network.
Crescent Blues: To start off, congratulations — your first book in the Harry Denton series, Dead Folks’ Blues, won an Edgar, and the most recent, Murder Manual, was nominated for another Edgar. How does it feel to have this kind of critical acclaim — and how has if affected your work?
Steve Womack: Obviously, being nominated for an Edgar feels really good. But in fact, every installment of the series has been nominated for a mystery award of some kind. The Denton books have garnered three Shamus nominations and an Anthony nomination as well. It’s very gratifying to have the books this well received. How has it affected the work? I don’t know that it has very much, except that it keeps me writing them and my publisher publishing them. Maybe I’m a little more confident now than in the beginning of the series, but probably not much.
How did you develop the character of Harry James Denton, the ace reporter who becomes a bumbling private eye after being fired from the newspaper?
The circumstances of Harry’s life were almost entirely made up out of my own research and life experiences. I was a reporter for awhile, but only for a short while, and I certainly wasn’t an award-winning investigative reporter like Harry. As for Harry’s character and emotional make-up, much of that has an element of autobiography to it, in the sense that I wish I could be more like Harry. He’s quite sure of himself in the world, without being arrogant or cocky, and he doesn’t seem to be plagued with anxieties, neuroses and self-doubt. So in that sense, I wish I could be more like Harry.
What about Jack Lynch, the hero of your earlier series set in New Orleans, who is a publicity man. Was this part of your work experience?
Only in that I once worked for a newspaper that was owned by a very rich financier in New Orleans and as such, I was more of a public relations flack than a real reporter. Those books — Murphy’s Fault, Smash Cut and The Software Bomb — disappeared very quickly, and I always thought that was a shame because in many ways they’re some of my best work. They’re much more serious than the Denton books, I think. They were very heavily influenced by my reading of the great Southern novelists, especially Robert Penn Warren.
Some of the events in your books, such as the firebug in Torch Town Boogie, the second book in the series, or the religious cult besieging the morgue in Way Past Dead, sound as if they were inspired by real events — are they?
Oh, yes. Absolutely. Torch Town Boogie was based on an actual case here in Nashville where an arsonist was torching homes in East Nashville that were being gentrified by yuppies, gays, and lesbians. Way Past Dead was a retelling, in some ways, of a story involving a fundamentalist cult here in Nashville. But in all the stories or books I write that are based on true stories, the truth is only a starting place for fiction. It’s a thin structure to hang a story on, and then takes on a life all its own. None of my books are straight fictional accounts of actual events.
A lot of people hear “Nashville” and all they can think of is country music. I liked the fact that although the music industry is definitely part of the background in all your Nashville books, so far only the third book, Way Past Dead, centers around people from that world. Was this part of a deliberate attempt to show the rest of the country that there’s lot in Nashville beyond the Grand Ole Opry?
This was absolutely deliberate. I wanted to get past the myths of Nashville and the surface appearance. Yes, country music is a big part of Nashville, but this is also a center for universities, printing and publishing, insurance, health care. The company that became American Express was started here in the late Twenties. Nashville is full of old money and aristocratic political power, a great deal of it thoroughly corrupt. It’s a gold mine for a writer.
I love the riff you do on The Big Sleep in Chain of Fools, and then later in the book — well, not to put in a spoiler, let’s just say another major noir classic. You mentioned Robert Penn Warren as an influence — what about Raymond Chandler?
Chain of Fools was in many ways a departure for me. The book is much darker than the others, and this came out of a period where I went back and reread the old masters, including Chandler. I set out to create a film noir on paper, one that did pay a certain homage to writers like Chandler.
What other writers do you like to read?
There are too many to list here without leaving some out. I think this is a golden age of literature in general and for mystery fiction especially. Some of the best writers working today are in mystery and crime fiction. It’s too much to keep up with, but it’s sure fun trying.
