Matthew Clemens Has a Job to Die For

Clemens, perhaps best known as the co-author of the successful ``CSI'' book spin-offs, has been crafting insidious fates and daunting obstacles for the characters in his crime novels for almost three decades.

His fruitful collaborations with Max Collins on a variety of film and fiction projects allow him to roam the corridors of his imagination with a child-like glee, concocting fun and deadly worlds for his readers to explore.

Clemens' latest book, ``You Can't Stop Me,'' is available in bookstores worldwide and online. Recently, we got together to chat about his career and future works.

Q: How do you feel about the current book?

A: It's really good. (Laughs.) It's really good. That's the quote I want the world to see. (Laughs.)

Q: Where did you get the idea?

A: It's something (Max Allan) Collins and I had been kicking around for a while. We had been doing ``CSI'' novels for years and thought we should come up with some ideas of our own. I thought the idea of having a group of serial killer hunters not affiliated with any government or law organization was interesting.

Q: It is. Tell us about it.

A: It's about a Midwest guy, John Christian Harrow, whose family is murdered at the same time he's helping to save the president from being assassinated. So he's shoved into the spotlight pretty fast and in ways that he's not entirely comfortable with, but he uses it to his advantage. He starts a TV show called `Crime Seen,' which is basically kind of an `America's Most Wanted.' And at the end of season one of the show he hijacks the show and says he's going to find the killer of his own family.

Q: It's a cool idea. Any other twists to it?

A: We came up with something slightly off-kilter in regard to the serial killer, which I won't reveal here, you'll have to read the book to find out, but it makes the killer someone you can sympathize with by the end of the book. It's not so black-and-white, it's morally more about shades of gray.

Q: Sounds interesting. How long have you been writing now and how long have you been collaborating with Max?

A: I'm 53 now and I've been writing since 1992 as a pro, so almost 20 years. April 10 will mark my 19^th anniversary since I quit my day job and decided to write exclusively. And I've been writing as an amateur since 3^rd grade. In the olden days I was the only 3^rd grader who had homework because I had extremely bad penmanship. So I had to copy pages from a book to work on it. One night, I got bored doing that so I thought I'd make up my own story instead. That's when I found out that making stuff up is cool.

Q: How many books have you had now?

A: There have been a lot, at least 50. This is my 19^th with Max.

Q: How is it collaborating with Max? How do you work on projects together - do you both get ideas to start, do you both work on narrative, how does it evolve?

A: It feels great. Part of it is that I came into this knowing he's Bruce Springsteen and I'm Clarence Clemons, so there's no competition or arguing over who's the boss. How it works is, one of us comes up with an idea, we'll start playing `what if,' `what if,' `what if,' until we have an idea that can be made into a book. I go start researching and he'll start working and soon with any luck we'll have a presentable synopsis and first chapter. I'll write a draft, he writes a draft and we arm-wrestle over whatever one works.

We can usually come to an understanding pretty easily. We work well together.

I think part of having me on board that's good is that it gives him another bullet in the chamber. I'm kind of like a reload.

Q: What advice would you give to aspiring writers?

A: Good luck! The business is shrinking quickly. There's so many entertainment options out there to compete for people's time, it's tough for books to keep on going. I don't know how much longer books will be books in the format they are right now.

Another piece of advice is for people to realize that 80 percent of the books sold are non-fiction, yet everyone wants to be a novelist. The vast majority of the fiction books sold are of a genre - mystery, sci-fi, romance, romance is a huge seller - and literary fiction, which is also a genre, but is what everyone tends to think of when they think of writing novels, makes up a very small piece of the pie. People need to keep that in mind if they're considering this as a career.

Q: It's a pretty dire picture, but it's true, it's one that people have been writing about the print media and the publishing world for a while. So, why do you continue to do it, and why would you recommend anyone else do it?

A: It's more fun than anything. It's the best job ever. You get to play with your friends, travel, and make stuff up. This allows me the opportunity to never have to grow up. What could be better? I'm 53 and I get to be Peter Pan and get paid for it.

I'm doing this until someone makes me stop.

Q: What are you working on now?

A: I'm working on the next Harrow novel. I'd like to work on them for a while. I've pitched a novel about a serial killer who preys on Supreme Court Justices. And we've got another book coming out later in 2011 called ``No One Can Hear You.'' So, we're having fun. It's a good life.