Author Interview: D.C. Corso

On Friday, I posted my review of Skin and Bones by D.C. Corso. Today I'm excited that she's taken time out of her busy schedule to answer some questions.

GJR: How much research went into the book?

D.C. Corso: Lots and lots; in fact, I think I am still researching it after the fact! I bought a few reference books and spent a lot of time at the FBI website, as well as the Seattle Field Office website. I also was advised by Island County Sheriff and mystery writer Mike Hawley (who is fabulous, BTW) on
procedural issues like search warrants and the like. I really enjoy
research but I think I could have saved a lot of time by doing it before I started writing.

GJR: I don’t think books about child abductions are easy to read, so they
have to be extremely hard to write. Why did you decide to tackle this issue?

D.C. Corso: I think I am perplexed by the presence of evil in humans, and try hard to understand what it is that compels a person to do this. It's an age-old question and the answer is, I think, that there is no answer. The brain is just wired wrong in some people and while I think they know what they're
doing is wrong, their compulsion overrides it. It is difficult to write about and that's one of the many reasons I try to keep most of the violence off-camera; I believe that people's imaginations are much more powerful than anything I can or should spell out.

GJR: What do you hope that readers come away with from the novel? Meaning, are there lessons to be learned?

D.C. Corso: I was hoping to capture a shift in attitudes at that particular time in our nation's history; for a while there (immediately after 9/11), a vigilante attitude became something that was respected and looked up to. And the message that we send our children about how we handle our problems is very much something I hoped to point out. They absorb a lot more from the adults they look up to than I think we realize.

GJR: Will we be seeing Severin Ash again? I liked that he was a damaged hero.
It made him more real.

D.C. Corso: I hope so!

GJR: Have you always wanted to be a writer?

D.C. Corso: I have been writing since I was a kid, so I think I have always been a writer, although it took a lot of practice to improve from those days!

GJR: Besides Skin and Bones, what else have you written?

D.C. Corso: When I was a kid, I wrote a lot of Nancy Drew-styled mysteries featuring non-identical (don't ask me why) twins, Sarah and Becky Spencer. In high school, I moved on to more teen-angsty short stories and even tried my hand at horror and sci-fi in my Stephen King/Star Wars period. In college,
I wrote a really bad novel (contemporary fiction) that has never seen the light of day thank goodness. I wrote a collection of loosely intertwined short stories called "Stranger Than Fiction" that is decent, but not great and needs a lot of work. I started something called "The Factory" that is really more of a fantasy about the mental trip taken by a woman in a coma;that's been ignored for a little too long. Nothing published aside from my Master's Thesis.

GJR: Are you working on a new novel? If so, can you tell us the premise?

D.C. Corso: I am, but all I can say about it is this: Agent Ash is trying to find his sister's killer.

GJR: Who are your favorite authors to read? Why?

D.C. Corso: For entertainment: Stephen King and Michael Connelly; their stories are fast-paced, their characters are real, and you really want to know what happens next.

GJR: What are you currently reading?

D.C. Corso: Lottery by Patricia Wood -- highly recommend!

GJR: What author’s have influenced you?

D.C. Corso: Definitely Stephen King in narrative voice, though I wish I had Hemingway's ability to self-edit!

Thanks to D.C. Corso for answering my 10 questions!!

Julie's Review: Skin and Bones

Summary: There are plenty of ways to die in a place like Carver Isle, Washington. There is blood, there is sweat and there is soil, and there are the leaves that wither and fall from the trees, crunching underfoot as they're raked into orderly piles. Fall is never anything more than a season in the small Washington town of Carver Isle - until the first child vanishes. None of them could have known what lay in wait for them, crouched at the end of that darkened hallway of a year. It began just two days after the Twin Towers fell, first with one missing child, and then another. When Parker Kelly returns to Carver Isle, she wonders if her disturbed cousin is involved. After confiding in FBI Special Agent Ash, she realizes that the truth lies buried deep in her past. Together, Parker and Ash must solve a puzzle of deceit and manipulation, exhuming secrets both would rather leave undisturbed. ~amazon.com

Review: Skin and Bones is a sharply written thriller that immediately brings you into the story. That's a good thing because the book is only 162 pages long. I love books that deal with the FBI, CIA or any other alpha government agency and this was pretty solid. D.C. Corso wrote characters you immediately wanted to know more about because you know there is some damage in their history. Severin Ash (aka Ash)is a great hero who has some baggage.

When my husband read the back of the book his comment was "Oh, a happy story". I'll admit I wasn't sure how I was going to like the child abduction part but I'm relieved to say that really was not the complete focus of the story. Sure, it was the main plot but Ms. Corso didn't go into gruesome details about what happened to the girls. I need to thank her for that.

The book doesn't leave anything loose at the resolution and I appreciate that. I was actually expecting because of the length that something wouldn't be resolved. Sure it's not a nice, neat bow but I rather liked the ending.

It wasn't too hard for me to piece together who was whom in the book regarding the bad guy but nonetheless I was waiting for the characters to catch up to me. It didn't take them too long and then the book came to an exciting climax. You immediately sniff out that Severin and Parker are going to hook up. I was all for it though. They both had a lot in common and truly needed each other.

I also loved the setting of the book. I've never been to Seattle but I can definitely picture it in my head. I loved that Parker's family had an apple orchard. Apple Orchard evoke sweetness and yet are a bit scary at night so it was the perfect setting for the book.

If you are looking for a succinct novel that reels you in and that you can't put down, pick up Skin and Bones by D.C. Corso. I can't say the resolution will be a big twist but it is still worth the read.

I'd like to thank Tracee at Pump Up Your Book for including me on this book tour.

Final Take: 3.75/5


In the kind of related but not really category:
I've noticed lately that no matter what the man's first name is, he always wants to be called by his last name. Is this because I'm reading a lot of CIA, FBI type books? Or is it a trend? Not even in books but in life. My husband's friends call him by his last name all the time. Must be a male thing!