{"id":21444,"date":"2024-12-20T09:14:07","date_gmt":"2024-12-20T14:14:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/?p=21444"},"modified":"2024-12-20T09:14:07","modified_gmt":"2024-12-20T14:14:07","slug":"william-boyle-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/the-bull-interview\/william-boyle-2\/","title":{"rendered":"William Boyle"},"content":{"rendered":"

If I had to compare Bill’s work with any other writer time and time again, I think of Charles Willeford. It’s not because Boyle’s work is similar or a copy, not at all, but Willeford understood his world of Miami. He knew the sweat stains in the concrete. Bill knows Brooklyn in\u00a0the same\u00a0way. It\u2019s a gift. I can taste the\u00a0food,\u00a0feel the\u00a0guilt,\u00a0laugh\u00a0at the jokes, see\u00a0what they’re wearing. The entire\u00a0time when reading Saint of Narrows Street<\/em>, I felt like I was in the room with the characters. The Irish kid with no dialogue sitting inside Bill’s small slice of Brooklyn full of rich, pained, human, and complex characters.<\/p>\n

I’ve been a fan of Boyle’s work for some time now. I was introduced to his work a year or two before COVID by a friend. I read Gravesend<\/em> and added him\u00a0on social media. I’ve hung out with him in Oxford a few times and threw back beers in City Grocery. We talked movies, music, Larry Brown, whiskey, and basketball. Great person, amazing writer. I’m glad to call him a friend. I’ve read all his other novels, top-notch storytelling. Each novel is\u00a0its own skeleton in search of a heart often lost in the darkness of crimes, and the haunted visions of a failing church. People that push until sin is the only available outcome, but his new one, the novel with one of the best covers of the year, is hands down his best work to date. Easily one of my favorite reads of 2024. A year in which I read big bastards like Fat City <\/em>for the first time.<\/p>\n

I want to say it was Ace Atkins who said, “This book is an experience,” I couldn’t agree more. I felt alive in his story about what happens when life comes to collect on the sins of the past. There’s such a rich tapestry of character studies throughout the novel. If any of his novels should be brought to the big screen it would be this one. However, due to its size and scope, I think it would serve better as an eight-to-ten-part miniseries on MAX or Netflix. I do believe it’ll make a bunch of best of lists next year, and it’ll certainly be nominated for an award or two. It’s a heavy beast of a crime book. A book not so much invested with the actual crime itself, but what it does to Risa, Guila, Chooch, Fab, and the forever ticking clock each character deals with up until the homerun of an ending.<\/p>\n

You don’t want to miss out on this book, which drops February 4th from SOHO Crime. You can preorder it right now through SOHO, a favorite indie bookstore, or online. I’m serious, Saint of the Narrows Street<\/em> will be one of the most talked about books of 2025. Bank on it.<\/p>\n

– Frank Reardon<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FRANK REARDON:<\/strong> How\u2019s it going, Bill? How was the trip to France?\"\"<\/p>\n