Okay, I have to ask, what is it with you hard-boiled guys? You introduce a character, you make us like him, and then you start torturing the poor schnook. About the time Harry Denton’s getting good enough at detecting not to starve — well, again, I don’t want to give any spoilers, but by now you’ve put him and everyone he knows through just about every major life event or crisis imaginable. Is that a deliberate plan for developing the character, or is that just the way it seems to work out as you write the series?
Both, actually. I do believe very strongly in the classical structure of story and of the notion that nothing moves a story forward except conflict. So I’ve been accused of belonging to the “one damn thing after another” school of plotting, and I guess I have to plead guilty as charged. However, I do object to being called “hard-boiled.” I don’t write hard-boiled mystery fiction, at least not in the accepted sense. I think of hard-boiled fiction as graphically violent, emotionally shallow, action-oriented and plot-driven, and on occasion, misogynist. My books aren’t anything like that, I don’t think. They’re very character driven, with characters that I at least hope are emotionally complex and layered. And while women are villains in my books about as often as men, I at least hope they’re treated fairly. That’s certainly my intention.
You’ve also shown Harry’s transformation from a yuppie who occasionally writes articles about repo men, nude dancers, and other people living on the other side of the tracks to someone who has become very comfortable living there himself. How planned was that transformation?
Not very. It was more of an evolutionary thing, and at least partly comes out of my own stuff. As I did research for the books, I delved into certain dark sides myself. I can see the attraction of it. And while I hate the pain and suffering that crime causes in our society, I can’t deny that criminals are some of the most interesting people I’ve ever met. I spent four years teaching in a prison and it was one of the most intense experiences of my life.
At the end of Murder Manual, it sounded a little as if Harry was riding off into the sunset — I can’t tell you how relieved I was to know from your introduction that you’re not ending the series, just taking Harry out of town to Reno for book six. Why Reno–and what else is in store for Harry?
Reno was a practical move that served two functions. First, it gave me a break from Nashville, which after five books the series needed. And second, it gave me a chance to go out west and see my friend Mike Price, who’s a sort of semi-retired comedy writer out in Reno. So I managed to kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.
You use a lot of real Nashville locations in the books — not just well-known places, but real down-to-earth restaurants and ordinary shopping centers. Do your Nashville readers like this, or do you get a lot of quibbles about the way you describe their city?
Readers who know Nashville seem to love this stuff, so much so that I sometimes wonder if the underlying substance of the story is coming through. But I can’t complain; no writer cares why a reader likes his book. As long as they do…
Once, when I was in Nashville, I was astounded to see a front page news article listing the johns picked up the night before in a prostitution sting. Someone told me, “Well, what can you expect; Nashville’s really just a small town at heart.” That sounds a lot like the Nashville of your books, but there also seem ominous signs of change — what’s your take? Is Harry Denton’s Nashville disappearing?
Yes and no. The city has grown tremendously and horrifically. We’re on our way to being, God help us, another Atlanta. Yet in many ways, this is still a small town. Small enough for people to be shocked that we have strip clubs, massage parlors, hookers, bondage clubs and the like. But not too shocked.
How do you do the research on Harry’s life as a private eye and part time repo man?
Research is fun, the most fun of all in many ways. The best skill a writer can develop is the art of shutting up. If you just shut up and listen, you’ll learn an amazing amount of stuff. In the beginning I thought people like cops would be especially reluctant to talk to writers; truth is, they love it so much the problem is cutting them off. It’s great fun.
Has your research work ever been dangerous?
No, I dislike real danger. When I was researching Chain of Fools, which required going to strip clubs and places like that, I took a buddy along with me.
Did you always want to write mysteries?
I never intended to write mysteries. My first published novel, Murphy’s Fault, was a novel of corrupt Southern — especially Louisiana — politics. There’s no mystery in it anywhere. And yet the publisher published it as a mystery, and then when I went back and offered them another book, their answer was: “yes, but could you make it more of a mystery this time.” Because I wanted the chance to work with them again, I said of course. And there I was. Now I’m nine books in… That’s okay; I’m glad it worked out this way. I love mystery and crime fiction.
