Like his fictional hero, Detective Sergeant Michael
McCabe, James Hayman is a native New Yorker. He was born in Brooklyn and raised
in Manhattan. He was educated at
Phillips Academy in Andover, MA and at Brown University. After Brown, he returned to New York and took
a job as a cub copywriter for one of the world’s largest advertising agencies,
Young & Rubicam. For the next
twenty-five years he wrote and produced print and television advertising for
clients like the US Army, Time Magazine and Ford. He left the agency business in 2001 and,
shortly before the 9/11 attacks, moved to Portland, Maine to begin a new career
as a freelance writer. For the next five years he wrote literally hundred of articles,
white papers, marketing brochures and two coffee-table books for corporate
clients. In 2006, noticing more than a little gray hair, he decided to scratch
a lifelong itch and try his hand at writing fiction. His first McCabe/Savage
thriller, The Cutting, was published
by St. Martin’s Minotaur in 2009. Darkness First from Harper Collins new
Witness/Impulse imprint is his third novel.
He lives in Portland with his artist wife, Jeanne O’Toole Hayman.
You can learn more about James at his website: www.jameshaymanthrillers.com
You can also go to the James Hayman Thrillers
facebook page www.facebook.com/jameshaymanthrillers
His blog, Musings of a Murderous Mind, can be found
on his website and two or three times a month at www.mainecrimewriters.com
When did you begin writing?
I’ve always been a writer. As a child I spent a lot of time in my room
making up imaginary stories. Sometimes I
wrote them down, sometimes not. I did a
lot more writing in high school and college and when I graduated from Brown I looked
for a job with a company that would actually pay me to write. I found one as a copywriter with a large
advertising agency.
What is this book about?
Darkness First is a story about a young woman named Tiff Stoddard
who is just a little too eager get rich quick.
She makes a deal with the devil… a sociopathic drug dealer named Conor Riordan…to
help him smuggle a massive quantity of illegal prescription drugs by sea from
Canada into Washington County, Maine.
When Tiff finally realizes just how dangerous Riordan is, she tries to
break away from him and takes with her what she thinks is “only her fair share”
of the haul. Riordan disagrees. He
tracks her down and takes sadistic pleasure in killing her as brutally and
painfully as he can. In the process, he
critically injures a local doctor who just happens to be Portland PD detective
Maggie Savage’s oldest and dearest friend. When Maggie hears about her friend’s
injuries she heads downeast to Washington County to help the Maine State Police
and her father, the 4 term Sheriff of Washington County, track down the brutal
killer.
What inspired you to write it?
My first two books, The Cutting and The Chill of
Night, were set in Portland and featured Maggie’s partner, Detective
Sergeant Mike McCabe. I wanted to write
a story with Maggie as the key protagonist and I thought it would be fun to set
it outside of the Portland area in a rural part of the state. When I read about
the epidemic of illegal prescription drugs in Washington County, I had the seed
of the idea. When I interviewed a Maine
Drug Enforcement agent who told me the DEA’s worst nightmare would be the
smuggling of Oxycontin by boat from Canada into Maine, I just took it from
there.
Who is your favorite character from the book?
I have a major crush on Maggie. My wife isn’t even jealous as she can deal
with fictional fantasies. In any case, I really enjoyed telling the tale from Maggie’s
point of view. My other favorite
character in the book is eleven-year-old Tabitha Stoddard, who is the semi-fat
and wholly nerdy little sister of the slain Tiffany Stoddard. Since Tabitha is the only person who can
identify Conor Riordan, when she disappears, Maggie knows she must find the
child before the killer does.
Was the road to publication smooth sailing or a bumpy ride?
Amazingly smooth.
When I finished my first thriller, The
Cutting, I sent it to exactly one agent, a woman named Meg Ruley who
represents some of the top mystery and thriller writers including names like
Tess Gerritsen and Lisa Gardner. Meg
loved the book and agreed to represent me.
Within weeks, we’d sold The
Cutting, in a two book deal, to St. Martin’s/Minotaur. For the third book, Darkness First, we decided to change publishers and agreed to
become the lead title for Harper Collins’ new ebook first Witness/Impulse
imprint.
Where can readers purchase a copy of your book?
At the moment, it’s only available as an ebook for
an introductory price of $2.99. Readers
can download Darkness First on
Kindle, Nook, iBooks, Kobo and any other tablet or smart phone device. Using Amazon’s Kindle app, it can also be downloaded
on to PC’s and Macs.
What is one piece of advice you would like to share with aspiring
authors everywhere?
Read a lot.
Write a lot––every day if you possibly can. And don’t listen to that little critical voice
inside your head that keeps telling you that what you’re writing is crap. Maybe it is.
Maybe it’s not. But wait for several qualified agents or editors to tell
you that.
What is up next for you?
I’m working on the 4th McCabe/Savage
thriller. No title yet. But it’s set back in Portland. Number 4 tells the story of two identical
murders in the same family that take place more than one hundred years apart.
Scenes that take place in the Portland of 1904 are my first stab at what might
be called historical fiction.
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