WILLIAM BOYLE:<\/strong> Hey, Frank. Holding steady. France was cool. It\u2019s always a bit surreal when I come back after going over there for book stuff\u2014almost like I\u2019m not sure it really happened. I got to meet James Ellroy at a festival in Pau, which was great.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> First off, I loved this book. I\u2019ve been a fan of your work for some time, but I have to say Saint of the Narrows Street<\/em> is my favorite book of yours. Your writing went on a whole other level with thisbook. It\u2019s a movie of a book. Early rave reviews from Megan Abbott, S.A. Cosby, Alison Gaylin, and Willy Vlautin. I agree with every\u00a0single one of their\u00a0reviews. I believe it was Ace Atkins who said, \u201cThis book is an experience,\u201d I agree one hundred percent. How was it writing this book? The challenges? Getting into the characters?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>Thanks, man. I really appreciate that. Writing the book was a tough process. Put a lot of soul and blood into it. I wrote the first draft in the early days of Covid, and I wrote it fast. Started it in March 2020 and probably finished it in a couple of months. But it\u2019s almost not right to call it a draft of this book\u2014it was set on one night, all on the block, in August 1986. Nothing from that version exists in the finished book except for a handful of characters\u2014Risa, Giulia, Chooch, Sav, baby Fab, Lola\u2014and some backstory. I realized after I was done that it wasn\u2019t working, so I chalked it up as a failed novel and put it away and started writing Shoot the Moonlight Out<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But something about those characters and that block kept eating away at me. After Shoot the Moonlight Out<\/em>, I worked on another book that would go nowhere\u2014I spent over a year on it, and it was a very frustrating experience. The way I structured that failed book\u2014four parts set across twenty years\u2014opened up the idea of returning to this book and structuring it that way. So, at some point in 2022, I came back to it, and it started to take shape. The process after that was still long and challenging\u2014lots of invaluable input from my agents and eventually my editor once the book was sold. Lots of tightening and refining. It\u2019s the longest book I\u2019ve ever written, and the finished version is cut down significantly from the version I originally submitted to my editor. It got stronger with every pass. I\u2019ve lived with these characters for a long time now, so I feel very close to them. They stayed pretty much the same throughout the process, though I came to understand them\u2014and see them more fully\u2014as I went along.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> Giulia is my favorite character in the book, especially early on. She reminded me of the types of women I was friends with or dated back in Boston. She gave me a feeling of nostalgia that I try to avoid but love to let inside my heart too. She\u2019s full of life, lives in the moment, takes no shit, a big mouth but in the best way. She\u2019s the perfect\u00a0balance for Risa. Did you know someone like Giulia in your life? What inspired the character? Tell us all about\u00a0Giulia.<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>Glad to hear that. I love Giulia, too. I\u2019ve known people like her, but she\u2019s not based on anyone specific. She\u2019s the kind of person who should\u2019ve left the neighborhood\u2014had a bunch of chances and missed out\u2014and now she\u2019s stuck. She was a relatively minor character in the first draft and got a much bigger role as my vision for the book changed. One of my favorite movies is Georgia <\/em>with Jennifer Jason Leigh and Mare Winningham. I was thinking about the relationship between the sisters in that movie, JJL\u2019s Sadie and Winningham\u2019s Georgia, to a certain extent. There\u2019s a lot of JJL\u2019s Sadie in Giulia, and there\u2019s some of Allison Johnson from Willy Vlautin\u2019s Northline<\/em>. She\u2019s haunted, trying to live right, but she always has the impulse to break loose.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> You have a column in Southwest Review<\/em> about movies you watched on streaming platforms. It\u2019s a great read for people reading this. I discovered a few gems myself. Do movies play any role in writing choices? Do they inspire you? How so?