Local authors explain why they set their works close to home
By Cheryl Minns, Arts Editor
Local crime and mystery authors E. R. Brown, Dietrich Kalteis, and Sam Wiebe appeared at the Burnaby Public Library McGill Branch for a public reading of their works, a lively discussion about crime and mystery fiction, and a Q-and-A on November 5.
Brown read from his novel, Almost Criminal, which takes place in the Fraser Valley; Kalteis read from his latest novel, The Deadbeat Club, which takes place in Whistler; and Wiebe read from his debut novel, Last of the Independents, which takes place in Vancouver.
One of the topics the authors discussed at length was why they chose to set their novels in British Columbia instead of using more popular USA locations.
“It’s true: books set in the States tend to do better. I think we all knew that going in. But the stories that we were going to tell were tied to the location,” Wiebe said.
Kalteis enjoys the familiarity of the locations he describes in his stories, such as the route a driver takes in the first chapter of The Deadbeat Club that involves going past the PNE grounds.
“I love reading a story where you can go, ‘I know where that is.’ It just makes it real for you,” he said.
“All of our books take place in BC. There are some really great crime novels set in BC, but not a lot. It’s really unexplored territory in a lot of ways,” Weibe said.
Wiebe explained that for cities and regions to become popular book locales, it only takes a few best sellers to influence people’s interest.
“There are so many great Scandinavian writers, but it just takes one Girl with the Dragon Tattoo to make people more aware of the setting and show that there’s good stuff out there,” he said.
He provided a lengthier example with Ian Rankin’s Inspector Rebus crime novels, which increased the popularity of Edinburgh, Scotland.
“When he started writing, Edinburgh was not a cool place. In fact, he had to move Rebus to London because London is a more attractive city. But after he wrote seven or eight books and people realized how good they were, suddenly Scottish lore is now a thing. They have a festival called Bloody Scotland with all these great crime writers,” he said.
For more insight to the crime and mystery genres, the Vancouver International Crime Fiction Festival, CUFFED, presents An Evening with Ian Rankin at St. Andrew’s-Wesley United Church on November 16 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $24 each and available through TicketsTonight.ca
