QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS WITH MARTIN HOLMEN (2017)

Martin Holmen, Swedish author of the Harry Kvist trilogy - Clinch, Down For the Count and the yet-to-be published Slugger answers a few questions for me.

Down For the Count featured on the blog yesterday - link here.

Clinch was enjoyed a year ago - thoughts here.


This is the second time Martin has graced the blog with his presence having previously submitted to a bit of gentle questioning, last September.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS WITH MARTIN HOLMEN (September, 2016)

Martin's books are published by Pushkin Vertigo, thanks are in order to Tabitha Pelly for setting this up for me.





I've just read the second Harry Kvist book and I'm assuming the third
in the trilogy, SLUGGER is done and dusted. Without any spoilers, is
Harry's tale at an end or can we but hope for a fourth?

This is the wild finish and me and Harry are going out guns blazing.

I was quite saddened by the ending of DOWN FOR THE COUNT, were you
ever tempted to offer a different outcome? (I'm trying to skirt around
giving too much away.)

There are basically two true noir endings and I think this is the happy one.

Did you have to do a lot more research for the second and third books,
or had your efforts with CLINCH, given you sufficient background and
detail to provide a realistic portrait of Sweden in the early 30s?

Not as much no, but you still have to put in a lot of hours.

Do you have a favourite out of the Kvist books? Which and why? Is
there one you would try and press upon a new reader more than the
others?

I really do like the first one, since it was my debut but people seems to like the second one better, and from what I can tell, the third one even more. But that's me, always doing it the other way around.

What's the next writing project on the horizon? How is it going?

Doing something contemporary now. Sort of an Thelma & Louise road trip novel. It is going to something completely different, for me, and the readers.

The last five books you've read?

My new year’s promise was to read nothing but female writers so that is what I'm doing. Mostly Swedish ones.

Last film you watched that rocked you?

Manchester by the Sea. Great script, excellent acting.

Any must watch TV in the Holmen household?

Don't have a TV but I tend to watch stuff with some sort of a historical angle, anything from Taboo to Peaky Blinders. Gonna watch The Deuce tonight.

If I check back in a couple of year's time what are your hopes for the writing?

I want to write a bestseller so I can pursue some of my other childhood dreams, like being a truck driver, run away with a circus or becoming a stuntman. I'm far from done.

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My thanks to Martin Holmen for his time.