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>Thanks, man. Big time, yeah. I go on kicks that influence what I\u2019m working on. Deep diving into a director\u2019s or an actor\u2019s filmography. Certain things about performances. Certain images. I love to read, and I love so many writers, but I grew up loving movies too and I can\u2019t help but seeing things cinematically in my mind. Imagining in shots. Imagining certain people playing certain parts. I was rewatching a lot of classic noirs as I worked on this\u2014Scarlet Street<\/em>, Criss Cross<\/em>, Blast of Silence<\/em>\u2014and they really inspired the book. Italian filmmaker Raffaello Matarazzo\u2019s \u201crunaway melodramas\u201d had an impact on what I was doing. Richard Linklater\u2019s Boyhood <\/em>was a structural influence. James Gray is one of my favorite filmmakers\u2014all his New York City films are important to me, but Armageddon Time <\/em>came out while I was working on this and it\u2019s set in the \u201980s, when my book starts, so that was huge. And Gray\u2019s one of those filmmakers whose work has shaped my imagination, along with Martin Scorsese, Abel Ferrara, and others. George Stevens\u2019s Giant <\/em>(based on the great Edna Ferber novel) was very much on my mind, also in terms of how I structured things. So, yeah, on a given day, there are the movies that are part of my \u201cspirit board\u201d (to borrow a phrase from Jordan Harper), along with tons of books and music, but there\u2019s also stuff that comes out of nowhere to surprise me and might change where I\u2019m going or give me a cool detail or a new way of seeing things.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> The book has a simple plot, but the characters are rich and deep, and you use real human dialogue which I always\u00a0find refreshing. I’m not the biggest fan of elaborate plots. I sometimes find it gets in the way. I’m invested in character. Early on, did you approach the book as a character study of sisters, abuse, loss, claustrophobia? Did you at times find the\u00a0characters were taking you somewhere you didn\u2019t fully understand? Did they frustrate you?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>I always start with character and place. I put the characters in desperate situations, usually in my part of southern Brooklyn, and see what develops from there. There\u2019s drama just in watching lives unfold. I was thinking about that a lot here. The natural drama of being alive. Throw some secrets and lies and betrayals into the mix and shit gets amped up. I\u2019m drawn to claustrophobic spaces\u2014apartments and houses, especially kitchens\u2014and, yeah, I was thinking about all those things. These characters\u2014with their own private universes of fears and worries\u2014face down everything that confronts them in different ways. Risa\u2019s the one who really believes in God. In a lot of ways, though it\u2019s never explicit, the novel charts the crumbling of that belief. There were times the characters took me places I didn\u2019t expect or understand\u2014that was part of the process. Fab frustrated me. I wanted him to give in and be happy with his life, but he wouldn\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> Great cover by the way. Whoever put that one together certainly hit on the classic \u201970s paperback vibes. Growing up in Brooklyn in an Italian neighborhood\u00a0do the people still have the classic names like Giulia and Risa? I remember reading an article you wrote about religious imagery. You and I both grew up in Catholic worlds, but in different cities. Do older names, imagery, religion, food, drink, and themes like guilt, all come from your experience growing up and coming of age in Brooklyn?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>Thanks. Soho had me fill out a form about what I wanted and didn\u2019t want from a cover. I sent them covers I loved, a lot of stuff from the \u201960s and \u201870s and further back. The cover designer, Luke Bird, did an incredible job. Just totally nailed the vibe of the book. I couldn\u2019t believe when they came back to me with that on the first try. I have friends who go through hell with their covers, trying to get publishers to understand what they\u2019re after. Covers are so damn important. I feel lucky to have a book out there that people might pick up just because the cover\u2019s so cool.<\/p>\n

