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Writing Blockbuster Novels Part I: An Interview with T. J. MacGregor

© Deborah Cannon

Since the publication of her first book IN SHADOW in 1984, T. J. MacGregor has gone on to write twenty-four suspense novels under three different names, eventually winning the Edgar award for best paperback, in 2003, for OUT OF SIGHT. First published at age thirty-six, this prolific author has a twenty year career that is going strong. She is well-loved for her Quin St. James/Mike McCleary mystery series and now she writes thrillers with a psychic edge set in Florida.

Before she was published, Trish worked as a social worker, teacher, and librarian. She taught Spanish to everyone from fifth graders to college students and taught English to Cuban refugees. She was even a prison librarian for three years!

Born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela, she loves to travel and read. She has a strong interest in dreams, the tarot, magic and spells, and astrology. She is married to the novelist Rob MacGregor, and they have one daughter. She loves animals and counts among her companions, three cats, a dog and a bird. Today she lives near West Palm Beach, Florida where she sets many of her exciting novels. Her latest hit is BLACK WATER published by Pinnacle Books and her newest book TOTAL SILENCE will be released in October.

DC: You've probably been asked this hundreds of times, but it's a question that all aspiring writers want to know. Have you always known that you wanted to be a writer?

TJM: Ever since I was old enough to know what stories and books are, writing was the only thing I wanted to do. I learned to read when I was about four, paging through comic books that a friend had brought over. As soon as I started putting words together, a whole new world opened up for me, the world of story. And over the years, the desire to tell stories became a slow, intense burn. It seems that everything I did, every detour I took to reach that goal, got tossed into the creative pot and eventually gave me a canvas and a voice.

Over the years, I've met plenty of people who want to write, who have loads of talent, but whose ideas about writers and writing are all mixed up with society's version of what a writer is. They sit down in front of a computer, think, "Oh God, I can't do this," and become paralysed.

During the fifties, for instance, when I grew up, writers supposedly lived in Greenwich Village, pounded away on old Royal typewriters, never had enough money, and subsisted on coffee and cigarettes and cans of tuna fish. Or they were like Jack Kerouac, nomadic, cool, and just a bit nuts. I don't know what today's model of a writer is - maybe that you write a novel, the first publisher who sees it buys it for a huge six figure advance, and you and the NY Times bestseller list are in bed together forever after.