Hi David, I’m so glad to have you on
Rachelle’s Window today. I love the tagline on your blog, “celebrating the bit
players of history.” Tell us about yourself and what got you interested in
these “bit players”?
Hi Rachelle, thanks for inviting me onto this great site.
You’re right, my blog historywithatwist.wordpress.com does have that tagline. I
think that so much of history is written by the winners and the leaders and
that those who actually helped them to make it all happen are overlooked. It is
the regular guy or girl in the street who really make the history, so why not
celebrate them as well. History, contrary to popular belief, is not written in
stone. New facts or stories emerge all the time to put a fresh slant or nuance
to someone’s decisions or actions. Those nuances can often come through the
stories of the bit players around the mayor event.
I was brought up in
a working class home, my mam and dad worked long and hard as a cleaner and post
man respectively to put me and my siblings through college. I suppose
subliminally, in wanting to celebrate the bit players I want people like mam
and dad to get the recognition they deserve.
Rachelle: Exactly! That's why I wrote Michal's Window. She was a princess, yet people forget that she saved the line to Christ when she saved David's (not you, but King David) life. Of course the bonus of writing historical fiction is giving in to your curiosity of
wondering what life was like in another time or place. You’ve recently published a historical novel Tan. With the wide arena of history available to you, what made you focus on
this particular story?
David: Tan is set during the Irish War of Independence, which ran
from 1919-1921. The Black and Tans was the nickname given to ex-servicemen from
the First World War who were recruited as Temporary Constables to try to
restore order in Ireland. They soon became notorious for their brutality and
ill-discipline.
To this day the
Tans hold a special place in the Irish psyche. They have been demonised
(justly) for their actions yet quite a lot of them were actually Irish
themselves. I thought it would be interesting to write a story from the
perspective of someone who joined this body of men out of desperation and soon
was faced with the reality of their actions against his very own people.
Also, my own family
history is full of fascinating stories from this time. My grandfather was very
active during the War of Independence and the Civil War which followed, so I
think that that had a part in drawing me to this era.
Rachelle: It is certainly a chilling thought how ordinary people could get caught up in situations so horrendous to think about, isn't it? You wonder, what would I have done in his shoes? Your blog is a fascinating
collection of bits and pieces from the forgotten and downtrodden. There’s a
nugget for a novel in each of those vignettes. Has anything grabbed you again?
What are you working on now?
David: I love digging up unusual stories from history and,
hopefully, they'll inspire me in my writing. There are certainly plenty of
real characters to draw upon, that's for sure.
I’m currently
working on a sequel to Tan, which is set in the battlefields around Ypres, in
the aftermath of the First World War. It incorporates a collection of very ordinary
veterans from the war, who still carry its scars both mentally and physically,
and who decide to return to France to retrieve something precious left behind
in the heat of battle. The journey resurrects their wartime memories, and they
must cope with this and a few other obstacles that reveal themselves.
Rachelle: Sounds fascinating. I bet there is a lot of survivor guilt and traumatic stress disorder they deal with. You’re an editor of a national
newspaper. How has your day job prepared you for writing a novel? Were there
obstacles you didn’t expect when you embarked on this journey?
David: The style of writing I use in my day job is very different
to that I use when writing fiction. Initially, I did find it a challenge to
break out of the newspaper habit of sharp, staccato writing and giving too much
of the story up front, but I soon got over that. My job as an Associate Editor
with a busy national newspaper did help me when it came to having ‘clean’ copy.
My grammar and punctuation are pretty good (at least I think so!) and I can write in short bursts. I generally write on
the 50-minute commute to work, during my lunch break and then on the way home
again that evening. I try to do about one thousand words a day – sometimes I
get a bit more done, sometimes a little less.
Rachelle: See? You are more prepared than the average software engineer (that was my day job). Describe your boyhood. What were
your favorite pasttimes? Did you play a lot of video games or with more
traditional toy soldiers and board games.
David: I would have had a fairly
traditional childhood…I certainly loved those toy soldiers! When I wasn’t
reading books or watching movies, I was out hiking and camping with the Scouts.
I was never particularly ‘sporty’ – and was usually one of the last to be picked
for any soccer match, whenever I did dare venture out onto a playing pitch.
Rachelle: Ha, ha, I'm the one they relegate to the right field. One day a ball came straight at me. I was so shocked and surprised and scared that I ducked! How are you marketing your book?
Have you gone to any writer’s conferences? Met other writers in your genre?
David: To be honest I did everything
backwards. I wrote the book and only then began learning about social media,
which is a bit problematic when engaged in online publishing. I’m catching up,
though, especially after a great 12-week ebook publishing course I did with
BeCreativeBooks. I set up my blog and am really quite enjoying Twitter. A few
nook bloggers have kindly agreed to review my book, I’m doing interviews like
this one and I’m using KDP Select with a free promo of the book going out on
June 29-30.
Rachelle: Great! Your book is free today and tomorrow. And David, you do know you have my favorite name, right? (Sorry about that, have to put Michal back in her place. She gets a little excited whenever there's a David around)
It’s been great talking to you. I wish you lots of luck in your career and look forward to more stories about the “bit players.”
It’s been great talking to you. I wish you lots of luck in your career and look forward to more stories about the “bit players.”

David
Lawlor is Associate Editor with the Evening Herald newspaper in Ireland and has
been writing features, reviews and working as a produciton journalist in
national newspapers for 22 years.
David has written three novels and is currently working on his fourth. This is the first novel he has published. David lives in Greystones, Ireland, with his wife and four children.
David has written three novels and is currently working on his fourth. This is the first novel he has published. David lives in Greystones, Ireland, with his wife and four children.
Twitter:
@LawlorDavid
Thank you for this interview, Rachelle. Loved getting to know David and plan on following his blog and checking out his book. I wonder if this is the origin the Black and Tan (Guinness and Bass Ale)?
ReplyDeleteLove reading about another writer of historical fiction. WWI is such an interesting time. I'm headed off to look at your blog, David. Good luck with your free days. I look forward to reading TAN.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this great interview, Clare. I think the main reason most history is told about the leaders and famous. It's refreshing to see an important story from Everyman's POV. I am heading right over to Amazon to get my copy of "Tan."
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