JACK HEATH
After writing the best-selling Hangman, his first novel for adults, the author returns with another in the series
What’s the basic premise of the Hangman books?
A dangerous lunatic solves crimes for the US government while trying to make sure the police never look inside his freezer.
Now you’ve written 40 books, does it get easier?
It’s actually getting harder, but I tell myself that’s because the books are increasingly ambitious. I push a little further out from my comfort zone each time.
Is there a book that made you love writing?
I read Ice Station by Matthew Reilly at age 15. I was writing my own action thriller, and Matt’s book expanded my horizons.
What’s the best book you’ve read?
Maybe The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North. There’s so much variety – tragic sci-fi meets existential comedy via historical thriller.
A book that had a pivotal impact on your life?
The Fictional Woman by Tara Moss changed the way I think about almost everyone I know. As a man, once you start seeing gender bias, you can’t unsee it.
It’s good, but Manifest Recall by Alan Baxter has a scene I can’t get past. Violence against children is too much for me now that I have my own.
The book you couldn’t finish?
A book you wish you had read but haven’t got to? The Luminaries by
Eleanor Catton is taunting me from my bookshelf, all 832 pages of it.
The book you are most proud to have written?
Probably Headcase. Pivoting between the psychiatric hospital in the present, the murder at NASA two weeks earlier and the kidnapping seven years before that – I couldn’t have woven all those threads together when I was less experienced.
How do you read books? (audio, e-reader, paper)
I like having the same book in print, audio and digital so I can read it wherever I am and whatever I’m doing.
How I Became A Famous Novelist by Steve Hely. The jokes are dated, but as with Harry August, there’s so much variety.
What book do you re-read?
What books are on your bedside table? Provenance by Ann Leckie and Tarquin the Honest: The Hand of Glodd by Gareth Ward.
What are you writing now?
I’m working on a murder mystery for teens. No cannibals this time, but it’ll still be quite a ride.