Author Peter Robinson
Peter Robinson, author of the 16 or so Inspector Banks mysteries, has celebrity fans from rock musicians and literary critics to Stephen King, all eager for the series’ latest instalment. He’s coming to this year’s WordFest with the new Banks novel, Friend of the Devil.
“This one has two parallel plots, both taking place in the present and intersecting in unexpected ways,” says Robinson. “Many of the ideas came from loose ends from previous novels in the series. I have a habit of leaving certain things hanging, and then 10 years later, I think, ‘Hmmm, what about that?’
“Most of the research this time involved rereading some of my earlier books, so it wasn’t too difficult,” he adds. “In previous books, when I have written about other time periods, the research has been tougher but much more interesting. I mean, I could hardly complain about listening to music and watching DVDs of old rock festivals for Piece of My Heart, could I?”
Some call the former poet a novelist, others a mystery writer. What makes his writing so addictive is his trademark use of humour, suspense and a dash of poetry. Although Robinson says he eschews classifying himself by saying he writes books about a policeman and some of the things that happen to him in his life and on the job. “There’s more to it than that, of course — other characters (other than Banks), such as Annie Cabbot, can also play large parts — but the characters probably come before the crime element for me. I’m not terribly interested in police procedure and forensics, though I do recognize that they must play a part in what I write. Human psychology and motivation interest me much more.”
The international author who calls Canada home also enjoys a good mystery himself. “I think that most of the best novelists — my favourites, anyway — create suspense to keep readers involved, and that applies to writers as diverse as Graham Greene, Ian McEwan, Tolstoy or Charles Dickens. Two of my favourite novels are Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Crime and Punishment, and both, in their way, are crime novels. They do, of course, much more than the conventional Agatha Christie-style mystery, and that’s one of the wonderful things about crime fiction — it’s open to just about anything. It also often stands as the best commentary on the society of a given place and time. So why would I want to do anything else? I think I will write books that don’t feature police officers, but I hope they do have suspense and mystery in them and give readers plenty of thrills. Otherwise, why should people bother reading them? For self-improvement?”
For now, readers can also expect Inspector Banks to stick around. “Inspector Banks keeps me interested because I haven’t got to the bottom of him yet and keep on finding out new things, hidden depths. I suppose as soon as I’ve got him completely figured out then it’ll be time to stop writing about him, but I can’t see that happening in the near future.”
Because Robinson has been interviewed many times, is there something he might wish someone would ask him? “If someone asked me politely why the most recent books are so much better than the earlier ones, I would be very pleased and probably say that I’ve got better as a writer over the years, perhaps because of both life experience and a lot more writing practice. I might never write the perfect book, but I always try to make the next one better than the last — and it usually gets harder because I also have to do it in less time.”
