I first met Nansi Kunze at the Sisters In Crime women crime
writer’s festival – SheKilda – in 2011.
We were sitting next to each other in the audience during one of the
panel events. I was there to see the
launch of Scarlet Stiletto: The Second
Cut, the SIC anthology that included my winning story ‘Tallow’ – I was high
on the energy of all the women at the festival, and feeling the glow that comes
from having something (anything!) published.
Nansi and I introduced ourselves, had a little chat. I admit I was a bit awed – Nansi was a
published author, with two books under her belt. She talked about the juggle of family and
writing life - her little boy was sick upstairs in the hotel, with her husband
looking after him while she attended the panel.
She was on speed dial. I talked
about how I’d left my four kids at
home with my husband for two days, and what a big deal it had been just to get
out of the house and drive the two hours down to Melbourne to attend the
festival. We hit it off right away.
So I’m rapt to be introducing Nansi as today’s guest for the
Crime Report. Nansi’s previous books, Mishaps and Dangerously Placed, have had a definite whiff of the criminal about
them too. But her most recent book Kill The Music launches right into Nancy
Drew-mystery territory.
In Kill The Music,
death threats against the world’s most famous boy band, Turmoil, have Lorna
Powell gasping. And it’s not because
she’s a fan – Lorna is a reluctant band mascot while her brother, Flint, plays
on stage with the rest of the guys.
Dragged from one glamorous location to the next, Lorna would like nothing
more than a normal life. But she’s not
going to back down when the boys’ lives are at stake. Lorna races to discover the killer…all while
trying to figure out why lead singer Marius is acting weird, as well as keeping
up with Turmoil, and getting her homework done on time.
Please give Nansi your warmest welcome!
Hey Nansi, so good to
talk to you again! How’s it going over
your neck of the woods?
Hi Ellie – it’s great to be here! Things are going pretty
well, thanks. We’ve been away for school holidays, so I’m about to get back to
work on my new manuscript. I’m about half-way through the first draft, and I’m really
looking forward to finishing it off.
So tell us a bit
about your process. Once you’ve got an
idea (or two, or three), how do you go about working it up?
I’m a major planner (which is another way of saying I’m a
bit of a control freak about my writing!). When I come up with a basic concept
for a novel, I write down a ton of things longhand in my planning book before I
get anywhere near the computer. I usually start with a fairly detailed outline
of the first scene, some basic information about my main characters and a plot
summary. After that I spend pages and pages scribbling stuff about the themes
and development I want the book to have, as well as one-liners and ridiculous
situations I want to include. Only when I’ve got a pretty solid idea of what’s
going to be in it do I let myself start typing the actual manuscript! Even
then, I stop every chapter – sometimes more often – to plan what’s coming up
next in close detail before I go on.
Now tell us about
Kill the Music. In the book, Lorna gives
us a wry glimpse into the world of super boy-bands – I couldn’t help but think
that this is what it would be like on tour with One Direction! What gave you the idea, and how did you
research it?
It sounds a bit ridiculous to use the old ‘It came to me in
a dream!’ explanation, but this one really did: one night I dreamt that I was
the manager of a boy-band, and the boys were so irresponsible I couldn’t even
trust them to cross the road without getting themselves run over! I thought it
was a fun idea, and while I was writing the initial outline for the book I
realised that Turmoil, the four-member rock outfit who’d had a bit part in my
first novel, Mishaps, would be perfect for it. A lot of the material I needed
came from my own experiences: things like starting at a new school (I went to
eight different schools in the UK and Australia), hanging out at gigs and
rehearsals (my parents are musicians) and speaking German and Japanese (I
taught foreign languages before I became a novelist). Some other parts, like
the physics and technological elements of the plot, were just fortuitous finds
gleaned from many hours on the internet!
Lorna is a great character
– she has a dry sense of humour, she’s tenacious and loyal, and she has an
old-fashioned integrity. Was she the
easiest character to write? And did she
pop into your head like that, fully formed?
