1--What is the title of your latest release?
THE DIABOLICAL
2--What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Bruno Johnson is a wanted fugitive - and unless he helps the Costa Rican police, they're turning him in. Bruno has to juggle the safety of his family while trying to solve a multiple murder.
3--How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
In the end of the first Bruno Johnson book, The Disposables, Bruno, his wife Marie and his father flee with some rescued children to Costa Rica to hide from the law. Books two through ten Bruno returns to the States to rescue others. Book eleven, The Diabolical is the first book set entirely in Costa Rica.
4--Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life?
Oh, without a doubt. I love to write his point of view and love his moral compass. I could easily sit down with him and just let him tell stories from his past.
5--What are three words that describe your protagonist?
Loyal, honorable, and moral.
6--What’s something you learned while writing this book?
I always shied away from setting a book in Costa Rica because I wasn’t comfortable working within the setting. I have been to Costa Rica but not for any length of time. For this book I looked and found a couple of contacts and did some research. Now I love the setting and the conflicts from the area. I have already finished the next book The Insidious. I have one more book planned in Costa Rica then I’ll be going back to the US for the final book in the US. That’s as far as I’ve planned. I will never stop writing Bruno books. I have two other series that are keeping me busy. The Blind Devotion of Imogene will come out in April (three books planned). The third book of the Dave Beckett series, The Gray Cadaverous Dawn comes out in Oct. The stand-alone the Obsessions of Harvey Usher comes out Jan 2025.
7--Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
When a writer sits down to write he/she could be slightly elated, depressed, or melancholy and that can translate into the prose.
I start my writing every day by going back twenty pages and edit to the end. Then I write forward four to six pages. I do it his way for tone and cadence. I edit the prose three or four times before moving on. After I write the last page I immediately put the book out to beta readers. I set the book aside for a week and then go back through the whole thing mostly looking for MAR, errors, Motivation, Action, Reaction. By that time the beta readers have returned with comments. I then go through the manuscript one more time. Then I put it out for a copy edit.
8--What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
I looove ice cream. The good stuff. The decadent stuff.
9--Describe your writing space/office!
I have a couch with wide cushion with an ottoman. On the wall in front of me are two grease boards with notes. This is in a den/converted garage with a sliding glass door that leads out to the front and another one that leads out to the back. I can watch the day go by. I have two end tables with notebooks, a crossword book, and several fiction books close at hand. On two bookshelves there are stacks and stacks of to-be-read books.
10--Who is an author you admire?
Tough question, I absolutely adore many authors. I have been an avid reader all my life. My top five books: Lonesome Dove, Pillars of the Earth, Shogun, River God (Wilbur Smith), Lost Nation. Others in the “Wow,” category: Writers and Lovers by Lily King, One True loves, Maybe in another life, and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo all by Taylor Jenkins Reid. In Five Years by Rebecca Serle.
11--Is there a book that changed your life?
Lonesome Dove. Absolutely brilliant in voice and point of view.
12--Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published)/Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
I started writing in 1989. I wrote thirty-eight novels went through five literary agents before I got the call. And I have to tell you I wasn’t sure it was real. I didn’t accept myself as an author until one morning I got up, checked my email and found an email from Michael Connelly who said the loved my book and it kept him up all night.
13--What’s your favorite genre to read?
I’ll read anything no matter what the genre as long as it’s well-written and carries me along in the Fictive Dream.
14--What’s your favorite movie?
Ah another tough one. I’m a huge David Lean fan so it has to be Doctor Zhivago, Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge Over the River Kwai. I also love (some-most) of the Cohn Brothers films.
15--What is your favorite season?
Spring. It’s a new awakening, fresh and bright.
16--How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
Of late, quiet only whispering in the hopes it passes by without noticing me.
17--What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
I know I’m almost alone in this one, but I absolutely loved Babylon. I’ve watched it three times already and plan on watching three more times. If a new author wants to see, plot, and character evolution this is it. The production value is also top drawer. For me this movie is mesmerizing.
Book would be Five Decembers.
TV show, Two and a Half Men.
18--What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
Steak. Pasta. Fish…Ice cream.
19--What do you do when you have free time?
Honestly, I don’t have much. My days are packed. I read, write, work out every day. Last year I did 32 events, conferences, book signings, and book talks. If I do have spare time I sit in front of the tube and watch sitcoms from the 90’s. I didn’t watch tv for twenty-five years and Missed a whole lot of fun in those sitcoms. While watching them I do crosswords. I try to do crosswords every day.
20--What can readers expect from you next?
As I said earlier, I have several books coming out next year. I just finished a book I had a lot of fun writing called Pablo and Peaches. It’s a story about a dog that a detective claims can tell if someone is lying. I’ve already started the second book in a planned trilogy.
Bruno Johnson Thriller #13
Bruno Johnson is a wanted fugitive—and unless he helps the Costa Rican police, they're turning him in
Ex-cop, ex-con Bruno Johnson is hiding from US law enforcement in Costa Rica with his wife, Marie, and the twelve children they rescued from toxic homes in south central Los Angeles. Bruno works at the Lido Cabana Bar at the Punta Bandera Hotel, and his friend, Karl Drago, is getting married on the beach right outside. After the festivities, Bruno and Marie go skinny dipping in the ocean, but they're quickly interrupted by a visit from law enforcement.
A shooting has just occurred at El Gato Gordo nightclub, and the victim is a prominent local figure and Bruno's close friend. The chief of police asks Bruno to help investigate, but the stakes are higher than ever—if Bruno doesn't find the shooter, the chief will turn him over to US authorities.
Everything is complicated further when Bruno becomes a victim of a crime himself, realizing that someone else may be after him. Bruno has to juggle the police investigation with figuring out who's targeting him—if he drops the ball, it might be the last thing he ever does.
Thriller Police Procedural [Oceanview Publishing, On Sale: February 6, 2024, Hardcover / e-Book, ISBN: 9781608095292 / eISBN: 9781608095308]
David Putnam always wanted to be a cop. His career in law enforcement has spanned over 30 years. He has worked in narcotics, served on FBI-sponsored violent crimes teams, and was cross-sworn as a U.S. Marshall, pursuing murder suspects and bank robbers in Arizona, Nevada, and California. Putnam did three tours on the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s S.W.A.T. team, executing dynamic entries, hostage rescues, and serving as team sniper. He has also worked in Criminal Intelligence and Internal Affairs and has supervised corrections, patrol, and a detective bureau. After 28 years of California law enforcement, Putnam moved to Hawaii where he worked as a Special Agent for the Attorney General investigating smuggling and white-collar crimes. Putnam is now retired and lives in Southern California where he farms organic avocado trees, reads and writes, and attends writers’ conferences with his wife and fellow writer, Mary. The Replacements follows The Disposables in Putnam’s Bruno Johnson series.
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