Interview with Author Brent Allen Bohn

 

1. What inspired you to write this book?

I have been a huge fan of the paranormal since I was small and have lived in four houses that have had paranormal events. I wanted to include a paranormal spin to the criminal/detective novel I was working on and I like how it turned out. My last novel was a paranormal suspense/thriller. Following in the same manner, I wanted to include a ghost that would help a detective solve cases.

2. What exactly is it about and who is it written for?  

This novel is about a ghost who happens to be the former deceased partner of the surviving detective that was shot in the head during the same confrontation with drug dealers. These two detectives have been working together for over fifteen years and were as close as sibling brothers wisecracking, bickering, and playing tricks on each other. After receiving his late partners lucky fifty-cent piece from his wife, Detective Martin can see and hear his old partner. Martin thinks he’s going crazy, but the old partners team-up to work cold cases with Martin’s new African American female partner just out of the academy. They don’t know how long this arrangement will last so they are going to make the best of it while it does.

I believe anyone who enjoys crime/detective and paranormal genres will like my book. This book can be read by all age groups including young-adults. I would have loved to have read a book like this when I was a young adult.

3. What do you hope readers will get out of reading your book?

I hope to open people’s minds to the possibility of the afterlife interceding with the living. It’s really more for their enjoyment. I happen to enjoy books with witty banter between the main characters instead of stoic characters going about the business of law enforcement. All of my books have a fair amount of action in them, so does this one. If a book doesn’t have some action, they can be somewhat boring (but that’s just my thoughts).

4. How did you decide on your books title and cover design?

The title was easy to do and conveys the simple fact that they are going to continue to work together. Since detective Martin’s partner died in the line of duty, he can now help him in different ways now that he’s dead (Ghost Partner).  For the cover design, I wanted to have a detective kneeling next to a corpse with his dead partner’s ghost hovering over him while they review the crime scene. Having it taken place during the night makes Martin’s partner stand out more in the background. I used a professional designer which helps a lot.

5. What advice or words of wisdom do you have for fellow writers – other than run?

My advice would be to not stop writing. As a self-published author, it may take 10-20 books before you get a steady following. Even I’m not there yet, but I just enjoy writing books. I just finished writing my seventh book, the fifth book in my young adult western series (Hands Faster Than Lightning). Writing may be a hobby, but I take do it seriously. I always want to put out a good product. Get yourself a good editor and graphic designer. You need to find your go-to behind-the-scenes people to help you make your book shine. These people have become extended family.

6. What trends in the book world do you see – and where do you think the book publishing industry is heading?

We need to stay away from AI in books. You could use it to help create a cover or build a website. Never, never use it to write any portion of your book.  That’s cheating to the umpteenth level. Authors before us wrote by hand, typewriter, and now we use a computer. Using AI is not writing from your own creativity. It’s hard to write a book. It should be. There are long pauses from authors to come up with an idea and flush it out. I often find myself with writers block not knowing what should happen next. But eventually an idea will pop into my head on how to proceed. Stay away from AI.

The publishing industry may be changing further since more and more people are self-publishing. It’s hard to get an agent and then you have to wait for them to get a publishing firm to take a chance on your book. Trying to get an agent turned me off to publish traditionally. Every agency wanted to know why their agency should take a chance on me and my book. I’m not going to stroke their egos and provide a long dissertation on why I am a good fit with them. Sorry, that’s just wrong. I’m the one with the creative product that will be used to pay their salaries.  They should be doing everything they can to go after and help new writers without the ego.

 Once you provide your submission, the book takes on a whole new life and almost all creativity is out of your hands. They may want to edit it away from what you sent in and be something completely different from where you started because they think they know what sells. They will pick how your cover will look. Me personally, I don’t want to give up any control of what I have written or any choices in how it looks. I may never get as much money out of my books as there would be going through the big five publishers, but I’m okay with that. I just want people to enjoy my books.

7. Were there experiences in your personal life or career that came in handy when writing this book?

Yes. It helped that I wrote a paranormal suspense thriller first before starting on the paranormal crime/detective novel. This way I had some experience for writing paranormal situations. Having lived in four houses with paranormal incidents has helped too.

