Listening In is a series of author interviews, featuring authors whose works have been transformed into audiobooks! R. W. Green is the long-time friend and current writer for M. C. Beaton‘s acclaimed Agatha Raisin cozy mystery series, and Dead on Target is the latest in a long line of these cozy mysteries, narrated by Penelope Keith.

Please tell us more about Dead on Target! Why should we listen to it?

Dead on Target is Agatha Raisin at her fiery finest. Dealing with one problem after another, including catching a murderer, Agatha shows the sort of spirited attitude most of us can only dream of. She never gives up and refuses to be beaten. The usual cast of characters are there to help or, sometimes, hinder her but any listener who’s entirely new to Agatha’s world will be able to slide right in as if they’ve lived alongside her in the Cotswolds for years. Audio has the power to draw you in that close.

Could you please tell us about your career as an author? What first drew you to writing?

I’ve been writing and involved in publishing ever since I left school, which is more years ago than I care to remember! I started working on children’s magazines, then had a spell on a newspaper, then worked for various book publishing houses before becoming a full-time freelance writer and author. I’ve written fiction and non-fiction for children and adults, with a great many of those writing projects coming my way from people with whom I used to work in-house. It pays to be nice to people you work with!

What drew me to writing? I guess that, whether you’re working on fiction or non-fiction, there’s a creative process involved that has always fascinated me. I love the way that, even when you start writing a book, you don’t actually know exactly how it will end!

We’d love to hear about your writing process. Please elaborate!

Agatha’s adventures all start as reasonably detailed synopses that are then fleshed out, planned as chapters, partially written, binned, retrieved from the bin, reworked, binned again and returned to square one. The truth is, just as military people like to say that no plan survives first contact with the enemy, no Agatha Raisin plot survives first contact with the characters. M C Beaton created a fabulous cast of characters and it has been a delight and a privilege to carry them forward, but they do tend to have minds of their own. Sometimes, in a cetain situation, there are things you know a character will say that take the story off in an unexpected direction. I think that’s as it should be. The durability of any book series, after all, is maintained by its established characters.

What drew you to Cozy Mysteries? When did you know that it was the genre you wanted to write?

Having known M C Beaton (Marion) for around twenty years, it was my pleasure to lend a helping hand on the Agatha Raisin title with which, due to illness, she was struggling. We had fun pulling that book together and working on ideas for future titles, and it was the fun that made writing Agatha so addictive. Marion said that, if you don’t have any fun writing it, how can you expect anyone to have any fun reading it?

Where is your favourite place to write?

I have been known to sit with my laptop on a hotel balcony in Pollensa (Mallorca) looking out over the sea, shaded from the sun and with a cold beer in easy reach. Mostly, however, I am at home in my study in our house in Surrey (England).

Describe your writing style in five words or less.

Seriously not serious.

Any advice for emerging writers?

The classic advice is always to write about what you know, but for a cozy crime murder mystery, that might mean going out and bumping someone off, so please don’t do that. Do involve yourself in a bit of research about places, about things and about their history. Your characters can’t learn or discover anything unless you do so first. You may find out far more than you need to use in your book, but you can then be sure that what you are writing is correct. There’s nothing worse for a reader, or listener, than realising that the plot is undermined because of slapdash research on the author’s part.

What do you do when you experience writer’s block or reader’s block?

Take the dog for a walk, get some fresh air, pop into the pub, think about other things and then go back to the writing. Write anything you like, even if you know you’re going to trash it later, but get back into the writing rhythm in order to clear the hurdle.

What has been the most exciting part of having your novels transformed into audiobooks?

It’s lovely to hear someone reciting what you’ve written, especially when they put an emphasis on a word or phrase in a way you didn’t expect. That’s someone else engaging with the text in a slightly different way without actually changing any of the storyline. It’s quite flattering to know that someone has been thinking about what you wrote in order to present the text in the most entertaining way possible.

Penelope Keith has narrated a number of the audiobooks in this series. Did you have any say in her casting? Is having the same narrator(s) across this series important to you? What made Keith the right fit?

Penelope Keith has been involved with Agatha Raisin for longer than I have, so I had nothing to do with her casting, but I’m ever so grateful to whoever it was that did bring her on board. I think she is a marvellous actress with a wonderful voice that adds immensely to the ‘Englishness’ of Agatha Raisin. I hope she’ll carry on doing them forever. Also, she’s married to a bloke called Rodney, and there aren’t too many of us around.

The Agatha Raisin Mysteries series is so iconic, what was it like taking over an existing series? Does the writing process differ when filling the role for a previous author? How does it compare to your typical writing style? 

I don’t much feel like I’ve taken over the Agatha Raisin series. Sometimes it feels more like it’s taken over me. I think I’ve been very lucky in being able to do so many of the things that I’ve done in publishing and I was especially lucky to be able to work with Marion. She taught me about her characters and made sure that I understood the dynamics of how they worked together, although I doubt she ever really thought of it like that. She invented them and worked with them instinctively. Hopefully, I’ve developed the same sort of instinct but I never really feel like I’m writing alone. I always imagine Marion at my shoulder and, if I’m ever stuck on a plot hiccup, I ask myself what she would do next. You’ll note that I said I ask myself what she would do, I don’t ask Marion. I’m not completely nuts. I know she’s not really there, although that does conjure up an image that might make its way into a future Agatha book… As far as my writing style goes, I guess it’s a bit different to Marion’s but, having written fiction and non-fiction for adults and children, I’ve always had to be able to adapt to the job in hand, so I don’t suppose I really have a typical writing style.

Does having a television adaptation of the series impact the writing process of new books in the series?

Not as far as I’m concerned. I love Ashley Jensen as Agatha in the TV series and so did Marion. All three of us being Scottish probably helped with that, but Ashley doesn’t look like the Agatha who appears in the books. Other characters are also different in the TV series but that’s how TV works and the show is a wonderfully colourful, wonderfully funny take on the Agatha Raisin books. I try not to let the TV style influence the way I write the books, but I couldn’t help wondering how Ashley might play the scene as Agatha in the naturist club in Devil’s Delight!

Please recommend an audiobook you absolutely adored!

Absolutely adored? Well, it has to be The Venetian Masquerade by Philip Gwynne Jones, and not just because Philip is a pal. Normally I really enjoy driving up to Scotland. It’s about 500 miles and, especially when driving alone, the journey gives you time to think. On one such drive, however, traffic troubles would have turned it into a nightmare. The Venetian Masquerade saved my sanity!

What are you reading (or listening to) right now?

A lot of research at the moment. Open on my desk is a book called Scottish Myths and Legends by Daniel Allison, who performs as a storyteller, and A Dictionary of Plant Lore by Roy Vickery. Both are providing inspiration and information for the Hamish Macbeth murder mystery I’m working on.

Fiction-wise, I’ve just re-read Agatha Christie’s Problem At Pollensa Bay short story collection for reasons that will become clear in the next Agatha Raisin adventure!