If anything characterizes the books of J.D. Barker is that the tension always increases as the plot progresses. "I make a lot of effort to make it so and I have thrown away entire chapters that, seen in perspective, slowed down the story," the author admits to La Vanguardia, during an interview at a hotel in Barcelona. A dynamic that he has not dispensed with in his recent book, The Last Game (Destiny), which now reaches bookstores.
The book has Jordan Briggs as its main focus, a successful radio journalist who takes on a killer on air. On a call, a listener, Bernie, asks her to be part of a game. She accepts thinking that this improvisation can reach a larger audience. And then comes the question that changes everything: "When it comes to public transportation here in New York, do you prefer Uber or regular taxis?" Jordan chooses the second option and seven taxis explode nearby. And from that moment it is impossible to put aside this infernal thriller.
“I love the idea of a radio studio because it's cut off from the rest of the world and I was wondering what would happen if someone called and committed murder while it's live. How would the journalist react? Would he call the police or continue with his program? That idea had been going around in my head for a long time but I didn't pursue it because something was missing. Then I realized that it would be better if the protagonist were a woman who has had a lot of difficulty climbing to the top. That's how Jordan Briggs was born”, confesses the American.
The story has a cinematic point. In fact, the writer acknowledges that “I always see my books as movies. I transfer to paper what I see in my head, basically. It's all very visual and perhaps that's why many directors find it easy to transfer it to audiovisuals. I already have seven movies and several series made based on my books and I think it's partly because of that. It's not something I think about consciously. It just happens like that,” he admits.
As cinematographic, he has even imagined which actors would bring him to life. And it is that, he explains, “when creating a character I cheat because I usually think of a famous actor or actress and from there I build it because I know how it looks, how it speaks, how it moves and I have a slight idea what his personality is like. Jordan, for example, reminds me of Jessica Chastain. But this is just a starting point. Then the character comes to life and becomes more real as the story unfolds."
When it comes to work, Barker has a very strict methodology. I get up around seven in the morning and I start writing. I don't connect to the Internet until I write the words I mark for the day. Today here in this hotel I have already written the minimum 2,200 words that touch me and it is only half past 10 in the morning. When I have finished with my purpose, then yes, I answer the emails and find out what has happened in the world. As a general rule, at three I have finished everything. Then I'm going to run and while I'm doing that I think I'm going to write the next day. The last part of the afternoon and evening is dedicated exclusively to my daughter and my wife”.
His wife is precisely what he has in mind throughout the interview. And it is that she, she assures her, “she is someone essential not only in my life but also in my work […] she is always my first reader. She reads the beginning of each chapter and she tells me if I should continue or if we throw it in the trash. And if she tells me it's worth it, then I lock myself in my office and write the rest. When I'm done I show it to her again and she tells me what she thought was good and what she thinks is boring. I think he has a lot of criteria. And he tells me everything I've done wrong. I rewrite it, and then I send it to my six very critical bait readers who just hammered me.
From the beginning, he says, his wife helped him. “It was she who recommended me to dedicate myself professionally […] For many years I worked as a literary black man. Helped others write their novel. They gave me a more or less finished novel but it didn't quite work. I gave it a few tweaks and then they sold it. I did it with six books and all of them ended up on the New York Times best read list. And then my wife told me why didn't she launch me and write on my own, and so I started with my first novel”.
The truth is that literature is something that has always been very present in his life. “I grew up in a house without a television, so in order not to get bored we would go to the library constantly. That made her start writing at a very young age. I remember that at the age of five I was already preparing my little stories. Writing is something that has always relaxed me and even if they didn't pay me for it, I would continue doing it”.
One of the things that he admits is most exciting about his work is that “I don't even know what's going to happen. I create the setting and try to develop the characters until I imagine them as real people and then I put them in that setting [...] In this book, for example, at the moment when Bernie calls Jordan for the first time I did not have no idea what was going to happen. I fully trust my characters and let them be the ones who tell me the story. I only write what they explain to me”.
4
