Q&A with Mike Bond

 

 

 

Mike Bond is the author of the new novel Crude. His other books include Saving Paradise.

 

Q: What inspired you to write Crude, and how did you create your character Ross Bullock?

 

A: I write thrillers because they involve readers, put them in an exciting, dangerous, and deeply alive place where I've been. By being in that place, they emotionally internalize the experience, it becomes theirs.

 

Every one of my 13 novels has also been written to increase awareness of a situation that needs to be changed -- from our Middle East wars to elephant poaching to the destruction of our environment and the uselessness of energy projects like wind turbines.

 

I was particularly inspired to write Crude because, having been involved for many years in the intelligence analysis of the dangers of nuclear war, I believe as many experts now do, that we're at the closest point in history to a nuclear catastrophe which will destroy all life on earth.

 

Therefore, it is an existential imperative to bring this to everyone's attention. Unless we change, we will have a massive nuclear war in the very near future -- what else is worth writing about?

 

It was very easy to create Ross Bullock as an energy company CEO because I have been one myself, and worked at a very high level in the energy business for years. He is also very interested in astrophysics, as I am. It was easy.

 

Q: Did you know how the story would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: I never know where a book is going until it is done. Novels are like life: you can plan all you want, but if you try to stick to your plan, you can have a very boring life. My books are alive; they leap out of my subconscious and my experience, are far more interesting than I could map out ahead.

 

Q: Did you need to do any research to write the novel, and if so, did you learn anything that especially surprised you?

 

A: Crude, like all my books, is written from my own personal experiences. Every place and action in the book, from Wyoming and Manhattan to Moscow, Indonesia, and Mongolia, I have been in and know well. Some historical facts I research to ensure that my memory is correct.

 

The places I've been, and what has happened there, have often been surprising, sometimes very dangerously.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb