Interview with Michael Robotham
Post the release of his latest book BLEED FOR ME Michael Robotham generously spared me some time when he was in Melbourne recently.
BLEED FOR ME is the 5th book in Robotham's central series, which is cleverly based around a shifting focus of 3 loosely connected characters. Unexpectedly, but pleasingly for readers, BLEED FOR ME sees the focus staying with Professor Joe O'Loughlin following on from SHATTER.
Michael, born and raised in NSW Australia, followed his dream of a journalism cadetship at seventeen. From there to ghost-writing autobiographies, and ultimately the start of this series of books, starting out with a bidding war at the 2002 London Book Fair for THE SUSPECT. Aside from the storytelling ability demonstrated, there are some really interesting elements within the make-up of this popular series of books.
Setting a book in another country from the one that you live in is a challenge, but as Michael says - the observer's eye sees things differently from the day to day participant. Perhaps that is why his books have achieved popularity in a wide range of countries, as Michael uses the language, and describes the places in a way that is extremely accessible to an outsider, in particular.
The change in viewpoint via the use of the 3 different protagonists is a particularly memorable aspect of the books, not just because these three people are somewhat loosely connected. Joe O'Loughlin and Vincent Ruiz start out as colleagues in the police and ancillary services, with that relationship switching quickly to an ongoing friendship and trust. DC Alisha Barba hasn't made an appearance in recent books, but she is, again, a colleague, a friend, a compatriot. Michael speaks of his characters with affection and exasperation, understanding and affection. He has set up less of a "team", more people who as a result of circumstances, have built up relationships and rapport. They are people who the author brings together, allows to form understandings, sympathies, and relationships, as easily as he can make them stand alone. In Michael's hands, in particular, O'Loughlin and Ruiz have a very realistic very male style of relationship with a shared friendship and care, alongside a realistic and dispassionate assessment of each other's strengths and weaknesses.
Michael is also interested in exploring conflict within an individual and O'Loughlin is the perfect antidote to the bullet-proof, invincible, chisel-jawed hero of many books. O'Loughlin has early onset Parkinson's, physically frail, Michael admits that the juxtaposition of a brilliant mind and a failing body was a scenario that fascinated him, but one he may not have tackled with hindsight. Despite the difficulties of ensuring that the progression is believable, and aside from the cruel and difficult position he has put a character he has a great liking for in, Michael has ended up with a flawed human, a brilliant mind that can be frustratingly blinkered. Joe can see how other people work, analyse the criminal mind and even support his colleagues and friends. Take him into his own family and he struggles, the one person in the world that he cannot seem to get any sort of a handle on is himself.
Using real-life events as a trigger for the plots of the books, BLEED FOR ME's central theme of a predatory school teacher - grooming female students, had its genesis in a true story of a man whose first wife had disappeared with a very young, ex-student becoming his second wife. Looking back at each of the books, there has been an event in real-life that has triggered a thought process, that ultimately results in the book. A sobering thought, Michael balances the intrusion of the evil side of reality with a complicated, touching, real and fragile family situation. Readers of SHATTER will know that the book ended with the Joe's wife Julianne leaving him, and somehow that seemed like such an extreme and almost cruel thing for her to do. BLEED FOR ME explores more of Julianne's motives, her feelings, her viewpoint, and it will go some way towards repairing her shattered reputation with Joe's fans and supporters. Or at least that's what Michael and his own wife hopes (she was one of the most vocal supporters of the need for another Joe book - to set the story straight and spell out Julianne's viewpoint).
The question of family relationships is obviously something that Michael also finds particularly interesting - he does say that he enjoys writing the family's story and that they are people who live and breath in his head. There's a wonderful reality to the changing relationship between a doting father and a teenage daughter pushing away, made particularly poignant by the recent threats as a result of Joe's job (events in SHATTER continue to reverberate through all of Joe's family).
We also briefly touched on SHATTER, the Ned Kelly winning novel immediately before BLEED FOR ME. Anyone who hasn't read that book yet, should seriously consider doing so. As a pure psychological thriller, there's actually a very low violence and body count. What there is, however, is a sense of pure evil - a cruel, focused, inhuman and ruthless mind against the equally ruthless, but conflicted and very human mind of Joe. A worthy winner of the Ned Kelly Award in 2008 indeed.
It's easy to forget the importance of the Ned Kelly's. Michael now has two awards - LOST in 2005 and Shatter in 2008, and whilst the awards may not be the best known in Australia, Michael really believes they mean a lot to the authors, their publishers and their publicists and they do mean something overseas. To win a Ned Kelly in Australia is now an indicator that this is a book / author to be commented on.
As is the way with Australian writers, and readers lately, at some point the subject of rights (particularly Australian territorial copyright) and the future of the publishing industry arises. Michael, as do other authors, regard the rise of ebooks and the general questions of Digital Rights Management warily. The rise of illegal copying of software, movies, TV shows, music and now ebooks is an ongoing concern for everybody. Not just a problem for the creators of the content - the musicians, the movie and TV producers, the authors; it is also going to be a problem for the consumer. Imagine a world in which the Michael Robotham's do not receive a reasonable recompense for what is, after all, a huge chunk of their time perfecting their output, creating an entertainment that is of immeasurable value to their fan base. If that fan base isn't willing to take some personal responsibility for ensuring that we contribute (by buying the book / the ebook / the audio book / the software program / the track / the DVD) then we run the risk of ruining that which we are so keen to possess that we will, (let's call a spade a spade) steal to get. It's not just a crime against "the big companies" - we need to stop pretending.
Now the extremely good news is that Michael says the next book is already well underway. Stand by for The Wreckage with Vincent Ruiz, a thriller set in the context of the Global Financial Crisis.
As if that's not enough to tempt fans (and new fans) of Michael Robotham's books - there is also the chance of a non-series book, set in Australia on the way as well.
