Q&A - Trey Stone Strikes Again

Welcome back, Trey! Thanks for returning for another chat about writing. First, a few quick-fire questions: Pen or Pencil? Light wood or dark wood furnishings? And what TV series are you watching currently?

Pencil! Though I rarely write anything by hand anymore - I use my phone or laptop for all my idea keeping needs.

Dark wood furnishing! My wife and I have somehow developed a fascination for old furniture and things and most of it is plain, dark wood. And whatever stuff we have that isn’t gets sanded down and oiled.

We’re currently keeping up with Ted Lasso and working our way through the second season of Succession. That show is brilliant. We also recently began re-watching Fringe, which I must say, I had forgotten how good that is. If you’re a fan of X-Files, you’ll love that.

Ted Lasso, a series from Apple TV

Before we dive into things, let’s catch up. We connected before the pandemic and, like many of my writer friends, we just reconnected after some strangely warped period of time that apparently was like what—three or four years? What have you been up to? How did you spend your COVID? And what has it been like re-emerging?

Yeah, it’s weird how that happened. I felt like it was just a few months ago that we spoke last, but apparently a whole pandemic happened and four years passed, huh? Strange. The year before the pandemic I moved to Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic. I was supposed to just stay there for a year, but ended up extending my stay there just as the pandemic hit. A frozen, barren island is remote and distant enough if it wasn’t for social distancing and lockdown, so that was a weird time. But it meant I didn’t experience much of the pandemic like everyone else in the world did - we were quite isolated up there, and we didn’t see a single case of Covid-19 until sometime in the middle of 2021. That’s around when I moved back to southern Norway and resumed my normal, everyday life, as much as I was able to.

"The year before the pandemic I moved to Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic...it meant I didn’t experience much of the pandemic like everyone else in the world did..."

Since then I published a new psychological thriller (September last year) called At The Gate which has been a lot of fun, and I’ve been working with various other writing projects, both long and short, including the now finally finished A Form Of Revenge. I also joined a death metal band, Dark Delirium, where I play guitar,  and I’ve spent the last year kicking life into another musical project I have with two good friends called Maryon, where I both write the music, lyrics and sing.

Congratulations on launching A Form of Revenge, book three in the The Columbus Archives! Agent Greer has hit an all time low after being fired from the FBI and is determined to spend as much time staring at his reflection in a near-empty forty of whiskey. Despite the attempts of his friends and colleagues to help stir him from his despair, he remains resolute in his misery until a mysterious stranger shows up. Take us from there, but don’t tell us too much!

Jordan Greer finds himself at a sort of dead-end after losing much, if not all, of what he finds to be worthwhile in his life after the events of book two. He’s not really interested in trying to get his life back on track either, no matter what his friends try to do. But when a stranger from Greer’s past shows up, adamant that Greer can help him with an old murder case, Greer quite literally doesn’t have a choice in the matter and finds himself strung along a dark and violent trip down memory lane. That’s the problem you see - Greer doesn’t really remember who his person is, and therefore has a hard time figuring out what he can do to help–and ultimately–escape.

"...when a stranger from Greer’s past shows up, adamant that Greer can help him with an old murder case, Greer quite literally doesn’t have a choice in the matter and finds himself strung along a dark and violent trip down memory lane."

I recently [admitting with slight embarrassment] read my first murder mystery novel, The Human Flies by Norwegian writer Hans Olav Lahlum. I loved it, no questions there. But I understand that Scandinavian crime novels have their own unique flavor; what sources of inspiration did you draw on either personally or creatively when creating Greer’s world and this series of stories?

Well, let me be the second person to admit something with slight embarrassment and say that I don’t read as much Scandinavian crime as I probably should have. I’m actually now reading my first Jo Nesbo novel (The Snowman) and what I’ve read most of before has been Danish and Swedish authors, not Norwegians. For some reason I find myself drawn to go broader, to go far away from what I find familiar, so my series of crime thrillers are set in the US. Maybe it’s because I prefer to write in English (a symptom of growing up in a world where so much of our entertainment comes from abroad, but also from spending a lot of my early twenties in the UK, I’m sure), but I tend to have an urge to not want to write about what I know. All that said, I have a plan to write a Norwegian crime thriller - in Norwegian - and I hope that will be just as cold, harsh and gritty as those Scandinavian mystery novels we all love so much.

By coincidence, I am also set to publish the third book in my trilogy later this year. I’d love to know what writing the third book was like as an experience compared to the first two. Was it a struggle? Were you continuing on in a steady groove from the first two or did it feel like a whole new writing experience?

I struggled more with the second book than the third, to be honest. My series was always planned to come to a point with this third book, so I had it very clear in my head how I wanted it to go. For now, this series ends there, though I have ideas to do a second trilogy within the same universe that builds on what has come before. But no, it didn’t feel like a whole new writing experience, it felt like a final release, finally all my ideas came together just the way I planned them. My series technically has three protagonists, and each of my books have been dedicated to focusing on one of them. A Form Of Revenge, the third and final book focuses on Jordan Greer who’s our main protagonist and now we finally get his story.

"I struggled more with the second book than the third, to be honest. My series was always planned to come to a point with this third book, so I had it very clear in my head how I wanted it to go."

One of the insights of writing a trilogy that I will be carrying into my next project is how to write not just a book but a book series. Plotting, character development, and world-building can all be heavily impacted, especially in the later books. What advice do you have for writers who are writing their first book and who are planning on making it a series?

To be blunt, the advice I’d give writers who are writing their first book is simple: don’t. Write a standalone or two first and see how it goes. It’s not that I regret starting a series, but I feel like you have more options if you don’t, and you can always write a series next.

 But, if you’re insistent on writing a series (which admittedly is very tempting when you’re first starting out), sit down and plan it out. I’m not much of a plotter. I’ll take a basic plot, maybe just an ending, or just a scene or two and build a story from that. I like to see where it takes me. But with a series it’s helpful to have at least a couple of stops you know you want to hit on the way there. Think about what your characters are doing and where they’re going. How they get there is for you to figure out along the way, but what’s the end goal? Where does everyone stand at the end? Who’s alive and who’s not? Don’t worry if those things change as you go, suddenly it all falls into place and one character fills the role of another, but it’s good to have a basic map to look at as you go. It’s going to make it a whole lot easier to fill in the blanks as you write.

Of course, I have to ask: is this Agent Greer’s curtain call or do you have more books planned in the series? If so, where might his adventures take him? If not, what is next for you?

This is both a final stop for the series and not. I don’t want to say too much and spoil something, but I always planned for it to be a trilogy. As I, my characters and my writing have grown, I’ve realized I can tell more stories within this universe, and I can imagine there being a second set of three books that play off those that have come before. But when, or if those books ever see the light of day… Who knows. For now, I have other stories I want to tell first. But we’ll see.

Last, but not least, where can readers find A Form of Revenge and keep up to date on your future publications?

All my books, my stories, any news, as well as my blog where I write reviews and the odd bit of advice can always be found on my webpage: www.trey-stone.com. And my books are always available on Amazon, Bookshop.org and Barnes & Noble!

To keep up with Trey and his future publications, follow him on Twitter and don't forget
to pick up a copy of his brand new book: A Form of Revenge!