I haven’t had any experience with law enforcement procedures, so I had to rely on contacting and interviewing former policemen and detectives. I’m not trying to follow police procedure to the letter, so law enforcement people don’t jump down my throat saying that’s not how this works. I’m well aware that former law enforcement people scoff at non-law enforcement people trying to write like we know what they do. I’m just trying to write an interesting book, not a procedure manual.

8. How would you describe your writing style? Which writers or books is your writing similar to?

I have an irregular way of writing my books. I don’t write every day. I don’t have a specific time of day to write. I may take a week, month, or months off from writing before getting back to it. I can write anywhere and at any time. Once I wrote several chapters at a glass business while waiting for my windshield to be replaced on my truck. Most of the time I am working on a small raising table, like you find in a hospital or nursing home, in front of my television. I try to write while listening to music, new age from the 80’s and 90’s, or classic rock.

I’m not sure which writers or books my writing is similar to. Nor do I really care. I’m not trying to compete with them or emulate their works. But I have used some other authors examples to base my characters after and I used Michael Connelly’s Bosch for detective Martin. An older detective with a gruff disposition. I also used Jim Butcher’s, Harry Dresden’s helper which is a skull with its previous spirit/presence inside to help the warlock out.

9. What challenges did you overcome in the writing of this book?

The major challenge for this book was learning about police procedures. I knew very little except what you see on television. The problem with police procedures is that all law enforcement departments from city to city and county to county have their own procedures. There are some similarities, but they tend to want things their own way. So, I generalized them for my needs.

10. If people can buy or read one book this week or month, why should it be yours?

If people like action-packed, snarky detectives, witty banter, and a smattering of the paranormal in the books they read, then they’ll love to read my book. If I saw my book cover on the shelf, I would certainly pick it up to read the back cover narrative. I would also buy it just because I like detective novels and the paranormal. What’s not to like!

About The Author:  Began writing in 2018. Born and raised in Northern Virginia and retired after 36 years of Federal government service. Avid reader of many genres including crime/detective mysteries, westerns, fantasy, sci-fi, horror, and ghost stories. We live with two dogs, a tuxedo cat, but we also feed birds, bunnies, and deer in Warren County, Virginia. Please see: www.brentabohn.com.

 

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About Brian Feinblum

Brian Feinblum should be followed on www.linkedin.com/in/brianfeinblum. This is copyrighted by BookMarketingBuzzBlog ©2024. Born and raised in Brooklyn, he now resides in Westchester with his wife, two kids, and Ferris, a black lab rescue dog, and El Chapo, a pug rescue dog. His writings are often featured in The Writer and IBPA’s The Independent.  This award-winning blog has generated over 3.9 million pageviews. With 4,900+ posts over the past dozen years, it was named one of the best book marketing blogs by BookBaby  http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs  and recognized by Feedspot in 2021 and 2018 as one of the top book marketing blogs. It was also named by www.WinningWriters.com as a "best resource.” For the past three decades, including 21 years as the head of marketing for the nation’s largest book publicity firm, and director of publicity positions at two independent presses, Brian has worked with many first-time, self-published, authors of all genres, right along with best-selling authors and celebrities such as: Dr. Ruth, Mark Victor Hansen, Joseph Finder, Katherine Spurway, Neil Rackham, Harvey Mackay, Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey, Warren Adler, Cindy Adams, Todd Duncan, Susan RoAne, John C. Maxwell, Jeff Foxworthy, Seth Godin, and Henry Winkler. He hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America several years ago, and has spoken at ASJA, BookCAMP, Independent Book Publishers Association Sarah Lawrence College, Nonfiction Writers Association, Cape Cod Writers Association, Willamette (Portland) Writers Association, APEX, Morgan James Publishing, and Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association. His letters-to-the-editor have been published in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, New York Post, NY Daily News, Newsday, The Journal News (Westchester) and The Washington Post. His first published book was The Florida Homeowner, Condo, & Co-Op Association Handbook.  It was featured in The Sun Sentinel and Miami Herald.