Second of the guest blogs I wrote for 49 Writers, No Moose in June.
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I grew up in a commercial fishing community in Alaska, which including all the squiggly bits has about 35,000 miles of coastline. Coasties were always around when I was growing up, and I’d always wanted to write them somewhere into my work, The original plan was to create a Coast Guard base in Newenham in the Liam Campbell novels, with recurring characters. Then, alas, Liam lost his publisher, so when my agent and editor ganged up on me to write a thriller I figured, Awwright, Coastie hero!
Coasties are the second most welcoming and hospitable people on earth (The Irish are first.) On both cutters the crews took some time getting used to me (most writers they host on patrol are journalists looking for a story), but once they figured out I wasn’t writing a scandalous expose they threw open every hatch on every bulkhead. I was in the circle around the captain as they planned the midnight rescue of an injured fisherman offshore of the Pribilof Islands. They let me put actual hands on things, like very big guns, the cyclic of a helicopter in the air, a garden hose (to wash down the turbines). I got to jump off the side of the ship into the Pacific Ocean where it’s 8,000 meters deep, and I’m a shellback now (although they still haven’t sent me my card).
You get the details right, you’ve got yourself a credible and convincing setting, and you’ve got your foot in the door of the reader’s imagination. And then you’re home.
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For more pictures of Munro and crew at work, click here.
For more pictures of Alex Haley and crew at work, click here.