~Post by MysteryPeople Crime Fiction Coordinator Scott M.
New voices are incredibly vital to crime fiction. They both challenge and invigorate the genre with fresh takes on the standards we love. A wondeful example of this is Rick Gavin, whose new book Ranchero is a fun and funny crime romp where the search for a stolen car takes us through a violent and satirical tour of the Missippi Delta. The book has drawn comparisons to Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiassen, but the book has a mix of grit, grease, and sweat all it’s own, and dialogue and pace any action film would kill for. It has been one of my favorites this year, making my Top Five Debuts of 2011 and my November Pick Of The Month. I recently was able ask Rick a few questions about his debut and his appraoch to writing.
MysteryPeople: Is there a particular reason this idea came to you for a first novel?
Rick Gavin: I was working in Indianola, lived in the Delta for about six weeks, and the place really won me over. The landscape, the people, the ethnic history of the Delta. The trashy crime too, of course. The Delta has plenty of that. I thought it was a spot worth exploring. I became interested in the Delta for the setting of a story with raw velocity to it. We can’t all write “The Bear.”
MP: What makes the Delta different from other parts of the South?
RG: The Mississippi Delta, along with the Nile River Valley and the San Joaquin Valley, is one of the most fertile places on earth. And the history of the Delta is the history of farming by hand with huge labor forces, first slaves and then anybody else the planters could entice to the place. Consequently, the population is ethnically rich in a way that the south generally isn’t. That fact has colored the culture of the Delta, the cuisine of the Delta, the tone and atmosphere of the place. Add crop dusters and Kool-Aid pickles, and you’re talking about a spot with a difference. The Delta is flat-out exotic. It’s the New Orleans of agriculture.
MP: You have Joe Lansdale and Elmore Leonard’s skill of balancing very funny characters with intense violence. Do you find that hard to do?
RG: To be honest, blending funny characters with intense violence is about the only thing I can do. I decided not to fight it and write the story I could write. So this book wasn’t hard work for me, but almost anything else would have been. I’m not proud of being limited as a writer, but I’m sure aware of it.
MP: Who are some authors who influence you and this book?
I’ve read a lot of Elmore Leonard and am tuned into his tone. Hard-edged but funny. I’ve also worked through much of Lee Child and Carl Hiaasen. I know I’m better at the comedy than I am at the plot, so I read to be instructed as well as entertained. I’m lately on a Randy Wayne White kick. He was kind enough to blurb my book, and I bought a few of his novels after that and just can’t stop reading him. I’m truly enjoying Florida with Doc Ford and don’t know when I might come up for air.
MP: When reading this book, it conjured up Seventies Southern action films with Joe Don Baker, Warren Oates, and Burt Reynolds. Are you influenced by film and other media, as well as books?
Warren Oates is a good touchstone. Any film he ever growled his way through was always all right with me. Just now, I find some British films to be closer to what I’m after than most American ones. Layer Cake is a good example. It’s smart, edgy, and funny all at the same time. I watch it about once a month. The snap and pacing of it suits me down to the ground.
MP: I’ve heard this will be the first in a series. What else do you have in store for Nick Reid?
RG: Yes, Nick Reid will be back in at least two more novels. Nick and Desmond will probably stay in and around the Delta for now. Trouble has a way of finding them there, and I do have further plans for Guy the Acadian meth lord. He’s got a lot more trouble to make. I finished book #2 about a month ago, and it should be out next fall.
Rick was kind enough to sign some copies of Ranchero that we currently have available on the shelves at MysteryPeople, BookPeople’s mystery bookstore within a bookstore.
BookPeople 