Tell us a little bit about your work methods — for example, do you outline or plunge right in? Do you have a methodical work style, where you write at the same time and in the same place every day, or is your method more varied?
I think about a book a long time before I start writing, and then when I do start, I get downright crazy on it. A friend of mine coined the term “binge writer.” I guess that’s what I am. I work like a fiend on a book, and then when it’s over I collapse for awhile, then go onto the next one. When I left corporate life just over a dozen years ago, I made myself one promise: no time clocks. I’m not much good in the morning, so I’m rarely in my office before 10 a.m., and even then I take care of email, phone calls, correspondence, business stuff. Then I write in the afternoon, eight to 10 pages a day, five or six days a week. It’s like running a marathon, really.
You mentioned teaching in a prison, which I understand was the Tennessee State Penitentiary. Could you tell us a little more about what that was like?
I used to teach writing at the old Tennessee State Penitentiary for four years, but I don’t anymore. “Teach” isn’t really the right word. I had a writing workshop, and I learned more from them than they ever learned from me. I made some good friends, several of whom I still talk to from time to time.
One of my students finally got out of jail after 17 years. He was a good writer, and we’d become friends. He got a job in a factory, even sold an article or two. Then the week before Christmas — his first Christmas as a free man in 17 years — he was killed in a car accident. That was very sad, very hard for all of us that knew him. God has a rotten sense of humor sometimes. I wrote the obituary for the local alternative newspaper; the first and, I hope, only obituary I ever write.
Has either the research you’ve done for your books or your experience teaching writing to inmates affected the way you look at crime and our justice system?
Absolutely. We have a madness at work in this country now. We attacked a crime problem by bringing back executions and locking people up for horrendous amounts of time. Both Amnesty International and the UN Human Rights Commission have listed the United States as a violator of human rights. We now imprison more people than any other civilized nation on earth, and we’re barely behind Russia and China for the overall world lead. Here in my home state of Tennessee, we spend more on prisons than we do on schools.
It’s madness. I think it’s much more important for us to try and figure out why we live in a society where so many people choose to do wrong and break laws. What is it about us as Americans that has presented us with this situation?
Our policy on drugs, for instance, is insane. Human beings have been getting a buzz since we crawled on all fours and discovered that if we let fruit juice get stinky, we get drunk on it. It’s part of our nature. We have to treat drug addiction as a medical and not a legal problem. If we don’t, we’re going to pay very dearly in the future when the people we lock up today get back on the street. There has to be a better way.
But don’t get me wrong. I’m not soft on crime. I had a friend who was raped and murdered nine years ago, and none of us who loved and knew her have ever gotten over it. If people commit violent crimes, they deserve to be removed from society for a very long time. Perhaps forever.
If you hadn’t become a writer, what would do you think you would have done with your life instead — or what would you like to have done?
I don’t really know. I knew I wanted to write when I was 16. But I have two other great passions besides writing: flying and jazz. I’m a low-time private pilot who would love to fly every day, and I’m a struggling jazz clarinet student who’d like to be on a bandstand with a bunch of other guys in penguin suits. Yeah, if I wasn’t writing, I’d definitely be either flying, or doubling on the clarinet and the sax.
Where do you see your writing going in the future?
I’m going to take a brief break from the Denton series. I’ve started a different kind of book for me, more of a suspense thriller, with a female protagonist, multiple points of view — all the marks of what most writers and editors think of as a “bigger” book, whatever the hell that means. But I hope it breaks me out into a larger audience and gets more readers for when I do go back to Harry.
Donna Andrews
Donna Andrews is the author of Murder with Peacocks, which won the St. Martin’s Press/Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Award in May 1998. Her second book in the Meg and Michael series, Murder with Puffins, will be released this spring.