Yeah, people still have those names. I get a lot of my names from people I went to school with or knew around the neighborhood and from my mom\u2019s high school yearbook and, most of all, from the death notices of a local funeral parlor. And, yeah, all that stuff comes from the Italian Catholic world I grew up in. Brooklyn, the \u201980s and \u201990s, you know? Everybody\u2019s probably got some picture of it from movies. All the sensory details. Went to Catholic school for twelve years, Mass every Saturday night with my mom and grandparents. There\u2019s so much I can\u2019t shake. The shame and guilt come from all of that, for sure. The fascination with regret and doubt and evil. Writing characters, like Risa, who must suffer. I call myself and the books I write \u201cCatholic-haunted.\u201d Catholicism is well-suited to noir, which is often just the stuff of classic tragedy.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> Not to give away anything for the readers as the book doesn\u2019t come out until February, but how was it writing the last quarter of the book? I couldn\u2019t stop reading it when I got closer to the end. I might\u2019ve even shouted out a couple of times. Do you as an author want it to go differently for your characters\u00a0but you know in your heart it has to end up the way it does?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>Yeah, that\u2019s a good way of putting it. I don\u2019t really believe in spoilers, but I\u2019ll try to avoid them anyhow. I was thinking a lot about fate and chance and consequences. I did resist ending this where I did\u2014I tried to write an epilogue that pulled some light from the darkness, but it didn\u2019t work. I knew where this was headed for the most part, but I had the thought the characters might take it somewhere else. I was definitely carried along in the current of that last stretch\u2014Fab, in particular, was unpredictable.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> There\u2019s a handful of people on the social media sites that really pump books, not just new books, but older books too. You are one of those people. I get along best with\u00a0people who share a love of books, music, and movies. What are your favorite reads that you read in 2024? The\u00a0book can\u00a0be older, it doesn’t need to be a new release. Give me four or five you want people to read?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>We\u2019ve both talked a lot about Willy Vlautin\u2019s The Horse<\/em>. My favorite book of the year. Willy\u2019s my favorite writer. I loved Ace Atkins\u2019s Don\u2019t Let the Devil Ride <\/em>and Eli Cranor\u2019s Broiler <\/em>and Gabino Iglesias\u2019s House of Bone and Rain<\/em>. Henry Wise\u2019s Holy City <\/em>was a killer debut. I read Alison Gaylin\u2019s new one, We Are Watching<\/em>, which comes out in January 2025\u2014I think the week before my book\u2014and that blew me away. Really surprised me. Claudia Pi\u00f1eiro\u2019s Time of the Flies <\/em>is terrific. Richard Price\u2019s Lazarus Man<\/em> was great, as expected. That\u2019s the new stuff I\u2019ve been reading. Mostly, though, I\u2019m reading older stuff. Donna Masini\u2019s About Yvonne <\/em>was my favorite discovery this year. I\u2019ve been going back to James T. Farrell a lot lately. The Studs Lonigan trilogy was formative as hell for me, but I\u2019ve been digging into his deep catalogue. I recently read The Silence of History <\/em>for the first time and loved it. Talk about Catholic-haunted. Brian Moore is a writer I really love\u2014I\u2019ve read maybe five or six of his books at this point\u2014and he always knocks me out. This year, I read Cold Heaven <\/em>and The Doctor\u2019s Wife<\/em> for the first time, both brilliant. Sorry, that\u2019s a lot more than you asked for.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> I couldn\u2019t help but picture Michael Imperioli in my head for Chooch. Did you personally know a guy like Chooch? How did you steer through Chooch\u2019s dilemmas,\u00a0mindset? He’s a self-defeatist and realist, but he\u2019s loyal. He\u2019s one of the BIG hearts in the book. Tell us all about Chooch?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>I love Michael Imperioli. I can see that. I\u2019ve known some guys like Chooch. With him, I think I was also trying to write a version of myself if I\u2019d never left home. I split when I was eighteen. Chased other things. But I often wonder what my life would\u2019ve been like if I never left home, stayed all cooped up and shut off. I put a lot of that into imagining Chooch. It wasn\u2019t hard to get into his mindset. Trapped and full of yearning. He\u2019s not me, or I\u2019m not him, not by a long stretch in most ways, but I could\u2019ve been. I love Chooch. I worry about him. He\u2019s got a good heart, for sure, but he\u2019s damaged.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> You have a full life: family, work, book travels overseas, etc. When and how do you spend\u00a0your writing time when you are deep into a project? Where do you write? Do you have superstitions\u00a0around you like a little shrine? Is it a set schedule or do you write when you can?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>When I\u2019m really working on something, I wake up at five and try to get right to it. No distractions. If I can get three or four good hours in the morning in, I can usually accomplish what I want to for the day. I\u2019ll work throughout the day beyond that if my day job teaching doesn\u2019t get in the way\u2014sometimes something about the book will keep itching at me, or I\u2019ll be revising\u2014but the morning\u2019s the best time for me. I mostly write at our dining room table when I\u2019m home\u2014I don\u2019t have an office or anything. I like to go out to coffeeshops, too. No real superstitions beyond needing music in my headphones. With this book, I was listening to a lot of Loren Connors, particularly Hell\u2019s Kitchen Park<\/em>. Nick Cave\u2019s and Warren Ellis\u2019s score for Blonde <\/em>was also in steady rotation, as was Harold Budd\u2019s score for I Know This Much Is True<\/em>. Lou Reed\u2019s Hudson River Wind Meditations <\/em>has been a big one for me in the last year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> Tell us about the book release. When exactly does it drop? Are you planning reading events online and in person? How is it working with Soho Crime? And are you working on anything new, or in the early stages of something new?<\/p>\n

