Write, revise, rewrite. On it goes as a writer strives to improve the story. Photo by Kevin S. Giles of personal ‘Purple Roses’ manuscript.
Kevin S. Giles, why did you decide to write a mystery novel?
My first inspiration came from The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps, a monstrous compilation of magazine stories from the heyday of gritty detective stories. When my wife gave me the book I promised I would read all of the 1,100 pages before my death, presuming it didn’t come early. These “pulp” stories, named after cheap paper used to print them, appeared in popular crime magazines in the 1920s and 1930s and in “dime novels” that found wide audiences.
Pulp heavyweights such as Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and Erle Stanley Gardner spun stories of hard-boiled detectives who solved crimes — usually the hard way. I didn’t know much about pulp fiction until I began reading this big book. Soon I understood why people bought these stories. The characters got right to business, good or bad.