I’m glad you liked her! I realised as soon as I had the book
concept that Lorna needed to be strong, loyal and affectionate – despite being
somewhat contemptuous of what Turmoil get up to – and that she had to be able
to kick butt. So I had a pretty good picture of her from the beginning. I
usually find that it’s the outrageous secondary characters who are easiest to
write, but Lorna was easier than the protagonists in my previous books because
she’s got so much of me in her, like her lack of tact and
tendency to make scathing remarks. I just wish I had her martial arts skills
too!
The locations in Kill
The Music are gorgeous, and give the book a cosmopolitan jet-setting
allure. Japan, Vienna…are these all
places you’ve been?
Yes! I’m lucky enough to have travelled to all the places
mentioned in the book, except the fictitious island in the Great Barrier Reef
where Turmoil hold a party. It’s based on Double Island, north of Cairns, which
I’ve often seen from the mainland and wanted to visit, but you have to rent the
entire island – a little out of my price range! I absolutely loved being able
to include some of my favourite travel destinations in Kill the Music, and I
plan on putting some more of them into my next books.
What sort of
detective mysteries draw you as a reader? And were you an early aficionado of crime?
For me, mysteries are all about character. While I love an
intricately-crafted plot and clever twists, if the characters aren’t
fascinating in themselves, I don’t think any plot can make up for that. An
early aficionado of crime? You know, I wouldn’t have said so. Actually, when I
was invited to speak at SheKilda I was kind of surprised, because I hadn’t
thought of myself as a crime writer up until then – even though Dangerously
Placed was technically a murder mystery! But since then I’ve realised that I
did read quite a lot of crime novels as a child. The ones that have really
stayed with me are the ones with the most convincingly-drawn and charismatic
characters, like Ellis Peters’s Cadfael and (of course) the superlative and
ever-engaging Holmes.
Teen sleuths – they
seem to be popping up all over the place lately! What do you think makes teenagers good
detectives?
One of the awesome things about teenagers is that they’re
old enough to be capable of the tasks investigating a mystery might require; a
teen sleuth can plausibly follow suspects over long distances, go undercover
while at work, and even get into places children aren’t allowed to be. At the
same time, teenagers are often underestimated or overlooked by adults, so
they’re in a unique position to find things out. More importantly, though, a
teenage detective can look at a situation with an open-mindedness, idealism and
willingness to challenge the status quo that a jaded middle-aged detective
might lack.
And finally, how do
you unwind at the end of a long writing day? (Are there any of Lorna’s luxuries
that you envy?)
I love curling up with a good book … like all writers, I
expect! Gaming is my other favourite form of unwinding, and I always look
forward to a bit of time with my 3DS. I don’t envy most of Lorna’s luxuries –
like her, I prefer the quiet life – but I must admit, I wouldn’t mind spending a
day checking out the bakeries and eco-boutiques of Vienna like she does!
Nansi, thank you for
being such a good sport and answering my questions J If you’d like to watch the cool trailer for Kill
the Music, go here – or if you’d like to read the book, you can buy it in all
good book stores, or maybe drop in here.
Get in touch with Nansi at her website, or on Twitter.
Now before I pull the pin, here’s a couple of events coming
up that you may like to know about:
* The Every Breath giveaway over on Goodreads is about to
finish. I’m giving away three signed
copies, open internationally, and it’s all over red rover on 31 October - if you’d like to put your name into the hat
(and an astonishing number of people have already done so, thank you!) dropover to Goodreads here and put your name down to win. (Or, you know, just go over to the sidebar and click)
* I’m talking on a panel!
Ooh, it is going to be very exciting…
It’s for a Sisters In Crime event, and it will be me, Kathryn Ledson
(Rough Diamond) and Jaye Ford (Blood Secret, Scared Yet?) talking about female
protagonists dealing with danger, and how to make crime fiction sparkle. If you’d like to come along, you’re quite
welcome! We’ll be at the Rising Sun
Hotel, South Melbourne, at 8pm on Friday 25 October – for more details go tothe Sisters in Crime website.
* I’m also going to be visiting the Mechanics Institute in
Ballarat on Thursday 7 November at 7.30pm, to talk at a Ballarat Writers Inc
event. I’ll be talking about process,
getting published, and why YA writing is the best (I just added that bit
in). Come along if you’re around, and
have a cuppa and say hi.
Have a good week, stay sane, and see you again soon.
Xx Ellie
