As one of the featured authors in this week's Endependent Publishers Book Club, I had to submit to a question-and-answer session that you may, or may not, find enlightening. Here it is:
Q&A with Mark Haugen
Q: Haugen? Is that Swedish?
A: Norwegian. Don’t call me names.
Q: No offense. So what’s the book about?
A: Joshua’s Ladder?
Q: You have other books you want to talk about?
A: It was just a marketing thing - repeating the name of the book.
Q: Clever.
A: Thanks.
Q: So what’s Joshua’s Ladder about?
A: A guy who builds a ladder and climbs onto his roof and replaces some shingles.
Q: Seriously?
A: No.
Q: Can you be serious for a minute?
A: Okay. Joshua’s Ladder is about a guy who lost his parents and brother and then had a falling out with his fiancé and cancelled the wedding.
Q: Does he go looking for his family?
A: No. They’re dead. Killed in a car accident.
Q: Sorry.
A: That’s okay. They weren’t my family.
Q: So Joshua is bummed out?
A: Very. He retreats to his cabin in the Black Hills of South Dakota, drowns his sorrows, for 10 years.
Q: That’s a lot of beer over 10 years.
A: Whiskey, actually.
Q: Then what?
A: He goes into town about twice a year. On his most recent trip he finds that his old friends have given up on him ever returning to the Joshua of old. So he moves.
Q: Where?
A: Cocoa Beach, Florida.
Q: Good choice.
A: Yep. Falls in love with an astronaut.
Q: He’s gay?
A: No, the astronaut is Amy. But he meets a couple friends who are. Joshua and Amy fall in love, his life is coming back together. All is good.
Q: Until?
A: Until things go bad. And just when you think he’s fallen to the bottom of the ladder, he goes back to South Dakota, Amy rejoins him, his old friends meet his new friends, they bust a nationwide crime ring.
Q: And all is good?
A: For most of them.
Q: That’s kind of vague.
A: You want me to give away the ending?
Q: I’ll ask the questions here. How’d you come up with this story?
A: I read Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises and it really struck a nerve. I decided I wanted to write a mystery/adventure/romance that was thoughtful, emotional, kind of the opposite of the serial killer/murder mystery stuff I usually read. No grisly murders, no courtroom scenes, just a narrative of a guy going up and down life’s ladder, something we all do but maybe not to the adventurous extent of Joshua.
Q: Will this book make me cry?
A: You’ll come close.
Q: Will it make me laugh?
A: Wet your pants.
Q: Is there a moral to the story?
A: Life is about the stories you can tell at the end of it. Stories, that when you tell them, people will arch their brow.
Q: Would your life’s stories make people arch their eyebrows?
A: Their eyebrows would fall off.
Q: Without getting into those stories, assuming the statute of limitations hasn’t expired, what’s your background?
A: Journalism. I’ve worked for newspapers belonging to two of the nation’s largest chains, Gannett and Lee Enterprises. I’ve also worked for small weekly newspapers. I’ve been a reporter, editor, sportswriter, written obits, pretty much everything. Finally, I started my own weekly newspaper from scratch, ran it with some success for five years, then sold it to Gannett.
Q: Went the full circle?
A: Yep.
Q: Where do you live now?
A: I’m a fifth-generation South Dakotan, and never strayed too far away. Lived the past six-plus years outside Rapid City, SD.
Q: Family?
A: Wife of 22 years; two daughters, 19 and 17; son, 13; a retriever/lab named Stanley; and a pet rabbit, Johnny Depp.
Q: Your rabbit is named Johnny Depp?
A: Yep.
Q: That explains a lot.
This is great! I love your writing style!Looking forward to reading your book!
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