with Judith Janeway
We are delighted to welcome author Judith Janeway to Omnimystery News today.
Judith introduces Valentine Hill in The Magician's Daughter (Poisoned Pen Press; hardcover, trade paperback, and ebook formats) — "Reality is illusion. Illusion is reality, and nothing is what it seems."
We had the pleasure of speaking with Judith recently to talk more about her new series.
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Omnimystery News: When you wrote The Magician's Daughter, did you know at the time it would be the first of a series?
Photo provided courtesy of
Judith Janeway; Photo credit Doreen Desalvo
Judith Janeway: I didn't choose to write a recurring character, it was chosen for me by my editor at Poisoned Pen Press. Once I understood that The Magician's Daughter was to be the first of a series, I recognized the appropriateness of it. A central story arc focuses on how the main character, Valentine, has to change. Because of her negative experiences with her con-artist mother, she is committed to a rigid, and somewhat naïve, morality. In order to take on the bad guy, she realizes she has to go against her code and become a con-artist herself, in other words, be bad in order to do good. In the following books, we'll see how she grows and changes to live in a not all black-and-white world.
OMN: Are any of the characters based on real people?
JJ: All the characters and events in this book are fictional, but I strive to make everything realistic. The events are occasionally over the top, but they're all plausible. And, more important for me, the characters are believable and psychologicaly coherent.
OMN: Describe your writing process for us.
JJ: I don't write character biographies, but The Magician's Daughter challenged me to write in the point of view of a character who's a bit, shall I say, different. I followed the suggestion James N. Frey makes in How to Write a Damn Good Novel and did a character interview. It was a huge help in nailing Valentine's voice. Just consider, the first and very inocuous questions you might ask someone you don't know, "how old are you" and "where were you born?" But for Valentine, that's the problem — she doesn't know. Her grifter mother never told her. She'd simply invent a history based on what would work best for her current con.
As for plotting, for some reason, when I begin a book I always know exactly and in detail how it will begin and end. Then I'm faced with the task of figuring out what has to happen to get from point A to point Z. I don't write a detailed synopsis, but a basic summary of events. Then as I write, some parts of the plot develop in ways I hadn't expected.
Cast of characters? It definitely contracts because, as often happens in mystery/suspense novels, characters are killed off as the story progresses. The deaths of characters contributes something of an element of surprise since the reader doesn't see it coming, and this heightens the tension and suspense.
OMN: How true are you to the setting of the story?
JJ: My books are set in a real places. I've found that readers who are familiar with the settings enjoy the evocation of place and atmosphere. I'm careful not to take too many liberties with setting. Nothing pulls a reader out of a book more than some awful blooper, like Dustin Hoffman driving the wrong way on the Bay Bridge in The Graduate.
OMN: What are some of your outside intrests?
JJ: I usually don't tell people who know me only as a mystery writer that I love to knit. When I do tell them, I joke — I'm a closet knitter; you can find my closet patterns on Ravelry. I'm reluctant to admit it because people associate knitting with cozies, and I definitely don't write cozies. I also love to do puzzles of all kinds — crossword, Sudoku, jig-saw. I've recently downloaded the app for jig-saws to my tablet and am a little obsessed with it right now. But my main interest outside of writing is baseball, particularly the Oakland Athletics. In fact, every year I test positive for baseball addiction. Of course, come the end of October I have to detox. Not that it does me a lot of good, because once spring training starts (like right now), I'm hooked again.
OMN: What is the best advice you've received as an author? And what might you say to aspiring writers?
JJ: The best advice I've received is "write every day." It's as easy and as hard as that. Only by writing can you become a good writer. You can learn about the craft of writing, but it's all theory until you do it, and do it, and do it. As for advice for aspiring authors, I have to channel Yoda and say, "Write, or write not. There is no aspire."
OMN: Do you write under a pen name?
JJ: I write under a pen name that in some ways is my real name. My first name is Judith. My current last name is my ex-huband's. My maiden name was my father's. Jane was my mother's first name and is my middle name. So Judith Janeway references both my maternal link and my first two given names. And, because of this, I would say that the main advantage for me of my pseudonym is that it represents an important separate identity.
OMN: What type of feedback have you received from readers?
JJ: Reader comments I love the most are that they couldn't put the book down. One blogger emailed me to say she'd be reviewing The Magician's Daughter. She told me that she'd started reading it while taking a bath and that she hadn't realized the bath water had grown cold because she'd been so immersed in the book. My books are mysteries with a strong element of suspense. My goal is always to keep readers turning the pages because they just have to find out what happens next.
OMN: What kinds of books did you read when you were younger?
JJ: There's a roundabout answer to that question. I taught myself to read when I was four. I was looking at The Animals of Farmer Jones, a Little Golden Book. I can still vividly remember the eureka moment when I deciphered the letters into words and words into sentences. After that, I became an avid reader. I checked out of the library as many books as permitted per visit. When I got older, my mother was concerned that I was reading too much and might (according to the belief of her time) "ruin my eyes." She decided I could check out only two books a week. So I read Moby Dick, Lorna Doone, Crime and Punishment, and every other very thick book I could find! Without knowing it, I ended up reading the majority of the great books before I graduated from high school. So, I'd have to say that no one genre influenced me, but compelling stories well told did.
OMN: What's next for you?
JJ: Next? Writing, always. The most immediate next is book two in the Valentine Hill Mysteries, The Magicians' Duel.
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Judith Janeway can't remember a time when she wasn't writing stories, but naturally she also had to do other things. She received a Master's in Comparative Literature and taught for some years at a men's college. It wasn't as much fun as it sounds.
She left teaching and earned a PhD in Health Psychology and worked for a much longer time as a social science researcher, studying people coping with serious or terminal illnesses and their caregivers. Just to be clear, she is a research psychologist, not a clinical psychologist. She has she never been reimbursed for handing out advice to people foolish enough to tell her their problems. During this time, she married, divorced and acquired a number of children. Not necessarily in that order. She also always continued writing.
Judith lives just north of San Francisco and writes in the interstices of a life that encompasses working, traveling, having fun with family and friends, and supporting her baseball addiction.
For more information about the author, please visit her website at JudithJaneway.com and her author page on Goodreads, or find her on Facebook and Twitter.
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The Magician's Daughter
Judith Janeway
A Valentine Hill Mystery
Magician Valentine Hill always begins her act with: "Reality is illusion. Illusion is reality, and nothing is what it seems." Valentine herself is a case in point: she is unquestionably real, but she has no legal existence. Her mother, a skilled con artist, has never revealed Valentine's real age, birth place, or her father's identity — except to say that he was a magician.
No grifter herself, the scrupulous Valentine has spent years searching for her evasive mother, desperate to learn the basic facts of who she is. Literally, to get a life. Robbed of her stake in Vegas, she chases it to San Francisco where a series of odd events reunites her with her mother who, Valentine is sure, despite her respectable façade, is playing one of the city's super rich. And Valentine quickly enters a world where truly nothing is what it seems. A socialite is a ruthless criminal, a car mechanic a psycho killer, and a cab driver a seductive gangster. After a friendly FBI agent is killed, Valentine forces herself into playing a grifter's role to put the criminals — and her mother — away. Or at the very least, get what she wants from mom. Will her skills as a magician prove enough to help her maintain the illusion?
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