WB: <\/strong>The book will be out on February 4, 2025. I\u2019ll be doing an event here in Oxford, Mississippi at Square Books that day\u2014I\u2019ll be in conversation with Ace Atkins. The next night, February 5, I\u2019ll be at Novel in Memphis, talking to my pal David Swider, who owns the record store, The End of All Music, where I worked for many years. On February 17, I\u2019ll be at Greenlight in Brooklyn, and then, on February 18, I\u2019ll be at Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan with Megan Abbott. On February 19, I\u2019ll be at Rough Draft in Kingston, New York. Still trying to put a few things together after that, but that\u2019s the schedule right now. I\u2019m sure there will be at least a couple of virtual things too, and I\u2019m hoping like hell to make it out west.<\/p>\n

Soho has been great. They\u2019ve been one of my favorite publishers for a long time, and I\u2019ve been hoping to wind up there. I love my editor and the whole team.<\/p>\n

I am working on a new book. You can never tell how things are going to go, but I think I\u2019m in the homestretch of finishing a draft. We\u2019ll see. I\u2019m superstitious when it comes to talking about stuff I\u2019m working on\u2014I hate to do it.<\/p>\n

FR:<\/strong> Bonus Question:<\/em> P.T. Anderson calls you up and tells you to stop at Blockbuster and pick up three movies of your choice. Also, to stop and get some treats from the best bakery in Brooklyn. What bakery are you going to? What kind of treats are you bringing? And what three movies do you pick?<\/p>\n

WB:<\/strong> First off, I\u2019ve gotta say, I was never a Blockbuster kid. I went to a mom-and-pop shop in my neighborhood. It was named International Video, but I called it Wolfman\u2019s because the guy looked like Lon Chaney Jr. in The Wolf Man<\/em>. They did open a Blockbuster a few blocks away from me in the \u201990s, but I never went there. And, oh man, that\u2019s a tough call. Am I trying to grab movies I think he\u2019s never seen or just favorites? I feel like it\u2019d be damn hard to get something Paul Thomas Anderson has never seen or heard of. I guess I\u2019ll go with a couple of favorites and one recent first-time watch. Louis Malle\u2019s Atlantic City<\/em> would be my number one. I think about that movie constantly, and it inspires everything I write. No doubt PTA\u2019s a big fan of Saturday Night Fever<\/em>, but I feel like I\u2019d have to take the opportunity to show it to him in the part of Brooklyn where it was shot and then I could pitch my idea for Saturday Night Fever 3: The Future Fucks You<\/em>, about a washed-up Tony Manero. And, finally, I\u2019ve been on a big J. Lee Thompson kick lately, and I just watched North West Frontier <\/em>for the first time. Kind of like Stagecoach <\/em>on a train in India. Thompson is one of those workhorse directors with a long, wild career that I really admire. I feel like that\u2019d been an unexpected pick.<\/p>\n

The bakery I\u2019m going to is Villabate Alba, which is where my character Risa in Saint of the Narrows Street <\/em>used to work before the action of the book unfolds. Best joint around. I\u2019d go with classic pastries\u2014cannoli, sfogliatelle, and sfinge\u2014and probably grab a pound of rainbow cookies.<\/p>\n

William Boyle is the author of eight books set in and around the southern Brooklyn neighborhood of Gravesend, where he was born and raised. His most recent novel is\u00a0Saint of the Narrows Street<\/em>, available from Soho Crime. His books have been nominated for the Hammett Prize, the John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger Award in the UK, and the Grand Prix de Litt\u00e9rature Polici\u00e8re in France, and they have been included on best-of lists in\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>,\u00a0CrimeReads<\/em>, and more. He currently lives in Oxford, M<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I always start with character and place. I put the characters in desperate situations, usually in my part of southern Brooklyn, and see what develops from there. There\u2019s drama just in watching lives unfold. The natural drama of being alive. Throw some secrets and lies and betrayals into the mix and shit gets amped up.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":21446,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[232],"tags":[2793,2456,3953,3952,2506,2501,3954,2507,1894],"class_list":["post-21444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bull-interview","tag-alison-gaylin","tag-charles-willeford","tag-city-grocery","tag-fat-city","tag-megan-abbott","tag-s-a-cosby","tag-soho-crime","tag-william-boyle","tag-willy-vlautin","writer-frank-reardon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21444"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21452,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21444\/revisions\/21452"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}